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Diaryland
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The Music of Your Life
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Why I love this music
That’s “fractured” Latin, which roughly translates to “don't let the bastards wear you down.” My personal version is, don't let a bully get away with anything.
We're all familiar with the schoolyard bully, who beats up those smaller than himself in order to make himself feel bigger and more important. If he is lucky, he is disabused of that idea before he grows up; someone will teach him to “pick on someone your own size.” If not, he continues to practice his methods into adulthood.
An adult bully is less likely to use physical abuse, but can be just as harmful; he wields his power on those weaker than himself. The typical adult bully aims threats, sarcasm, ridicule and sneering at a person who, for one reason or another, can't fight back.
A supervisor who speaks roughly to his employees is a bully. So is a teacher who reduces students to tears. While this mindset is not reserved for males alone, men practice it far more often; women have historically been powerless in a man's world. On the other hand, women often pass their suppressed anger on to the most susceptible victims of all, their children.
Sexual harassment, whether physical or verbal, is a form of bullying. No man makes suggestive remarks to a woman who could affect his job standing, for example, because she's the one with the power, not he. A female teacher who continually embarrasses male students as a group is just as guilty of sexual harassment as the fellow who pats all the women on the fanny.
A bully at work may take many forms – a racial bigot, a sexist, a self-righteous Christian. But we should all be aware that a “hostile workplace” is not to be tolerated and that it is indeed actionable, if you should wish to pursue it.
So what do we do about it? Our first step, of course, is to strengthen our own self-esteem to the point where no tough guy can scare us. To someone who is constantly browbeaten, this is very difficult. Then we must make sure that we ourselves aren't passing along our feelings of inadequacy by bullying someone else. It's necessary to break the chain.
Once you have gained the ability to withstand threats and intimidation, it is tempting to sit back and ignore the bully who used to menace us. However, that's not enough.
It is essential to stay on the lookout for bullies and, whenever possible, stop them before they do further damage – whether it be a Saddam Hussein or your next-door neighbor. You don’t have to get violent; the courts are on your side.
That’s more or less the way I originally wrote it. It pretty well stands on its own, both as a letter to the editor and as an anonymous handout at one place I worked. (When it appeared in our mailboxes, someone wondered whether it was meant for the bully or the victims. That woman happened to be both.) But the reason I wrote it is a story unto itself.
The stuff that I write often evolves from sort of talking to myself. (Of course I talk to myself; at least I’m assured of a listener who understands what I’m talking about!) About ten or fifteen years ago, I had pretty much learned to stand up for myself, despite a history of being a rather timid child. However, though I was willing to fight for my kids, or for an employee who’d been bullied, I had not come to the conclusion that I should try to protect anyone other than my own.
At the time this essay began to come together, I was in the hospital with an inflamed gall bladder; the doctors were trying to bring down the infection before initiating surgery, and I spent several days in pain, kind of drifting in and out and dealing with my own problems. Through the pain, even through my sleep, I became aware of a particularly offensive patient in a room across the hall. I guess everyone knew all his business, since he spoke in a very loud voice, yelling at the nurses and the aides, even being nasty enough to his wife that he reduced her to tears. After a while I became aware that he was a real sexist bully, sweet as pie to the (male) doctor, but absolutely rotten to any woman who crossed his path.
Once I began to recover, I became even more aware of this man. He had decided that he wanted to take a shower, although the nurses advised against it. Naturally, he went over their heads – as you might expect from such a person – and got the doctor to order a shower for him.
As it happened, an orderly was assisting him to prepare for his shower just as I was walking past his room. “I have a nurse who’s a real prick,” he said to the orderly. “Do you know what a prick is?” I had had enough! I stopped right in front of his door, me and my mobile IV unit, and I said, loud enough for him to hear, “Do you know what a bully is? You’re nothing but a bully with a filthy mouth!” And I continued on my way.
After lunch, the afternoon nurse stopped by my room. “I heard you took a walk this morning,” she said. And thanked me for standing up to the abuser. “We didn’t want him to go into the shower,” she told me, “because he has open sores on his feet from his diabetes.” In other words, the nurses had been trying to protect all the other patients and were rebuked for doing so. I think it was then that I realized, I wasn’t going to let any bully get away with that behavior again if I could possibly help it.
The wife, incidentally, looked daggers at me next time I saw her. In the true pattern of abused women, she probably thought he was right.
By the time I returned to work, I had begun to formulate a plan. Our office was a wonderful place to work, but several of the men – and one in particular – routinely resolved their hostilities by scolding their secretaries. It had never bothered me, but I had decided that I wasn’t going to let it bother anyone. No one was going to walk around red-eyed any more. One by one I told them, “Don’t let him see you cry. If you must, go into the ladies room till you’re okay, but don’t give him the satisfaction.”
It worked, I guess. The guys were reduced to yelling at each other. They should have known better. They were teaching thinking methods that specifically demonstrated how to disagree without insulting one’s opponent, yet they couldn’t put it into everyday practice. I will never allow anyone to bully people again.
Current Reading:
Good Diary Today:
From the Old Folks' Radio:
Looking at the Economic Picture - 2008-07-21
A Little Name Dropping - 2008-07-13
Crocheting Grannies - 2008-07-11
Not Quite So Worried - 2008-07-09