Options
Were you a school bully?
woofwoof77
Posts: 2,166 Forum Member
✭✭✭
I'm just interested to know really.
I was bullied at school, I was a bit of an outcast but never bullied anyone myself.
How do school bullies feel about what they did years later? Say if you left school 10+ years ago. You had a bit of time to grow up, do you feel remorse, like you shouldn't have done it? Or do you feel it was just part of you growing up?
If you met someone you bullied years ago at school , who never bullied you back, would you want to speak to them, be friendly?
I was bullied at school, I was a bit of an outcast but never bullied anyone myself.
How do school bullies feel about what they did years later? Say if you left school 10+ years ago. You had a bit of time to grow up, do you feel remorse, like you shouldn't have done it? Or do you feel it was just part of you growing up?
If you met someone you bullied years ago at school , who never bullied you back, would you want to speak to them, be friendly?
0
Comments
no I wasn't and if i did meet someone in the street who did bully me in the past I would not talk to them, there are very few people from my school years that I wish to see again
For example, the kid at my school who (allegedly) got chewing gum stuck under his foreskin and had to go to hospital. He was ribbed mercilessly by all and sundry for many years afterwards.
I'm friends with loads on Facebook and we occasionally catch up...
My best mate has done very well since leaving and he drives a Merc E class and my other best mate spends most of his time looking after his daughter and taking her camping in his Iveco van with different colour panels ..
As for being a bully, absolutely not .. I was a BBC Micro nerd
I was never really one for sticking to a specific friendship group, I floated around school. One day I might spend time with people from my form, the next I'd spend time with people from two years below, or whatever.
The school offered mountain biking trips, and I'd been on a few. I was handy with a bike, in terms of repair and maintenance.
The teachers running the trip knew me quite well because I was on several sports teams, and one of them was my head of year.
Anyway, because of this, it got to the point where I'd go for free with the younger year groups, and act as a chaperone I guess.
I went once with a a group from the year below me, and ended up befriending a group who in their year group were I guess ostracised, they didn't have many friends, and were quite lonely.
Anyway, when we returned to school, they started following me around. It was a little..unusual. I spent my breaktimes playing football, and they used to stand and watch, and sort of cheer me on.
I guess it was kind of cute, but the people I played with bullied them mercilessly, they were called gay, and shoved around and even physically beaten.
I didn't know how to stop it, and I hated seeing them getting picked on like that, one of them was my sister's ex, and I'd always been fond of him.
Anyway, one day they were following me, and again, getting bullied because of it, so I shouted at them and said, "Will you just leave me alone already?"
Even now I can still see the sad little looks on their faces, and feel terrible.
They never spoke to me again. One of them even went to sixth form with me, when I was in year 13, he was in year 12, and he used to leave the common room if I entered, and it was so awkward.
Really, I should have stuck up for them, and I think it's that incident that led me to volunteering for BeatBullying, while it was still operational..
I actually felt a bit sad when I read the end of your post. I can imagine the regret you feel.
I was never bullied nor did I ever bully anyone else in school. I witnessed a lot of bullying but never joined in and never entertained the bullie by laughing along with them. At the same time I never said anything to stick up for the person who was being bullied.
It is difficult because you may end up getting bullied because you stuck up for someone being bullied.
My nephew starts secondary school this year and I just hope that he does not get bullied. I find it quite upsetting and it must be scary for parents sending their kids off to school.
Kids today are told they're being bullied if someone doesn't like them, or their football team, or their favourite tv show, or their hat or something.
Also, some kids who were/are 'bullied' are absolute ********s who deserve every bit of it. If everyone hates you, maybe you're the problem and it's not everyone else. Obviously I'm not saying that every kid who gets bullied deserves it but a lot do bring it on themselves. Most of it isn't actually bullying though, it's just very young people who haven't yet developed adequate social skill reacting to dickish behaviour.
When it happened, I was still in denial about my sexuality. They were being called gay and worse, because they were following me around. I stupidly worried that people would figure out that I was gay, and wanted to avoid it.
It might sound arrogant, but at the point it happened, I could have stopped it, and no-one would have questioned it.
I let my own insecurities cloud my judgement.
The funny thing is, around a year later, I did get outed, and that's when I started getting bullied.
I do wonder if I had come out on my own terms, whether it would have been different.
I also regret not sticking up for those boys. They were actually all straight, and I knew it, because one of them dated my sister, and another dated my sister's best friend.
I completely understand why the one that went to sixth form with me avoided me.
I just wish I had the opportunity to apologise to the three of them.
This post just reminds me how much I miss "Our Tune"
I was in a children's home and the only one at that time to pass the 11+ so in a way I felt like an outcast but certainly wasn't treated as such. Despite not being treated like an outcast I hated senior school, it was a very uncomfortable time for me It was an all girls school though.
No, I wasn't a bully.
It is very hard though being the only one (to stand up for them) against a group. However joining in with what others do is a different matter, that would have been even more wrong. I'm not saying you did that.
Deleted, not worth the comment.
I was selfish and childish, and I made my shit their problem.
A little while ago, I joined an abstinence based drug and alcohol service, and those three are actually on my making amends list.
Tragic stories full of regret were a staple on Our Tune. I used to love them.
I wouldn't say my post was particularly tragic. Certainly full of regret though.
I understand that some people are impacted for life because of the actions of bullies, but these type of people are very unlikely to have been a success anyway.
We are mammals, you have the alphas and the runts, just like all other life forms.
I was both at school. I went to a school that tended to attract the richer demographic (was a top school) and I got bullied in year 7 for not having the right trainers or bags (I had Gola trainers if I remember correctly). I had a fight with the bully and actually lost, but the bullying stopped immediately.
I then became a bully and I enjoyed it quite a lot. One incident I remember with humour is this one kid had saved up his paper round money to buy a Nokia 3210. He had been saving for about 6 months and proudly showed it off to everyone in our year. He left his phone in his blazer pocket so I found it, smashed it against my knee and put it back. I can still remember his face when he found out, he actually cried.
Another time this kid actually wet himself in assembly. ha ha ha, can you imagine that! I called him "pee your pants douglas" for the rest of his time at school. Can you imagine a 13 year old boy wetting himself? Some people deserve to be bullied, a kid who wets himself as a teenager is one of them.
I disagree completely.
No-body deserves to be bullied.
I wonder what "pee your pants" is doing now?
BIB: Covers it really. Bullying back in 1970 may be different to 'bullying' in 2015.
I was in secondary in the 80's and never really saw or received what I would term as bullying. Nothing worse received or delivered than 'ribbing' for very much the sort of 'out of the ordinary' things that happen from time to time in the way that particulalry boys (and continues as men) do. To someone else just the 'ribbing banter' might be their bullying, wereas it has to be sustained, maybe physical and plain nasty to hit my bullyometer. Never saw the latter in my school though. No doubt someone in some year was on the receiving end though.
Has just had a fairly ugly child and is working as a supervisor in Asda. Fairly nice kid though, just a bit simple.
Pretty much the same here. There was a lad who used to get really really wound up over quite small things and then he'd flip out and run around screaming and kicking and punching walls and stuff. I imagine today he'd be diagnosed with some kind of autism or aspergers. Just about everyone used to try and wind him up just to get the reaction out of him. I used to go along with it and wind him up sometimes. Other times at school though we'd be fine and get on OK.
I was never really bullied, I remember one lad always had it in for me and used to try and hit me and call me names and stuff but I always used to laugh it off and often purposefully went out of my way to wind him up as I knew it annoyed him.