Wednesday, August 31, 2016

On raising kids who stand up to bullies


The following is an excerpt from a new book by my very smart, very funny friend Marjorie Ingall. Mamaleh Knows Best: What Jewish Mothers Do to Raise Successful, Creative, Empathetic, Independent Children is packed with wisdom that applies to any parent, anywhere (as Margie says, "Jewish motherhood is a philosophy not an identity!"); it's also a generally interesting and amusing read. Margie is also the brains behind the apology-analyzing blog SorryWatch—very much worth a read, too. 


Jews have no monopoly on social justice. All of us have an obligation to ensure that our kids care about the lives of people who are not necessarily like us. As the civil rights advocate Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said, “God did not make a world with just one color flower. We are all made in God’s image.”

One tikkun olam lesson we should all be teaching our children is to stand up when someone else is being bullied. Studies indicate that bullying often takes place in front of an audience (in as many as nine in ten cases), but kids who witness bullying defend the victim less than 20 percent of the time. University of Illinois psychologist Dorothy Espelage found that sixth and seventh grade boys who didn’t bully but who were friends with bullies were less willing to intervene when they saw bullying in action. If you have a kid who is considered “cool” (I have not been so blessed, since my husband and I are geeks who have raised geeks), your kid has social capital! He or she can use it for the forces of good! But if your kid’s school isn’t encouraging these small acts of kindness, it’s up to you to encourage them.

As a parent, you can make sure the language you use at home is slur-free, and you can talk about why tolerance and acceptance of differences are vital qualities. As Emily Bazelon points out in her terrific book Sticks and Stones: Defeating the Culture of Bullying and Rediscovering the Power of Character and Empathy, study after study shows that the best way to prevent the harassment of gay students is to make it unacceptable. Saying that you love the sinner but hate the sin does not fly. Schools and camps need to convey that slurs and taunts of all sorts are immoral, and parents can and should talk to principals to be sure the message is getting through.

My own 10th grade English teacher used to prance in front of the classroom with a limp wrist extended, making fun of “little Wally Whitman, shrieking his poems to the ocean.” Ugh. Teachers, coaches and counselors today still fail to curtail the use of hate speech, and parents have an important role to play in making sure the world is a safe space for all. My kids have gay uncles, so we’re a step ahead of the game here, but I still wasn’t sure how Maxie would react when was four, and we were visiting San Francisco and drove through the Castro, the historic gay neighborhood. As we stopped at a light, a fabulously dressed drag queen crossed in front of the car. Maxie stared, and I worried. But then Maxie yelled out the window, “I LOVE YOU, COLORFUL LADY!” (Let me assure you I am no perfect exemplar. I’m still struggling to banish the word “retard” from my vocabulary. I grew up with it, and when I’m tired or careless, it slips out. It’s awful and it’s wrong, and I’ve made sure my kids know I’m ashamed.)

Tikkun olam should be a big tent. Jews have no monopoly on persecution and trauma, even though some of us want to play the Holocaust as a tribulation trump card. Six! Million! Ovens! Beat that, other marginalized groups! Yeah, no. Life is not a suffering competition. It’s our job to ensure that as our kids grow, they work to end ongoing, systemic inequities in their own cultural groups and in the wider world.

The book of Deuteronomy commands, “Tzedek, tzedek tirdof”– righteousness, righteousness should you pursue. We need to right wrongs, support the underdog and fix what’s broken, even when it’s hard and uncomfortable work. A lot of people who become active in doing social justice as adults can’t really articulate why: “It’s just the right thing to do,” they say. It’s what a lot of Christian rescuers said after the Holocaust, when asked why they risked their own lives to help Jews. But one study of helpers and bystanders during the Holocaust found that the majority of Christian rescuers had something in common: They came from loving homes. Middot (the Hebrew word for “virtues”) are, in my mom’s words, “caught, not taught.” When you grow up in an atmosphere of kindness, you’re more willing to imperil yourself to help others – even people you don’t know. This is my ultimate goal in raising my daughters: Raising empathetic humans. (Chris Rock said that one’s ultimate goal is to keep one’s daughters off the stripper pole. Which, I grant you, is also valid.)

Reprinted from MAMALEH KNOWS BEST: What Jewish Mothers Do to Raise Successful, Creative, Empathetic, Independent Children. Copyright © 2016 by Marjorie Ingall. Published by Harmony Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC.

Photo of Marjorie Ingall: Deborah Copaken

8 comments:

  1. Even though I am not Jewish, I gleamed so much from this piece as someone who was bullied. I still remember the bystanders who stood up for me and gave me the courage to stand up for myself.

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    1. That's the thing about the wisdom in this book—it's universal. Kathryn, I was also bullied, but nobody stood up for me. My mother was of the "turn the other cheek" mindset, which doesn't help when someone is physically abusive, so I learned to stand up for myself. Actually, make that sit: One day I literally SAT on the girl who was bullying me. I didn't hit her, I just sat on her. After that, she backed off.

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  2. Hey, there's two sides to this thing.

    As someone who was the bully, I would like to point out that bullying can be disguised as a social justice campaign. I was young, passionate, and ignorant at the time, but that does not justify my actions. I kept equating standing and speaking up with courage so often that I forgot the amount of guts it takes to sit down and listen. I thought I was campaigning for something worthwhile the entire time, but I was just being willfully ignorant.

    This is the damage campaigning to stand up and speak--and only to do that--can cause.

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    1. Ender-Chan....
      "As someone who was the bully, I would like to point out that bullying can be disguised as a social justice campaign. I was young, passionate, and ignorant at the time, but that does not justify my actions." You were a bully in your past? I truly appreciate this honest confession!! As a kid growing up, I was bullied. Never physically, always verbally. Mean kids {in our neighborhood, at church, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera} called me--this learning disabled, different, quirky, oddball girl--mean, hurtful, nasty names. A word of advice.... We cannot go back, we can only move forward!! And, like I have with every single mean kid who made fun of me? I forgive you, Friend {with grace, absolutely zero judgment and a wide-open mind} even though you never personally hurt me as the bully.... Now is time to forgive yourself.... ;)
      "Stay hard, stay hungry, stay alive", Raelyn

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  3. Ellen and Marjorie....
    "Stand up when someone else is being bullied. Kids who witness bullying defend the victim less than 20 percent of the time." Confession. I was one of those kids. At Vacation Bible School in church. It was not long after my youngest brother {who has Down syndrome} was born. I was around nine, ten, years old. And suddenly these mean kids called this poor boy "retarded". Hearing that word felt like nails on the chalkboard, because of my brother. But I never defended or stood up for this boy. Lookin' back now? I wish I had defended or stood up for that boy.... I appreciate the reminder!! ;)
    As a kid growing up, I was bullied. Never physically, always verbally. Mean kids {in our neighborhood, at church, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera} called me--this learning disabled, different, quirky girl--mean, hurtful, nasty names. Although I learned how to forgive these kids? I also remember every single girl and boy--by name, by face, by memory--who made fun of me. Because it still hurts to this day. Bullying did not stop once I became an adult.... I was twenty-one years old when some mean, teenage girls made fun of and called me nasty, hurtful names.... Long story short? A baseball "game" at the park brought us all together, one girl eventually sincerely apologized to me and my act of forgiveness softened the heart of another girl!! ;-D
    "Stay hard, stay hungry, stay alive", Raelyn
    PS. Sorry, long comment. I so cannot do Twitter!! Ha!! ;-D

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  4. Thank you, Ellen, and thanks for the comments, everyone!

    I'm not sure what precisely Raelyn meant about bullying masquerading as social justice, but I totally agree that demonizing bullies is a bad idea. I reviewed Emily Bazelon's Sticks and Stones book, which gives concrete strategies for dealing with bullying in a systemic, holistic way. Once we treat bullies as "the Other," we lose empathy and we lose the opportunity to work with everyone to create a kinder community. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/558840166

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    1. Examples of Bullying Masquerading as Social Justice:
      -"Feminist" content that's really just misandry (I've seen Tumblr users with "misandrist" in their usernames.)
      -Harassing content creators because it doesn't represent (minority group) "correctly" (This happened to Lauren Zuke, one of the creators behind Steven Universe, when fans accused her of "queerbaiting".)
      -Telling conservatives of color that they should have their "race card" revoked due to their political beliefs
      -"LGBT positive" spaces saying that cis straight people are inherently terrible
      -"Body-positive" campaigns that mock conventionally attractive bodies
      -Stereotyping Christians as intolerant to promote "religious tolerance"
      -Telling content creators that they want X group to be represented, then getting mad when they do it wrong and not trusting that the creator put an honest effort into representation

      I see a lot of it on Tumblr. (I'm @ender-kun)

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    2. Marjorie....
      "I'm not sure what precisely Raelyn meant about bullying masquerading as social justice." I never wrote that.... I never said that.... I never even thought that!! It was Ender-Chan, who is far more brilliant than I am!! I just thought I'd clear that up!! ;)
      "Stay hard, stay hungry, stay alive", Raelyn

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Thanks for sharing!