Grown-Up Bullying

There is a tremendous amount on the news and in talk shows lately about the epidemic of bullying going on in the United States today. The things that children are doing and saying to each other are horrifying, and yet we can't seem to put a finger on the causes of these horrible behaviors. Also, there is no shortage of people who will complain about the behaviors, but entirely too few who are willing to step in and put a stop to it when it is happening.

I have spent a lot of years studying and teaching psychology, and way too many years being the parent of a child who was bullied, almost to the point of suicide. I was lucky, I guess, in having the knowledge that my local school district would do nothing to help, so I quit wasting my time trying and transferred both of my children to a tiny private school, where there was zero tolerance for any form of bullying. It drained us financially, and got rid of any college funds we might have had, but we were rewarded with healthy kids who are doing well as adults. Thank you, scholarships and loans!

This essay, however, is not at all about the failings of our school systems, and the inability of adults to intervene when desperate help is needed. Those are problems being dealt with on an enormous scale right now, and I hope some corrective measures will develop as a result. What I find myself angry about at the moment is based on a psychological maxim that most adults have yet to learn - that children don't do as you say, they do what you do.

Now I will break one of my most basic rules in the design of this blog, and that is to never talk about politics. I am completely fed up with the way we "adults" practice politics in this country, and in the way the current candidates for office have run their campaign advertising designs into a bullying contest, may the meanest liar of them all be elected!

Where on earth do we get the idea that we must teach our children to treat each other with basic courtesy and understanding, even if we do not agree on some point or other, while at the same time we are name-calling and back-stabbing at our fellow adults in nonstop election TV ads, posters, radio spots, or speeches. This candidate calls his opponent an "ignorant airhead," while she fires back that he is a money-grubbing tax hog.

Another one insists that his opponent has misused public funds and lost thousands of jobs (Gee, it seems the economy had nothing to do with it - I wonder where he put them?). Then that ad is answered with the accusation of harboring aliens. Personally, I thought all of them had been corralled into Area 51.

I have heard more taunting, character assassination, name-calling and truth twisting in the last couple of months than I would expect in an average lifetime. The candidates have done a magnificent job of showing our young people that the one with the most capacity to bully is the one most likely to win. Every election season we make a big deal out of the problems with negative campaign ads, but every time that season rolls around again, we don't make it clear to our candidates that we won't tolerate that kind of behavior in the adults we are supposed to respect.

There are only a few days left in this election, and voting is already underway for this year's races. It may be too late to do anything about it this time. The next time there is an election, why don't we try something really radical - the first time we see a negative campaign ad, call the offices of the candidate running the ad and let his campaign workers know that you will not vote for that candidate unless he/she stops that kind of campaigning. Encourage everyone you know to do likewise. Tell them you don't care what the other guy did, you want to hear exactly what this candidate is going to do to make things better.

If an ad does slip through the radar and appear when the youngsters in your household are watching, take the time to let them know what a despicable thing it is to dump one's insecurity and small-mindedness on another human being instead of learning to deal with it in a positive and responsible fashion. Explain that only those with a very poor opinion of themselves try to belittle anyone else, to try to make themselves feel better.

Children are way smarter than we are. Without our bad behavior as an example, they might just learn to get along with one another instead of looking for any differences as a reason to bully. Political meanness is just as poor a behavior as schoolyard meanness. We all need to take a quick look in the mirror to see what types of grown-up activities we silently condone. Those are the behaviors the kids will learn to copy.