I know its old news and I tried finding a previous thread on this but i was reading an article listed on CNN.com that linked to a new Time article titled "How Not to Raise a Bully: The Early Roots of Empathy".



http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1982190,00.html?hpt=T2

The article starts off with the anecdote of the Phoebe chick who committed suicide after being "bullied to much."
I am sorry if it is cold and heartless but i find it ridiculous that authorities are trying to blame her peers for bullying her to death.
Kids will be kids and sure maybe some of these individuals may have crossed the line, in this case a charge of harassment
is called for. Let us not forget about personal responsibility. Ultimately Phoebe made the decision to take her
own life. This is not feudal Japan where dishonored samurai take their own life to end their shame and as punishment for screwing up.

If we are going to blame the "bullies" for bullying Phoebe to death then perhaps we should charge some kids at Columbine;
for bullying the two shooters to the point to which they went berserk.

Phoebe obviously had some other psychological issues and if it were not bullying kids it would have been something else (a new boyfriend
ditching her, her parents grounding her, failing a class, etc).

Kids are always going to be teased and their will always be bullies. When is the line drawn? I could make fun of Will Francis in 9th grade telling him his cowboy boots make him look like F@g. If he is on the edge and this is all that it takes to make him go hang himself, am i a criminal?


At my high school a guy shot himself in the faculty parking lot after school one day because his girlfriend cheated on him. Perhaps she should be charged with adultery.


[Edited on April 19, 2010 at 1:37 PM. Reason : a]

4/19/2010 1:33:50 PM

She's right, those boots definitely make him look ~

4/19/2010 1:36:59 PM

Quote :

"If we are going to blame the "bullies" for bullying Phoebe to death then perhaps we should charge some kids at Columbine; for bullying the two shooters to the point to which they went berserk."

I thought it was clear that video games turn those kids into the killers they are?

4/19/2010 1:55:01 PM

nah dude, it was their music. so evil.

4/19/2010 1:56:20 PM

Quote :

"If we are going to blame the "bullies" for bullying Phoebe to death then perhaps we should charge some kids at Columbine; for bullying the two shooters to the point to which they went berserk."

except it turned out that the bullying was pretty much a myth insofar as the massacre is concerned

[Edited on April 19, 2010 at 1:59 PM. Reason : .]

4/19/2010 1:57:54 PM

HUR I agree with you in most cases of bullying, which is just varying degrees of teasing.

However, 'real' bullying exists as well, where physical violence is done towards the individual or threats of physical violence are made. Of course, such violence is followed up by threats of more violence of the individual reports it, or threats to the family. Someone who is weak willed or timid would actually not report it due to those threats. And could end up killing themselves if the bullying reaches a certain threshold level.

Interesting that you mentioned Japan because bullying is a big problem in Japan, coupled with suicides by some of the victims.

4/19/2010 2:18:27 PM

are you sure it wasn't the trenchcoats? I am pretty sure I remember the coroner report saying that the columbine shooters showed heavy traces of trenchcoat disaffection hormones in the brain

4/19/2010 3:10:28 PM

Pecking order.

4/19/2010 3:21:56 PM

Quote :

"HUR: Phoebe obviously had some other psychological issues and if it were not bullying kids it would have been something else (a new boyfriend ditching her, her parents grounding her, failing a class, etc)."

Lots of kids have psychological issues. That doesn't mean it's okay for other kids to pick up on those issues and bully the fuck out of them. And it definitely doesn't mean that kid will off themselves because they get dumped or fail a class. Failing a class is not the same thing as, say, getting seduced by a boy and then having that same boy and a group of girls (including his "real" girlfriend) physically threaten you, call you cruel names in front of hundreds of your peers in a school assembly, defile a photograph of you with the word "SLUT" and have it posted around school, get another boy to sleep with you and join in the bullying, throw things at you, and relentlessly harass you on-line, by phone, and in school every single day of your life for months...

That's what happened to Phoebe Prince, and that's just the stuff that's been documented. So if you're still not clear on this, the reason why she received so much attention and is used as an example of someone who was "bullied to death" is because she was, in fact, bullied to death...

After Phoebe killed herself, one of the bullies responded by writing the word "Accomplished" on her Facebook wall...

4/19/2010 3:50:59 PM

They won't be convicted. Too much subjective interpretation.

4/19/2010 4:07:53 PM

wat i think is cool is that even her own parents are getting annoyed with blaming her suicide on bullying

you stop bullyin by letting people defend themselves and not leaving it in the hands of overworked administration to "get around to it"

cuz they wont get around to it until someone is dead, to be honest

[Edited on April 19, 2010 at 4:18 PM. Reason : d]

4/19/2010 4:15:37 PM

Quote :

"by a boy and then having that same boy and a group of girls (including his "real" girlfriend) physically threaten you, call you cruel names in front of hundreds of your peers in a school assembly, defile a photograph of you with the word "SLUT" and have it posted around school, get another boy to sleep with you and join in the bullying, throw things at you, and relentlessly harass you on-line, by phone, and in school every single day of your life for months"

So why did these girls randomly decide to pick on this one chick????

She must have done something to piss them off or make some major enemies. This does not excuse the bullies but i find it hard to believe that she was innocently walking along and became the target of some hardcore harassment. I am in no way condoning the actions of the other kids, I also can empathizes with Phoebe's pain before dying and her parents grief after her loss. I though do have a problem with Phoebe's parents and the liberal authorities of Mass. trying to retroactively pin the blame on someone else for Phoebe's death. Ultimately, Phoebe was the one responsible for her committing suicide. She is the one that tied the noose. If not bullying teens today, it would have her backstabbing sorostitute sisters in college, her future husband cheating on her, or her work colleagues betraying her.

4/19/2010 4:18:44 PM

teen girls are fucking mean man, i grew up with sisters and i can definitely believe everything they are talking about.

4/19/2010 4:23:46 PM

Quote :

"So why did these girls randomly decide to pick on this one chick???? She must have done something to piss them off or make some major enemies."

Uh, no, not necessarily. Bullies pick on anyone they think they can pick on. Shy, timid, unpopular students. There doesn't have to be any reason or logic behind their choice of victims.

4/19/2010 4:24:45 PM

i could have sworn her parents were asking that people lay off the accused bulliers

4/19/2010 4:26:33 PM

^^ she hooked up with the ex of another girl, teen girls are crazy jealous and territorial

4/19/2010 4:42:59 PM

That's pretty harsh HUR to make judgments like that without knowing the situation. You may be right, but there are many kids who really do get bullied without any provocation at all. I can think of two kids in my high school in particular who, for whatever reason, just got picked on all the time by a group of guys who thought they were really tough. They were genuinely nice people who honest to God would never do anything to provoke these guys. They were just very timid and the guys who did it fed off eachother and fed off of the kids' fear.

I know one of the guys (Joe) who got picked had one of the other guys (Jack) come to his house once and threaten him. I had personally seen Jack threaten Joe many times verbally and physically, and like I said, totally unprovoked. Jack was about 180 pounds and really built, and joe was probably 160 pounds and a ball of fat. Well, like I said, Jack came over to Joe's house and started pushing him and doing the normal scare tactic/intimidation thing, and Joe, after having been picked on for years, tried to fight back. Well, after one swing, Jack put Joe in the hospital, and bad. Joe had several broken bones and brain damage, and almost died. It was very sad.

Point being, don't just assume that people always provoke something, because in many cases, that is far from the truth. Some people are simply evil, and for some reason they get followers that get caught up in the groupthink.

[Edited on April 19, 2010 at 4:48 PM. Reason : space]

4/19/2010 4:46:16 PM

HUR, I thought I was clear that it was her sleeping with that dude (the kinda/sorta boyfriend of one of the bully girls) that set off the bullying (like m52ncsu said). The fact that she had psychological issues and was susceptible to bullying probably spurred them on to continue attacking her.

And BigHitSunday is right that it's more of an administration failure than anything. The kids who bullied her are still just kids. Prince's mother had gone to the school on multiple occasions for redress, and the school didn't handle it. Basically, the school botched it like a mofo and then tried to come out looking good by falsely painting the girls as full-blown sociopaths and having them charged with felonies.

Also the parents did ask people to lay off the bullies. Just to show how ridiculous the situation is...people actually started bullying the bullies and sending them death threats and shit.

And I'm glad you can empathize, HUR, but you can't keep asserting that if it wasn't the bullies, it would have been "her backstabbing sorostitute sisters in college, her future husband cheating on her, or her work colleagues betraying her" or "a new boyfriend ditching her, her parents grounding her, failing a class, etc." You really, really don't know that at all. Plus, it's not very empathetic to downplay her misery by making her out to be some sort of a ticking suicidal time bomb that was liable to go off at any hint of distress...

[Edited on April 19, 2010 at 6:46 PM. Reason : ]

4/19/2010 6:31:48 PM

The reason one girl initiated the bullying is because Phoebe dated her on again off again boyfriend, and she accused Phoebe of stealing him away. He later continued going out with her. Well, Phoebe then dated another guy and the same thing happened, he had been going out with one girl, and this girl felt Phoebe "stole" him away. The two girls got together and basically began spreading the idea that Phoebe was stealing girls' boyfriends away, and the boys went along with it.

This wasn't Phoebe Prince bringing anything down on herself, in general she kept to herself and mentioned to others on more than one occasion that she wasn't the kind of girl who fought back at all because she was not a fighter.

4/19/2010 6:46:37 PM

^^ you're right in that it's not fair to suggest she would have killed herself eventually anyhow. But, it's down right ridiculous to say "bullying killed her." Bullying has never and will never, in and of itself, cause someone to die. Beating someone can cause them to die (that's beyond bullying).

She decided to kill herself. I don't know why. Perhaps because she hated being bullied and felt she had no other way out. I really don't know.

Was it wrong for them to bully her, yes. Is it sad, yes. But there are plenty of things I'd "blame" this on before the bullying.

Her mother and aunt knew she was prone to being bullied (they contacted the school before she started attending to tell them). Is it just as much their fault as those who bullied her? They could have had her home schooled. They could've had her schooled somewhere that bullying was less prevalent. There were plenty of factors that led up to her suicide. But SHE did it. It was her choice.

And it's not that I'm not empathetic toward her situation. But she took an extreme route out of said situation. Pointing that out doesn't mean the person isn't sad for her, or that they don't care, or they're cold, heartless bastards. They's just stating their opinion that she had a choice in the matter. She was not murdered (a situation in which she would not have choice). You can't just toss the blame of something as serious as death from one person to another because you don't want to put any blame on the victim.

However sad her story, she killed herself. It's crazy to not put any "blame", "fault", etc. on her. [I'm using quotes there because I realize that in this context those are harsh words, but I can't think of anything softer/more empathetic sounding at the moment].

[Edited on April 19, 2010 at 7:00 PM. Reason : .]

4/19/2010 6:57:28 PM

Quote :

"That's pretty harsh HUR to make judgments like that without knowing the situation."

That's pretty much ALL HUR does with his time on TWW.

Make rash judgments and post about them with an elitist attitude.

4/19/2010 7:14:58 PM

^^Oh yeah, a lot of people failed with regards to the bullying. Her parents could have been more proactive (suggesting they should homeschool her is ridiculous though; you shouldn't be the one to leave school when it's other kids who are creating the difficulty). The parents of the bullies could have stepped in. One of the girls in the group or another kid at school could have intervened. The school, administration, teachers, etc...could have helped. But it was still ultimately the bullying itself that led to her demise.

On the topic of "blaming" Prince herself, I tend not to "blame" children too much when they kill themselves. They're children, and that's part of what makes their suicides so devastating--for the most part, they really don't know what they've done, and it's way too early for a person to decide they're done with life. A desperate and tortured adolescent just coming to grips with the horrors of reality is different than a forty year-old who chooses not to take the heat anymore.

My friend's daughter killed herself around this same time last year. She had just turned 14. It's kinda hard to blame or fault her, you know? I don't see that as "crazy" of me.

[Edited on April 19, 2010 at 7:26 PM. Reason : VAHA. Roots of empathy right here, y'all.]

4/19/2010 7:18:35 PM

This ain't a world for soft-core pussies. You have to fuck 'em up or you'll get fucked up. It's called life. Life ain't easy, so if you can't handle it, then yes, please, turn your "keys" in and call it a day. Don't weaken our society with your feeblement. Grow some thick skin and learn to deal with the stresses that come with life or GTFO. If you allow yourself to get bullied, I have no sympathy for you. Eat or be eaten. Darwinism at it's finest.

4/19/2010 7:23:15 PM

http://www.onpointnews.com/NEWS/Jury-Awards-$800K-to-Victim-of-Pattern-of-Bullying.html

Jury Awards $800K to Victim of "Pattern of Bullying"

Click to read all.

Quote :

"Patterson eventually left high school after years of enduring such taunts as “faggot” and “man boobs,” the defacing of his locker with a drawing of a penis inserted into a rectum, an episode in which students urinated on his clothes, and finally a locker room assault in which a star football player rubbed his genitals in Patterson’s face."

Is that a school or a [can't think of a succinct and to the point disgusting term]

WTF are parents doing? Seriously, a lot of parents shouldn't be parents. That's just sick and sad.

4/19/2010 8:36:19 PM

those of you blaming the children for these incidents are severely misguided. if anyone needs to be blamed it's the parents. parents often ignore bullying or have this naive notion that the kids are just "playing" or "having fun". and i've seen far too much bullying promoted by parents as well. have parents ever been charged in these cases?

4/19/2010 9:09:14 PM

it is not all or nothing. after a certain age (say 15?), you are definitely responsible for your actions owing to the fact that you can tell right from wrong. and even more so at 17 or 18.

both should be blamed. but it also depends on individual cases; in some cases, parents would be more to blame, in others, not.

but as you can see in my post above yours, i DID blame parents. there is NO WAY in hell that if you bring your children up properly and teach them to be kind/decent/etc human beings, they would be as cruel as in the case i mentioned in my post.

at the same time, if you are 15+ and doing these cruel things, you are also very guilty.


[Edited on April 19, 2010 at 9:16 PM. Reason : ]

4/19/2010 9:14:51 PM

Quote :

"at the same time, if you are 15+ and doing these cruel things, you are also very guilty. "

+1

Parents are also at fault. However, if they are not informed that their children are misbehaving at school or other social functions where they are not present, then you can't really blame them (how are they to discipline their children if they do not know of any wrong doing?). Kids need to be taught that it's okay to report these things to adult authorities and not to put up with it. Bully should not be tollerated and should be punished without any reservations. What is a shame is that people, young or old, witness these and turn the blind eye because it's easier to do so than to report it... Our society has become lazy and pathetic. No one has enough value in the community anymore to respect it and enforce decency anymore. Kids will be kids, but there is a line... Ignorance is not a valid excuse.

The Abridged Version: Moar people need Jesus in their life.

4/19/2010 10:09:36 PM

Quote :

"Interesting that you mentioned Japan because bullying is a big problem in Japan, coupled with suicides by some of the victims."

This actually happens quite a lot here and it:s very sad. A boy at my school hung himself from a tree on the school grounds because of relentless bullying. At a middle school down the road from me a girl jumped off the roof because of bullying. I think the worst part is there:s usually no rhyme or reason to it. They don:t like the kid because he:s nerdy, or shy, or his hair is the wrong shade of brown. So they go on an all-out rampage against the kid until he either drops out of school or he kills himself. There:s even been cases of the bullies going after the kid:s family in their bullying, which blows my mind. Why grown adults would allow teenagers to harass them is beyond me.

4/19/2010 10:13:43 PM

All of the mass kids should get years in prison. Especially the ones that threw the rock the day she killed herself. unacceptable behavior from a human being. These kids are absolute scum and it won't change with age. Put them away.

4/20/2010 12:59:38 AM

Quote :

"The Abridged Version: Moar people need Jesus in their life."

I assume you're serious, since not only is this a Lounge post, but you actually capitalized that fool's name. But, for the future of humanity, I will hope that this part of your post was a joke.


Anyway, of course the bullying drove her to the edge. Some people are more capable of handling it than others because every mind is different. Note that, JUST LIKE ON TDUB, the people who don't handle it well are the ones that keep getting bullied.

4/20/2010 2:22:31 AM

Naw, I think mambagrl handles it quite well. The people who can't handle it stop coming on the site

4/20/2010 2:30:01 AM

Obviously, if she would have been trained with a Tasman Salt, this would have been a moot point, am I right?

4/20/2010 6:12:41 AM

Quote :

"the kid because he:s nerdy"

I thought "nerdy" is cool in Japan.

Quote :

"All of the mass kids should get years in prison. "

give me a fucking break.....

4/20/2010 8:00:37 AM

^ Far from it. They're ridiculed here just as much as the US

4/20/2010 8:24:05 AM

one of the boys that is being charged in the Phoebe Prince case was arrested last night for drunk driving.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/04/20/teenager-charged-phoebe-prince-case-arrested-drunk-driving/?test=latestnews

Quote :

"Teenager Charged in Phoebe Prince Case Arrested for Drunk Driving One of the teenagers charged in the bullying of 15-year-old Phoebe Prince was arrested for drunk driving, MyFoxBoston.com reported Tuesday. Austin Renaud, 18, was arrested shortly after 3 a.m. ET on Sunday and released on $40 bail. According to MassLive.com, Renaud failed a Breathalyzer test at the Holyoke Police Station after being arrested. Renaud pleaded not guilty to statutory rape in the bullying case. He is among six teens charged in what prosecutors said was the "unrelenting" bullying of Phoebe Prince at South Hadley High School. Prince committed suicide Jan. 14. According to court documents, Renaud was in a brief relationship with Prince, which upset other students. He was scheduled to be arraigned in Holyoke District Court on Tuesday."

4/20/2010 9:45:22 AM

$40 bail?

Quote :

"Parents are also at fault. However, if they are not informed that their children are misbehaving at school or other social functions where they are not present, then you can't really blame them (how are they to discipline their children if they do not know of any wrong doing?)."

parents are responsible for everything their children are learning and/or doing. how/where do you think these children are learning this kind of behavior? their parents SHOULD know

the article asks at the beginning:
[quote]Could teachers have stepped in and stopped the bullying? Could parents have done more to curtail bad behavior? Or could preventive measures have been started years ago, in early childhood, long before bullies emerged and started heaping abuse on their peers? [/user]

and i agree with every single one of those statements. ultimately the parents responsibilities to teach right/wrong and be aware of what their children are getting into, but educators absolutely have a responsibility in these situations as well

[Edited on April 20, 2010 at 10:05 AM. Reason : ]

4/20/2010 9:59:49 AM

[Edited on April 20, 2010 at 10:01 AM. Reason : woops double post]

4/20/2010 10:01:17 AM

^^^ You would think if your ass is already in trouble with the law you'd be laying low

4/20/2010 8:08:22 PM