Do bullies ever feel remorse?

[MotherOfOlafs]

Sorry if I’ve posted this in the wrong place as it is not lighthearted.
After reading today about yet another bright beautiful young teen having taken their life after relentless bullying I wondered if at any point the children who have bullied someone to the point of no return ever feel regret or remorse? Do they even realise that their actions may have potentially caused another child’s death? Are they taking some sort of sick pleasure from it? What do their parents think? Are they ashamed?
Apologies for the stream of consciousness, I just feel such sadness about it.

When I was in Year 3, my best friend and I went through a phase of being utterly unpleasant to a girl in our class. I think it could be called bullying. I knew at the time it wasn’t okay. I think I just enjoyed the power I had over her. It lasted a few months and then one day I just wanted to stop. We ended up being friends in years 5 and 6, and never mentioned what had gone on before. I do feel very guilty. It was horrible behaviour, probably the worst thing I have ever done.

@MotherOfOlafs

There was a horrific incident locally to where i live,
that happened a bit more than several years ago,
where a teenager boy of 15 years age hanged himself in his Catholic secondary school toilets,
his sister found his body,
I think he was on extreme autistic spectrum,
this was after being bullied for years on and off...

He would quite often hide in the boys school toilets to get respite from the bullying,

It was a Big news story at that time...

I would hope so - especially if they eventually have a child who is bullied - karma. But somehow I can’t see the utterly poisonous little cow at my school (and she was little) ever feeling bad about it. She went on to be a primary teacher - I often think of all the poor children she must have taught.

I don't understand how not being friends with someone can be classed as bullying, given that we have a legally-protected human right to freedom of association.

On balance, I suspect teenagers are not meant to be herded together and educated en masse, factory-style. They need proper supervision and support, to prevent pack dominance behaviour getting out of control.

This deserves repeating.

Humans can maintain around 150 stable relationships. Schools numbering into the thousands of pupils are going to have multiple relationship groups, tribes if you like, in them. A school year intake of more than 150 means that you have more than one tribe in a year group. I don't see how you can have consistent peer enforcement of social norms in that circumstance.

Ditto.

I don't think they grow out of it either.

I met my school bully by chance when I started a new job. She was one of my team but I was at managerial level.

She jokingly boasted to our colleagues about how she bullied me at school.She was called out by a couple of her colleagues that it’s not something you boast about or feel proud about.
I think it brought her down a peg or two.

So, no I don’t think they feel remorse.

A friend owned a shop, and employed a woman who used to bully me at school. My friend told me that the ex-bully was absolutely mortified about her behaviour towards me, and felt guilty every time she saw me. She had grown up in an unpleasant household, but had matured into a lovely lady when she left home, so I told her not to worry about it. I think we both felt happier after that.

I am not the same person that I was when I was 14; I suspect we all like to think of ourselves as kinder and more thoughtful than we actually were. We need to grow, and mature, and be bumped around by society a bit to become the lovely people that we are now.

Leaving people out of things is classed as bullying.

A woman recently sued her workplace snd won, because she was left out of a staff night out.

@VitoCorleoneOfMNMafia

You mentioned about on your ubove post, you didn't understand why not being friends with someone
leaving someone out of things ect,

Just amagine you are back at school
School yard,

and you have a ring leader bully who actively encourages other pupils children to ignore you,
not to have anything to do with you
on some possibly made up lie such as theres something wrong with her or him
she/ he looks different or acts different,
she/ he smells ect,

Or and
everyone gets invited to birthday party but you are not invited

What we are talking about " Means girls film sly bitchy psychological abusive attitudes mindsets behaviours...

@RemarkablyBrightCreature I take the point that teens are old enough to know they’re being deliberately cruel to a peer. What happened in my day (and sadly probably still happens in spite of anti-bullying policies) is that adults completely normalised bullying, were themselves bullies and quietly despised the kids who got the worst of the bullying. All anyone ever said to me was that I needed to make myself more likeable. I didn’t see other kids in my class getting bullied - maybe they were and I was too miserable to notice. I think one kid gets picked out and isolated as a survival response by the rest, as in they are united in attacking this person so they’re safe from
attack themselves. Some people will realise as adults that what they did was wrong and their behaviour should have been managed by adults. Some adults will have grown to be adults who think it’s fine to bully others and enjoy feeling their power.

What about all the bullying on mumsnet?

Countless times, I have seen women actively enjoy humiliating and bullying other women on here.

They really enjoy it.

It's a vipers pit on here.

People bully on here because it's fun to be nasty to others. To feel power when you tear someone else down.
And they can do it anonymously.

People bully others for power.

These days though it’s not just being bullied at school, come home on Friday or finish for school holidays and have a break, all the teens have social media and it carries on - there can be no getting away. Removing yourself from group chats is an option but they’ve still got to you, and would you add back in unless you block. At least DC was able to show me what the bullies intended to do to her when she turned up at school next day, I never sent her back, one of the bullies parents thought I was over reacting, I’m glad I did remove her because they went to beat some other poor kid up, (yes I reported to school about DD and reasons why I withdrew her, and showed SM evidence, they just tried to sweep any bullying accusations under the carpet) I hope they do have remorse, I doubt it, I hope they rot actually, it will take me a long time to get over DDs trauma, let alone DD, I just hope the parental support we’ve given her has been enough, the lasting effects for DD worry me.

I don't know. I hope so. I've got friends who were bullied at school, different school to me and they were affected for a long time.
I think someone has to stand up to them. A classmate of mine was being bullied (not a close friend) by girls a year older than us. She was a quiet timid girl as were her friends. One day I saw them being nasty to her so I punched the ringleader! I'm tiny but could pack a punch! Got called to Heads office who said she should really suspend me but wouldn't because of who the bully was! Result. The bullying of Donna stopped.
I've never seen her since she left school, actually I can't even remember her name.

That's not the one where she was unhappy they didn't plan the night out she wanted bit planned something else? Or is that example a mn poster?

^This. I know adult women who are complete bitches, and post these slogans. The reason I hate “be kind”. It’s a joke. Along with “Treat others how you like to be treated”.
I was lucky, I was only bullied once and a punch to the chops sorted that little problem out.

No idea how today’s children cope with the abuse, one reason why I think mobile phones in school should be banned. If there’s an emergency and you need a phone, ask the teacher to use the landline.

Some bullies probably do feel remorse, but I think it’s rare.

I know I didn’t go around making anyone’s life pure hell. If being a complete cunt comes so naturally to you, that it becomes a state of being and you ‘forget’ how cunty you are then I truly pity what must be a very sad existence.

Ah just checked 2 different cases, one who won for discrimination for not being invited out for drinks, one who lost, tried to sue because colleagues wanted christmas night out out not at a farm park.

The girl who made my life a misery in the Junior School added me on Facebook and chats to me in Tesco. I often wonder if she ever even gives it a second thought as so much of those couple of years shaped the mess I am deep inside still.

A staff night out, organised by the company, is not the same as being friends with someone. If the night out was organised by or for the company and one person was omitted, that could create a hostile environment for that one person. Yet, if a group from the office decided for themselves, without management involvement, to go to the pub after work and left me out, that's their right.

Please send me the Bailii links.

I was bullied at school pretty relentlessly as I was very academic, musical, not sporty, short & wore glasses. Doing homework & studying was not seen as cool.

When I did my options at the end of Third Year Senior, I discovered, to my horror, the main bully was going to be in my class & she was the only other girl.

We shared a table & work bench. Despite all her 'doing homework & studying is crap' she was actually working very hard but telling her minions to do the opposite.

Bizarrely we worked well together, both of us sparking ideas off the other's brain. The bullying eased off although I was still seen as very uncool.

When the results came through, she did really well in all her subjects whilst the sheep that followed her all did really badly.
You had to admire her - she obviously bullied me yet she subtilely manipulated all those girls in her gang into doing what she wanted them to do.

I have no doubt that she has any regrets of her behaviour.
She's got a great career & I hear from old school friends that she cheerfully stamps over the weak to make it up the ladder. Charming to your face yet stab you in the back.
A very dangerous woman.

At least with my bullying it ended when I got home & I knew some other boffins outside of school. I don't know how it would've worked out if it had been 24/7 bullying like nowadays.

Im sorry but you are wrong.

The staff night out in this case was not organised by the company

The staff night out was organised by her colleagues.and she was left out. I think she was the only one left out.

She sued the company for bullying. And discrimination. And she won her case

Well now I've Googled Bailli and know what it means.....(not everyone knows everything!)
You can do same and Google for the cases! They come up quite quickly!

The second case I absolutely agree with her losing as that's ridiculous, the first am not sure, but looks to my (not legal) brain, that although it wasn't work organised but they spoke about it in work, that's why she won?