I was bullied mercilessly--Margret Atwood wrote in cat's eye: "LITTLE GIRLS ARE CUTE AND SMALL ONLY TO ADULTS. TO ONE ANOTHER THEY ARE LIFE-SIZED." I felt like there was no escape from the kids who tormented me--I did think about killing myself back then. The thought that kept me from it was another thought: "well, let's see what happens." Somehow that helped me, to just be there and see what happened. I'm ok now, still nerdy but in a mecca of nerds! (NYC) Who knew. I would love to somehow mentor for nerdy girls, if only to let them know that it is not forever. Because that's what it feels like when you're there.

Of course parents are responsible for their children's bulyin for many reasons: 1. parents think tehy're open minded but express their fears and biases infront of their kids; 2. parents don't and teach morals to their kids to show them we don't tell on people, we don't avoid them based on uncoolness, race, religion or toher aspects of life; 3. parents don't observe their kids attitude towards other or converse to discover their children's biases and discriminations; 4. parent sometimes sponsor bulying by believing blindly their kids version of events or people.
I feel this society can be very cold and oblivious to their discrimination toward people who are differnet or from outside their community; most importantly, it is us that through examples and conversations we can model and teach our children to be tolerant, not friends but friendly towards everyone, and to remember cases in books, history where intolerance and discrimination caused hurt and destruction.

At the suggestion of a school principal, -- to help combat bullying--, we produced a CD of upbeat songs for young children (up to about 9 years old): "BE A BUDDY, NOT A BULLY." (Rymar Publishing Co.) Many schools and libraries have purchased it and School Library Journal favorably reviewed it.
http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/gennaro4

Yesterday morning, I awoke to the sound of the clock radio blaring "news," which was really sneering jabs at Kate Gosselin. Since this was an event that has been repeated several times in the past few weeks, I started my day feeling aggravated, and ended up arguing w/ a local woman on Twitter about the casual bullying so many adults do. While some of the Gosselin's choices might not have been mine, it seems clear that she is a person who is struggling, and not entirely happy, and I can't join in on the pile-on to mock that. When I was younger I didn't realize that when I was in my thirties, High School reindeer games- at least in CT, would be alive and well. I'm not blaming the parents speaking on the show, but it is ironic that many parents here worry about bullying yet openly engage in exclusionary activities (very cliquey/clubby) and casually snide talk.

I have to agree with Bonnie about the impact of television on this problem. As residents of the Detroit area, we were lucky to get Canadian public television on our local channels and that is what my daughter preferred to watch as she was growing up. The shows were gentle, intelligent and very inclusive. When the US went to digital programming, we switched to internet TV and now can't get Canadian public television. We have been relegated to American commercial television, including the Disney network. I immediately noticed the change in the tenor of the programming and was very surprised at the content. All of the shows contained "sassy" smartmouthed kids who seemed to continually one-up or put-down every one, including adults. Many of the shows focused on "mean" kids who verbally and emotionally abused their peers. I am not that old, and don't remember people acting like that when I went to school, especially to the degree that it is shown on television. I believe that seeing this behavior over and over again, especially when modelled by celebrities, makes it acceptable to kids and encourages them to think that behavior is expected. Don't get me wrong, I am very liberal and free thinking- and about as far from a Luddite as you can get, but even I found American children and teen programming distasteful. And I certainly notice the "sass" leveling rising whenever my tween daughter watches it. I have to work continuously with her to discuss the behavior she is seeing, why it is wrong and how it could have been handled differently.

Years ago I produced a television program that dealt with certain aspects of the holocaust. In the course of my research for that program, I came upon the work of Norwegian social scientist, Dan Olweus, who had done considerable work with bullying in the Bergen schools and had developed a system for reducing incidents of bullying (perhaps even populations of bullies) and that this had been quite successful. I didn't hear the first part of this report but I can't help wondering whether Olweus' insights might inform the discussion as much as our own ituitions have been allowed to here. He can be googled - there is a website. I commend it to you all and to the Takeaway staff.

Bullying is fast becoming an epidemic. I Found this article; Bullying is Breaking our Schools; http://bit.ly/bu04Ey - unique perspective.

Celeste made a serious mistake at the end of the show. She said there are three categories of people: the bullies, the victims, and the ones who stand by. There is a fourth category: those who intervene. These are the people who do not tolerate bad behavior and take a stand against it by acting to safeguard those victimized.

While parents are not to blame solely, they are responsible for the actions of their children. Simply put, once you become a parent...you are ALWAYS a parent. whether your children are 5, 15, 35, or 55; you still have the responsibility to nurture, advise, and counsel them; even scold, chastise, and correct them if need be. Their actions are a direct reflection of your parenting.

A good book for discussion of bullying is DON'T CALL ME MICHAEL. It is available from Tate Publishing or at Amazon or BN. It is a children's chapter book about bullying, friendship, and forgiveness. It can be used by teachers and parents to talk about what is happeing in the book, and what kids could do that would be better in such situations. I wrote a story that is realistic about what some kids tolerate and how the bully isn't always obvious.

It seems to me that we are teaching our kids to bully on many of our reality TV shows. The host or authority figure puts people down, and the anger factor is played up for its "entertainment value."
We are seeing aggressive behavior spreading to many different levels in our society, not just in children, and it is a very disturbing trend. What happened to tolerance and civility?

When I heard Fran this morning discribing her son's bully, she seemed to be minimizing his behavior. It made me think how many parents probably minimize their children's ' bad' behaviors, bullying and otherwise. Once you have decided to have children, you are responsible for them. They are raised in your household with your rules, values and religious beliefs or lack thereof. They can't develop their own until they mature. All parents have to take responsiblity for their own children first and what they may or may not be teaching at home. To do that you have to make parenting your children the priority.