New Local Law Says Parents of Bullies Must Pay Fines if They Don’t Control Their Kids

[Canpinter]

I expected "ex"-bullies to arrive en masse. I was not wrong.
So sad, so predictable.
This law is good. All depends on the actual implementation. Some at least will think twice before doing something to another one, if at home they will be punished because parents had to pay 1k $.
P.S.
And, of course, we have those, who still havent grown up and think that everyone can "stop being pussies" and stand up to bullies. Out of touch with reality, it seems.

unless the reason the kid is a bully is because they are getting abused in some way at home then the problem will only get worse

[Lenonis]

Yes, it will create weak coddled children that will fail as soon as things are not going exactly their way, and fall apart when someone calls them stupid for not knowing something.

No. Coddling children creates coddled children. Subjecting children to bullying just creates trauma. Why is it so freaking hard to understand that children can learn all sorts of life lessons without being bullied??

Why is trying to stop bullying being equated to not allowing children to fail, or to lose, or to experience hardship? It's nonsense and pathetic that people are trying to justify kids beating up and mocking other kids.

This is not excusing bullying

that is exactly what you are doing.

[Canpinter]

Why is trying to stop bullying being equated to not allowing children to fail, or to lose, or to experience hardship? It's nonsense and pathetic that people are trying to justify kids beating up and mocking other kids.

that is exactly what you are doing.

except that's what a lot of people are defining as bullying now, when i was i grade school, not wanting to let someone join a game you where playing was considered bullying.

[Lenonis]

except that's what a lot of people are defining as bullying now, when i was i grade school, not wanting to let someone join a game you where playing was considered bullying.

I suppose that's where people who are reasonable need to step in and set some guidelines. I'm pretty sure 90-95% of people would agree the following would be bullying:
-Physical violence that isn't in self defense
-Repeated verbal attacks that are demeaning in nature (fatty, retard, fag, nerd, etc.)
-Threats of violence or of public humiliation

Seems like a reasonable set of definitions to start with at least I'd say. You'd necessarily need a case-by-case decision though.

But there are also some things that aren't bullying:
-Not letting someone join your group for lunch.
-Not inviting someone to a party.
-Not inviting someone to your study group.
-Essentially not inviting someone to any non-public event, group, or social occassion. (including games at recess)

[Deleted]

Which comparison I made the first time around? Are you confusing me with someone else?

And fining parents for repeated bullying offenses (read the op) makes great sense. You ARE being ridiculous if your argument is that, "oh kids are mean, the world is cruel, best not to even bother in the first place"

"toughen up" as a philosophy in life will only take you so far, and in your reasoning, blames the victims of bullying rather than the bullies themselves.

I work in a district where I saw one student bullied to near suicide because he turned in a stupid kid for making a school shooting threat. Should we just tell him to "toughen up" because the friends of a kid who threatened a school shooting decided to wage an online and real-life bullying campaign against him?

or would it be more reasonable, having evidence, to fine the families that let this behavior go on unpunished?


get real please

Sorry i did confuse you with the poster that the bit you quoted was aimed at, and if you read that it will make more sense.

No, fining parents for repeated bullying of their children will not in anyway make the children stop with bullying, if anything it will increase. No, that is not my argument, if you had read the comments you would have know this much.

"toughen up" is something we all have to do at one point in our lives. This isn't blaming victims of anything, this is them learning to cope with life. Being picked on is something that is just part of growing up, finding your standing in the social ladder. No, its not fair, life isn't fair.

Right, that is a nice extreme, now on the other extreme end you have a kid dressing like a freak in my little pony shirts at the wise age of 16 while sporting his WHAM lunchbox, dancing through the halls. Are students not allowed to make remarks about this?

And good sport, if you work there and you see this happen, why not help the kid? Because if it got this far then clearly something didn't work as intended.. But ultimately then, yes, he needs to toughen up, if people can't handle some assholes poking at them then this is their problem. And if it goes further then this to a point of harassing the guy, that is illegal, and you can go to the police for that.

No, it would not be more reasonable to fine families that probably can not afford it. If they are raised in a way that condones bullying then your fine isn't going to help, solve the problems, that helps. Find the root of the problem and address it, as someone working at a school, it is your job.

[Canpinter]

I suppose that's where people who are reasonable need to step in and set some guidelines. I'm pretty sure 90-95% of people would agree the following would be bullying:
-Physical violence that isn't in self defense
-Repeated verbal attacks that are demeaning in nature (fatty, retard, fag, nerd, etc.)
-Threats of violence or of public humiliation

Seems like a reasonable set of definitions to start with at least I'd say. You'd necessarily need a case-by-case decision though.

But there are also some things that aren't bullying:
-Not letting someone join your group for lunch.
-Not inviting someone to a party.
-Not inviting someone to your study group.
-Essentially not inviting someone to any non-public event, group, or social occassion. (including games at recess)

true the problem is we are seeing a slow moving away from the "reasonable person" standard and more and more to the "whatever the victim feels is bullying" standard.

[Lenonis]

true the problem is we are seeing a slow moving away from the "reasonable person" standard and more and more to the "whatever the victim feels is bullying" standard.

And that needs to stop. But the argument that we've gone too far so we shouldn't try to stop any bullying isn't valid either.

[Canpinter]

And that needs to stop. But the argument that we've gone too far so we shouldn't try to stop any bullying isn't valid either.

but until we go back to a reasonable standard its also not a good idea to put more tools in the hands of those who would misuse them. this law is going to do more harm then good in all likelihood

[Lenonis]

"toughen up" is something we all have to do at one point in our lives.

I don't understand at this point how you still think you aren't defending bullying. I'm not arguing that some element of "toughening up" is needed -- for reasonable things like failing a test, not getting invited to the cool kid's party, or whatever. But asking a kid to "toughen up" who is beaten up after school, or publicly humiliated in the hallway by a group of kids calling him names is just cruel and completely devoid of any empathy. That is not behavior we should consider acceptable in our kids.

Right, that is a nice extreme, now on the other extreme end you have a kid dressing like a freak in my little pony shirts at the wise age of 16 while sporting his WHAM lunchbox, dancing through the halls. Are students not allowed to make remarks about this?

There is a huge range of reactions from normal to unacceptable. Snickering to yourself or joking with your friends about the weird kid is just kids being kids. But publicly humiliating that kid? Beating him up? Why is that acceptable? Just because he's a little weird?

Your comment about going to the police is problematic because a) these kids are minors and b) the whole problem with allowing bullying is part of it is the threat of more violence if kids go to authorities or speak out about it. Because people like you defend bullying it perpetuates the cycle where people feel that if they speak up they'll just be told to "toughen up" and then get twice as much bullying because they spoke up.

I have to wonder if you've ever been bullied to have the stance you do. Maybe you were on the other side of it eh?

[Turtlewithnoshell]

I hope it doesn't go so far as to fine people for name calling...

[Lenonis]

but until we go back to a reasonable standard its also not a good idea to put more tools in the hands of those who would misuse them. this law is going to do more harm then good in all likelihood

That's why I started by saying the law would need to be written in a way where it can't be misused. That's actually not hard to do if you put in effort to make it a clear law with specific enforcement rules/principles.

[Dextroden]

I suppose that's where people who are reasonable need to step in and set some guidelines. I'm pretty sure 90-95% of people would agree the following would be bullying:
-Physical violence that isn't in self defense
-Repeated verbal attacks that are demeaning in nature (fatty, retard, fag, nerd, etc.)
-Threats of violence or of public humiliation

Seems like a reasonable set of definitions to start with at least I'd say. You'd necessarily need a case-by-case decision though.

But there are also some things that aren't bullying:
-Not letting someone join your group for lunch.
-Not inviting someone to a party.
-Not inviting someone to your study group.
-Essentially not inviting someone to any non-public event, group, or social occassion. (including games at recess)

Time to down the list.

-What actually qualifies as physical violence? I was suspended for Slapping a kid's hand away in middle school for trying to take my pizza.
-Is it bullying if a bunch of kids just call a kid a tree? No jokes about it. Just saying they are a tree.
-"I'm gonna hit you if you don't leave me alone." Is that kid the bully since he threatened violence?

This is why zero tolerance is all nonsense.

[Canpinter]

That's why I started by saying the law would need to be written in a way where it can't be misused. That's actually not hard to do if you put in effort to make it a clear law with specific enforcement rules/principles.

i will be very pleasantly surprised if they do something to make it clear and specific as these type of laws are often left vague so they can be enforced at the discretion of those in charge.

[Lenonis]

Time to down the list.

-What actually qualifies as physical violence? I was suspended for Slapping a kid's hand away in middle school for trying to take my pizza.
-Is it bullying if a bunch of kids just call a kid a tree? No jokes about it. Just saying they are a tree.
-"I'm gonna hit you if you don't leave me alone." Is that kid the bully since he threatened violence?

This is why zero tolerance is all nonsense.

I never advocated for zero tolerance (I know you are responding to something else) and in fact stated that each situation would need to be evaluated individually with a significant expectation of proof.

Obviously, to any reasonable person, the situations you outlined would not be bullying (I'm confused about the tree thing though!).

I'd advocate starting with the really obvious bullying. People here are acting like every case of bullying is grey, but some is very clear black-and-white. If we can't get an agreed upon approach for 100% of situations then go for the 80-20 rule.

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i will be very pleasantly surprised if they do something to make it clear and specific as these type of laws are often left vague so they can be enforced at the discretion of those in charge.

Yeah -- although the courts have and will throw out laws if they are too vague.

I think, to everyone's point, these laws can be potentially good if written and executed well, and potentially a nightmare if done sloppily and arbitrarily.

The point, which seems to have gotten lost in the details, is we really should do something about the more egregious cases of bullying in schools today -- especially now that cyber-bullying is so easy to do. (And before someone jumps on that -- yes, people can change their phone numbers or get off facebook or whatnot, but that's a form of victim blaming.)

[Regia]

Kids who bully usually are experiencing some type of abuse at home.

Let's solve it by giving abusive parents the incentive to beat the hell out of their kids more, because they're pissed about paying a fine for their kid acting out like a kid does...I'm sure that will help!

[Deleted]

I don't understand at this point how you still think you aren't defending bullying. I'm not arguing that some element of "toughening up" is needed -- for reasonable things like failing a test, not getting invited to the cool kid's party, or whatever. But asking a kid to "toughen up" who is beaten up after school, or publicly humiliated in the hallway by a group of kids calling him names is just cruel and completely devoid of any empathy. That is not behavior we should consider acceptable in our kids.

There is a huge range of reactions from normal to unacceptable. Snickering to yourself or joking with your friends about the weird kid is just kids being kids. But publicly humiliating that kid? Beating him up? Why is that acceptable? Just because he's a little weird?

Your comment about going to the police is problematic because a) these kids are minors and b) the whole problem with allowing bullying is part of it is the threat of more violence if kids go to authorities or speak out about it. Because people like you defend bullying it perpetuates the cycle where people feel that if they speak up they'll just be told to "toughen up" and then get twice as much bullying because they spoke up.

I have to wonder if you've ever been bullied to have the stance you do. Maybe you were on the other side of it eh?

Because if was defending bullying i would say something like "Fuck em they deserve it", but im not saying that now am i? If you are beaten up then you need to go to the police, specially if it happens more often. But, if you are humiliated by something, that is definitely something you should toughen up from. You do not seem to understand that we are not born with social skills, they need to be learned. Social standing within a group is something from a very young age, bullying is something that is a natural part of it. Most people get over it, some do not, but it is not something that you can "ban' just because you do not like it.

Right, you can talk behind his back that is all okay... the morality.. The point is, everyone who doesn't conform to the status quo will have to be able to take a punch. And right, going to the police is problematic because they get beaten up again, nice circle jerk.. I'm not defending bullying, that is something you make of it. I'm merely saying that it is something you can not remove from schools no matter how hard you try.

No need to wonder, been bullied for 9 years straight. And ultimately i needed to toughen up, learn not to react or how to react to the bullying to make it stop. You just can't expect the whole world to take your sensitivities into account, if and when something pisses you off (this goes for bullying, not for every other bad thing you come across) then you are the one that needs to change, not the rest of the world. This isn't about preventing it, because you simply can't, this is learning how to deal with it, it is the best and only thing that you can do.

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Kids who bully usually are experiencing some type of abuse at home.

Let's solve it by giving abusive parents the incentive to beat the hell out of their kids more, because they're pissed about paying a fine for their kid acting out like a kid does...I'm sure that will help!

Exactly, should work wonders /s

[Lenonis]

Because if was defending bullying i would say something like "Fuck em they deserve it", but im not saying that now am i?

No. you aren't defending bullying in that manner...but you are still defending it.

But, if you are humiliated by something, that is definitely something you should toughen up from.

Gotcha. So if you are hit, then it's bad, but if you are repeatedly publicly humiliated every day you go to school, that's perfectly ok and we shouldn't do anything to stop it. Do you have any idea how damaging that is to kids? Any clue at all?

You do not seem to understand that we are not born with social skills, they need to be learned.

From being repeatedly publicly humiliated?!? WTF sort of social skills is that supposed to teach other than making bullied kids turned into introverted anxious adults? What a weird illogical stance you have.

Right, you can talk behind his back that is all okay... the morality..

Yup. Because immoral or not 1) it's not harming the kid directly like humiliation and 2) I'm not interested in becoming the thought police.

The point is, everyone who doesn't conform to the status quo will have to be able to take a punch.

I'm not defending bullying

I give up.

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No need to wonder, been bullied for 9 years straight.

I don't believe that for a second.

Or is this like one of those situations where kids who were physically abused by their parents become physically abusive towards their own children?

[Rooflesstoofless]

Dumbest shit I've seen in a while.

Sometimes bullies are really good at playing the victim when persons of authority come around. Teachers and school officials can be very biased in establishing who is the actual bully as well.

Where my kids go to school there is a kid with one fucked up eye. He taunts and ridicules and hits other children and as soon as one of his victims respond he goes running to the teachers or principle with tears in his eyes. He is technically "disabled" so people by into his bullshit victim complex. It wasn't till several parents called the school out on their obvious biases when dealing with that child did they stop labeling everyone but him a 'bully'.

I sure as hell wouldn't pay a dime to the state because my kid bothered to stick up for herself against a kid that knows how to play adults like a fiddle.

[Kapadons]

I've always wondered why schools didn't have a separate class room just for kids that are repeatedly accused of bullying. Get 20 bullies in a room and let them bully each other to see how it feels. But I would also approve of a counselor being allowed to take a kid that bullies people non stop into a back room and punch em in the face.

[Triggered Fridgekin]

But I thought we can fight and end bullying by wearing pink shirts.