...To think the mum who attacked bullies is RIGHT?

[candidkate]

Just read this story

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/i-know-what-wrong-im-8870532

This poor mum has witnessed her DD be bullied for years. 15 school kids had the balls to even show up at her home screaming abuse, threatening to kill her poor DD! She comes home furious and attacks one of them, punching the other who tried to break it up.

I don't condone violence full stop. But these were 14 year old hardly little kids who do not know better. I'm sorry but I'm putting my hands on you before you ever harm my child!

It was a daunting situation - she had even called the police and what did they do? Nothing. Kids are killing themselves while schools and police twiddle their thumbs. Enough it enough!

If only I'd known when working with disturbed adolescents that were capable of awful things that I should have just punched them and that would have sorted everything out!.

Oh, no wait....It wouldn't.

Some really shocking posts on this thread and not the 'intended to shock' ones - believe me OP I am under no illusion of what happens on the streets/in schools/pupil referral units/adolescent secure units but never have I thought a teenager 'demonic' nor thought violence was the answer to violence.

It isn't. And our society is much more fucked than it already is if we entertain that idea for even a second.

well said always.

I would have done the same. OP, YADNBU.
To people doubting mother's words - if mother lied, how was she not jailed? Since when it's enough to say "they bullied my daughter" for court to say "oh, did they? I didn't know that. In that case it was justified and you'll get just few weeks of not actually being in jail."
Court would definitely request evidence and I'm sure mother had more than enough of it.

Indeed always

Do we really want to live in a society where adults are at liberty to punch children in the face if they personally think the child deserves it?

Where does it end? A two-year-old slapped my one-year-old last week at a toddler group. Should I have chased him around the room and punched him back?

finnbarrcar Clearly said you werent bullying and loads of people have disagreed with me none have been as rude as you.
Was again clearly saying it's funny how we will teach our kids one thing but act like bitchy kids on MN.
Once again - if you don't like the OP or what they have to say don't comment and be rude. You do know its okay to articulate yourself without insulting the other person? You shouldn't speak of miscarriages and suicide so callously x

Bullies are basically cowards though, often bullying stops when someone stands up to them. My DH told me that years ago when he was at school he was bullied by the same group of boys, always taunting and hitting him. Nothing would stop them.....one day DH thought enough is enough and punched the ring leader, the worst of the lot. The bullying stopped from that day onwards. IN my DHs case I'm certain he did the absolute right thing.

SaucyJack I really don't think it's a casual thing that's happened. I would never ever want to lay my hands on another human let alone a child and what she did is very serious.
Can i genuinely ask if you believe that sometimes people have been failed by the system? Do you think the people who have shared their horrific stories of being ignored have perhaps missed the mark? What did they forget to do?
One poster even had the GP write a note and took photos.
I'm not being difficult but I do believe in the hopelessness some people speak of.
Are you saying that under no circumstances would you have done what this mother did? None at all?

hyperbolic ranting about suicide and miscarriages?

Than is just about the nastiest, least compassionate, thing I have ever read on mn. Do you say such nasty things to people affected by such things in RL?

You are advocating violence against children.
No, Finbar, the bullies were advocating violence against children.There was about 15 of the brave souls against one. Nobody would stop it. The mother of the bullied one took steps to stop it, she was justified. They might have been children but they certainly weren't acting like children.
What was the mother supposed to do?

So, what if a 13 year old girl attacks me? I am an adult but small. There are 13 year olds bigger and maybe stronger than I am. What if a gang of them attack me? Am I not allowed to fight back?
If I knew a gang were outside my house who were going to attack my child, I wouldn't be trying to discuss it with them. If the police didn't come, I would do what I thought was right under those circumstances.

Yes, they are classed as children, but they are in a gang and threatening violence. As a child I would want a mother who did what this mother did.

AHEM

I love the way Olivia says AHEM.

Those of you who have witnessed good conclusions to bullying - what seemed to do the trick? What did school/police actually do that worked and made it stop? These sorts of stories make me feel sick - even more so when the story hits the news because the child committed suicide. I know it's not right to punch a 13yo but I also know I would find it very difficult in the circumstances to keep my cool. So what does work? What's good practice? I quite liked the idea of filming it and uploading it to the police (or Council) Twitter feed, but that again is a solution for when the shit has hit the fan irretrievably.

Violence doesn't stop violence though. It just leads to more violence.

As long as we have the idea that there are certain circumstances where violence is necessary or approved in some way then we will never get anywhere in actually tackling violence.

It's either wrong or it isn't - there can be no middle ground with such a serious subject which is multi-factorial and has such severe consequences.

You can't say that inflicting harm on another person is unacceptable but if they do it to me or my own enough/I feel justified/they deserve it...I can inflict harm on them.

Violence always, always has to be wrong because otherwise you're saying it's ok under certain circumstances and your idea of those circumstances will be very different to the next person.

To you, your child being harmed or threatened may be those circumstances. To another it may be the bloke who mugged their Nan. To another it may be finding your partner in bed with someone else. To another person it's being 'disrespected' in a pub or laughed at. To another it's their kids teacher giving them a detention. To another it's their wife flirting with a bloke in the street. To another it's their child giving them cheek.

Until we say no it is never acceptable EVER we can not in any intelligent or moralistic way say it isn't ok when a kid is being beaten by kids at school but punching one of those kids is ok.

And then the cycle can never be broken.

fakenamefornow Thank you for saying that. I'd describe being beaten to a pulp by a bullies resulting in a miscarriage as a lot of things but not hyperbolic. The same goes with an innocent 12 year old boy who hung himself with his school tie as his mum made dinner downstairs none the wiser.

Reading the M.E.N and the Facebook posts, it sounds as though the mum snapped, because her dd was the victim of systematic failings by the school and police. Possibly there is more to it, however the schools response to this hasn't been good at all.

Of course it shouldn't have come to this, and although I can't and won't condone it, I can understand why she did what she did.

The exact same thing happened to me when i was being bulllied, because I finally stood up and punched one of the bullies so about 20 of them came outside my house, chucking stuff, scratching our car.

Rang the police and they didn't come. Wasn't urgent apparently. They came 2 days later.

So my mum jumped in the car, went round to the parents - who weren't arsed. So my mum had to say if anyone put a hand on me or our property she would come round and take it out on them.

Not the most reasonable or responsible approach but it worked.

I really feel for this woman, obviously at her absolute wits end.

GraysAnalogy - sorry to hear that thanks for sharing. Theres so many people on this thread who have been failed by the system. Self defense and aggression come in different forms.Just because the mum threw the first punch doesn't mean she wasnt defending herself her kids and her home

candid I understand your passion about this and don't think you sound unhinged. It's something that hits home for a lot of us. I know my mum used to cry sending me to school, then even when i changed schools it didn't help.God help me when my child is older and goes to bigger school and may have these problems. I don't know what I'll do if the school and police are as supportive (aka useless) as they were with me.

It's very easy to see these 'kids' and innocent children who are just name calling. I know that the girls in my story had jumped adult women and took great delight in terrorising people.

But when there's retaliation they're suddenly innocent little girls again and can't believe how an adult would hit them

I think it's scary that for some people it has to get to this point for something to happen.

Always I understand and that's an interesting thought. But human nature will always give us some bad eggs....we must defend ourselves against them. What you speak of sounds like a Utopia to me...No disrespect it sound like a ideal as opposed to an ethos humans can live by. There will always be bullies, terroists, rapists, paedophiles etc...we must protect ourselves from them
I find it interesting also that no one has a response for what u do when the system fails.

GraysAnalogy You know what...The reason more so than anything why I'm so passionate is because my kids have to go to school....and I'm scared to think some parents think the way some of the posters do here. Because when it gets down to it...it's the parents to blame.
Finnbarr calling me hyperbolic is just the rhetoric that parents/teachers/police/social services spout to avoid any empathy, responsibility or guilt.
How does a child sit in front of a headmaster beaten black and blue and receive no justice? By being a drama queen that's how!

TooExtraImmatureCheddar I agree. While you are filing paperwork and the headmasters PA twiddles her thumbs telling you you have to wait a week to discuss your child your child is being beaten to a pulp and self harming. Sometimes even contemplating suicide.
I'd shut it down the say it starts by any means necessary. Even if i have to drive behind the ring leader and speak to threaten their parents. Even if i have to put my hands on them myself
As for the toddler anecdote - you cannot compare the actions of someone who's skull is still soft to that of a young adult who knows what they are doing.

Suicide is the worlds third highest cause of death for teens, so it's hardly hyperbole. It's a very real problem that we as a society need to start addressing on a larger scale. You only need to read the news and at least once a week you'll see a story of a child or teen taking their life due to bullying. It's very scary and I feel we're letting them down. I'm not really sure what the answers are to start solving it, but I do think training teachers nation wide on how to deal with bullying, recognising signs of depression in teens etc (if they don't already, like a universal way?). Because there has to be a reason why some schools are getting it right and some are failing so tremendously.

OP - the 'system' fails sometimes. Of course it does. I have been victim of it myself. It's shit.

But it's not a utopia I am talking about - In my mind it's the only solution but not one that I am naive enough to think will ever happen!.

If in 'defending' yourself from the people you speak of; you behave like them ..
then you become like them.

Then you can never be part of the solution, you become part of the problem.

I can't think in any other way because it is nonsensical. It's like advocates of the death penalty who seem to believe that killing another human being is the worst thing you could do and a sign of your lack of humanity so if you do it ..
...we'll kill you for it.

And believe me I understand pain and anger and the desire for revenge and to want the person who has inflicted pain to feel pain.

But it makes no sense at all to judge or condemn someone for causing harm to anyone else and think that the answer to that can ever be causing harm to them.

It makes NO sense.