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Quote of the Day: Bullies
“When someone calls you a racist, sexist, bigot, homophobe because you happen to disagree with them about tax policy or same-sex marriage or abortion, that’s bullying. When someone slanders you because you happen to disagree with them about global warming or the government shutdown, that’s bullying. When someone labels you a bad human being because they disagree with you, they are bullying you. They are attacking your character without justification. That’s nasty. In fact, it makes them nasty.” – Ben Shapiro
I am not sure who coined the expression “cry bully” conflating crybaby and bully. The term is an apt description for many of today’s Social Justice Warriors. It fits.
When I was a child, the way you dealt with a bully was to ignore them (they hate that) until you no longer could, and then pop them one on the nose. In my experience most bullies were cowards, bullying others to hide their fear. Even a little pain made them flee.
Of course, in today’s zero-tolerance school system, popping someone on the nose is Not Allowed. My suspicion is this is because today’s school system is run by bullies who have grown up. Certainly, bullying seems to be at a maximum in our institutions of education.
While we may not be able to physically pop bullies on the nose, we can certainly do it metaphorically by calling them out on their bullying.
Published in Culture
I think you and Ben said it very well on this subject.
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I hate bullies. And I agree – 9 times out 10, they are cowards. It never occurred to me that SJWs are, in fact, bullies of a sort. And “crybully” is a pretty apt description.
Important points. And I agree. But I have a good faith question.
“When someone labels you a bad human being because they disagree with you, they are bullying you. They are attacking your character without justification.” (Ben Shapiro)
Does this principle only hold true in a personal-confrontation context — when the person who disagrees with you actually tells you (verbally or in writing) that you’re a bad human being? Or can bullying exist among a group of like-minded people who among themselves agree (verbally or in writing) that people they don’t agree with are bad human beings?
In other words, are there functional boundaries to bullying? Like I said; good faith question. It’s just something I find myself thinking about a lot these days.
Good question. I only know that anyone who disagrees with me is a bad person… :)
I don’t think so.
And I’m kind of covering my own backside on that answer.
Here’s my reasoning: I teach my kids what is right. I prepare my older kids for the eventuality that someone will call their mother a liar for teaching them these things. To shore up my children’s conviction and to pave the way to a more discerning mind, which comes with age and wisdom, I refer to them as bad people.
It is largely rhetorical with a little truth in it, meant to persuade without deceiving.
However, if my children indiscriminately accused individual people of being bad, then I’d pop them for it.
Only zero-tolerance for the politically disfavored. “Punch a NAZI” is OK, but micro-aggressions (aka non-aggressions) by the disfavored are subject zero tolerance.
Or by people who felt themselves victims and are exacting their revenge on the world. I think it’s a synergistic combination, but that’s the subject of a book, not a comment.
And be accused of a microaggression! Fine to do from afar, but hard to do when subject to leftist attack.
I think the term bullying has associated with it a sense that the bully is relatively powerful compared to the victim, and is exploiting that power. So, as much as I like the tone of the post, I’d stop short of accusing someone of bullying per se simply because he or she accuses an opponent of being sub-human for, for example, thinking that global warming alarmism is misplaced.
I haven’t felt bullied on the handful of occasions when it’s been suggested that I’m racist (because I opposed the Affordable Care Act), sexist (ah, but that one is actually true), or a hateful Republican who wants to crush the poor. I have a hard time imagining feeling bullied in a one-on-one encounter.
But bullying is exactly the term to describe what goes on within our Universities, where weak and/or complicit administrations cede authority to self-anointed enforcers of political correctness — the mobs that shut down free speech and intimidate conservatives. And it’s exactly the term to describe what many professors do to students who veer from the leftist path — or who would, if they weren’t browbeaten into compliance in the classroom.
Not sure if I agree here, Seawriter. I think that if a SJW is blown off, with ridicule and a demurral for engagement, he/she/it/them/they will react physically to you. Not acknowledging your hateful racism/homophobia/misogyny/etcetera-ism is a micro-aggression. They have spent the last coupla years pumping themselves up that not bending a knee toward their towering ignorance and slack-jawed totalitarianism is hate, and that violence is mandated against hate.
Blow them off derisively, ignore them, and guaranteed they’ll lay hands on you, and then you can get to poppin’.
Way back when I was a kid, bullies inflicted or threatened physical harm (see the soon-to-be-ubiquitous A Christmas Story). Now that we live in an era of verbal creep where (as Shapiro notes) much of “racism” isn’t really racism and most “phobias” aren’t really phobias, it’s natural that much “bullying” isn’t really bullying. However, in its assault on speech, the left is constantly telling us that speech they don’t like is actually akin to physical “harm.” This fits in nicely when expanding bullying beyond the physical nature that it used to denote. Should we be surprised?
Bullies rely on the conviction that no one will respond with force. They assume that Nazis will let themselves be punched ,much less that mild-mannered conservative speakers will let themselves be humiliated
In the real world, punching bad guys will get you shot. That conservative sheepdog is only friendly becausc he doesn’t want to hurt you, and his bite is much worse than his bark
SJW are effectively a form of passive / aggressive bullies that have been weaponized by using legal / government force to get their way. They thrive on their self perceived victim status and get their rocks off on the use of governmental force and regulation to enforce their will.
I think we are arguing over something we agree on. Remember, I said may not be able to. I did not say cannot.
When I was a kid I was a master of saying something that sounded totally innocuous to everyone around me but the jerk who was bullying me. He would then take a swing at me, and the fight was on. Most of the time I would win, but even if I didn’t I won anyway. This was back in the day when teachers sorted out who started the fight, and punished the aggressor. All the witnesses would say, “Well, gee, Seawriter apologized to Billy and Billy turned all red and took a swing at Seawriter.” Billy would disappear into the principal’s office and Seawriter was told to go to class. And Billy would leave me alone afterwards and go after easier prey.
Seawriter
I dearly love a good verbal tussle. I take enormous pleasure in dismembering stupidity.
My problem is that SJWs never, ever “have a go” at me. I give them every opportunity – I throw a few verbal grenades and watch them squirm. But they never try to bully me. Maybe I need to find a pack of ’em so they can screw up the courage to take me on. I very much doubt any one SJW would even dare.
Wimps. SJWs need to man up.
Bullies only attack those they perceive as weak. That is the essence of a bully.
Seawriter
Yes, it’s bullying. It’s an attempt to claim the moral high ground while holding objectively immoral positions. This can only be accomplished by force, whether physical force or the force of social opprobrium.
I happened to watch some Ben Shapiro YouTubes last night and I’m particularly fond of his way to fight against the idea of socialism. We right-wingers tend to argue that socialism is ineffective or inefficient, to which the lefties always respond, “It just hasn’t been done right yet.” The better argument is that it is simply immoral, no matter who is implementing it. It isn’t moral to steal people’s earnings and give them to people who haven’t earned them. End of story.
I couldn’t agree more. Socialism is the literal version of the metaphorical bully stealing some innocent’s lunch money.
This was in the news this morning and if it isn’t fake news, but real, it is a prime example of bullying that you speak of. I’ve never heard of so much mean-spirited bullying in the name of race, gender, faith, political association, even among teens and children, as the current social environment.
It’s worse than the 1960’s because of the speed of social media. I hate to keep throwing former president Obama continuously under the bus, but I feel his “hope and change” message, which could have had a positive impact if handled differently, perpetuated this movement. If this is the Saul Alinsky method, to pit people against each other to force social change, it is diabolical.
http://www.foxnews.com/health/2017/11/26/indiana-night-nurse-says-white-women-raising-sons-who-are-rapists-and-killers-sparking-probe.html
I think I slightly disagree with the original quote, as I’m with some of the other comments that “bullying” requires a party actually or perceived to be stronger, and a party actually or perceived to be weaker. Two equals don’t (to me) a bullying make.
As @fakejohnjanegalt noted above, modern SJW’s are bullies because they have co-opted the power of government to make themselves the stronger party to bully those of us who have very limited ability to push back effectively. They have also co-pted large corporations that have power over us employees and vendors or suppliers.
I agree with the OP and several comments that schools (including universities) are among the most frequent bullies. On the rare occasion that I am on one of the local school campuses and see the now-ubiquitous “anti-bullying” posters, I note to myself how ironic they are, since the school administrators are often prominent bullies – requiring students and parents to implement the administrators’ worldview and preferences under threat of almost unchallengeable authority. I find the posters particularly ironic in my state of New York, since bullying is official state policy – using the state’s perceived economic power to punish voters of other states that do not implement the preferences of the New York powerbrokers (see most conspicuously, North Carolina) when those other states are perceived to be less economically or politically powerful.
I saw a car with a Bernie sticker on it this morning. I also just recently heard that Jeff Bezos (Amazon and Wapo owner) had just achieved a wealth of 100 billion dollars. So a thought occurred to me. What if one took the net wealth of all of USA billionaires and spread it equally amongst all USA citizens. How much would everyone get? The net worth of all USA billionaires is 7.71 trillion dollars according to a Google search. If we divide that by 330 million American citizens, every man, woman, child and other would receive about $23 thousand. How long would it take until that was gone? One, two, three years and poof, there would be no more. All of the billionaires would be penniless and so would all the people that stole the billionaires money. And that is the problem with socialism. We all know it well. Pretty soon one runs out of other people’s money. But there is an additional problem. Under socialism we also run out of employers and therefore jobs as well.
Awesome! This opens up for the world a wholly new, heretofore hidden side of iWe!
Yeah, they’re the type of bully that needs to outnumber the victim by at least 4 to 1.
Really?
I thought “bullying” was this big national problem. Are you saying THAT is what bullying is?
I go through this with some of my relatives; one niece in particular. We had one healthy debate about abortion on FB. She’s no dummy and I enjoyed the tussle immensely. However, after she lost (I do believe it was when I asked her is someone she knew aborted a baby because they knew it was gay, would she still call it an “opinion”), she caused a huge family drama by taking offense at a comment in an unrelated thread. Tears where shed; I went round and round with her mother via email, text and phone calls. And this was after I’d apologized.
So I’ve learned my lesson – I will never apologize again. Nor will I engage with her. More than once at Thanksgiving she threw a verbal bomb knowing damn well I wouldn’t respond. By not responding, I let her win.
For family, I’ll take the loss.
One a related note, Scott Adams got attacked via Twitter after he endorsed Trump. His attackers were referred to as “Hillbullies”. I loved that.
Yeah, you can’t do that without repercussions. You can’t confront a lefty with the hard truth. They can’t handle the truth.