Stop School Bullies: Force Reluctant Principals to Act

How can you stop school bullies by forcing reluctant, do-nothing principals to protect your children?  That’s a skill many parents must learn. First, bullies are always 100% at fault and that never decreases.  Kids who act as spectators or cheerleaders, and kids who pile on also are at fault on their own.  There’s more than 100% to go around.

The worst are the adults who are responsible for stopping bullying; for creating bully-free schools, but who don’t.  Let’s focus on reluctant, do-nothing principals who tolerate bullying at their schools.

Some principals won’t tolerate bullying, but many principals won’t act strongly and effectively.

Five signs of these do-nothing principals are:

1. They don’t have a school-wide program, including kids and parents, to stop bullies.  There’s no training for teachers, administrators, janitors or bus drivers to recognize the early warning signs of overt and covert bullies; of verbal, emotional, physical and cyberbullying.
2. Even though every kid in the school knows who the bullies are and where and when it happens, do-nothing principals make no effort to monitor areas of the school where most bullying occurs.  They plead ignorance and expect you, the parents who are off-site, to provide the proof for them.
3. They think the best way to stop bullying is through forgiveness, sympathy, compassion, understanding, education and compromise with bullies.  They focus on the reasons bullies bully instead of simply stopping them.  They think that doing some process counts.  But only the results count – stopping bullies.
4. Do-nothing principals blame the target – your child.  They assume your kids must have done something wrong to antagonize the bully.  They don’t keep your kid’s complaint confidential.  Reluctant principals have great sympathy for how hard the bully’s life is and little sympathy for your child, who is the target of harassment and abuse.  Some can’t figure out how to stop a relentless bully so they’d rather look the other way.
5. To keep you in the dark, they plead confidentiality.  Or they ask you to trust them while they handle the situation, but you see that the bullying doesn’t stop.

In these schools, bullying is never one incident; it’s a pattern.  Relentless bullies know who has the power and what they can get away with.

Learn how to force reluctant principals to act. These do-nothing principals are afraid of two things:

1. Publicity.
2. Legal action.

Do-nothing principals don’t want to be involved with something that can get messy for them.  Often, they’re afraid of the bullying parents of the bullying kids.  You must change that.  Since do-nothing principals won’t do what’s right on their own, you must make them more afraid of you.

Four things you can do to make sure your children are protected are:

1. Before there are any incidents, even before school starts, organize a few like-minded parents and start lobbying for a school-wide program including kids and parents.  Get media coverage.  Make sure there are legal rules and a legal process.
2. If bullying begins, talk to the principal and staff.  Listen carefully for excuses, rationalizations, confessions of ignorance, discussions of what constitutes legal evidence – these are bad signs.  Record the conversation.  Send to everyone a follow up email listing all the points and promises made.
3. Give the principal (and counselors and teachers) one chance to stop the bullying – maybe a week or two.  Are bullies removed?  Does cyberbullying stop?  Or is your child picked on even more?
4. If bullying continues, see an expert lawyer, get an expert coach and start making waves.  Contact parents of other kids who are bullied.  Get evidence.  Contact District Administrators.  Contact police.  Get publicity from local radio and TV stations.  File a law suit.  Be prepared for a long, ugly fight.  Document, Document!

Don’t be sweet and weak; be firm.  Be courageous, determined and relentless.  Silence, appeasement, wishful thinking and the Golden Rule don’t stop real-world bullies.

Be effective.  Teach your children how not to be victims.  Your children’s mental, emotional and physical well-being is at stake.

Since all tactics depend on the situation, expert coaching by phone or Skype helps.  We can design a plan that fits you and your situation.  And build your will and skill to carry it out effectively.

Don't tolerate or appease mutineers in the workplace

Do you have mutineers aboard your Ship of Business?  Can you distinguish mutiny from discussion and disagreement you encourage and can you skillfully quell it? To read the rest of this article from the Washington Business Journal, see: Don’t tolerate or appease mutineers in the workplace http://washington.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2004/10/25/smallb5.html

Mutiny is resisting, rebelling and revolting against duly constituted authority.

The way Captain Bligh dealt with resistance on the Bounty – constant flogging – isn’t a good approach.  It ultimately leads to rebellion: They jump ship or put you over the side.

The opposite approach gives equally poor results: Nice managers tolerate resistance, sabotage, and poor performance while they beg, bribe and appease mutineers to buy in and produce.

For example: Sam was mystified because he couldn’t figure out how to convince his supervisee, Jack, to perform necessary and agreed-upon tasks.  For more details, read the complete article.

Sam was wracked with self-doubt.  Had he failed to communicate clearly; been too harsh with Jack; not been sensitive enough to Jack’s possible reasons for not wanting to train Amy?

No.  It was simply that Jack was trying to make his rules, rule.  Sam had encouraged mutiny to grow like a cancer in the months when he accepted Jack’s assumptions that, until he was interested in acting differently, Jack was entitled to:

• Refuse to train Amy.
• Act rude, disrespectful and insubordinate to Sam.
• Harass, bullying and abuse Sam.

Also, Sam had had accepted 100 percent of the responsibility to help Jack change his opinion.

The interactions that developed between Sam and Jack are similar to interactions between many parents and their children – parents who try to be their children’s “friends” and who assume that the best way to raise civil, strong, productive, responsible, mature adults is not to make them do anything until reason and persuasion have gained their understanding and acceptance.

Nonsense.  Parents provide encouragement, guidance and enforcement of clear boundaries of acceptable behavior – with immediate and predictable consequences for transgressions.  Children allowed to be the sole judges of the efforts they can make, usually become spoiled, weak, self-indulgent and irresponsible adults.

Ditto for adults in the workplace.  Sam was the duly constituted authority.  His primary task was not to be sweet, understanding and therapeutic; not to win Jack’s agreement and affection; and not to wait until Jack was willing to perform.  Sam’s task was to produce quality results, on time and within budget, and to hold Jack accountable for his part of that effort.

When Sam saw Jack’s resistance as mutiny, he finally told Jack that the responsibility for continued employment was Jack’s.  Jack’s primary loyalty must be to their mission and the performance and deadlines required.

One problem with the approach of reasoning, tolerating, appeasing, begging and bribing forever is that children won’t believe you when you begin to apply consequences.  That’s your fault.   You’ve already trained them to think that if they resist persistently, eventually you’ll give in.   When you finally try to suppress the mutiny they’ll either sabotage or react with shock, outrage and, sometimes, legal action,

Jack chose not to continue working in a company in which his rules no longer ruled.  In his exit interview, Jack admitted he never thought Sam would face his anger and carry through.  His parents had allowed him to act any way he wanted while they re-negotiated their requests.  He thought Jack would also.  Would your opinion of Jack change if you knew he wasn’t 22; he was 35?

If you don’t recognize and squash mutiny, it’ll grow unchecked until it sinks your ship.  Ask for what you want, you’ll get what you’re willing to tolerate.

Often, individuals need coaching and organizations need consulting to help them design and implement a plan that fits the situation.  To get the help you need, call Ben at 1-877-828-5543.

Can I Build my Children's Character with the Cowboy Code?

Following reviews of Paul Tough’s book, “How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity and the Hidden Power of Character,” Holly Finn brings in Cowboy Ethics and the Cowboy Code in her review in the Wall Street Journal, “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?”  She contrasts the Cowboy Code with many examples of poor character shown by students and their parents – lying, cheating, stealing and doing anything to get ahead at many of our most prestigious schools. Of course she’s right about character versus greed and success at any price.

Whether the Code comes from Jim Owen’s book, "Cowboy Ethics: What Wall Street Can Learn from the Code of the West" or from Ernest Morris’ “El Vaquero: The Cowboy Code,” the message is the same.  Character counts.  Character counts first and most.  Or, as said elsewhere, “What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?”

Some of the crucial traits of Cowboy Ethics and different Cowboy Codes are:

1. Live each day with courage.
2. Take pride in your work.
3. Always finish what you start.
4. Do what has to be done.
5. Be tough, but fair.
6. When you make a promise, keep it.
7. Ride for the brand.
8. Talk less and say more.
9. Remember that some things aren't for sale.
10. Know where to draw the line.
11. A cowboy never takes unfair advantage - even of an enemy.
12. A cowboy never betrays a trust.  He never goes back on his word.
13. A cowboy always tells the truth.
14. A cowboy is kind and gentle to small children, old folks, and animals.
15. A cowboy is free from racial and religious intolerances.
16. A cowboy is always a good worker.
17. A cowboy respects womanhood, his parents and his nation's laws.
18. A cowboy is clean about his person in thought, word, and deed.
19. A cowboy is a Patriot.
20. The highest badge of honor a person can wear is honesty.  Be truthful at all times.
21. Your parents are the best friends you have.  Listen to them and obey their instructions.
22. If you want to be respected, you must respect others.  Show good manners in every way.
23. Only through hard work and study can you succeed.  Don't be lazy.
24. Your good deeds always come to light.  So don't boast or be a show-off.
25. If you waste time or money today, you will regret it tomorrow.  Practice thrift in all ways.
26. Many animals are good and loyal companions.  Be friendly and kind to them.
27. A strong, healthy body is a precious gift.  Be neat and clean.
28. Our country's laws are made for your protection.  Observe them carefully.
29. Children in many foreign lands are less fortunate than you.  Be glad and proud you are an American.
30. I will be brave, but never careless.
31. I will obey my parents. They DO know best.
32. I will be neat and clean at all times.
33. I will be polite and courteous.

But the Cowboy Code is not true; few cowboys really followed it. Yes, that’s right.  Many of the exemplars are fictional or fictionalized characters like Hopalong Cassidy and Wild Bill Hickok.  We can quibble with many of the sentiments and find situations in which, for example, parents are not always good, right and deserving of respect.

So what?  The factual nature doesn’t matter.  What matters is what spirit gets stimulated in our children’s hearts and even in us as adults.  The history of the greatness of the human spirit and human endeavor is passed on generation after generation through stories that inspire each new individual to be great and to do good.  It’s passed on in myth, legend and fiction, as well as through the lives and deeds of great men and women – great humans.

That’s the way human education works.  What counts is what gets inspired in the heart of each child and each adult.

Won’t honesty and good character mean that our children will be beaten out by the cheaters? That’s what many parents are afraid of: the cheaters will get better grades, get into better schools and eventually get better jobs and careers; lying cheating and stealing are necessary for survival or success.  But those predictions come from fear and aren’t necessarily true.

Step back from fear and think.  Would we want our children to become or to marry people who are selfish, lying, cheaters?  Don’t we want our children to have “Cowboy” character and to their live lives based on that?

If our children become witnesses or defenders, won’t they get into trouble? Maybe.  Children or adults who speak out against harassment, bullying and abuse can get trouble focused on them.  Children or adults who speak out against domestic violence, racism, religious persecution, genocide and terrorism can get trouble focused on them.  We each decide what to do in specific situations.

What’s crucial is to know the difference between right and wrong.  If we don’t know the difference, if we think that all values are the equal because there are so many different ones across the globe, we are making a grave mistake.  Different values lead to different places and we choose the direction we will try to go.

The engine and the steering wheel. Traits and skills like grit, determination, perseverance, fortitude, endurance and resilience are our engine.  We need the power of these abilities to get anywhere on the long road of life.

The values, beliefs and attitudes that are embodied in the humans who exemplify the Cowboy Code or Cowboy Ethics, whether as real as Lincoln, as fictionalized as Wild Bill Hickok or as fictional as Hopalong Cassidy, are our steering wheel.

We need both an engine and a steering wheel to get where we want to go.

What engine and steering wheel do we try to teach our children?  What engine and steering wheel are we models of for our children?  Which values are more important when some of ours conflict or are even mutually exclusive?

Since all tactics depend on the situation, expert coaching by phone or Skype helps.  We can design a plan that fits you and your situation.  And build your will and skill to carry it out effectively.

Stop Bullying Diet Saboteurs

Sue Shellenbarger’s article in the Wall Street Journal, “Colleagues Who Can Make You Fat,” focuses on people at work who try to sabotage coworkers’ diets.  People reported that colleagues and bosses made them uncomfortable admitting they were on a diet 23% of the time. In contrast, dieters said they were uncomfortable admitting that they were dieting to people in personal life – friends, relatives and spouses – 63% of the time.  That is, there are almost three times as many diet saboteurs among those who are closest to us.

What’s wrong with this picture?

Diet saboteurs use many techniques.  They:

• Tease, taunt and mock.
• Criticize, pressure and manipulate.
• Gleefully predict failure.
• Get upset because we’re spurning their offerings of fatty, starchy, sugary, calorie-loaded food.
• Lecture that we’re harming our body by dieting.

The article says that these saboteurs usually mean well.  I disagree. When diet saboteurs continue harassing and abusing us relentlessly, they don’t mean well.  They’re narcissistic bullies who have their own agenda that they think is more important than ours.  They’re righteous. They know better and they’re out to change us – usually by beating us into submission.

Typically, they try to sabotage our diets because:

• They may feel abandoned because we no longer eat the same food with them.
• They may be striking back because they take our change as a put down of their old habits.
• They may feel jealous that they’re not losing weight.
• They may see our being thinner as a threat.
• They may simply not like us and are finding another reason, excuse or justification to mock, ridicule, or put us down.

Who cares what their reasons are?  Understanding their reasons won’t help us stop them.  After the first time we’ve asked them to stop, their reasons for continuing now become excuses and justifications for continued harassment, abuse and bullying.  Bullies always find excuses to continue inflicting pain.

What’s wrong with this picture?

1. People who are closest to us – toxic spouses, family, friends – are the most relentless saboteurs.  Things are not as we would wish. Notice that I didn’t say, “Things are not as they should be.”  Things are as they are.  That’s not what’s wrong with this picture.
2. What’s wrong with this picture is that people feel uncomfortable and that feeling keeps them from doing what they need to.  Their discomfort is their excuse to become victims.

As William Boast said, “It’s important that people know what you stand for.  It’s equally important that they know what you won’t stand for.”

Don’t debate or argue with their justifications.  Don’t accept apologies unless their behavior changes.  They won’t change their behavior; they won’t give up their desire for domination and control.  Instead, stop bullies or get them off our Isle of Song.

These bullying spouses, family members and friends are telling us to examine what kind of behavior we will and won’t allow around us and our families.

To have the wonderful lives we want, we must stop bullying behavior in our personal spaces.  We wouldn’t allow family members to push an alcoholic to have “just one drink” and we wouldn’t allow family abusers or perverts access to our children.  The need to stop diet saboteurs is no different.

Of course, we can start resisting gently by asking them, one-to-one in private, to stop. Or we could ignore it or laugh it off in public.  Those approaches become tests of them.  Do they stop or do they identify themselves as bullies?

We know what doesn’t stop bullies: ignoring, minimizing, conflict-avoidance, begging, bribery, defeatism, forgiveness, appeasement, understanding, unconditional love, the Golden Rule.  Relentless bullies misunderstand our kindness. They take our “rising above” as weakness and, like sharks or hyenas, they’re encouraged to attack us more.

Their relentless attacks force us to confront the central issue: which is more important; good behavior or bad blood?  And when they continue their abuse, bullies force us into an all-or-none choice.  Are we willing to defend the behavior we need to have, even if it breaks the old family dynamic, the code of silence that enables the nastiest spouse or relatives to continue getting away with their abuse for the sake of, “family?”

That choice thrusts us into the second stage of maturity – we’re called upon to decide, as independent adults, what behavior we will or won’t allow into our lives, no matter what the relationship is called.  We’re called upon to have more confidence and self-esteem.

For some examples, see the case studies in “Bullies Below the Radar: How to Wise Up, Stand Up and Stay Up,” “How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks” and “Parenting Bully-Proof Kids,” available fastest from this web site.

Since all tactics depend on the situation, expert coaching by phone or Skype helps.  We can design a plan that fits you and your situation.  And build your will and skill to carry it out effectively.

"Nice Girls" Can’t Stop Bullies

Almost every one of the women who’ve interviewed me on radio or TV admitted that they were raised to be “nice girls.”  Their mothers had taught them that the most important value was to be nice, polite and sweet at all times.  They should ignore or rise above bullies; feel sorry for how empty and insecure bullies must feel; how horrible bullies’ family lives must be.  Nice girls should try to understand those mean girls, to forgive them and to tolerate their nasty, insulting, abusive behavior. Nice girls should be sweet and kindly in all situations; not be disagreeable, not make scenes, not lower themselves to the level of the mean girls by pushing back verbally or physically.  Nice girls were raised to believe that the virtues of loving compassion and sympathy were their own rewards and would also, eventually, stop bullying.  Nice girls were to live by the Golden Rule.  Being a virtuous martyr was preferable to acting “not-nice.”

As a result, when these nice girls became adults, they had trouble protecting themselves from bullies.

Many had married nice guys so they didn’t have to worry about bullying at home.  But they didn’t know how to stop bullies at work, especially stealthy, covert, sneaky female bullies.  They didn’t know how to teach their children to stop bullies at school.  They didn’t know how to protect themselves from manipulative, abusive, controlling, narcissistic, nit-picking, negative, self-centered relatives, friends or neighbors.

And, in addition to the emotional scars and the feelings of helplessness and impotence in the face of the real world, they bore a measure of anger toward their mothers for not teaching them how to be effective as grown ups.

The start of their change was to openly admit that, in this area, their mothers were wrong.

Their experience had taught them that they needed to feel stronger in the face of bullies, to learn to act more effectively now and to teach better skills to their children.

They had to decide which values were more important than being nice. They had to adopt a new hierarchy of values to reflect what they’d learned.  They had to discard their childhood rules and roles, and adopt new ones as adults.  Once they made the decision to determine their own values, they felt a surge of power, confidence and self-esteem.

At first they thought that they needed at least two hierarchies of priorities; one for their home life and one for the outside world.  This was abhorrent to many because it sounded like situational ethics.  But it wasn’t.  They would have the same ethical framework and merely different tactics that fit their different situations.

A general example of the new hierarchy they all adopted was that although being nice, sweet and agreeing with people might still be important, protecting themselves and their personal space was more important.  Being treated well was more important than keeping silent and not making a scene or not creating a confrontation.  Speaking up and keeping themselves and their families safe was more important.  They would not allow toxic waste on their “Isles of Song.”

Determination, will and perseverance were more important qualities than being nice.  These qualities gave them the power to take charge of their lives.  They didn’t have to be mean, but they did have to be strong, courageous and sometimes firm.  They were the ones who decided what they wanted and needed; what was right for them; what their standards were.  These decisions were not consensus votes affected by the desires and standards of other people.

Their tactics had to be situational.

In their personal family lives, where niceness was usually reciprocated, they could usually interact by kindly suggestion and often be very forgiving of some behaviors.  But with some relatives in their extended families, they had to be more direct and enforce more boundaries; no matter what other people thought was right or thought they should put up with because the bullies were “family.”

In most other situations – work, friends, their children’s schools – they had to overcome the idea that being open and firm automatically meant confrontation, which they’d been taught to avoid at all costs.  They had to learn how to speak clearly, disagree in a nice and firm way, and make things happen even if it made people uncomfortable; especially people who were abusive or slacking in their responsibility to protect their children.

The hardest skill for many of them to learn was how to isolate some bullies or to work behind the scenes to thwart covert attacks from sneaky, manipulative bullies.  But once they’d stopped thinking that being nice was the most important value, they were able to learn these skills. Expert coaching by phone or Skype helps.  We can design a plan that fits you and your situation.  And build your will and skill to carry it out effectively.

Stop Bullies: Make Some People Uncomfortable, Upset, Angry

Many children are raised with a set of rules such as: “Don’t make anyone uncomfortable.  Don’t hurt people’s feelings.  Don’t upset anyone.  Don’t be disagreeable.  Don’t argue.  Be polite.  Be nice.  Follow the Golden Rule.  Make everyone like you.”  But those are not effective rules for adults in the real-world. Of course, we know why we teach children those values.  Who wants to raise hostile, nasty, argumentative, vicious, abusive bullies?

I’m not encouraging bullies to be nastier.  I’m talking with nice, decent adults who are being harassed, tormented, controlled, abused and bullied, and yet who hesitate to speak up or to protect and defend themselves effectively because they don’t want to break those childhood rules.

Mary is a typical example.  She held her tongue in public when her toxic mother abused her.  She held her tongue when relatives criticized, mocked and demeaned her.  She held her tongue when friends told her what she should do to be the good friend they wanted.

She held her tongue but she built up huge resentment that eventually exploded.

With friends and a few relatives, either she’d get in a fight so she could be righteously angry, blame them and never talk to them again or she’d nurse a cold fury until she felt justified in simply cutting them off completely without explanation.

With her parents, she’d explode and tell them off.  Then she’d feel guilty for being so mean and she’d come back groveling and apologizing.  Nevertheless, she still felt she was the one who’d been wronged and she resented the price her toxic parents made her pay for forgiving her outburst.

With strangers, she sat quietly and never shared what she thought or what she was interested in.  She didn’t want to make them uncomfortable and she was afraid of hurting their feelings or raising a subject that would be contentious.  Most people thought she wasn’t very bright.

Mary was also a master of self-bullying. She’d flagellate herself with self-doubt and self-questioning.  She’d obsess on every slight taken or given and always end up blaming herself.  And she’d judge herself as guilty, no matter what they’d done to her.  She was never perfect.  Her anxiety, stress and negative self-talk led to sleeplessness, loss of confidence and self-esteem, and to depression.

Mary had two underlying and interlocking problems:

1. The set of rules that made “not upsetting people” her most important value, no matter what.
2. Having only all-or-none responses of holding back totally or exploding.  In a sense, she could remain at zero mph or she could go 100 mph, but she didn’t know how to go 30-60 mph.

The solution to the first problem required that Mary examine, as an adult, the rules she’d accepted all-or-none when she was a child.  Children do think in black-or-white but adults have more experience and wisdom.  Mary could see the kernel of value in her old rules, even though her parents had used them to control her all her life.

But as an adult, she could see where those rules were insufficient and what changes were necessary:

• She felt the pain of all the times she’d made those rules the most important ones instead of protecting herself.  She could now see situations in which speaking up or pushing back verbally in order to defend herself were more important values.
• She could see the difference between people sharing their tastes and opinions, versus having an angry exchange with someone trying to convert her to their “absolutely right” way of seeing things.
• She could also see which subjects she simply didn’t want to discuss with which people.
• One of the most compelling moments was when she saw which people she did want to disagree with, whether or not they were uncomfortable or had hurt feelings, because to be “nice” to them would have violated her most important values.  In fact, she reached a point where making a few people, like her toxic mother, uncomfortable or angry was a sign that Mary was on the right track.

She changed her old, out-dated and ineffective beliefs to new, effective ones, encapsulated in the phrase, “Not hurting people’s feelings is a much lower priority than protecting myself or being myself.  I’ll speak what I think and say what I want in the nicest, firmest way and if they don’t like it, it’s their problem.  That way I’ll test whether I want to allow them to be on my Isle of Song.”

That simple change gave her a rush of peace, freedom and energy.  She felt powerful enough to create the life she wanted, which was more important that not making anyone uncomfortable.  She now had the will and determination to learn how to be skillful in protecting herself.

How she learned to respond clearly, simply, kindly and firmly from 30-60 mph will be the subject of another article.

Expert coaching by phone or Skype helps.  We can design a plan that fits you and your situation.  And build your will and skill to carry it out effectively.

To Increase Confidence and Self-Esteem: Test the World, Not Yourself

We grow up testing ourselves; “Are we good enough?  If not it’s our fault.  Did we succeed; we still could have done more.  Did we fail; it’s our fault.”  Testing ourselves is a motivation strategy, “Figure out what’s wrong with us and improve it.”  And behind it is the hidden message, “We’re defective and we’d better work at improving and perfecting ourselves every minute or no one will want us and we’ll fail.” The strategy may work for us when we’re children, but it’s self-defeating when we’re adults.

We do grow up; we do get free of our families; we do get jobs, lovers, our own children.  That seems to prove that the self-testing strategy works.  Since we’re obviously still a long way from being good enough, so we’d better keep questioning ourselves in order to improve.

However, when we become adults, the strategy of always testing ourselves, always finding fault with ourselves guarantees failure.  It stimulates guilt, shame, anxiety, sleepless nights and negative self-talk.  And it destroys self-confidence and self-esteem.  It’s self-destructive, self-bullying.

For evidence, we can look back at our failed relationships.

Think of the times we went with someone when we knew it wasn’t going to work because we had to give up what we wanted, we had to change in order to make another person happy.  We kept asking, “Are we good enough to be liked, to be wanted, to be loved?”  But that didn’t last.

The message of the self-testing strategy is that if only we’d tried hard enough, we could have changed enough to make the relationship work the way the other person wanted.  Then we feel more guilty, more unworthy and we think we have to work harder to change our bad characteristics or personality.

And if we can’t change a pattern, that means we have a great and permanent defect, an evil place inside of us, maybe too much ego, and we’re doomed to fail forever.  And that feeds a vicious cycle:

• Low self-confidence and low self-esteem --> so we give up ourselves even more --> we pick the wrong people and try to please them by doing what they want --> we fail once again and feel even worse --> our self-confidence and low self-esteem plummets -->…

In addition to failed loves, the same pattern exists for many failed friendships we tried to maintain with the wrong people.

So what can we do to find love and relationships that fit?

Instead of testing ourselves, we can test the world.

1. Act like we are and set high standards for behavior we want. We’re reasonably good, nice, decent people.  Therefore, in addition to participating in the other person’s activities, ask the other person to participate in ours.  Don’t justify our standards.  Be behaviorally specific.  Ask for more than vague words like “kindness, respect, appreciation, love.”  Simply say, “No yelling, no hitting, no threatening, no relentless sarcastic blaming, no controlling, no public humiliating, no demanding perfectionism.  Instead, speak softly, negotiate about what we do, give in and do what I want sometimes for no reason, keep disagreements private and my sense of humor counts.”  We can fill in the rest of our lists from what we got or didn’t get in previous relationships.
2. To increase confidence and self-esteem, test the other person. If they act the way we want, they can come a step closer.  If they don’t, we move them a step further away.  If they’re relentless boundary pushers or they violate one of the big boundary lines, “one strike and they’re out.”  Notice who has control of the distance; we do.
3. “Create an isle of song in a sea of shouts.” Rabindranath Tagore said that decades ago.  I agree.  We were told that if we insist on our high standards and what we want, we’ll end up alone.  “The only way to get someone is to lower your standards.”  Nonsense.  Of course, in all relationships we make agreements and we don’t always get our way, but we must not lower our important standards.

Now that we’re adults, now that we’ve been in and out of relationships in which we gave up our true selves, we’ve learned that we’ll never get the love we want if we fill our space with inappropriate, abusive bullies.  We’ll never get what we need if we give up on ourselves.  We’ll only get what we need, we’ll only find someone who loves us for ourselves if we act like ourselves and test the other person to see if they like that.

Of course the other person has free will also.  They can stay or leave if they want.  But if they leave because they don’t want to live up to our standards or they think we’re incompatible, we have to get over the emotional pain and be thankful that our isle is clear for someone else who wants to be with us as we are.

Only one of many examples: A homely, awkward girl with a wonderful personality and spirit.  Of course, during high school and college she was rejected by all the boys who were looking for cheerleaders.  As much as she wanted to be wanted, she knew in her heart that she didn’t want jerks like that and she wasn’t going to abandon herself in order to please one. Then she met someone who was worthy of what she wanted.  And wonder of wonders, he was hot for her, body and soul.  They’re still enthralled with each others’ unique greatness and with their fit with each other.

How can we improve if we’re not always testing ourselves?  It’s simple, although not necessarily easy.  We know when we haven’t lived up to our standards, when we’ve done or not done something we should have.  We don’t have to beat ourselves up in order to apologize, make amends and do better next time.  We simply dedicate ourselves to that task.

So we mustn’t give up on ourselves.  Test other people; some will stay and some will leave of their own accord. The real power is in our making our choice; who do we want to send away and who do we want to keep on our isle of song?  Only then will it truly be our isle and our song.

If you need personalized coaching to maintain your strength and courage, your determination and dedication, call me at 303-458-6616.

Facebook Teams with Time Warner to Fight Bullies

The Associated Press and the Wall Street Journal report that, “Facebook and Time Warner are ganging up on bullies to address a problem that torments millions of children and young adults.  The partnership announced Tuesday calls for Facebook and Time Warner to use their clout to raise awareness about bullying and encourage more people to report the abuses when they see them.” They recognize the need.  Facebook also recognizes the economic problem if they allow massive amounts of bullying to flow through their pages.  Eventually parents will force their kids off Facebook or will start suing Facebook for carrying the content.

Their present effort (“Stop Bullying: Speak Up”) will be focused on educating parents and kids about the problem; on “teaching young people to speak up and stop bullying.”  A pledge not to bully plus Facebook’s effort to make reporting cyberbullying and cyberbullies easier are good steps.

But even the backing by the President Obama’s family won’t stop bullying unless there are laws, policies, programs, and people willing to prosecute bullies for their actions.

That’s why I’d like to see Facebook and Time Warner use their huge influence to pressure legislators to pass strong anti-bullying laws that require district administrators, principals and teachers to stop bullies and protect our kids.  That’s the only way to stop bullying-caused suicides.

The present educational efforts will sway many kids and their parents by sensitizing them to the issue and encouraging them not to be drawn into bullying by the truly relentless bullies.  But these sensitized kids will be encouraged to come forward if, and only if, responsible adults – school district administrators, principals and teachers – respond swiftly and firmly, and protect the kids who speak up.

If the responsible adults don’t step up by passing strong laws and by being willing to confront bullies and their bullying parents, the effort will be “all talk, no walk.”  Legislators must legislate so that principals will be protected in order for them to be proactive in observing bullying and stopping it.  If it’s all talk, the effort won’t survive the first month of school.

Programs that depend only on educating, converting or rehabilitating bullies don’t work.  Strong consequences are necessary deterrents.

As a parent, there’s a lot you can do this summer.  Don’t count on Facebook and Time Warner to do all the work to protect your children.  Don’t count on advertizing/educational campaigns to protect your children

If your children are the targets of bullies and school officials aren’t protecting them, you need to take charge.  With expert coaching and consulting, we can become strong and skilled enough to overcome principals and other officials who won’t do what’s right.

“How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks” and “Parenting Bully-Proof Kids,” have many examples of children and adults commanding themselves and then stopping bullies.  For more personalized coaching call me at 877-8Bullies (877-828-5543).

Teacher Watches Bullying: Not an Isolated Case

Newspaper videos show a suburban Dallas teacher watch one of his high school students get beaten by another student.  This was not an isolated incident.  That student was targeted for months.  Since Dallas doesn’t have a policy, teachers are on their own in deciding what to do.  In that environment, do you think that this is an isolated incident?  Not likely.  Is this only a problem for Dallas schools?  Not likely. I have a lot of sympathy for the teacher (even though he was a relatively large man) and even more for the target, who’d been turned into a victim by school-system adults who were irresponsible.  Don’t focus only on the teacher; focus on all the adults in the Dallas school system who abandoned that kid – from board members to principals and teachers and the teachers’ union.

Everyone involved in schools knows there’s a problem.  Everyone points fingers at everyone else but no one takes the obvious actions.  Why wait until there’s another killing or another suicide before they act?

Sometimes I get mad enough to want to see the bullies and the adults’ people’s pictures in the post office among the most wanted, or on television, so we can recognize the slackers when we see them at the supermarket.  Who do I fault?

• Legislators and school board members: How can they not have laws and policies?  I know there are lots of problems writing good laws and crafting effective policies, but if they’re not up to the task, resign and let us get some adults who can.  We all know that if their kids were targeted, they’d spring into action.
• The teachers’ union: I’m appalled that the union isn’t leading the fight (read, “spending their lobbying dollars”) to make legislators pass laws and school boards implement strong policies to empower and protect teachers when they intervene.  They have all the evidence they need to act.
• According to the article in the Dallas News, “Rena Honea, president of Dallas teachers association Alliance-AFT, says, ‘Teachers have intervened in the past.  They have been injured.  They have not been able to return to work.  They have been reprimanded for intervening.  So there is a huge question mark as to what's truly appropriate.  Teachers who have intervened in the past have found themselves on the ground, suffering from sometimes serious injuries, a 2008 story by Tawnell Hobbs found.  She found that assaults by students on Dallas ISD employees and volunteers had more than doubled over a 5-year span from 147 incidents in 2002-03 to 312 in 2006-07, according to district statistics.
• Of course, bullies don’t respect adults who don’t maintain lines of civil behavior.  Of course, bullies will attack people, even adults, they think can’t protect and defend themselves.
• Principals and teachers: They’re stuck, hanging out to dry on their own, unprotected by their employers (school boards) and by their union.  That teacher in Seagoville, Texas was risking his career and his personal life if he intervened.  The attacker could have beaten him.  The attacker and his parents could have sued him.  No one is protecting him.  He’s in a no-win situation.  How come the school district doesn’t have a clear, strong program that requires principals and teachers to act?
• The bully and his parents: Have his parents done anything to teach their child?  Has the kid never learned any better?  How come the parents haven’t come forward to apologize or ask the police to prosecute their child?  Are the adults in the school system so afraid of being sued that they’ve abandoned our children?

Harassing, bullying, abusing and beating kids are terrible acts.  Irresponsible adults who have good reasons, rationalizations, excuses and justifications for not intervening are even worse.  They convert targets into victims.

Targets can resist and get help from responsible adults.

Victims are unprotected, helpless and isolated.  When victims grow up:

• They tend to perpetuate the pattern of being victims in relationships and at work.
• They’re not resilient; the smallest adversity defeats them.
• Happiness is fleeting; bitterness and depression is their lot.  Anything good they get is never enough, never satisfying, never brings joy.
• They have no inner strength, courage, determination, perseverance and resilience.
• Their self-confidence and self-esteem may be destroyed.  Anxiety, stress, guilt, negativity and self-mutilation may be stimulated.  They move easily toward isolation, depression and suicide.

The next articles will deal with what we, as parents, can do to make sure this doesn’t happen to our children; especially what we can do during the summer.

But the general take-home for parents is that all tactics depend on the situation – the people and the circumstances.  So we must plan tactics that are appropriate to us and to the situation.

If your children are the targets of bullies and school officials aren’t protecting them, you need to take charge.  With expert coaching and consulting, we can become strong and skilled enough to overcome principals and other officials who won’t do what’s right.

“How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks” and “Parenting Bully-Proof Kids,” have many examples of children and adults commanding themselves and then stopping bullies.  For more personalized coaching call me at 877-8Bullies (877-828-5543).

Maturation: Overcome Fear of Bullying Parents

Many people still feel like children when their parents boss, belittle, criticize, demean, blame, shame, bully, abuse and guilt-trip them.  The now-adult children still feel afraid, just like they did years ago. Angry, hostile, harassing, taunting parents still elicit the most primitive responses from their adult children – fight, flight or freeze.

How can these adult children free themselves from uncivil, impolite, nasty, manipulative or toxic parents who trample their boundaries?

The first step is always inner change.

Grown children need to mature into adults; to free ourselves from our childhood rules expectations and roles, from our fears and guilts.  In many ways it’s like shedding our old skin and growing one that fits better, or going into a cocoon and emerging as a butterfly.  It’s also just as natural.

We must make up our adult minds and hearts about what we will allow in our personal space.  Will we allow anyone to treat us like a child or simply treat us badly, or will be allow only our parents?  If our answer is “yes,” then we’ll probably be bullied, abused and terrorized by toxic parents for the rest of our lives.

That is a life choice many people make.  If we make it as an adult, not only as a beaten and submissive child, then it’s our choice and we get to live with it.

Many cultures consider that duty, obligation, respect and catering to parents – even vicious, abusive, bullies – as the most important duty of a good child.  It’s often called “filial piety.”  The principle is that we owe them our lives and must pay that debt as long as we live.  If we’re lucky, our children will pay their debt to us in the same way.  Some cultures have been organized around filial piety for thousands of years; it works and is self perpetuating.

However, the negative, bullying, abusive self-talk can corrode our spirit, sap our strength, ruin our focus and destroy our courage.  Looking at ourselves with demanding, toxic parents’ hostile eyes and talking to ourselves with their critical, perfectionistic, never-pleased voices can be demoralizing and debilitating.  Constant repetition of all our imperfections, mistakes, faults, failures and character flaws can lead us down a path toward isolation, depression and suicide.  Don’t go there.

In many ways, the Enlightenment in the West broke with that old tradition of filial piety championed a new way of being in the world.

As adults, we have the freedom and responsibility to make a different choice.  We have the moral right, permission and strength to stand against our parents and other people’s commandments.  We may and can and must choose for ourselves.

We can choose not to look over our shoulders and bow to our ancestors in fear and obedience.  Instead we can look ahead to our descendents with hope.  We can focus on taking care of our physical and spiritual children more than our parents.

The old way was to ask authorities, ask “What’s right?”  Now, we say, “That’s for us to decide.  We will follow the call of our Spirit, not the roles, beliefs and ideas we accepted when we were children.”  Of course, the Enlightenment’s way has its own downsides, but I’d rather have its upsides.

Maturing requires us to stand our Spirit’s ground, especially with our parents and extended family.  The longer we endure what we think of as mistreatment, the more our Spirits will shrivel and die, day-by-day. We must say some form of, “I love you but I’ll allow you in my space only if you treat me like I want to be treated, like you’d treat a person whose affections you’re trying to win.  I’m an adult; treat me nicely, kindly, respectfully and with fear that you might anger me.”

Often, we hold back because of our fears – fear of offending a moral code, fear of the condemnation of the “elders,” fear that we must think they’re evil, fear of saying the wrong thing, fear of going too far, fear of our bullying parent’s power and retaliation, fear of being on our own emotionally even if we’re already married and have our own children.  We hold back because of the Golden Rule.  We hold back because we accept their excuses and justifications.

If we hold back, their bullying and abuse will continue and escalate.  If we still try to beg, bribe, please and appease them in order to get them to treat us decently, they’ll keep thinking they’re right and safe in continuing to beat us into submission.  We’ll get what we’re willing to tolerate.

Instead, break the game.  We don’t have to be perfect before they have to change how they act.  We’re not mature until we simply tell them what we want and have rewards if they’re nice and consequences if they continue abusing us.

Many people think that before they act they should do psychoanalysis until their fear is gone.  That’s a seductive trap, especially because it means they don’t have to act.  That way makes us think we’re weak and cowardly – it fills us with anxiety, stress and self-recrimination; we lose confidence and self-esteem; we’re more easily subject to physical ailments; we isolate ourselves and become depressed.

Speaking up and acting to make our words real is the way of courage; it builds strength, confidence and power.  Those fine qualities are developed only by overcoming fear and strong challenges.  Don’t wait until we’re “ready” to act in a way that’s perfect.  Act now; act next time.  We don’t have to be perfect the first time. If we go too far or not far enough, accept no blame, shame or guilt.  Simply adjust so we get closer to the way we want next time…and the time after…and the time after.  There will be more “time after’s.”

Some parents will finally see the consequences of losing contact with us; they’ll change their behavior.  Some won’t.  They also have free will and choice.

We’re not mature until we make an adult decision about what we’ll allow in our personal space and then back up that decision with rewards and consequences.

Of course the predicament is the same for parents with abusive children, or even worse since the children can deny their parents contact with the grandchildren

Remember, all tactics depend on the situation – the people and the circumstances.  We must plan tactics that are appropriate to us and to the situation.  With expert coaching and consulting, we can become strong and skilled enough to overcome our fears and hesitations, and parents who won’t treat us right.

“How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks” contains the case studies of Carrie, Kathy, Doug, Jake and Ralph taking charge of themselves and stopping bullying parents and extended family members.  For more personalized coaching call me at 877-8Bullies (877-828-5543).

Protect Your Children from School Bullies

In a new interview and article, Theresa Marchetta, Investigative Reporter for Denver ABC-TV station, KMGH-TV reports on the steps you need to take to protect your children from becoming victims of bullies and of principals and district administrators who won’t stop taunting, teasing, harassment, bullying and abuse. Of course, if your wonderful principal protects your children, your two tasks are still to:

• Enhance your children’s inner strength, courage, determination, perseverance, resilience.
• Support your principal who may be putting his/her job on the line.

But if you’re faced with a “blame the victim; avoid the bully” or a do-nothing principal, you’ll have to become strong and skilled in your children’s defense.

Some key steps mentioned in the article are:

• Think of “Relentless bullies as predators.  They are not going to stop and will do it over and over again.  I have to let my child know I am going to help protect you.  I don't want my kid to be a suicide, so I’m willing to fight.”
• “My first action is with my children.  I want to let them know they are being targeted, but I won't let them be victims.  I want to build their strength, their character and their willingness to do something to protect themselves.”
• “Second, I'm going to bring it to the school.”
  • “Request a meeting with the school principal…I expect that principal to meet with you the next day, the day after -- that fast.”
  • “To prepare for that meeting, parents must bring any evidence of the bullying including hate notes, e-mails, texts, pictures and any details of the child’s story.”
  • If you cannot stay calm, bring someone who can.  “If you're not calm you'll be targeted as the angry parent throwing a fit.”
• “Does the bullying stop?  I'll give them a week or a day depending on how bad it is…My tests are, is the bully separated to another part of the room or is the bully allowed access to my child?  Is my child the one who is kicked out of class or is my child protected?...If your child, the victim, is the one having to make changes, that is a red flag.”
• If the situation is not resolved quickly, take the case directly to the district superintendent and the school board.”
• If the responsible adults don’t resolve the situation, “Your next step is that you have to up-level.  You have to get a lawyer.  You have to think publicity…You've got to be willing to go right to that level.   When the people who should be protecting our children are fired and sued successfully, it will change.”

We all know the consequences of not stopping bullies and of allowing them continued contact with their targets, the bullying and violence will increase.

Principals who avoid the issue make the targeted children feel helpless and that their situation is hopeless.  It starts them down the path to being victims for life.  It destroys self-confidence and self-esteem.  It stimulates anxiety, stress, guilt, negativity and self-mutilation.  It starts children toward isolation, depression and suicide.

Remember, all tactics depend on the situation – the people and the circumstances.  So we must plan tactics that are appropriate to us and to the situation.

If your children are the targets of bullies and school officials who aren’t protecting them, you need to take charge.  With expert coaching and consulting, we can become strong and skilled enough to overcome principals and other officials who won’t do what’s right.

“How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks” and “Parenting Bully-Proof Kids,” have many examples of children and adults commanding themselves and then stopping bullies.  For more personalized coaching call me at 877-8Bullies (877-828-5543).

Are You Defeated by Defeat?

What do you do after you’ve been hit hard and knocked down by life?  What do you do after your dreams have been shattered?  What do you do after you’ve been rejected or lost everything?  What do you do when you’ve been defeated?  What do you do when you realize you chose an abusive bully and you don’t know how to protect your kids?  The wisdom of the ages, from all traditions and cultures, gives the same answer, even if the reasons are very different. In “The Ghost and the Darkness,” Val Kilmer plays a British engineer trying to build a bridge across a river in Africa.  Two lions, accurately named “The Ghost” and “The Darkness” begin stalking and killing the men building the bridge.  The lions outsmart every attempt to trap and kill them.

Finally, Val Kilmer develops a brilliant plan to trap one of the lions in a railroad car.  They do trap the lion but he escapes, burning down the car.  Kilmer is devastated and defeated.

The killings mount until the workers start leaving.  They hire a skilled hunter, Michael Douglas, who is also caustic and sarcastic.  At the climax to the first half of the movie, when the hunter sees Kilmer’s dejection and hears of Kilmer’s failed plan, he says, “There’s an old saying in boxing, ‘Everyone has a plan until they get hit and knocked down.  Then the plan goes out the window.  What matters is what you do after you’ve been hit and knocked down.  Do you stay down or do you get up and fight again?’”

There it is.  Kilmer faces his plans in ashes and his life as a failure because the men will leave, the bridge will be abandoned and he’ll never get another job.

The tension comes to a head when Douglas has a plan but the lions outsmart him and kill all the wounded men in the hospital.  Douglas, the great hunter, is devastated and defeated.  In total, the lions killed over a hundred men.

Kilmer says to him, “There’s an old saying in boxing, ‘Everyone has a plan until they get hit and knocked down.  Then the plan goes out the window.  What matters is what you do after you’ve been hit and knocked down.  Do you stay down or do you get up and fight again?’”

There it is; the point of the movie; the point for all of us in the real world.  Will we be defeated by defeat, will we give up when we’re back to square-one, will we give up when life is unfair or too destructive for us or will we get up and fight again, build again?

We, who don’t face killer lions everyday, still do face risk and disaster everyday by:

• Human agency – we get fired, we put our savings down on the wrong stock, we give our retirement money to the wrong Ponzi scheme, some maniac or drunk driver kills people we love, some crazy person kills us and 10 others at work, we’re in the wrong place at the wrong time when a riot, revolution or war breaks out, our parents are toxic, our grown children won’t let us see our grandchildren or our spouse is negative, harassing, bullying and destroying our kids’ self-esteem and confidence, and running away means being broke.
• Natural forces – tsunami, earthquake, hurricane, prolonged drought or flood.

Even the smaller failures growing up can seem like disaster – we fail a test or a course, we’re rejected or dumped by someone gorgeous or handsome, our secrets are spread over school or the internet, we don’t make a team we’d hoped for or counted on, we don’t get into the school of our choice, our parents don’t or can’t give us the latest stuff, the cool kids scorn us, we do something really embarrassing. Our children face the same questions repeatedly: Will we be defeated by defeat; will we give up when we’re back to square-one; will we give up when life is unfair or too destructive for us or will we get up and fight again, build again?

“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent,” Eleanor Roosevelt.

As adults, our job is to:

• Teach kids to get up and fight and build again, no matter what happens, no matter how unfair, no matter how devastating.  Remember the sign on the bridge to Terabithia, “Nothing Crushes Us.”
• Be models of great-hearted human beings who are not defeated by defeat; who don’t give in to depression and discouragement; but instead, who get up and fight and build again.  Our job is to be models of courage, strength and resilience in the face of whatever life holds for us.  Our job is to be models in the hope that our children will be inspired to be as great-hearted.

Notice, I ignored whether Douglas and Kilmer finally kill the lions.  Yes that’s important to building the bridge and to the material parts of their lives.  But that’s not important to the human spirits of Kilmer and Douglas being great because they’re undefeated by defeat; to them having the indomitable will to continue, no matter the obstacles and not knowing whether they’ll succeed.  Okay; the factual resolution is that the Ghost and the Darkness are now preserved in the Field Museum in Chicago – and they did kill that many people.

“Strength comes not from physical capacity.   It comes from indomitable will,” Gandhi.

Notice, I also ignored the historical implications of colonialism.  Of course, that’s there, but that’s not the main point for my life.

The point is to use the movie to stimulate in me the greatest that I can be.  There are thousands of heroes and heroines, real and fictional, who can remind us to get up off the floor when life has knocked us down.  The point is to use everything I see and hear to inspire me to choose whether to live a selfish, shabby, sordid story or a great and worthy story; to chose to be the hero of my life.

“Glory is not in never having been knocked down.  Glory is in rising up again, each time you are knocked down,” Vince Lombardi.

Amy Chua, "The Chinese Mother," is a Bully

Amy Chua’s article in the Wall Street Journal, “Why Chinese Mothers are Superior,” has gotten enough publicity to make her book, “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother,” a best seller.  She’s clear that she uses the term “Chinese Mother” to represent a certain way of treating children that may be found in people from many, many cultures. If many people adopt her style of parenting in order to make their children play at Carnegie Hall that would be a shame.  Amy Chua is an abusive bully.

She beats her children into submission and claims that they’ll have great self-esteem as well as becoming successful in the competitive jungle of life because they can accomplish the very few things Ms. Chua thinks are important.

They also won’t suffer from anxiety, nightmares, negative self-talk and depression because they’ll be successful in her real world.  The bullying and beatings will make them as tough as nails.  They’ll wipe out your kids; you lazy, slacking, guilt-ridden, ambivalent, permissive American parents.

Some of her ideas and claims are:

• “What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until you're good at it.  To get good at anything you have to work, and children on their own never want to work, which is why it is crucial to override their preferences.”
• “Chinese parents can order their kids to get straight “As.”  Western parents can only ask their kids to try their best.”
• “Western parents are extremely anxious about their children's self-esteem…Western parents are concerned about their children's psyches.  Chinese parents aren't.  They assume strength, not fragility, and as a result they behave very differently.”
• “Chinese parents demand perfect grades because they believe that their child can get them.  If their child doesn't get them, the Chinese parent assumes it's because the child didn't work hard enough.  That's why the solution to substandard performance is always to excoriate, punish and shame the child.”
• “Chinese parents believe that their kids owe them everything.”
• “Chinese parents believe that they know what is best for their children and therefore override all of their children's own desires and preferences.”

Therefore, she proudly states that never allowed her daughters to:

• “attend a sleepover
• have a playdate
• be in a school play
• complain about not being in a school play
• watch TV or play computer games
• choose their own extracurricular activities
• get any grade less than an A
• not be the No. 1 student in every subject except gym and drama
• play any instrument other than the piano or violin
• not play the piano or violin.”

Why will some people take her seriously? People who think that American culture produces only losers – selfish, lazy, narcissistic, weak, slacker teenagers and adults who will never succeed – will be tempted to improve their children’s test scores acting like Ms. Chua did.  People who enjoy beating their children into submission will be tempted to use her ideas as a justification for dominating and abusing their children.  People who think that China is the next rising super-power and that today’s Chinese children will rule the world and our children won’t be strong and determined enough to stop them will be tempted to channel their children down Ms. Chua’s narrow track.

There’s a grain of sense in what she says, but that grain is covered by a mountain of brutality that will be successful in creating only slaves or another generation of bullying parents, not in creating fully human beings.

What’s wrong with Ms. Chua’s ideas?

• She lives in a kill-or-be-killed world of desperate striving for the most material rewards of success.
• She’s rigid, narrow, and all-or-none with only two possibilities.
• She allows only a few criteria for success – Stanford or Yale, violin or piano, maybe ballet.  I assume only one or two acceptable careers like lawyer or professor.
• She assumes that there are only totally slacking children (Americans) or totally successful children (with “Chinese Mothers”).  If you give children an inch, they’ll become complete failures.
• She assumes that there’s only one way to get children to work and succeed.  Because no children want to work at the right subjects, you must beat them into submission physically, verbally and emotionally.
• She thinks that the only way her children can be successful and happy and honor their parents is to be champions at her approved activities.
• There’s almost no joy in their lives.  Yes, there’s a moment when her daughter masters a difficult two-handed exercise.  But the best that the rest of life holds is the thrill of victory and success at winning.  There’s no possibility for joy in doing activities that thrill your soul and uplift your spirit.

Ms. Chua has only one value – compete and defeat; win at any cost. This is a great and necessary value.  It has made our society the first world.  But if when the only value, when she ignores all the other equally great and necessary values she becomes inhuman – a barbarian, a torturer, no better than a Nazi or Communist or Fascist.

No wonder she’s aghast at all the personal attacks.  She may be a brilliant law professor and accomplished writer but she’s completely out of touch with the world’s great traditions championing other values like great character, individuality, liberty, self-determination, love, beauty, compassion, spirituality and human connection.  That’s why people take it so personally.  Ms. Chua is attacking our most cherished values; cherished for good reasons.  These values make us human in our most fundamental American, western ways.

Ms. Chua represents inhumanity justified by Darwin and Marx.  She represents a revival of B.F. Skinner’s way of raising his daughter in a “Skinner Box,” as if she was a pigeon.  When she grew up she sued him.

A better approach:

• Have you observed your children individually and carefully?  One approach does not fit them all.
• Which children need you to provide more structure and which will be dedicated and determined on their own?  Which children respond better when they’re encouraged and which respond better to having their imperfections pointed out?  This is where expert coaching is helpful to design approaches that fit you and each child.
• What are your children passionate about so they become energetic and determined on their own?  Are following an artists path, playing the oboe, writing “silly” stories like “The Little Prince,” learning to program computers, studying bugs and strange sea creatures, mastering any sport, being a person who inspires others to be the best they can be, dedicating yourself to raising independent and creative children living rich and full lives, being a craftsman who makes great pianos or violins, coaching basketball teams at “minor schools” like University of Connecticut or UCLA to set winning-record streaks, being entrepreneurs like Bill Gates or Steve Jobs, making movies, loving children and a thousand other endeavors worthwhile to you?  How can you encourage and nurture your child’s dedication and skill in those areas?
• Character is critical.  All of the world’s great literature points to the deficiencies of social climbers, bureaucrats and people whose only focus is to win at all costs.  What would Ms. Chua have created if she could have gotten her hands on the children who became, for example, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Charles Dickens or Alexander Solzhenitsyn?  Or great figures in the world from Joan of Arc, Hildegard of Bingen and Mahatma Gandhi to Martin Luther King Jr. or Aung San Suu Kyi, to name only five of thousands.
• Don’t be a victim of your parents’ ideas about what constitutes success and how to achieve it.  You can give your children the tools of the mind, will and spirit and let them create their own lives that they’ll love.

By the way, Ayalet Waldman wrote a somewhat tongue-in-cheek response in the Wall Street Journal, “In Defense of the Guilty, Ambivalent, Preoccupied Western Mom.”  In part she defends her children’s choices and her catering to those choices.  In part she also defends her selfish desires to discourage her children when their activities would inconvenience her.  That’s not the answer either.

All of the poles in this discussion are the wrong places to be – being a wimpy parent or an uncaring, selfish parent or a brute.

Instead, find the fire in your children and feed that fire.  Help them become skillful and competent in areas that matter most to them.  Help them create a life that’s uniquely theirs, not one you think is proper or best for them.

Why do I say that Ms. Chua is abusive and a bully?  Let’s review – what do “Chinese Mothers” and bullies have in common.

• Bullies and “Chinese Mothers” don’t care what you think or how much pain you feel.
• Bullies and “Chinese Mothers” can do what they want to you and you’d better like it.
• Bullies and “Chinese Mothers” are right and righteous.
• Bullies and “Chinese Mothers” are the best because they’re the winners in life.
• Control-freak bullies and “Chinese Mothers” beat you into submission for your own good.
• Control-freak bullies and “Chinese Mothers” isolate you and make you dependent on them.

My conclusion is that if it looks like a bully, if it acts like a bully and if it feels like bullying then it’s a bully, even if it calls itself “Mommie Dearest.”

Stop Domestic Violence and Bullying

In their New York Times column, “From Dangerous Home to Safe House,” Amelia Duchon-Voyles, with Liz Welch, describes how Amilia helped a woman and child escape from a bullying and domestic violence situation.  They also described the mother’s progress toward standing up to her batterer and to establishing a steady life for her and her son. Good for all of them.  Their individual efforts, in emergencies, under duress, save lives.

Some ideas for the targets of domestic violence are:

Some ideas for the targets of domestic violence are:

1. Don’t remain a victim.  Whatever your second thoughts, stop the harassment, bullying, abuse and domestic violence by getting away safely.  If you’re threatened, beaten, terrorized or abused, get away.  Don’t live in fear.  Don’t allow your children to grow up in fear.  In your heart of hearts you know that if you stay, you’re dooming your babies to a life of pain, stress and anxiety; negativity and depression; low self-confidence and self-esteem; increased chance of addiction, alcoholism and suicide.
2. Find a safe house and helpers to get you away and to start a new and better life.  Seize any window of opportunity; you don’t need a plan with all the details worked out.  From a safe house you can make and carry out a better plan than you can when you’re terrified.
3. Don’t worry about the stuff you leave behind.  It’s got his cooties on them.  You’ll get new.  More important than any attachment you or your children might have to the stuff, is the value of being free to breathe deeply again, to laugh and sing and dance with abandon, and to plan for a great future.
4. Your children need your good example more than they need his bullying, abusive presence and any benefits you imagine of growing up with a bully for a father.  They need to be away from the fear.  The boys need to learn that bullying and violence won’t be tolerated or get them what they want.  The girls need to learn that they don’t have to tolerate abuse and battering.
5. Don’t believe his promises.  You’ve heard them all before.  Don’t answer emails, texts and calls.  Your safe house helpers will help you get the police on your side.  Give up false hopes of rehabilitating him.  Later you can find a different love that feels good.
6. Get stable over time.  You can get education, skills and a job or career to make a life in which you can get your own place.  Start stable routines for the kids.  Convince them that there’s light at the end of the tunnel.  Tell them hero/heroine stories.  Even though it takes time and hard work, they can be fine as adults – successful people and good parents.
7. Don’t think about divorce and moving far away until later.  The people at the safe house will help you plan ahead.  Guilt and shame won’t help you now.  When you can stand up straight again, you’ll figure out how you let yourself slide into marriage hell and you’ll take steps to make sure it won’t happen again with a new boyfriend.

Be courageous, take the risk.  Your future, your children’s future is calling to you to make your lives better.  No matter what you say, if you stay your babies will believe your example.  They’ll think that being a bully or being a victim are acceptable ways to go through life.  Set a good example for your children.

More Bullies in Public or Private Schools?

In his New York Times Op-Ed column, Charles M. Blow reported on the experience of his three children and the results of a study conducted by the Josephson Institute Center for Youth Ethics, which interviewed more than 43,000 high school students.  He reports that the study showed:

• “Boys who went to private religious schools were most likely to say that they had used racial slurs and insults in the past year as well as mistreated someone because he or she belonged to a different group.
• Boys at religious private schools were the most likely to say that they had bullied, teased or taunted someone in the past year.
• While boys at public schools were the most likely to say that it was O.K. to hit or threaten a person who makes them very angry, boys at private religious schools were just as likely to say that they had actually done it.”

In addition, he says that, “While some public schools have issues with academic attainment, it appears that some private schools have issues with tolerance.  No person is truly better when they lack this basic bit of civility.”

Most of the discussion and argument will focus on whether or not his general conclusions are correct about most private versus public schools.  And many people will base their conclusions on their personal experience in each type of school.

But the important point is not about the generalizations.  Don’t get distracted by academic speculation about the generalizations.  The important point is about the schools your children are going to.

If your children are going to a school that tolerates or encourages other children to think that they’re special and, therefore, that they can tease, taunt, mistreat, bully or abuse people who are different, that’s the situation you need to focus on.

Children need to feel that they’re special and that high standards of behavior are expected of them.  The problem is caused by the idea that, therefore, they can scorn or torment other people who aren’t in their group or who are different.

Bullies will target any difference they can find.  It’s not the difference that causes bullying; it’s the bullies who find the difference.  Of course bullies will focus on race, religion, color, gender, sexual preference, etc.  But we all also know examples of mean girls and mean boys who bully people they decide are too tall or short, too skinny or fat, or who have different hair color or hair style, or different clothes, or who aren’t as fashionable or faddish.

Their bullying can range from verbal, emotional and cyber-bullying to physical violence.  They form cliques or gangs to harass, cut-out, put-down, torment and abuse their targets.  If responsible adults don’t intervene and stop the behavior, bullies will be emboldened to push every boundary and to take power.  Unfortunately, mean parents often encourage their kids; sharing their prejudices and hatreds or thinking that popularity is worth any price.  Also, bullying parents will protect and defend their bullying kids, like Lucius Malfoy protecting his rotten son, Draco, in the Harry Potter series.

I’ve consulted with principals, teachers and staff of both public and private schools, who won’t ignore, tolerate or support bullying.  And we have developed effective programs to stop bullying.  In addition, I’ve seen both public and private schools in which principals, teachers and staff look the other way or condone or even applaud harassment, bullying and abuse.  Some even think that building school spirit this way is worth sacrificing a few weaklings or sinners.

I’ve also coached families of children in both public and private schools to help them learn how to stop bullies and how to be skillful when dealing with reluctant, do-nothing principals.  The “reasons” for the bullying usually vary from situation to situation, but the tactics used by bullies are the similar across the board.

More than generalization to be discussed and disputed intellectually at a party, we’re hit home emotionally by what happens to our children.  If one school, whether public or private, doesn’t stop bullies and it’s your children’s school, that’s the one that counts in your life.

But there is one generalization that cuts across all lines; we can stop bullies before we’ve analyzed in detail the reasons why a particular kid or group of kids selects its target(s) and long before we can teach them to have increased empathy and tolerance.  The first step is always having clear, firm and immediate consequences for the perpetrators.

If we don’t stop bullying and abuse, we’ll continue the downward spiral of stress, anxiety, negativity and depression; of loss of self-confidence and self-esteem; and of increased suicides among targets who become victims because the responsible adults didn’t protect and defend them.

Stop Sneaky Bullies' Agenda Control

In his article in the New York Times, Erik Eckholm, points out that, “Alarmed by evidence that gay and lesbian students are common victims of schoolyard bullies, many school districts are bolstering their antiharassment rules with early lessons in tolerance.” The article continues, “Rick DeMato, pastor of Liberty Baptist Church, [who] opposes the curriculum changes in the school district in Helena, Mont. [has led] angry parents and religious critics…[to] charge that liberals and gay rights groups are using the antibullying banner to pursue a hidden ‘homosexual agenda,’ implicitly endorsing, for example, same sex marriage.”

What does this have to do with the devious tactics of sneaky, stealth bullies?

Stealth bullies win when they can change the subject to fit their agendas; when they can distract you from your subject and make the focus of discussion be something they want to discuss and over which they think they can win.

For example, suppose you complain about your date or spouse’s public or private sarcasm, put-downs and nasty, mocking humor.  If he’s a stealthy, manipulative bully, he might change the subject by saying that you’re hypersensitive and you over-react, or that you hurt his feelings by complaining.  If he can get you to focus on whether you’re hypersensitive or have no sense of humor or on making him feel better, then he wins and you lose.  You’ll never get him to stop making those remarks.

Or suppose you’re angry that he hit you.  If he’s a stealthy predator, he might complain that you didn’t communicate that in a supportive way or that you over-reacted or that you started it and you provoked him or that he felt put-down by your anger, which reminded him of his childhood.  And that’s the only thing he wants to talk about.  If he can get you to focus on your poor communication or his hurt feelings and past trauma, he wins and you lose.  He’ll never have to talk about your pain when he hit you and, since he has a good excuse for hitting you (his past trauma), he doesn’t have to change.

Notice the general rule: whoever controls the focus of the discussion will win.  Teenagers are also adept at doing this to their parents.

Therefore, you must take charge of the agenda.  Make him focus first on his sarcastic put-downs or on his hitting you.  And you have to be satisfied by the result before you’ll discuss his agenda.  If he doesn’t satisfy you, don’t go on to his agenda.  Go as far away as you can.

What does this have to do with the anti-bullying policies and programs we started with?

The initial agenda in those schools is stopping harassment, bullying and abuse of kids or adults.  The reason given by the bullies to justify their verbal, emotional and physical attacks was that their targets were gay or lesbian.  I pay more attention to the actions than to the excuses and justifications.  The agenda is stopping the bullying and violence.  The agenda is stopping the negativity, pain, anxiety and depression bullying causes.  The agenda is stopping the targets’ loss of self-confidence and self-esteem, and the increasing number of bullying-caused suicides.

Some people want to make the agenda be a torturous and emotionally-charged discussion of whether schools can be allowed to promote a pro-gay and pro-lesbian agenda.  And whether parents or educators control what’s taught in schools.

If those stealthy bullies can get you into those discussions, you’ll never stop school bullying.  They won’t have to stop their children from bullying and abusing other kids.  They feel that bullying and violence should be condoned or at least tolerated because the bullies have good reasons to torment their targets.  Since, they think, being gay or lesbian is a sin, if one of the targets becomes a victim and commits suicide, the world is a better place.

So keep the focus where it should be: anti-bullying programs that stop bullies.  When I’m called in to help schools develop effective programs, I always challenge dissenters to come up with a better program to stop bullies before we talk about areas that would distract us from the main agenda.

And in your personal and work life, take charge of the agenda and keep the focus on the subject that matters; stopping bullies in their tracks – whatever their reasons, excuses or justifications.

Stop Your Teenage Bully

Parents who bully children, and parents who bully and abuse each other are all too common, but an often unrecognized bullying situation is teenagers who bully their parents, especially their single parents. Of course, teenage girls can be manipulative bullies, but for a typical example, let’s focus on a 19 year-old boy who is mentally and physically capable of being independent but who’d rather sponge off his mother and lead an easy life at home.  He’s not working enough to support himself, he’s not succeeding in full-time school and he’s not struggling sixteen hours a day to become an Olympic champion.  He’s merely hanging out trying to have a good time every moment.

These adults can become physically as well as verbally abusive.  Their simmering rage when they’re thwarted can be frightening.  Usually they’re selfish, narcissistic control-freaks, lazy, demanding and surly, and feel entitled to whatever makes their life work most easily.

They’re good at arguing.  They want to convince you that “love” and “support” mean that you give them money.  You have to love and give to them, but they don’t have to give anything in return.  Their hidden assumption is that if you can’t make them agree with any changes, they don’t have to change.  They’re masters of whining, complaining and blaming others, especially you, for their problems.

They’re great emotional blackmailers: “A good, loving mother would take care of me while I’m getting it together.  A caring mom would help me.”  They’re also master manipulators of your fear that, if you don’t cater to them, they’ll fail in life and it’ll be your fault, not theirs: “I need your love to keep me away from bad company.  If you kick me out, I’ll be emotionally damaged.”  They’ll subtly hint that they’ll commit suicide if you don’t coddle them.  They always have a friend who has a “good mother” taking care of him.

Your caring and fear make their arguments seductive.  No matter how much you had to struggle on your own to be successful, it’s easy to think that if you only give them one more chance, they’ll finally wake up and get it.  So you give him one more chance – over and over and over.

Popular culture also makes their arguments seductive.  Most people have been raised to think that loving your child (“mother’s love”) means giving them what they want.

In my experience, one path in dealing with healthy, intelligent teenage boys almost guarantees failure.  That’s the path of giving them what they want.  The more you let them leech off your energy, wallet and good will, the softer they’ll become, the harder it will be for them to become strong and independent, the greater the chances that they’ll fall in with other lazy losers.  The more you give them, the more lazy, entitled and spoiled they’ll become.

In my experience, the path that has the greatest probability of success is to kick those little birds out of the nest before they grow too big for their fledgling wings.  They’ve already grown too big for the nest.  In order to fly, they need to strengthen their wings by use under pressure and stress.

Of course there’s a risk.  They might fail and turn to drugs, booze or burglary to support themselves.  They might give in to depression.  But, in my experience, staying home wouldn’t prevent that.  Leeching off you will only make them weaker.

Confidence and self-esteem are developed by succeeding at real and difficult challenges in which there’s a chance of failing.  Staying at home avoids important, meaningful challenges.

Some of the things to say to them when you tell them they’re moving out, depending on the circumstances, are:

• “I know that inside you, you have this great one of you struggling to take charge of your life.  Now’s your chance for that ‘you’ to take over.  Struggle and succeed.  I’d rather you struggle and prove me wrong while hating me, than that you love me and stay here as a whining, complaining loser.”  Use the word “loser” a lot.  Challenge them to prove you wrong.
• “This is not a discussion or a debate; you don’t get to vote.  This is definitely not fair according to you.  I know you think I don’t understand your side of it or how hard it is in today’s economy, but that’s the way it is.  I’m protecting myself from my own flesh and blood, who’d suck me dry if I let him.  You can try to argue but it won’t change anything.  It’ll just waste your time.  If you threaten me or damage the house, I’ll call the police and there’ll be no going back.”  Don’t engage in debate.  Walk away.
• “I love you and this is scary for me, but that fear won’t stop me.  If you become a loser, just like (fill in the blank), I’ll be sad and cry that you wasted your life, but I won’t feel guilty.  I won’t regret what I’m doing.”  Then walk away.
• “I’m going to have a joyous, good time in my life.  After you move out, if you make it fun for me, I’ll take you out to a restaurant sometimes or have you over for a good meal.  But if you nag at me and make it a rotten time, I won’t want to waste my time with you.  Your job is to make it fun for me to be with you.  Yes, that’s blackmail.  You pay for my attention, kindness and money.  Be the nicest to people who are closest.  Be nicer and sweeter to me than you would be to a stranger.  Suck up to me as if you want something from me.  You do.  Even if you can prove to me logically that it’s not fair, that’s the way it is.”
• “You, my beloved son, are now facing the choice we all face in life at this age.  Will you settle for being a loser with a good excuse – your mother didn’t love or suckle you enough – or will you be a winner despite your mother?  Every one of your ancestors faced this.  Your ancestors lived through plague, famine, flood, war and slavery.  They lived through worse than you.  I know you have the stuff of a hero in you.  Your choice is whether you bring that out and succeed, or to be a whining, petulant, blaming loser.”
• You have the body and mind of an adult.  You want to make adult choices in living the life you want.  Now you’re being tested.  Being an adult means taking care of yourself financially and physically.  You probably didn’t prepare yourself.  That’s your problem.  I could never teach you anything because you never listened to me when I gave you good advice.  We both know that.  You think you know everything.  You think you know what’s best for you.  Now prove it.  The less you learned useful skills, the more you’ll have to struggle now.  So what?  That’s just struggle.  I hope you’ll grow strong by struggling.”
• Mom, make a specific plan.  For example, “You must be out by (date).  If not, I’ll throw your stuff out the window and call the police if I have to.  No negotiation.  No promises.  We allow little children to get by on promises and potential.  When they’re 13 or so, we start demanding performance.  Now that you’re 19, I demand performance.  Your performance earns what you get.”  Mom, don’t give in to satisfy one more promise.  Think through what you’ll give, if anything, and under what conditions.  My bottom line is, “Make me enjoy it and I’ll consider it.  Beat me up, physically or verbally, and you get nothing.”  The more calm you are, the better.  If he can get you upset, he’ll think he can win again…as usual.

Your teenager will be sneaky and manipulative in pushing your buttons and boundaries.  He’s mastered manipulating you for years.

Single parents are often easier to bully than couples.  For example, see the case study of Paula bullied by her daughter, Stacy, in “How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks.”

Stepchildren can jerk your chain more.  A couple that disagrees strongly (one stern and one permissive) can be the worst case scenario.

This is a start.  Because all solutions depend on the specifics of the situation, you will need coaching.  Some circumstances that might alter your plans are if your teenager is not physically or mentally competent or needs extensive mental health counseling or is 13-16 or is a girl or there are drugs or alcohol involved or there are younger children at home?

Stay strong and firm.  Don’t let him move back in even for a just week or month.  It’ll reinforce the laziest in them and it’ll become permanent.

Stop School-Bullying Suicides Caused by Do-Nothing Principals

Principals didn’t stop school bullies and now there are more school bullying-caused suicides.  In all of the cases I’ll describe, there were differences in the bullies’ methods of harassing and abusing their targets.  But what was the same was that the parents complained and the responsible school teachers and principals didn’t protect the children in their care.  Also the same was the principals’ or school district administrators’ defense: “We didn’t know.” To me, especially after the parents of the targets complained, that’s an admission of incompetence, delinquency and neglect.  The other kids at school knew who bullies were and where, when and how it occurred; why don’t the college-educated, supposedly intelligent and responsible adults know?

I know that the first culprits are the bullies themselves and their parents.  But I want to shine two lights: I know that the first culprits are the bullies themselves and their parents.  But I want to shine two lights:

• First, on the responsible, but do-nothing adults in the schools – the principals, assistant principals, teachers, counselors, district administrators and school board members.
• Second, on the skills parents need learn in order to force inactive, conflict-avoidant, lazy, cowardly or uncaring principals to protect their children.

Notice the similarities in all these cases:

• In Texas, a straight “A” eighth-grader, Asher Brown, took his life 18 months after his parents claim to have reported on-going bullying by four other students.  Despite the evidence of repeated conversations offered by the parents, the school district spokeswomen, Kelli Durham, whose husband, Alan Durham, is assistant principal, claims that they never knew and never had evidence.  Nothing was done to stop the bullies or remove them.

However, numerous comments from other parents and students on the web site of KRIV-TV Channel 26, which also reported a story about Brown's death, stated that the boy had been bullied by classmates for several years and claimed Cy-Fair ISD in Texas does nothing to stop such harassment.

• A 13-year old, Texas eighth grader, Jon Carmichael, took his own life because of repeated bullying.  Teachers and students in the school district had already undergone anti-bullying training after a similar suicide last year.  Nevertheless, nothing was done about this case of repeated abuse.  One of the admitted bullies, Chris Montelongo, said, "I can guarantee you it was most of the school who messed with Jon."  But none of the responsible adults noticed and intervened.

• An 11-year old Oklahoma boy, Ty Smalley, committed suicide after being bullied repeatedly for about two years.  Despite the parents contact with the school, teachers, counselors and the principal never saw anything and never stopped the bullying.  The parents were told things like, “Boys will be boys” and “It would be looked into.”  According to Ty’s father, Kirk, the school never documented any of these conversations so they can now claim that they never knew.

The event that precipitated Ty’s suicide was when he finally retaliated against the bully he was suspended for three days while the bully, previously identified to the teachers, was suspended for only one day.

• An eight-year old in a Texas Elementary school tried to commit suicide, but survived his leap off the balcony of a school building.  He had been repeatedly harassed but school officials had done nothing.  His mother said that teachers kept telling her they'd “handle it” when she complained about the bullying over the past seven months.  The last straw for the 8-year-old was when he was told to leave his classroom after two other boys pulled down his pants in front of the class.

The principal, Linda Bellard, said teachers never informed her of the harassment until the boy's suicide attempt, although the child's mother had visited the school seven times since September to complain about the problem.

Each of these cases will wind their way through courts, settlements will be reached in some, some school administrators will get off because there aren’t specific enough laws that require them to act and we’ll probably never know the whole truth because we weren’t there.

As a parent whose responsibility is to ensure the physical safety, and the mental, emotional and spiritual well-being of your child, you need to know how to get appropriate action from principals and teachers who will resist acting strongly and swiftly to stop bullies.  Your child’s self-confidence, self-esteem and life depend on your skill.

• Complain to teachers, counselors and principals.  But it’s never enough to complain or even to keep a record of your visit and conversation.
• Give the responsible adults one chance.  Do they remove the bully?  Do they continue to monitor the bully and his or her friends for further retaliation?  Or do they remove your child?  Do they excuse the bully’s behavior as, “Kids will be kids?”  Do they say that the bully has a right to be educated in classes of his or her choice?
• Use “The Lucius Malfoy” test.  Is your child’s principal standing up to the bullying parents of the school bully?  Or will he or she cower in front of bullying parents who say their child does no wrong or who threaten to sue the school if anything happens to their little darling?
• If your principal fails theses test you must bring pressure to bear - immediately.  Remember that principals fear three things more than anything else: loss of job, publicity and law suits.
• Get a lawyer and media publicity.  Learn what constitutes evidence and documentation.  Record all communication.  Communicate in writing and have proof that school officials received the letters you write.
• Bullying is rarely an isolated event.  Unite with other parents whose children are bullied.  Get witnesses who will put their evidence in writing.
• Have support for the long-haul.  Find people who’ll keep your spirits up through repeated set-backs.  Find experts to help you plan tactics at each step of the way.

Have great appreciation for principals who simply won’t tolerate bullying – who will have strong, proactive programs to train their staff and who will act swiftly and firmly in response to complaints.  Training is never enough: strong and courageous people are required to make these programs effective. Have realistic expectations; don’t assume that principals, teachers, counselors and district administrators will be active in stopping bullies.  Expect bullies’ parents to thwart your efforts.  Expect most uninvolved people to look away.  If nothing bad happens to bullies, expect other kids to pile on.

You’re on your own.  Many children will give up if they’re not protected by adults; make sure that you know how to protect yours.  Be the skillful advocate of your child’s safety and well-being.

Is it Normal for Kids to Bully?

At every presentation for teachers wanting to stop school bullying, I get asked, “Is bullying normal?” When I look at child development, I see that we’re born demanding.  We must demand that our parents feed and change us when we want, not merely when they feel like getting around to it, not at their convenience or pleasure.  As babies, the more strong and tough, the more determined and persevering we are, the better our chances of getting what we need. Therefore, drive, determination, will and perseverance are normal. Asserting our needs and fighting for ourselves are normal.  Grit – perseverance, endurance and resolve – is normal.  All these are normal and desirable qualities.

I think of drive, determination, will and grit as part of our engines.  Without strong engines we’ll never get anywhere.  With strong engines, we have a chance of making wonderful lives.

As we grow, our parents are supposed to teach us how to get what we want or need using methods other than bullying or abuse; using peaceful methods that are more considerate of other people.  Indeed, most of us do learn to ask nice and to use the magic words (“please,” “thank you”).

As we grow, our parents are supposed to keep reminding us to think about how little Johnny or Jane feel when we don’t share or when we take their toys or when we whack them physically or verbally.  And eventually, especially when we feel the pain of being harassed, bullied and abused ourselves, we understand how the other person feels when we bully them.  And we stop bullying in order to get what we want.

If these methods are reinforced and rewarded at home – if we see compassion, empathy and negotiation successfully used within our families, successfully used by our families when dealing with outsiders like clerks, cops and strangers, successfully used on the streets by our peers and their parents – we’re likely to learn these techniques.

But we, individually and as a society, do not admire drive, determination, will and grit without limits.  We do not admire barbarians.  We don’t want to raise brutes, thugs and bullies who grab whatever they want and crush everyone in the way.

We will not take our freedom by subjugating or enslaving other people.  We do not admire bullies or tyrants.  We know that if we teach only drive, determination, will and grit, if we preach only Darwinian Survival of the Mightiest we are in danger of creating barbarians.

Therefore, it’s also normal in our society for us to learn not to use harassment, threats, bullying and abuse to get what we want. Compassion, concern, caring, empathy and respect are normal in our society; they’re part of our steering wheels.  We, individually and as a society, value these qualities.

Children are born with drive, determination, will and grit; we teach them compassion, concern, caring, empathy and respect.  A car with a strong engine but a lousy steering wheel will take us no where good.  Examples of societies that lack a good steering wheel are obvious; our own failures are glaring.

At the same time, we do not admire compassion, concern, caring and empathy without limits.  People with these qualities, but with no drive, determination, will and grit won’t survive in the real-world.  They’ll be too weak, afraid and dependent.  Typically, they’ll lack confidence and have low self-esteem but have a veneer of self-righteousness, arrogance and entitlement.

We don’t want our children to become adults dependent on handouts from us or a “Big Brother” government.  We don’t want them to become so dependent on comforts, self-indulgence and entitlements that they won’t fight for their national, political or individual liberty.  We certainly don’t want our kids to become weak, wimpy citizens still sponging off us as adults because the world is too harsh, cruel or difficulty for them.

We want bullies to have more compassion, concern, caring, empathy and respect for their targets.

We want our children to have more drive, determination, will, grit and skill so they’ll be strong and smart enough to stop bullies.  And we want the responsible adults to protect them.  We don’t want to subject our children to continued bullying because we’re overwhelmed with sympathy for the bullies who we assume must be bullied at home and on the street.

Personally I want to make sure my children and grandchildren have wonderful engines.  Then I’ll teach good steering wheels.  And I look at each and ask, “What does that person need more of?”

To function most effectively, we need both strong engines and good steering wheels.  We need the cluster of drive, determination, will and grit, and we also need the cluster of compassion, concern, caring, empathy and respect.

There are many examples of children and adults stopping bullies in “How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks” and “Parenting Bully-Proof Kids.”  Or call me for coaching at 877-8BULLIES (877-828-5543).

Stop Self-Bullying by Blame, Shame and Guilt

If used well, blame and guilt don’t lead to self-bullying.  They’re useful ways of motivating us to do better, even though they can cause a lot of wear and tear on our bodies, minds and hearts. If we analyze our actions objectively we might take on the blame for some of what we did or failed to do.  We can decide how to make amends.  We can decide what actions would be better and we can strive to do better next time.

We can also use guilt and feeling ashamed of an action to motivate us to act better next time.  That’s a hard way of motivating ourselves but it’s often effective.

However, wallowing or obsessing in blame or guilt without changing behavior is merely self-bullying.  At some point, self-abuse becomes addictive and gratifying.  There can be a sinister pay-off in the pleasure of feeling wretched.

Unrelenting and deep shame, on the other hand, leads to destructive self-bullying – negative self-talk, self-doubt and self-harassment, loss of confidence and self-esteem, and increased anxiety and depression.

By shame, I mean the idea that “There’s something wrong with me; I’m bad, evil or defective; I’ll never be free from sin; I’ll never succeed; I’m cursed.”

This kind of deep shame, as opposed to the way I’m using blame, guilt and feeling ashamed, is not focused on an action.  This kind of deep shame points us at supposed defects deep within us, at defects that we can’t change, at defects in our identity.  There’s no escape from the flaws we imagine are inherent and permanent.  The self-laceration of this kind of shame is endless and self-defeating.

Where does this deep shame come from?  We’re not born with this kind of shame.  We’re born demanding that we be fed, clothed and have our diapers changed.  Little babies don’t question whether they deserve to get what they need for survival; they demand it.  That demanding approach is necessary for our survival.

Deep shame can only be taught to us through continued and brutal repetition – physical, verbal, emotional.  Eventually, most children internalize constant harassment, criticism, put-downs and denigration – assaults on our identity.

Imagine how you’d feel if someone shouted or scolded you, 24/7, “You’re bad.  You’re defective.  You’re wrong.  You shouldn’t have been born.  You’ll never do better.  I wish you were dead.”

However those harsh and shaming messages were thrown at us, whoever the bullies were, our task as adults is to leave them behind.  The two critical steps in leaving home are to leave physically and to leave mentally-emotionally.

The first leaving is obvious to most of us; we get financially independent in order to stay physically independent.  We test ourselves against the world, not our parent’s opinions.  Can we earn a leaving?  Can we meet people and make friends?  Can we love and be loved?

The second leaving is mental, emotional and spiritual.  We put aside all their beliefs, ideas, attitudes, values, opinions, rules, roles and moods – all the ways they thought mattered in how to face the world, how to earn a living, what equaled a good life, how to be a good person.

We put aside all the false ways they thought about us – whether we were good or bad, strong or weak, stupid or smart, pretty or ugly, hard-working or lazy, the prized child or the scapegoated child, probably going to be successful or guaranteed to fail, blessed to be happy or doomed to be miserable.

We put aside all we were handed when we were children and all we accepted because they were the big, right and righteous people and we were the little and learning people, and because we knew what would happen to us if we disagreed.

To become independent adults we must cast aside all of their opinions and, as independent no-longer children, we must choose and adopt our own beliefs.  Some may be the same as theirs; some may be exactly the opposite.

The two important aspects of that mental, emotional and spiritual leaving: One is that our ideas are now adopted by us as adults, with our adult understandings, meanings and limitations.  The second is that they are not carved in stone as childhood ideas are.  We change them as we get feedback from the world – does this idea actually fit the reality I can now see clearly with adult eyes; does this way of facing the world get me closer to what I want; does it help me be and do good as I now think of that?

In this destroying and creating anew our inner world and our ideas of the ways of the outer world, we can choose whether to keep blame or guilt.  But, in order to be free and independent, we must discard deep shame as a way of thinking about ourselves and of facing the world.  We can excise the stain we once accepted, we can heal the great empty space we once had, and we can fill us with ourselves at our best.  We can develop strength, courage and skill.

Then we can look back at the bullies in our family and decide whether to be with them at all or when and how to be with them.  If they continue to bully us, if their bullying continues to trigger our self-bullying patterns we are better served by disconnecting, by making distance – electronically and physically.

If they treat us as newly made adults they’ve just met and want to be friends with, instead of forcing us back into their old images, instead of continuing to try to beat us into the shape they want we will probably want to be with them sometimes.

My recommendations: Don’t stay where you’re continually blamed, guilted or shamed.  Be where you’re respected, appreciated, honored.  Also, don’t accept the one of you that continually blames, guilts or shames you.  Train and discipline yourself so that you have better internal self-talk.  Live with the good inner coach you create, not with the internal bully who sounds like your parents, still ripping you down.

For clear examples, read in “How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks,” the studies of how Kathy, Doug, Jake and Carrie got away from bullying, abusive parents.