Are some people just life's victims?

[BusyGreySnail]

I am giving this a lot of thought at the minute. My daughter is being bullied in school (lots of seperate incidents involving different kids) and she was at primary too. I am trying to figure out why it keeps happening and even being really critical of her own behaviour/ contribution to the situations I can't help reach the conclusion that there is something about her that just makes her one of these kids that bullies target (possible neurodivergence so I can see that, objectively, she doesn't read social situations very well, can come across as annoying, and is sensitive so reacts to meanness).

Do you think this exists? That some people just find themselves continually being victims of bullying/ meanness?

Having been a teacher, it sounds like a situation where your DD somehow stokes up conflict - knowingly or unknowingly - with other children who are volatile. IME most children know when other children are best avoided and quickly understand when an argument is becoming too heated and it's best to back down, but it may be the case that your DD isn't good at picking up on those signals and so either keeps going or says something that sends the other child/children into a rage. Does she have a strong sense of justice? Is she quite rigid in how she expects things to be? She might not be aware of 'not crossing the line' - ie she may say things that other children wouldn't say because she's not aware of the effect it might have. How good is she at conflict resolution at home?

No. No-one needs to be bullied, no-one benefits from it. There are no ‘lessons’ other than that people can be utter shits. The psychological damage can, although it hopefully doesn’t always have to, shape someone’s entire adult life. I have friends in middle age who are still visibly dealing with the fallout of teenage bullying. I am finding this thread so disturbing. Bullying someone is a choice, the responsibility for it always lies with the bullies.

If some of the posts on here were about a woman who had been raped, trying to work out what she’d done to ‘provoke’ it, I’d hope people could see more clearly how awful some of the posts on here are. Bullies have agency. The choice not to bully is always available to them.

Oh god please don’t suggest anyone do that.

If she has copies of the messages then go to the police. Just because she’s at school and they’re kids it’s not unserious. They’ve threatened violence.

As I said OP bullies do usually exclude more than one person, so chances are there are a few stragglers having the same issues. Can she round them up as an alliance? She might have more in common with them than she realises. Often these girls aren't very bright (may be able to do exams but not emotionally savvy) and go for clever kids who as others have pointed out, are highly attuned to justice. This is why I think bullies stunt their own growth, clever ones feel they have to hang around with the dim-wits or be at the other end of the bullying. That is the choice they make that can keep them stuck in this cycle for life, wondering why they never have any real friends.

It worked for my relative. The bullies backed off and left him alone.

Sometimes you need to call people out on their behaviour and make it clear you won't accept it. 'Being the bigger person' is often poor advice for children being bullied imo.

I don’t think anyone should be the bigger person but I have second hand embarrassment reading that. That would perpetuate any bullying hugely!

Yeah, agree. Long term bullying has lifelong physical and psychological effects that often people never recover from. It needs to be stopped as soon as possible by whatever means work. Victims and parents standing up to it and nipping it in the bud is the only real option.

He'd already suffered for months by this point. He was well and truly over the embarrassment to himself, but the bullies didn't like the embarrassment to them.

Say what you like, it worked. Bullies rely on their victims feeling ashamed and keeping quiet. Speaking up works.

You say your DD puts messages on TikTok and has sent mean messsged but no worse than others her age. Are you excusing her behaviour

From a teachers point of view, there are many complicated issues that contribute to social problems. Children with social difficulties find it much harder to pick up in social cues. For example, they find it harder to choose more sympathetic friends, they can be unwilling to follow the game/activity conversation in the way the group wants to, they can laugh at others when they get something wrong or do something embarrassing, they are more likely to overshare embarrassing stuff about themselves or others, they can also lack empathy and be nasty to others. Obviously, none of this is the child's fault but it does mean they run into difficulties, other children don't want to work with them and they sometimes get bullied.

You also get children who are clearly very vulnerable or different in some way and they can get bullied, but this is almost always by other children with issues. The well adjusted happier children tend to be kinder.

There are also plenty of children who struggle a bit at first but end up finding friends and get on well with others. They sometimes need to be helped to get into the right group, class or extra curricular clubs. Once they have had a bit of a helping hand, they are fine.

13 year olds can be quite hard work but it sounds like your daughter might need a bit of help navigating social situations and choosing who she is friends with. It doesn't sound like she has enough sense of self preservation for the people she spends time with. If might be good to get her involved in clubs where she is more likely to form positive friendships. Hopefully she can make a fresh start at a different school.