From: rc@depsych.Gwinnett.COM (Richard Carlson)
Newsgroups: misc.kids
Subject: Re: Aggression in boys (Was: Re: BARBIE
Date: 13 Oct 92 12:48:41 GMT
Article-I.D.: depsych.uR3ksB2w165w

pburch@bcm.tmc.edu (Paula Burch) writes:

> 
> In article <TVHHsB1w165w@depsych.Gwinnett.COM>, rc@depsych.Gwinnett.COM (Rich
> |> lgsax@igc.apc.org (Lynn Gazis-Sax) writes:
> |> 
> |> > 
> |> > Girls *do* get attacked on school playgrounds often
> |> > enough.  I personally was attacked from first through
> |> > eighth grade...
> |> 
> |> Are you sure your memory is accurate on this?  My impression was
> |> that anybody who fought back wasn't bothered again.  Did two or
> |> more heavier girls  repeatedly attack you in the schoolyard, get
> |> hit back every time they hit you, and keep coming back?
> |> 
> |> Is it possible that either you didn't hit very hard or that you
> |> were doing something that made them dislike you.
> 
> Several boys in particular, fortunately only one at a time, kept coming 
> back and hitting me. Fortunately they wasn't big enough to hurt me badly 
> before the teachers interfered each time. I always hit back, in the face, 
> but I wasn't any great fighter. What was I doing to make them dislike me? 
> Not being as dumb as they thought I should be. (I can assure you that 
> it *wasn't* their way of saying they liked me.)
> 
> I expect you (Richard Carlson) didn't mean it that way, but your comment 
> came out sounding pretty offensive to me. You mean it was her *fault* she 
> got beaten up on so much? That's what it sounds like.

Bullies often say their victims were "asking for it" by "showing
off."  I got to wondering if the anti-intellectualism in American
life might have its origins in the classroom and the schoolyard in
the resentment of mediocre students for more capable ones.  Maybe,
I thought, a smart kid doesn't have to _do_ anything, may not talk
a lot in class, but just _being_ smarter might be enough to set
some bullies off.

Actually it's not what I found.  In the inner city among black
kids at any rate, the smart kids actually look up to the bullies
and look down on the nerds. That happens even if they _are_ the
nerds, although more often than not they, the smart kids, are
themselves the "bad" kids!  Then I realized that all I'd done was
replicate Terman's archaic 1920's finding that smart kids are
bigger, stronger and more socially skilled than average kids and
they do the things that society values.  If society values being
bad then the smart kids will be the baddest.

I'm sorry you found my comments offensive. But ask yourself this:
how do you begin to discuss victim behavior and characteristics
_without_ sounding like you're "blaming the victim."  The point I
was trying to make was that her "fighting back" was probably
counterproductive, even though she took evident pride in it.
Indeed when the muscularly weak wimp "fights back" all sh/e
accomplishes is to legitimate the aggression of the bully by
making it "mutual combat."  Of course I never had any idea of
anything else the wimp could do except possibly move to a
neighborhood where kids didn't fight.

--
Richard Carlson
Internet:              rc@depsych.gwinnett.COM
Bangpath:              {rutgers,ogicse,gatech}!emory!gwinnett!depsych!rc
CompuServe:            76605,470
Voice:                 (404) 881-6877