Children with too high self-esteem have an inflated opinion of themselves that shows no consideration for others, or any real understanding of their own strengths and weaknesses. This attitude is the root of much bullying.

While self-esteem is awarded, self-respect must be earned through responsibility, cooperation and achievement. Humility, empathy, compassion, generosity of spirit, a realistic belief in their own abilities, and a willingness to try new things all show self-respect.

A child who respects himself also respects others – and other things, such as property, emotions, responsibility and authority. A bully does not respect others because he has no respect for himself. A child with no self-respect sets himself up to be a victim by not interacting normally with others, by lacking the social skills that are a definite part of self-respect. Children who respect themselves have been shown respect.

But autistic children who do not have social skills can learn self-respect, which is not dependent on having those skills.

I think that’s exactly it. It’s about difference (and really, a form of bigotry – both the bullying and the tolerance for bullying).

Of course, I think about this from the non-autistic plus “I’ve been bullied” point of view, rather than the “bully’s” point of view.

I know for a fact that most of the children that first bullied me failed school horribly because of personal issues. The one who was the front bully was severely ill, which nobody recognised until she attempted suicide. However, all these children, today they are young adults, remain mostly extremely popular and well liked among other people. I think identification is a big issue here. It’s easy to treat someone bad whom you can’t recognise as a being that is similar to yourself, but it’s all the harder to bully a person that appears to be just like you. But of course, that’s just a try at understanding the non-autistic mind from an autistic point of view.

I was almost too angry to reply to that, I don’t know what I said to him, but it wasn’t friendly. (We were not very formal between teachers and students in that school).

And this was at a school that was generally very friendly and where picking on people was very rare compared to other schools. I just hope that girl managed to make it stop during the next few years too.

Good point. I think often teachers chastise bullies, but there’s an implicit message that reinforces the higher social status of the bullies. It’s almost as if they’re saying “I know he’s lame and deserves it, but try to resist.”

I had a teacher who would participate in negative gossip about unpopular students. The thought of it still makes me smoulder. I think the issue with her was that partly because of her age (fresh out of college), she was caught up in the pressure of wanting to be liked by students. She gossiped for the same reason the students did- she wanted to make sure that she was in the elite circle.

There’s no doubt more to it, but I would assume it’s the primary factor in the bullying Amanda describes in her post. I believe it’s why I experienced the bullying I did.

Bullies pick on their targets and keep pushing as far as they can before they hit real consequences. Often, they never suffer any.

I think the important thing is to look for an explanation, or at least a solution, rather than taking the easy route and ascribing bullying to an inherently evil nature. (At least from a public policy perspective).