Rant: Over indulgent parents strike again

"Bownse"
Gee. I don't see brand as having anything to do with my definitions. I
know I personally don't see it that way. In fact, most "classic brand"
owners I know tend toward the pose(u)r side of the discussion instead of
being bikers.

this is a relatively recent & disturbing trend.

I think "biker" would cover those folks too, since IIRC my descripting
included all-weather riding just for the sake of riding (no other
purpose needed than wanting to ride the bike). No rally to go to, no
"group" to be seen by, etc. Seems the "transportationalist" would be
covered in the broader description of "biker" imo.

hm. ok, i suppose it would, it's just that those people wouldn't call
themselves "bikers". (though obviously, i only asked what _you_ would call
them, not what they would call themselves. :-) i mean, i don't call them
anything. well, "motorcyclists" maybe.

right, motorcyclists they are in my tiny world, bikers in yours.

say, have you ever seen the dykes on bikes element of the sydney mardi gras
on telly? hee hee.
kylie

"toto" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 15 Jan 2004 00:35:05 GMT, Charles Soto
wrote:

You must be an idiot. There is lots of evidence. Even the FBI was
able to determine that the main reason behind school shootings is that
bullies pick on kids, and the teachers refuse to do anything about it.
Check out FBI.gov.

Check out the parents, idiot. My kids aren't doing **** without me
being responsible for it.

Charles

How old are you children if I may ask?

they must be young if he's even responsible for their ****! (heh)
kylie

"Brent P"
It's not a matter of being *perfect.* Victims of bullies do have
some common characteristics though. Nothing that is their fault
and it isn't physical size that matters.

That was in response to someone who
was arguing that the victim should modify his behavior not to be
an "abuse magnet"

you appear to mean me. there might be some behaviours or tendencies that
should be got rid of, if possible, in order to not attract bullying (see
dorothy's list), but overall there's no way on god's good earth i'd suggest
a victim "should modify his behaviour" to avoid being bullied, & it simply
isn't the victim's "fault" & i would never say that. so i hope you don't
mean me. you're already reading things that aren't there & this might be
another example.

And some kids have other strengths but aren't allowed to use them.
But if a 'bully' doesn't get the reaction he is looking for he
will increase the intensity. He doesn't go elsewhere until it's
painful for him not to.

actually, i often hear how people were able to diffuse bad school (or other)
situations with humour. there's a lot of comedians out there who'll actually
thank their bullies for being their first audiences.

Children who are not bullies or victims have a powerful
role to play in shaping the behavior of other children.
Teach your children to speak up on behalf of children
being bullied. "Don't treat her that way, it's not nice."
"Hitting is not a good way to solve problems, let's find a
teacher and talk about what happened.

lol... sorry but that cracks me up. That would turn the neutral
kid into a victim in short order or if not a victim, a social leper.

no, it doesn't, actually. it tells a bully that they're going to have their
work cut out beating up _everyone_. it makes clear that where there is one
helper, there are bound to be others. it creates dialogue. it does a lot of
things. what it doesn't do is automatically create shiny new "victims"
because, as said before, victims tend often to be a "type" & the confident
kids who speak up don't fit that "type". they aren't easily scared nor
scared off.
remainder of generalisations & relentless negativity & pessimism snipped

i enjoyed dorothy's post & it very clearly outlined a lot of things i'd have
said, but it said them much better.
kylie

"toto" wrote in message
news
On Thu, 15 Jan 2004 03:38:11 GMT, DTJ wrote:

Educators are bureaucrats more interested in keeping their
jobs than in educating.

And fight any effort to hold them accountable. Tenure? What the ****
is that? Any other job you can get fired from, but not a ****ing
teacher.

Wrong. Administrators can fire a teacher for cause. They need
documentation in the states where the teachers are unionized.

indeed, i knew a couple of teachers personally who lost their jobs because
they could literally be described as "****ing teachers" (rather than
"teachers who knew how to keep their dacks on"). the more time goes by, the
higher the standards to which teachers are generally held.

but by the time teachers are held to a standard somewhere between
beatification & full-blown sainthood, i fear that certain people, sadly
well-represented in this thread, will still be unable to see beyond their
own experience & still find forgiveness to be some foreign (nay, "touchy
feely") concept.
kylie

"toto"
School is supposed to be about academic learning,

i don't think so. school is supposed to be about producing well-rounded &
hopefully educated individuals (wow, i should add "what ho, awfully, old
chap!" or something to that ;-)

If the school can provide them, that's
fine, but sports should be cut when they are cutting music and
art. Not everyone wants these, but they should be available and
during school hours as classes not as extra-curricular activities.

well, i think sport is as important as art or music (or computers or
metalwork or chemistry or you-name-it) & if things are being cut, i wouldn't
pick ANY of those three. let's face it, at the end of the day, very few
children will ever have a use for trigonometry. they may have an equal lack
of use for knowing the rules of soccer, or how to high-jump, (etc) but it's
not for anyone to say which of these things is more "important" except in
their own view. (my view is that sports are a million times more important
than trigonometry & a host of other academics as well).

2 reasons:
1: school is for everyone & everyone has to go. that means if the musical or
wordy or arty or mathematical kids get their time to excel, so should the
sporty kids.
2: let's face it, there are some children who would never get off their
arses if they weren't made to. :-)

purely anecdotally, i've noticed in my perambulations that north americans
(i include canadians in this) often seem to have an overly & excessively
negative view of sports in schools. whereas my compatriots & my good self
will generally agree that sport in school was rubbish of the first order,
but wouldn't dream of trying to have it outlawed or anything. during sport &
p.e. sessions i did things i never would have tried (nor had the
opportunity) otherwise, & learned some interesting things (not always the
things that were being taught, but interesting nevertheless.) at worst it
was a mental break which was physically good for us (even the time i broke
my nose playing basketball). at best it was good fun & a good learning
experience (again, what was learned wasn't necessarily what was being taught
;-)

so if there's a problem with teaching methods & general unfairness &
horribleness during sport & p.e. those problems should be addressed, but
just ditching sport wholesale won't benefit anyone. i cannot see how sport
can be said to provoke bullying, where properly taught. (or even where
improperly taught, like at my school).
kylie

In article ,
0tterbot wrote:

there's a plain element in some people that they attract derision. there's
an element in others who are attracted to harrassing weaker people. imo
acknowledging that will go some way towards helping solve these problems -
after all, you can see these kids on first sight, so you'll know what to
look for & can see more quickly if or when problems start coming up. a
teacher with half a clue can look at her new class, make a note of the kids
who are going to end up in a state of mutual loathing, & use preventive
stuff with them to get them interacting from the get-go & prevent the
problems getting out of control.

There is no "get them interacting" between these types of people. If
they are interacting, the interaction will be of the harrassment
and bullying sort. What you want to do is make sure they _don't_
interact. Since you can't watch them at all times, this
non-interaction has to be by mutual choice.

The attacker gets free reign.

zzzzzzzzzz

And another "educator" sticks its head in the sand.

--
Matthew T. Russotto
"Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in pursuit
of justice is no virtue." But extreme restriction of liberty in pursuit of
a modicum of security is a very expensive vice.

In article ,
toto wrote:
On Wed, 14 Jan 2004 08:57:28 -0600,
(Matthew Russotto) wrote:

In article ,
toto wrote:
On 13 Jan 2004 14:19:36 -0800, (Roger Dodger)
wrote:

While I think that some violence is linked to school sports and jocks,
I disagree that eliminating them will make the violence disappear.
Too much violence occurs outside of school and kids who experience
violence in their homes and on the streets *will* be violent at school
too if they attend.

Then expel them. Though actually I suspect this kind of thing is
_less_ of a problem in places where the streets are violent.

You would have to give the public schools the power to do so.

They have it.

Atm, they really can't expel anyone at all.

Nonsense. Even when they can't throw them out of the system, they can
transfer them to disciplinary schools.

Eliminated compulsory attendence would help, but again it won't
solve the whole problem and mostly it will shift the violence to
other arenas. Problem shifting is often how universities and
colleges deal with problems.

So? The school is responsible for what happens at the school,
not what happens elsewhere. They can't solve the problems
of the world.

Creative snip of the story that illustrates what happens when you
don't address the whole problem.

I snipped the story because it's not relevant. The school is
responsible for the school's problems, not the world's problems.

Shifting the problem out of
the school only solves a very small part of the problem and thus
it really does not work very well.

The school is the only place the kids (both attackers and victims) are
_required_ to be for 6-8 hours a day. Solve the problem there and
you've solved a LARGE part of the problem.
--
Matthew T. Russotto
"Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in pursuit
of justice is no virtue." But extreme restriction of liberty in pursuit of
a modicum of security is a very expensive vice.

No, it is not. Some kids are picked on because the bigger kids are,
get this, are you ready, can you stand it - bigger! It has nothing to
do with the child who is picked on, it has everything to do with the
bully and the teachers.

You are only partly right, IMO. And this is coming from someone who
was ALWAYS the smallest guy in school. Bullies certainly use size to
feel people out, but the ones they continue to bully are (with
exceptions of course) the ones that allow it. I was never bullied for
any length of time, because I did not allow it. As I said, there are
exceptions, but most bullies want to move on to easier prey.

Case in point, I was picked on a bit until 7th grade. Why? I was
very small.

I doubt it. That may have been what initiated it, but from my
personal experience, and most of what I have read supports the idea
that they bullied you because you allowed it to happen. However, I
admit, I don't know your personal experience.


Why did it stop?

Apparently, becaue you did something about it.


Christmas vacation I got a weight set.
Perfect age. Next asshole who tried to pick on me understood what it
was like to be on the receiving end of a darth vader style throat lock
against a locker.

Guess what? The abuse lasted only a couple more days. Once people
learned I was now strong enough to defend myself,

Was it really strength of body, or was it strength of will. I am
betting your new strength of body gave you a renewed sense of
confidence, and that you weren't bullied - not because you were
stronger physically, but stronger in spirit. You probably could have
gotten them to stop bullying you even without the weightlifting. Not
guaranteed of course, but certainly very likely.

they left me alone.
Went on to smaller pastures.

In article ,
0tterbot wrote:
"Matthew Russotto" wrote in message
...
In article ,
0tterbot wrote:

i don't think so (?). being a plain-speaking person i simply know no
other
[...]

the other true thing is that once a dynamic of harrassment exists, the
"victim" becomes a participant. of course, they don't _want_ to be a
participant, but they are, that's just the facts of it: the fact that
they,
too, participate in this dynamic is something that must be accepted. once
they can accept that they are a participant (albeit an unwilling one),
they
can then decide what they want to actively do to prevent their unwanted
participation in these exchanges. this is what i mean about personal
power -
whatever they decide to do empowers them (or at least has strong
potential
to do so), taking a more active role in the pre-existing dynamic empowers
them. feeling powerless about the situation not only makes it worse, but
*that* is the part that causes damage.

Plain-speaking? This is touchy-feely bull**** apparently designed for
nothing but obfuscation.

it is NOT touchy feely obfustification. how offensive!!

We appear to have a terminology problem. What you call
plain-speaking, I call touchy-feely obfuscation. What _I_ call plain
speaking, you call offensive.

it's practical
parenting (well, practical living). i know the word "empower" makes people
feel ill. but it's a proper word & if you can find a better one to use, be
my guest.

It's not the terminology I have a problem with. It's the shifting of
the blame to the victim.

here's the facts of the matter: people who know they have power & are
confident with that don't feel the need to lord it over other people, & nor
do they fear others.

Nonsense. Some people just enjoy lording it over others.

in most bully/victim situations, neither person has
much power. the bully needs help as much as the victim does, just for
different reasons. if the bully felt confident of his own power, he wouldn't
be throwing his weight around nor behaving violently (or any of the other
methods bullies use to belittle & frighten others.) is this not obvious?

Even accepting your hypothesis for the sake of argument, you can't
make the school bully confident of his own power -- he really DOES have very
little, and will for quite a while because he's a kid. What little power he
has is _obtained_ by being a bully. If he stops being a bully he
loses that power.
--
Matthew T. Russotto
"Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in pursuit
of justice is no virtue." But extreme restriction of liberty in pursuit of
a modicum of security is a very expensive vice.

In article ,
DTJ wrote:

Case in point, I was picked on a bit until 7th grade. Why? I was
very small. Why did it stop? Christmas vacation I got a weight set.
Perfect age. Next asshole who tried to pick on me understood what it
was like to be on the receiving end of a darth vader style throat lock
against a locker.

You did it without touching them, like Vader? :-)
--
Matthew T. Russotto
"Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in pursuit
of justice is no virtue." But extreme restriction of liberty in pursuit of
a modicum of security is a very expensive vice.