Should I be proud or angry??

[Seymorbutts]

My 14 yo son is a blackbelt in Taekwondo. He worked really hard to get there, has always had a lot of discipline and regularly competes in competitions. It’s been drilled into him by his teacher and myself that the best way to avoid physical conflict is to walk away and Taekwondo also taught him de-escalation techniques and how to avoid getting into fights. It’s a sport for him. He’s never been in a fight other than the odd push or shove in the playground in his life…until the other day. A boy in the year above him has been “hassling” him for months, as he puts it. I’d call it bullying. He’s had racist abuse from this boy (DS is mixed race in a very white school) I’ve spoken to the school about this, nothing ever seems to change. The boy’s deliberately tripped him up a number of times, causing him to fall, taunts him, steals & hides his schoolbag, and has shoved him more than once. From what I know DS gives back as good as he gets verbally but has never retaliated physically. The other day however, this boy shoved him hard (not just according to DS, multiple witnesses also) against his locker and called him a horrible racial slur and DS finally cracked. He floored him with a kick to the head! The boy wasn’t knocked out or anything and according to DS he didn’t kick with full force but it did knock him to the ground. There was no real damage done, it wasn’t severe enough for him to go to hospital or even go home from school (the school didn’t find out about the incident till much later in the day). I’m in conversation with the school about it now and DS is temporarily suspended pending a final outcome but the other boy hasn’t been suspended. AIBU to be backing my son here? The other boy started it - he got physical first, my son was defending himself, he’s been bullied by this boy for months (who is far bigger and stronger than DS) including being racially abused and the school did nothing about it. IMO this boy had it coming. DS also used a controlled kick, deliberately designed not to do severe damage. I’d never usually defend my son using violence, other than in self-defence, especially because of how highly trained he is, but in this situation I feel it was warranted. As a black woman, if someone called me what that boy called my son (especially if they also shoved me like he did) I can’t say they wouldn’t get a flying kick to the head either! For that reason alone I can’t condemn him for doing what he did. I do feel uncomfortable with condoning violence but I also feel proud my boy stood up for himself AND managed to have the discipline in the heat of the moment not to hurt him more severely (which he definitely could of done). And part of me feels like saying to the school, well if you let racism go unchecked what did you think was going to happen?! Needless to say the boy won’t be bothering him again and he’s now a bit of a hero around school!

Unpopular opinion but is there a decent male figure in his life who can talk to him about this? Someone he respects/looks up to? It might mean more coming from them than his mum. Maybe even his coach at the club? As a woman I don’t understand the fighting mentality of boys, my husband talks of getting into self defence fights at school with bullies and he’s the most lovely man now he’s so kind. I’d struggle in this sort of conversation as I don’t fight/never have done/hate all this fighting stuff whereas he would give decent advice to a young boy on this topic I think.

Good for your son ….i fucking hate bullies…..

Don’t start what you can’t finish then? 🤷‍♀️

There is only so much bullying and taunting one can take. Your son seems to have been pushed to his limit. You are doing the right thing by supporting him, please don’t let anyone or the school tell you otherwise. I am proud of him and don’t even know him!

Yes, he floored him with the minimum force required to do so and then stopped attacking - that shows restraint and is strong evidence that it was self-defence on his part.

Result!

It's the only way to deal with bullies, and the only way to make schools shape up.

Sorry to follow the same path as MN posters and make your story about me, but I hope that this helps. When my DS was being bullied, I taught him basic self-defence tactics - chop under the nose so that the aggressor's eyes start watering and they can't see to stop you hitting them where you want. Break their fingers because it is easy to do & very painful, so stops the assault.

I also told him that if he got into trouble at school for following my training, I would support him against the school - very important point. I then wrote to the school explaining what I had trained him to do and why, and what my attitude would be if he had to defend himself.

The school weren't happy, and wrote to me as such. However, victims are restrained by fear of getting into trouble, and bullies don't care.

Later a bully hit DS in the school & DS responded by hitting him back (better) and he fell over a low wall and had to be taken to hospital in an Ambulance. Bully wasn't seriously hurt, DS was never bullied again.

Well done OP & OP son!

You should support him 100% he has done nothing wrong and has shown amazing restraint. He's followed his training to the letter.

Tell the school it is their fault for failing to address bullying and racism. I hope that racist little fucker is suitably chased.

Do not feel a second's guilt OP!

Fuck around and find out. The bully did this and found out.

I definitely agree that your son was wholly entitled to fight back - and I agree that the abuse he received was outrageous- but I think a kick to the head was too dangerous.

Do you have a very low level of reading comprehension?

OP the bully totally had it coming. Well done to your DS 👏 Sounds to me that the powers that be at the school are racist too 😢

It sounds like there were a lot more than 2 wrongs

Play stupid games win stupid prizes. I'm on his side.

I'd probably have a conversation about appropriate force, and that hitting the head is probably not the best idea - but I would 100% back his actions. He retaliated when the school had failed to keep him safe.

I’d be proud too !

Its good that your son now knows that he can stand up for himself. As the world becomes more divided, insecure people will select those that have obvious difference to what is percieved to be common will be more at risk. That will be race, but also gender "non-conformity".

You are right to be angry that your son felt threatened enough to resort to violence to defend himself. You should talk to him about not using violence in anger just to make sure that actually he wasn't reacting. Maybe tell his Tae Kwan Do leader so he can have a chat through with it.

You are also right to be angry that the school is not taking the provocation seriously. If they do not handle this well than that kid will just continue to take out his anger on other people.

But you can also be proud too. You son is able to defend himself, and he will learn from this what the threshold is. Good for him... sometimes people don't learn until they are given a slap.

Fwiw my husband is a senior black belt and an instructor. He would’ve also kicked the lad in the head. Sometimes the only way to stop a bully is to physically stop them, and to do so in a controlled fashion is probation the best outcome for everyone. If you have a paper trail of reporting the build up I would collate it and send it to school as evidence that this was a response to a long line of targeted bullying.

I hope your ds is ok and is back in school soon! 💐

I would ask the school about the recording of previous incidents - put a lot of pressure on them to find out how they have dealt with these incidents. Don't be fobbed off by excuses either. If you need to go to the LA about the issue.

In Scotland we can take out a court order after three incidents have happened which basically means the child who is bullying cannot go near the child he is bullying or he could be arrested. The police would definitely be involved in any new incidents.

Next time tell your son to wait til the boy is outside school and take care of him.

That counts for nothing if he cracks his head against a locker and an aneurysm occurs. He can control the force of impact, but not the resulting fall.

You definitely need to hold the school to account for their recording of racial slurs. I work in a school and this should absolutely be dealt with - race is a protected characteristic and I believe that racism remains on a student's record until they leave school. If the school aren't recording this, you should contact the governors.

100% proud. I'm even proud of him! As a fellow black belt in Taekwondo, he did what he was trained to do, defend himself. Ofcourse avoiding conflict is good advice but sometimes self defence is needed. He could have done far worse but stopped after one hit. I've competed also and know how it can be hard to stop/be softer once the adrenaline kicks in, especially if the other person has been abit underhand.

This is 100% a school issue. They could have prevented it. They should have made sure your son didn't need to defend himself. He's there to learn, not to be bullied. They are the ones at fault, alongside the bully. Your child did what they couldn't, he defended himself in an unwarranted attack.

Good lad for having the confidence

Fwiw, I wouldn't use a kick to the head as my first port of call though as it's unpredictable in its outcome. There's many people who have died from even one punch, depending on where they were hit and how they landed. I was told, because we're trained, we'll be more under scrutiny from the police than a general person would be, if it went wrong. But hopefully his reputation now will stop any further bullying.

We had a similar situation, my son retaliated but unfortunately for the aggressor my son has done kickboxing since he was 4 (now 12)
the school put him in isolation but not the other child who actually started it as cctv showed. I backed my son! I understood they had a zero tolerance approach to fighting and that’s why he was in isolation but just because my son was skilled enough to throw a few kicks and punches whereas the other child had pushed and shoved he got the punishment. I told the school that he was not in trouble with me and I expect him to always stick up for himself! It’s exactly how bullying starts. Your son did the right thing and I’ll put money on that child never bothering him again!!

I'm inclined to agree.
I don't blame your son for finally putting the racist bully on the floor, but there are safer ways to do so.
Be proud of him for handling the abuse as well as he did for so long, be proud of him for standing up to him, but I wouldn't be OK with the way that he did so.

How lucky the racist bully was that his shoving OP's son around didn't cause serious damage when he shoved him hard against the lockers, eh? OP's son might easily have hit his head as a result of that uncontrolled violence.

Absolutely, but there are reasons we don't operate an eye for an eye punishment in this country

Admit I don’t know anything about Jiu Jitsu only the training my family members underwent for years where one of the 5 tenants was Guk Gi, which is the ability to control one's body, mind, emotions, impulses, and behavior. - of course all teachers were available to discuss with students how difficult it could be to control one’s emotions and actions and I have acknowledged that when there is horrible bullying going on this will be difficult to control oneself - this does not negate though the fact that there may be repercussions to his actions ( I have not mentioned how I personally feel only that this may be an issue for his future training.

Not the point. Everyone is going on about how wrong Son was to kick the bully, once and in a controlled way; the bully had been using violence against Son for quite a while and is lucky none of it had serious consequences, isn't he. Suppose when he pushed Son over, Son had cracked his skull! We ought to be being shocked about that possibility, shouldn't we.