Matt Gurney in the National Post pointing out that the instinctive response of many to bullying just isn’t a viable alternative for many or even most victims of bullying:
The federal NDP has reverted to type, calling for a national strategy to combat bullying. School boards and educators will no doubt develop strategies and zero-tolerance procedures. Counsellors will want to chat about mediating the disputes. Well-intended suggestions, all. But they all suffer from the same fundamental weakness — they can only spring into action once the victim further victimizes themselves. For many, the solution is as bad as the problem.
I’m referring, of course, to the mere act of asking for help. Bullying is an intensely degrading assault. It strips power and dignity away from the victim. Sometimes it’s crushing and sudden, other times it’s gradual, with the victim’s mental defences whittled away piece by piece. The end result, as we all know, can be a victim utterly convinced that everyone is staring at them, laughing at them, enjoying the defenceless, pathetic state they’ve been reduced to. The bullies themselves feed off the crushing of their victims, but the keen attention of the mob is what makes it so humiliating for those targeted. It’s not just a humiliation. It’s a very, very public one.
And it is in that moment of maximum vulnerability and humiliation that the students are supposed to further compound their embarrassment and signal their total defeat by appealing for help from a teacher or counsellor? Or even a parent?
[. . .]
If there is a way forward on bullying — I’m not sure there is, as much as we’d all like one — it will have to recognize the inherent advantage bullies possess. Their victims don’t want help. They might desperately need it, but asking for it is, for most, a step too far, an added injury they simply cannot contemplate. The only effective means of deterring a bully may lie with the observing mob becoming enforcers of an anti-bullying code. And as that seems unlikely, outrage notwithstanding, this is probably a problem we’re stuck with.
