Anti-Bullying Law: What About the Bully?

commentary by Daniel Duerden | December 14, 2011

This year, one of the dominating topics of discussion in both education and in the news has been responses to bullying. Whether it be about anti-bullying laws, celebrities showing support for victims, the effects of cyber bullying and so on, the general consensus is finding a way to stop bullying in elementary and high schools. However, many of the solutions are fixed on punishing the bullies, sometimes in rather dramatic fashion, and not on actually changing the behavior.

In a recent posting on The Huffington Post, Elizabeth Perle, criticized the media for the focus that is often placed on the victim while ignoring the bully, who may be struggling just as much as the victim.

“By vilifying children and fetishizing bullying, we're blaming kids for a systemic, cultural problem and taking the onus off adults,” Perle wrote. “Instead of telling these kids why their actions are wrong, we should be asking -- what else is going on?”

This sentiment has been echoed by professionals in school counseling and education as well. The American School Counseling Association explained,

“The ‘punish-the-bully’ urge is natural and, unfortunately, ineffective. Think about it. You see a bigger boy picking on a littler boy. You intervene by grabbing the bigger boy by the back of the neck and chewing him out. Yes, your response is natural. Yes, the bigger boy deserved punishment. But ironically, when an adult intervenes in an aggressive or violent manner, the bullying cycle repeats, only this time an older, bigger adult is picking on a younger, smaller bully.”

And yet, some anti-bullying laws, such as one recently introduced in New York that places cyber-bullying in the realm of stalking laws, focus on harsh punishments for bullies but not on trying to rehabilitate the bully. This is unfortunate, especially since bully rehabilitation should be a priority for children and teenagers.

Charles R. McAdams, III, and Christopher D. Schmidt, professors in education at The College of William and Mary, and Villanova respectively, stated in a study that unchecked bullying behavior can carry into adulthood. They argued that middle school students who bully have been found to be up to four times more likely to be involved in later criminal activity than those who do not.

Because of this, a larger emphasis should be placed on helping the bully change their behavior rather than punishing them. McAdams and Schmidt explain that bullies who engage in proactive aggressive behavior are very adept at rationalizing and defending their behavior, even after they have been punished.

They offer the following recommendations to teachers and counselors in helping bullies changing their behavior:

• Provide clear behavioral expectations that are free from loopholes or ambiguity - schools must have a structured system of behavioral expectations that explicitly defines responsible student behavior, that effectively exposes students' failures to fulfill those responsibilities. Additionally consequences must be laid out clearly, and there should be no way for the aggressor to talk their way out of those consequences.

• Avoid debates and arguments - arguing and debating with the aggressor can often end with the consequences of the bullying being minimized. Any form of compromise regarding guilt or the severity of consequences is likely to be viewed positively by a proactive aggressor as an endorsement of his or her control over the situation.

• Avoid repetitious or standardized responses - any form of compromise regarding guilt or the severity of consequences is likely to be viewed positively by a proactive aggressor as an endorsement of his or her control over the situation.

• Reinforce positive achievements, but cautiously - When respect from others is achievable through positive behavior, proactive aggressors will have less reason to risk the potential consequences.

• Don't drop your guard - an important step in helping bully’s change their behavior (and ultimately, their perspective) is to ensure, through careful and continuous monitoring of their activities, that their risks of getting caught are high.

• Focus on feelings rather than facts - by focusing on the feelings surrounding suspected aggression, the school counselor can eliminate the bully’s grounds for rational or logical denial of responsibility, because there is no standard for reference from which the rightness or wrongness of feelings can be reasonably argued.

• Don't stop at consequences; teach pro-social behaviors - by teaching and modeling such skills as active listening (to others' views), accepting failure, impulse control, collaborative problem solving, and conveying respect, as well as promoting their emphasis in the classroom, school counselors can directly help bullies expand their limited inventory of socially acceptable responses to others.

The media may not change its coverage on bullying, as it can provide a great story to tell. However, it is important for teachers and educators to not buy into that rhetoric and not forget that the bully is a student too, that likely needs as much help as the victims.