I guess BB thought they should let him do it first so that they can get some 'entertaining' highlights.
Because of course BB 'take bullying very seriously'.
Yes they do. They take it seriously in that they know that they've got to get into the HL show as soon as they get the opportunity.
It's taken seriously in as much as it takes priority over everything else when it comes to seeking attention grabbing TV highlights.

Then when they do retaliate they are made out to be the bad one like with James and the incident in the kitchen when 3 of them were constantly touching him and he asked them not to but they continued anyway -BB should have stepped in when he had to ask them a second time to stop

BB have, in my opinion, been failing in their duty of care for years now as they chase controversy and headlines.

I know it's going over old ground but they should have interceded in the 'David's dead' confusion right at the start, the second that Tiffany asked "David Guest" and Angie clearly hadn't heard the surname and said yes and Tiffany got hysterical. That was never going to end well for either of them and it didn't - first with Angie being vilified and then Tiffany. Angie was even sitting on the sofa after tiffany ran out saying "oh God, somebody help" or words to that effect and still they didn't do anything to calm it down like calling tiffany to the Diary Room or later on, replaying the conversation so everybody could know that Angie hadn't said "yes David Guest is dead" so deliberately misled Tiffany but also how Tiffany came to the wrong conclusion and it was neither of their faults.

You are missing the fact that Lewis is a Towie person and most of them are Rylans friends, it sickens me that he lets his Towie mates get away with murder on his show, as he did with Gemma Collins most of the time! The same goes for his Towie panel mates too, the blonde girl was on the other night and she was rather speechless when Lewis was getting boos after being shown a clip, but she eventually said that somebody was being personal about him. Mark Wrights sister is the same, they constantly make excuses for their mates! I am so sick of the Towie people in the house and on the panel they are so over the top!

To justify a proper debate show, they'd need a proper big brother main show rather than the towie wannabe it's become.

To talk about it so openly in the diary room, I can only think he's been lead down a merry path by the producers about it being a bit of fun for the show. Or he's wilfully playing the part. Or it is indeed a bit of fun, everyone is aware and involved, and the producers are dramatising it into something it isn't.

It's what they do. They're reality tv professionals hired for that very reason. Either the older lot are in on the game and play along, or the younger, reality tv trained lot, think that's what's happening when it isn't.

The reality tv lot are boring because they seem to only ever have one storyline in them when no one else is coming up with the ideas. Their storylines have been done a million times. But it's what the producers expected when they hired them.

We're never shown the full conversation. In context his words can have a different meaning. Maybe it was a threat of bullying, and maybe it was edited to appear that way.

Personally, I think the reality of the whole discussion was likely part of a light hearted conversation about joking around and having a laugh and it wasn't a threat of bullying. That seemed to be his tone to me. There's a reason you didn't see the question that lead to his response.

It was Bear but you are totally right I thought that too from Lewis - surely deliberately targetting a HM is bullying (and I hate to use that word)

Maybe thre is an Essex conspiracy!