[yetanotherphd]

Unfortunately bullying by its nature is not a very popular political issue.

Conservatives (somewhat correctly) consider bullying to be part of how society maintains is social structure.

Progressives only consider bullying through the lens of oppressed groups, not individuals who are targeted for their perceived/actual difference or weakness. They don't identify with individual rights and self-defense as these are seen as libertarian issues.

Furthermore, to admit to being bullied as often interpreted as admitting to weakness. That is why it is easier to champion people who have some extrinsic reason for being bullied (e.g. being gay, or some other minority).

However, I suspect the severity of bullying is gradually lowering simply as a result of society becoming more prosperous and adopting middle class lifestyles and values.

[mayanksinghal]

> how society maintains is social structure

I grew up in India. My schools had no bullying at all. And we still had a (much weaker) social structure, the popular ones, the slightly-dangerous ones (those I would avoid hanging out with) and the not-so-popular ones (like those who would spend time on a computer instead of meeting up for sports). Bullying is not universal. Neither is it necessary.

[skwirl]

According to a Microsoft survey, India is the third worst country in the world for online bullying[1]. The same survey showed that 54% of Indian students report being bullied offline, and 50% report having bullied someone offline. I think you are quite mistaken in your assessment of your schools.

Studies have shown bullying to be universal among not only humans, but all primates and many social mammals[2] (such as rats and dolphins). Among human societies, bullying is present across the board, from hunter gatherer groups through post industrial societies.

That isn't to say that it can't or shouldn't be dealt with, but you are dead wrong when you say it isn't universal.

[1] http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd...

[2] http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2011/12/15/th...

[yarou]

It may be universal, but as you yourself suggest, it is highly dependent on cultural constraints. To talk of bullying in India without understanding communal tensions is ignorant and takes away from the rest of your valid points.

[TheBiv]

I am not quite sure of your definition of 'somewhat' however giving a mild amount of justification for treating others wrongly simply bc they don't confirm to your standards of 'correctness' is not justifiable.

[yetanotherphd]

I meant they are somewhat correct in their belief that bullying is a part of our social fabric. But I don't endorse bullying, rather I think that there is something wrong with our society.

It is not an uncommon (again, I don't endorse this viewpoint) for people to say that bullying is a normal part of growing up, and that it helps strengthen people's character, etc. I don't think people who say this are being 100% honest. I think if they were honest they would say that bullying is a way to identify the weakest or least socially capable 10% of people, and that if you don't fall into this category, then it's a great part of the growing process to find out you belong to the 90%.

[Dewie]

> I meant they are somewhat correct in their belief that bullying is a part of our social fabric. But I don't endorse bullying, rather I think that there is something wrong with our society.

Of course it's part of the social fabric of wherever it happens and goes unpunished. This seems like saying "this is a thing that happens", which feels like a truism.

Like you're saying, it isn't something that should be encouraged or that should go unpunished. If there is something beneficial about it, then that is probably just a symptom of something else that is wrong with society, which forces/enables the bullying.

[yetanotherphd]

Well it's not surprising it seems like a truism to you, since a big part of conservatism is maintaining the status quo.

But to be more precise about the benefit that conservatives see in bullying: bullying can be thought of as a social pressure not to be (1) weak and (2) different. I know some people will think that I am blaming the victim with (1), but I'm not. I was bullied in school, and I was physically weak and tended not to stand up for myself. Many of my friends were the same. Anyway, many people see discouraging (1) and (2) to be good things. (1) because society needs people (at least) men to be strong and vigorous in order to prosper and fight external enemies, and (2) because if there is no pressure to conform, people might do anything they liked and completely ignore societal norms.

[Dewie]

> Well it's not surprising it seems like a truism to you, since a big part of conservatism is maintaining the status quo.

Even conservatives have to give convincing arguments as to why the status qou is good.

> I know some people will think that I am blaming the victim with (1), but I'm not. I was bullied in school, and I was physically weak and tended not to stand up for myself.

Having been a former victim does not preclude one from blaming current victims. In fact, it can be a badge of honour; that the fact that they are not a victim any more is because of their own volition.

> (1) because society needs people (at least) men to be strong and vigorous in order to prosper and fight external enemies

That's what conscription is for. Or, if society can't be sold on slavery, encouraging activities that foster strength.

The concept of bullying is the direct opposite of something like a military organization. Bullying is, at least in the school yard, more like a disorganized and "wild habitat"; people who are "strong", either by social status or physical strength, pray on the weaker. A military organization is highly hierarchical and rank is based (ideally) on merit within the organization. It is also based on submission to your superiors orders, not seizing every opportunity you can to take them down a peg by putting them in a headlock and assuming their former status (rank).

What kind of person is more likely to be sent to a disciplinary institution; a bullying rebel, or a meek and weak individual? Probably the former.

(And I could tell you some things about bullying in the military. But let's just say that it isn't terribly good for morale, nor for anyone's safety when there is a lot of ill emotions and everyone has weapons at their disposal.)

> , and (2) because if there is no pressure to conform, people might do anything they liked and completely ignore societal norms.

When people that violate social norms in a way that upsets others are taught a lesson or shamed into correcting their behaviour, that is called reprimanding, not bullying. It is, if successful, a one time affair. Bullying is more of a regular thing, sustained over a time period, in the same general location.

If people get reprimanded for silly things that does not hurt anyone, but is just part of who they are... then yes, that's bullying. But then we're back in the silly domain of conformity-for-conformities sake. An argument that you have presented, but supposedly does not agree with, because you're doing that whole devil's advocates thing I guess. Nonetheless, I don't agree with it, nor do I find anything much to be agreeable with it, even if I were to be a so-called conservative.

[yetanotherphd]

On my motivations, society does allow bullying to happen, and the discrepancy between what it allows to happen to children in the context of bullying, and what it allows in most other cases, requires an explanation.

This requires putting oneself in the shoes of the people responsible for this situation, including people who minimize the importance or harm of bullying, people who justify it outright, and people who silently ignore the issue.

In doing so I am going to argue that given certain assumptions (both positive and normative), bullying should be permitted or justified. That is the inevitable outcome of being intellectually honest.

You claim there is a difference between upholding social value through reprimand, and bullying. I couldn't tell if being "taught a lesson" referred to violence so I won't assume either way. If it didn't refer to violence, then in an individualistic society like ours, people could just ignore it. Maybe in Scandinavia a verbal reprimand is enough, but not in the rest of Europe or the English speaking world.

And yet a free for all of violence would not work either (which seems to be the straw man of bullying you are using in your argument). Bullying is not only violence and the establishment of a pecking order, and also not only punishing violators of the social code. Rather it is doing these things together in a complementary way. The social code is respected because it comes from the most dominant people, and the violence is justified because it also helps cement the social code.

This explains why schools and prisons punish people who defend themselves against bullies more than the bullies themselves. To defend yourself is anti-social violence. Furthermore, as students get older, this social order morphs into the actual social order of the adult world. It is not only a pecking order that teachers tolerate because it makes the school easier to manage. It also gains the gloss of society's actual moral code.

For example, students might be bullied because they exhibit middle class speech and behavior, and are unwilling or unable to adopt "cool" working class behavior. A teacher might be sympathetic, but also consider that without this kind of bullying, middle class student could be as snooty as they liked, and that forcing middle class students to respect working class students (even out of fear) would help societal cohesion in the bigger picture.

The values that bullies enforce are arbitrary, but not entirely arbitrary. If they only punished the truly snooty, or the truly degenerate, would progressives or conservatives respectively complain? I see many people encouraging bullying tech workers in SF because they claim those workers really don't respect the values of the communities they live in. And (this was a while ago) I read a Time magazine article about the bullying of the Columbine shooters, which claimed precisely that their bullying was justified because they violated social norms (as the article said quoting a footballer "they were a bunch of fxxxxts", and this was in the 1990's so the implication wasn't that the footballer was in the wrong!).

I am not saying that society will fall apart without bullying, but that people who want to maintain social norms that aren't enforced by law, logically have little choice but to accept that experiencing an environment with bullying is an imperfect but necessary precursor to knowing your place in society.

[trentmb]

How does one enforce a social structure with no agents to enforce said structure?

[yetanotherphd]

When I say "social structure" I mean the idea that people should feel compelled to follow societal norms. Even though school bullies don't enforce the same norms as society at large, they do enforce the norms of their peer group.

Conservatives (not all, but many) consider the principal that social convention be backed by actual violence, to be sufficiently important that establishing it at young age is worth some suffering or unfairness.

[nirnira]

I think the idea here is that the system is self-reinforcing. An initially undifferentiated mix of children self-segregates as the children begin to perceive difference, and privileged/norm-conformant children persecute unprivileged/norm-nonconformant children. The persecution has the function of excluding the unlucky children from the social opportunities that come from access to privileged society (both because they are actively blocked by the other children, and because they block themselves by not realising they can seek opportunities or not considering themselves capable or worthwhile). This exclusion compounds as the cohort ages, rapidly becoming total. The result is that only a small selection of the cohort has access to privileged channels of society, maintaining a relatively low degree of competition at that level.

[NAFV_P]

> Conservatives (somewhat correctly) consider bullying to be part of how society maintains is social structure.

Have you ever been bullied?

[yetanotherphd]

please see my other replies - I'm not endorsing bullying, I'm explaining why many conservatives don't think it's a problem.

[NAFV_P]

> I meant they are somewhat correct in their belief that bullying is a part of our social fabric.

I agree with this statement of yours from another comment, but I don't agree with the previous quote that I posted. My reasoning is that an old "friend" of mine, Adam Mohungoo - black, 5'9", born 26/09/1980, attended Sir Thomas Rich's School, Gloucester 1992 - 1999, is a FULLY FLEDGED SOCIOPATH. He would threaten to "kick your fucking head in" for such things as turning up at his house 3 minutes later than expected.

People like him do not facilitate the maintenance of the social structure, but unfortunately they are part of the social fabric.

> ... I'm not endorsing bullying, I'm explaining why many conservatives don't think it's a problem.

The recent tv campaign "This is ABUSE" highlights a shift in attitudes regarding very similar issues.

I see you mentioned that you were bullied, apologies if I sounded harsh.