<p>The worse part of all this is that Casey is getting suspended. What exactly does this teach Casey? That he was wrong in defending himself? Take the beating now and hope to tell about it later?</p>
<p>S1 was very big for his age and was always picked on. When he snapped he also was the one blamed and punished. He could hurt the others more than they could hurt him, physically. Only thing we could really do was work with him on alternative methods to deflect and manage the bullies. The ones that are large stand out. Fair? No. Real? yes.</p>
<p>Wow. Just wow. Nobody wants to see violence of any kind and ideally this boy should have walked away if he could have but, really, how can anyone fault him for taking that kid on? The school’s response is maddening and I doubt we have heard the last of this one.</p>
<p>When your kid snapped, did the other student get penalized as well?</p>
<p>It’s true that the kid was much bigger and could probably cause more damage to that little runt. But how could that little punk just get away without any consequence? If an adult did that to another adult, it would be considered harassment, assault and battery at the very least. But in this case, a kid defends himself, and he gets in trouble? Punish Casey if you want for breaking the kid’s ankle. But the bully should get equal or worse of a punishment. It sends the message to Casey that he may have to rethink his actions more carefully next time, but it also sends a message to the bullies that they will face fiercer consequences for provoking, instigating, harassing, and assaulting another member of the student body. And that doesn’t mean the kids watching and laughing should be off the hook either, they should also be penalized. If you see something, say something, do something.</p>
<p>Stuff like this should trigger all sorts of events. I mean what kind of environment is that bully living in where he feels the need to pick on other people at school. Is he getting this from his parents? Are they fit to be parents? Was the kid abused at some point?</p>
<p>Just seems stuff like this should be taken more serious with more balanced justice dished out, not this one sided stuff where the bully gets away free and continues his rein of terror on other students. It sends a horrible message to bullies.</p>
<p>The bully was absolutely wrong. The kid being bullied was also wrong for retaliating with such force as to cause a broken ankle. I don’t fault the boy for standing up for himself, but he shouldn’t have body slammed the little kid with such force into a concrete sidewalk. Had the smaller kid not twisted his body mid-air, he very likely would have been hurt more seriously.</p>
<p><a href=“1”>QUOTE=New South Wales Crimes Act of 1900</a> A person who assaults, stalks, harasses or intimidates any school student or member of staff of a school while the student or member of staff is attending a school, although no actual bodily harm is occasioned, is liable to imprisonment for 5 years.
<p>Unfortunately, bullies often don’t stop unless someone fights back and wins. That is often the only way to “manage” a bully. Problem is, that may not work if the bully is part of a gang.</p>
<p>The school punishing your son does not make sense, unless your son used obviously excessive force beyond what is needed to defeat the bully in self defense. The bully should have gotten a much harsher punishment for starting the fight.</p>
<p>Is it reasonable to expect the bullied kid to know exactly how much force is needed in self defense, or, without any special training, how to defeat an assailant without hurting him? If you were being punched in the face by someone, would you just passively keep getting punched or would you fight back even though you may injure your assailant? (Obviously, those with police, combat, or martial arts training may be better able to defeat an assailant without hurting him, but most people do not have such training.)</p>
<p>I could not get the links to load, so I cannot speak to this directly. However my oldest son was bullied in Middle School. The administration kept trying to pass it off as teasing. In our many school conferences we told the administration to address it, or our son might get fed up and defend himself, and since at the time he was a jr. black belt it might not turn out so well.
Well the school did not address it, and one day DS did get fed up and punched the bully and broke his nose. The administration wanted to suspend my DS and insist he take anger management before he was let back in school. Luckily I had documented all the meetings with the school and was able to “persuade” them that my son should not be punished. DS was literally heralded as a rock star by other students and teachers.
Oh and he was never bothered by bullies again.</p>
<p>That’s the good that comes out of this - They’ll quit bullying the big kid, who needs to learn not to over-react next time. I can not believe that the bully wasn’t suspended too.</p>
<p>Maybe someone wiser than me can explain why schools don’t take these problems seriously. The bully obviously has a big problem and should be evaluated. It should never have gotten to this point, where the bully thinks he can act as he did with impunity. I’d like to see everyone in every school role-play an appropriate response to bullies, something other than running away, which will make them even more of a target.</p>
<p>My kid was picked on too. The attitude seemed to always be ‘deal with it’. Are they just lazy? Uncaring? Unobservant? IMO some of them were bullies themselves and are sympathetic or prefer to align with the bullies.</p>
<p>I’m not defending the bully in any way. He deserved payback from the kid he was bullying.
However, the kid being bully reacted in a way that was sure to cause excessive injury. He knew exactly what he was doing when he picked up the much smaller bully and body slammed him onto concrete—a typical WWF move.</p>
<p>The two of them deserved to be suspended. The kids in the background egging on the bully should have been suspended too. The kid video taping should have been suspended.</p>
<p>Part of the punishment should include counseling for everyone involved–the bully, the kid being bullied, and the bystanders who watched it all unfold. After talking with the kids individually, they should be put them all in a room together with an impartial counselor and have them talk through the experience. Everyone involved needs to learn something from this experience–Why the kid chose to bully? Why bystanders stood around and either egged on the bully or did nothing to stop the bullying? Why stand by and video tape? How to react to a bully?</p>
<p>I am completely on the side of Casey! In fact, I was Casey over 40 years ago in school. I was constantly pushed around by a kid. Later, I found that I can beat him. The table turned. I beat him every chance I get, until his compete submission. It may not have been the standard for today’s school yard. But that is what I called school yard justice. The little kid deserves what he was getting: A lesson on how to behave properly in the real world. If you look at the world today, the relationships among countries, do we see any similarities? Like it or not, when driving in the street of NY or Boston, “bigger bumpers always have the right of way.” The phenomenon does not limit to the kids. It happens in the real world as well.</p>
<p>Submit to bullying => get bullied more
Snitch => school won’t do anything, get bullied more
Fight back => works if you win, but you will get punished by the school for winning; doesn’t work if you lose or if the bully is in a gang</p>
<p>I agree with nysmile. The photographer should be suspended, because it looks very likely that he/she knew the bully was going to strike in advance, and was prepped and ready to record the attack. Sometimes the humiliation is worse than the physical pain, and it seems clear someone wanted to record that attack. Our children should be protected against emotional bullying as well as physical bullying. </p>
<p>Some of you do not seem to have access to the updated info. The school did suspend the attacker, not just the victim. And the attacker was suspended for more time than the victim was.</p>
<p>Or the school administration does not want to get involved in petty (to them) schoolyard arguments. So they ignore everything until someone ends up in the hospital after a fight, a gun is brought to campus, or a bullying victim commits suicide, etc… Also, it appears that they usually end up punishing the victim for fighting back after a long period of harassment and assault that they ignored.</p>
<p>And if he kills a kid accidently next time because of a bad landing? Can happen. Both parties should have gotten disciplinary action. I don’t know if suspension is the appropriate punishment. </p>
<p>The problem with this solution is that it really is not a template for a solution. All bullied people cannot successfully retaliate. Retaliation can backfire and cause more problems if someone is truly maimed or killed.</p>
<p>My son broke a kid’s hand in middle school when the rotter would not let him shut his locker. The kid had a class right near the locker and could just rush in at the bell whereas my son had to go some distance and was already in some trouble for being late for class. So the kid deliberately blocked my son from closing his locker door. What my son did was “ignore what he was doing and shut the locker door with the force necessary to get it closed” which broke the kid’s hand. All kinds of trouble.</p>
<p>But then a few years later, some nasty kid delibertely blocked my son when he was trying to get out of a parking spot. Would running him over be the right thing to do? He could have done it. That’s the problem with responding in kind.</p>
<p>Seems like the bully was (up to that time) manipulating the system to get your son in trouble for being late to class. It appears that your son did not have much choice in the matter – either do something that could cause injury to the bully, or be subject to yet more disciplinary action from the school for being late to class, while the bully gets ignored by the school administration.</p>
<p>Did the action successfully cause the bully to stop bullying your son?</p>
<p>The problem with bullying is that most “solutions” don’t work. Fighting back works only if you win and the bully is not in a gang, and other “solutions” just invite more bullying.</p>
<p>Imo, the solution is for the bullied child to tell the administration about the bully’s behavior EVERY SINGLE TIME IT HAPPENS, and for the bullied child’s parents to demand that the administration to put a stop to it immediately or threaten to sue for their child’s safety. The bully’s parents should immediately be called after the first offense, and also put on notice by the bullied child’s parents that they will call the police and the district attorney to press criminal charges if the bullying doesn’t stop immediately.</p>
<p>It would be ideal if the school administration responded as desired when bullying is reported, but as we have seen from all of the examples, the common reaction from the school administration is to ignore it, or blame/punish the victim.</p>
<p>In CA, public schools are required by law to provide a safe learning environment, free from harassment, for every student. Once put on notice of harassing behavior, the school must stop it or be held liable. Other states probably have this requirement as well. </p>
<p>If your school administration does not appear to be aware of this responsibility, I’d suggest you inform them. If they thereafter do not respond appropriately to continuing bullying behavior, I suggest you hire a lawyer immediately.</p>
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