In the past, I have written articles on Mutual Combat, Participation Trophies, and the value of failing. In those articles, I always promised that I would eventually get around to writing one on child self-defense and bullying but I have yet to deliver on that promise... Until now! So, let’s get into this very controversial topic, shall we!?
Currently, there is a movement going on throughout our school systems to effectively crack down and end bullying once and for all. The movement has stemmed from zero-tolerance policies in which any child doing anything that remotely resembles bullying shall be suspended or even expelled from the school. As of late some districts have even started issuing fines to the parents of school bullies as a punishment for raising the little “tyrants.” As someone who was through most of my school life, it is somewhat nice to see some swift justice being done to the little bastards but we that is simply emotion and bad memories speaking, which is the exact same thing that these ludicrous policies are stemming from. People who were bullied in school trying to get revenge on a new generation of kids who are to be completely honest…just being kids. Now I am not forgiving bullying, bullies are cowards who verbally and physically dominate those smaller than them because it makes them feel powerful. If left unchecked these children will grow to be bullies as adults either in the workplace or in the home. So, my article is not necessarily aimed at arguing against the current measures being taken against bullying. Instead, I would like to submit what I believe is missing from the current system and what could be introduced that I believe would have a huge benefit for the children being bullied.
The current policies in place focus far too much on the bully and often forget about the one being bullied! When you enact policies that remove bullies from your public schools you may believe you are creating a safe learning environment for the rest of the students, and maybe you are, but you need to understand that the child who was being bullied was being bullied for a reason. That bully targeted that child from an entire classroom of kids because the bully perceived that classmate as an easy target (remember bullies don’t go after hard targets), if your only solution to the problem is to remove the bully then you are doing the bullied child a disservice because you are removing any opportunity for him or her to grow and develop. Humans respond to stress by getting stronger. Adversity is a necessary tool to develop resilience in children and even though I do not like bullies, I acknowledge that they are somewhat of a necessary adversity for children to overcome. That leads me to the next part of the problems with the current policy. If a child who is being bullied decides to defend themselves then they are treated the same as the bully by the school... I.E. suspension, expulsion, and parental fines. What kind of message does this send to the children? That it is better to lay down and be a victim instead of fighting to protect yourself or others? What kind of adult does that make? It makes weak skinned cowards who will continue to be timid or in the face of adversity overcompensate and become bullies themselves.
I understand that I am coming off strong right now but please hear me out further while I try to justify my point and offer an alternative method of bully prevention. If bullies are looking for weak targets, then we need to turn our children into hard targets that bullies will not want to get wrapped up with. How do we do this? I am personally an advocate that every child should be in some sort of martial art and that in fact, the school should provide these classes just the same as they provide wrestling. I may be a bit biased but I submit that more so than just learning a martial art, every child should be afforded the opportunity to learn Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. BJJ is a perfect martial art for children because while it is physically demanding it is a relatively low impact martial art that does not involve punching or kicking but highly technical grappling. BJJ was in fact designed by Carlos Gracie to be used against much larger and much stronger opponents. In this way, BJJ is a perfect martial art to combat bullies who target smaller and perceivably weaker children. The ability for children to defend themselves is huge not only to combat bullying but to build self-confidence and mental toughness. Simply learning Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is a challenge that children will need to overcome by developing discipline. It is also extremely fun and has a culture all its own. As a BJJ player myself, my only regret is that I had not started sooner!
I am not saying that we should not hold bullies accountable but we need to make sure that in doing so we are not raising a society of victims and weaklings.
