Quote:
Originally Posted by DrPhil
Maybe my parents were more kick-ass but they never completely relinquished control over my outcomes to other adults.
Parents need to remember that they have more of a vested interest in their child's well-being than the school and cops ever do. Don't sit back and wait. That might require going to the school for an early lunch break, putting your child in a self-defense program, or taking the kid to a new school (I wouldn't want my kid in a school full of adult idiots, anyway).
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Yep.
And I sort of see what DeepImpact is saying as well, which, I think, is that kids themselves should be prepared to do what they can to avoid continuing victimization or extending that victimization to suicide. The bullied kid is in no way to blame, but the bullied kid can be taught how and helped to cope.
I apologize if someone has already pointed this out, but we've got to remember that the actions that are taken, laws passed, etc, are still going to be implemented in the very imperfect world of the public schools, and that we need to adjust our expectations accordingly.
I think it's important to serve notice to schools that they are legally obligated to address this behavior, just as it was apparently important to make them realize they had to protect kids form sexual harassment by other students. But you know that this is going to lead to a lot of messy situations when schools are going to seem to be overreaching into students' personal lives, overreacting, etc, applying misguided zero tolerance rules, whatever.
Just as Dr. Phil noted about her own experience, sometimes bullying is not as clear cut as it appears to have been in this high profile cases. Sometimes the bullied kid is also a bully. It's likely to be a huge non-instructional time-suck for the schools to handle it, but apparently a necessary one.
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