To feel a wee bit sorry for the bully girl in the new "happy slapping" video?

[Bluemonkeyspots]

I mean the one with the girl jolene bullying the autistic boy.

The video is disgusting and makes very uncomfortable viewing, I felt sick watching it and putting my own dc in the place of the poor boy, if it was my dc I would want to rip her head off but I'm also really disturbed by all the comments about the girl that are online.

She is only 14 and I can't help but feel a bit sorry for her, maybe she is just pure nasty through and through but none of us know her background story.

While it would not make what she did ok what if she is abused at home by her own parents? What if there is nobody to support her through this and it pushes her to take her own life?

Maybe I'm just going soft due to pregnancy hormones but I really don't like all the hate groups springing up on Facebook etc with adults calling her all the nasty names under the sun and listing the disgusting things they would do to her. Can they not see the irony in what they are doing.

[MrsBucketxx]

I have no sympathy either, maybe if more people stood up to bullies like this the bullies woukd think twice about what they are doing.

But thats assuming they have the brains to do this.

[MyBaby1day]

YABU, I feel no sympathy for bullies like this girl, only sympathy I have is for the poor lad. Karma is only a bitch if you are...hey Jolene!.

[TempNC]

This sadly reminds me of a situation I intervened in about five years ago. I was out shopping alone in my local precinct when I saw a group of girls (about 15/16 years old) pushing and shoving a young man with Downs Syndrome. The names they were calling him were utterly vile and the thing that made my blood boil was that members of the public were just walking past when it was pretty obvious this poor man was being atrociously bullied.

I'm not trying to look like a martyr here but I stormed over and pulled him away, while giving those scumbags a piece of my mind. In return I was spat at and called a 'nosy cunt.' Those kids were bloody vile. They were still trying to get at him while I led him away. I called the police and they were very good but I cried my eyes out when I got home. I just felt so bloody cross and upset for that poor lad.

So in regards to the OP, I think YABU to feel sorry for that girl in the video. Regardless of whether she has had a tough upbringing there is no excuse for that sort of behaviour; at 14 you know the difference between right and wrong, so no sympathy from me.

[AutumnMadness]

ophelia275, if she could take it, would it be ok for her to dish it out then?

[ophelia275]

I don't feel sorry for her at all. If she can't take it she shouldn't dish it out.

[AutumnMadness]

shesariver, perhaps I am not making myself totally clear. I do not mean "understanding how bullies are made" as conducting an in-depth longitudinal research of a bully in action and doing nothing to stop him/her and also doing nothing to help the victim. Of course bulling has to be stopped immediately, through schools, police, social services, voluntary organisations. And it is despicable that many institutions in our society do not see bulling as a problem and even openly encourage it.

[AutumnMadness]

shesariver, as I said, I am aware of the subjectivity of my position and I am very honest about it. I am do not understand, however, how my wanting to understand how bullies are made actually produces them. Understanding is not the same as excusing. How are we to then to deal with the problem? It's a bit like wanting to eliminate obesity without knowing why people get fat in the first place. I can understand your emotional position and your not wanting to engage with bullies. I would probably be the same if I was a victim of serious crime. But I am not sure why you do not want others to think about how to prevent bulling behaviour. What would your solution to the problem be?

[shesariver]

autumn fair enough, but I really do think you would think differently if you and your child had been through what we have. Now I really dont care how my DSs bully was "made". But whilst people like you think like you do we will always have a society that favours the bully over the victim, and thats just how it is. You have no idea how sad your post has made me and frustrated. But I know everyone thinks differently about this so I will leave it at that. And I have worked with plenty of people with terrible childhoods who dont turn into bullies.

[GreenShadow]

bee169, I don't think anyone is defending her.

What they are doing is feeling a little sympathy for a situation that has got out of hand.

I (regrettable) took a look at a Facebook page where people are literally baying for the bully's blood. Totally uncalled for and frankly quite frightening. They can't seem to get it into their heads that what they are calling for is just as bad as what the girl has done.

[AutumnMadness]

I am probably going to get pelted here as I have not experience bulling myself or witnessed overt and serious situations of bulling in my life. But it seems to me that people who behave in terrible ways always do out of some kind of internal problems. They can be mental as in terrible home life, abusive parents, or physical (e.g. learning disabilities that have not been addressed properly or even noticed). It may (MAY) be that the girl in question has some form of disabilities herself. People, like animals, lash out because of fear.

I am not using this as an excuse for horrible behaviour. There is enough of it out there (rape, murder, abuse) that makes me intensely sad and sick and afraid myself. And yes, people, and especially adults, are reponsible for their own behaviour. But they do not come from nowhere. Just look at the recent articles on the link between lead poisoning and violent behaviour. And then there may be a potential bully/abuser in every one of us - read about the Milgram experiments if you are not familiar with them yet. "The Banality of Evil" is also an appropriate read here.

So dividing the world into black and white, hurling abuse at the other side is probably not the way to achieve justice or make a world a better place. And it is possible to feel intense sympathy with the victim in this video, not to excuse the behaviour of the bully but at the same time wonder how this bully was made and what could be done to help her and other children like her.

[bee169]

As a mother of a very sweet and kind autistic child this sort of video fills me with dread :(

Now that the bully is getting bullied does not make me want to sympathise with her. She is now feeling the fear she was more than happy to dish out. I am just surprised that people are looking to defend her!!

[Greensleeves]

How awful that your family were terrorised like that

I hope your ds is happier now x

[shesariver]

Thank you greensleeves, I wasnt trying to sound nasty..just a bit angry , so Im sorry to if that came across, of course no-one here knows what happend, suffice to say losing our home was a small price as my DH nearly lost his business (he is a male CM), this bully was actually our next door neighbour and he soon started verbally assualting the mindees when they were in our garden and throwing stones over the fence at them etc. the stress placed on our marriage was immense and every night when I came home from work I would dread finding out what had happened that day.

All against a background of my poor DS being attacked physically (apart from the one serious observed incident which was witnessed by anotehr parent as it was at the school gates we couldnt charge him again as he did it with no witnesses) and feeling completely helpless to actually stop it, because some people cut him slack because he had had a difficult childhood. This ranged from friends to professionals.

Im sorry you had to experience bullying yourself to.

[StraightTalkinSheila]

YABU. She needs to realise it is totally unacceptable to assault another person. She needs to accept that to taunt someone as she did is cruel.
She needs to accept that her actions have consequences.
Regardless of how difficult her childhood has been, it does not in any way excuse her behaviour. She is old enough to know that what she has done is wrong.
However, I do not approve of the ferocity of the comments against her, especially form adults, as that is tantamount to bullying itself.

[ThatVikRinA22]

blimey boobs you are forgiving. and good on you. you are unique and very lovely.

as the mother of someone who endured a fairly shit time through school i dont think im quite so forgiving....i think its harder to watch someone who love go through this shit on a daily basis.

but i agree - some of hte comments on this girl are uncalled for. i hope now she realises what it feels like to be a victim of abuse though....it might just make her think in future.

[Greensleeves]

So sorry you went through that BoobAlot

I don't hate the people who did it to me either. They were just angry miserable kids a long way from home (boarding school). But I will never get rid of it either. I used to open the door to the common room and get pelted with compasses, books, shoes, kicked, trapped under a chair with someone sitting on it and get deodorant sprayed into my face - we used to get told to go in there by the teachers, and I wasn't "allowed" in there because the boys said I was too disgusting. I wasn't allowed to sit with my year group in assembly either as I would get pelted with hymn books and my hair spat in, so I used to sit at the front with the first years. I stayed because my home life was even worse and that place was my only way out. But because I stayed, I was there when they grew up a bit and the bullying faded, and I worked hard to get to know those people, some of them even apologised when we all left.

I suppose I have clung to the fact that I don't hate them as an empowerment thing and I have definitely brought that with me onto this thread. BUT I can see, now it has been pointed out, that watching your ow child go through this is a totally different ball game. So I am sorry my comments were patronising and unhelpful.

[SirBoobAlot]

I haven't watched it, I don't want to - having the jist is enough.

I was horrifically bullied throughout school. I still get those pangs of fear in my stomach if I see them in the street. My life was hell, every single day. I was pushed down stairs, had my hair set on fire, was put in a box and kicked, had my arms pinned to the table in class so they could cut my wrists with a compass and screech "slit rat" at me.

But I don't hate the people that did that any more. At least, not by itself. People only do things like that because they have been taught it is okay, or because they are trying to escape from their own internal pain. So now I pity them, for whatever pushed them to behave like that.

And the more we label children with issues as lost causes, the more likely they are to let go of hope themselves, and become what they themselves do probably not want to be.

[Greensleeves]

admittedly my experience of really severe bullying is based on my own childhood, not my children's. if I think about it, yes, the picking on/ostracising my ds has had has been really mild by comparison, but it upset me much more and made me very angry. So I do see where you are coming from shesariver - I don't have experience of my child suffering what this poor lad or your ds have been through.

I wasn't trying to patronise you though. I just feel strongly that demonising young offenders doesn't help improve matters. But as you say, I have the luxury of a relatively detached perspective and I might be different if I had had my child being beaten up and terrified.

[saintlyjimjams]

Whilst not agreeing with the extreme responses & mob response (obviously), no I didn't feel sorry for her really. [competing interest: mother of a child with severe learning disabilities]

[Callycat]

Haven't seen the video. But she is a child, and therefore capable of change. Sadly, that change is much less likely to occur if she is publicly stamped as "bad". People are much more complex than that.

Gah, I've just seen too many "bad" people turn their lives around to be comfortable with this. We're all capable of badness under shitty enough circumstances.

[shesariver]

The Policeman that dealt with the charges we brought against him said he was the most manipulative liar he had ever seen in his career, some going.

[shesariver]

At no point did I say "piling on more hate and anger" is acceptable - Im talking about sympathy expressed for the bully!

Greensleeves - you have no clue what my DS and my family have been through, what I wrote was only a brief few sentences, so dont patronise me with all this "poor bullies " claptrap, society and what we do with them. There is no hope for the boy that terrorised my DS, he doesnt want to change as he gets far too much pleasure doing what he does. I will bide my time, as he wont always be a child and dealt with by the Childrens Panel system, one day he will be an equally bad adult who will undoubtedly kill someone, just very thankful its not my son. So he can rot for all I care.

[Greensleeves]

some of us have been through this ourselves shesariver, and can still see that piling more hate and anger into the situation is not contributing to a solution

what would YOU like to do? Lock up all the damaged children? There are too many, and there is nowhere to put them. We have to be grown-up and think smarter than that.

TBH this is why victims and their families DON'T get to make the decisions about what happens to perpetrators. Because if they did, we would be living in a very frightening society.