Bullying: Parental intervention

“Why are you clobbering him,” Humza asks Mukhtar, as the latter is busy knocking the daylights out of a freshly admitted boy in the desolate section of a lobby in the boys section of a well-known private school of Karachi. “It’s so hot, I am going mad — do you want to take his place?” Mukhtar snaps back. Humza backs off, walks away and as soon as he turns right for the stairs, runs straight to the staffroom to inform the physical training instructor — because this guy is tough enough to control an overgrown eighth-grader who simply enjoys violence. Later in the evening, as Humza talks about the incident with his father — strange, he and his father do talk — the elder feels sorry not for the one who was beaten up but the aggressor. “There must be something that has tormented that boy. Has any teacher ever tried to find out anything about him? Maybe he comes from a broken family, subjected to violence at home or worse.”

Here comes the issue of profiling a bully. Such children come from almost every background with diverse traits that even seasoned school administrators would fail when it comes to profiling a bully. It’s true that bullies have problematic backgrounds like broken homes, bullying by siblings and revenge for not excelling in class.

Some students, whether they are boys or girls, pick on those who get better grades. They react to the negative attitude they receive from the teachers and take it out on the ‘good kids’ but these cannot be termed a formula. Human behaviour is diverse and two plus two does not always make four. However, there can be little doubt about one thing: bullying is a mental illness.

Victims have been known to suffer from anxiety and depression. They lose grades, their performance in sports is poor, and above all, they have little self-confidence and low self-esteem. In some instances, the victims of bullying have even committed suicide. The fear of the child being bullied is so intense that parents tend to become over vigilant. They must. But at times, the parents should also tell their child to stand up and fight.

The issue rolls back to point one — how to stop bullying. I don’t think it can be stopped. This behaviour is present in anyone who has a spine and a brain.

Should the parents become over-protective of their children or should we encourage them to show some spine and stand up for a face-off? In the latter case, please do make sure the child has enough pounds on his frame to bear a pounding.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 13^th, 2013.