Bullying

Man I've been reading some stories about school bullying after this latest suicide that's in the news and it is all very distressing. It's the one thing that makes me hope that Tyler does take to sports because I think that would insulate him somewhat, although then I'd have to worry about him being a bully. He has the genes for it (sports not bullying). All of Husband's family played sports in school, and I played basketball and baseball when I was a kid. (And was pretty good if I do say so myself.) And with his leg strength and general build I really think he is going to physically take after Papa who was a baseball player. I know I can't (and won't) push in any direction but this so terrifies me. I was only slightly made fun of as a child and it still haunts me. Like, people who used to be mean to me want to be all chummy now, somewhere on the order of 15 years later, and I won't engage because I can't let it go because it is something that so deeply affected me and I feel like they should realize that now as adults and if they don't then I have no use for them. The point is, somewhere in me I still carry those wounds and my torment was not nearly on the scale that a lot of people I've known have experienced and that still more of the stories I've read exhibit. I'll tell you one thing, if my son or any future children come to me and tell me they are having trouble with this at school, I will immediately leap to the "these kids are assholes and the problem entirely lies with them and I will do something about it" line of reasoning and skip right past the "you're too sensitive" "ignore them" "this will build character" craziness that I'm reading about and that I'm seeing in the parenting of one of my son's older cousins. And if any of our children ask to homeschool or switch schools and there is ANY way at all to swing that it will be swung forthwith.

Likewise, I won't be tolerating any reported bullying, not even as a young child. Liz at ...but then I had kids made her four year old miss his best friend's birthday party (a big party with a bouncy house and magic, and took his younger brother to it and came home and talked about how great it was) because, after having already been routine-type punished for this once, he ganged up with other boys and beat up another kid on the playground. Apparently, the other mothers in her social circle and her parents and her husband's parents are all over her about how she is being too hard on him. And quite personally I call shenanigans. I mean yeah he's little and is likely a lovely person overall, but he has even admitted that he knew that it was a "bad choice" and did it anyway. What are you supposed to do? Give him ice cream and teach him how not to leave bruises? I think that punishment is totally appropriate and I applaud her for taking this so seriously. "Kids will be kids"? No. Kids will be who you teach them to be.