Bullies

Thugs, whether acting on their own or collectively, sadden me. Whereas associates’ physical illnesses upset me, their disturbed minds equally pain me. Brokenness in any form is difficult for me to behold.

Lately, as an individual and as “a member of the tribe,” I’ve seen/been subjugated to the latter via numerous incidents. It seems that spring sunshine not only brings forth flower buds and songbirds but also generates nasty operators who rely on coercion to make themselves feel esteemed. Simply, both at the personal level and as part of Klal Yisrael, I’ve been laid open to hurtful comments, hostile intent, and the type of exhaustion concomitant to bravely coping with incorrect perceptions of social “justice.”

Overall, attempted unkind undertakings cull one of three responses from me. Namely, rather than stew in the shadow of those attacks, I look right through them, I erect fortifications between myself and their perpetrators, or I involve myself in direct, forceful counteractions.

While personalities’ inability to get beyond provocative, vicious communications dispirits me, forever, it’s mistaken or worse to defend received abuse. Sensible soul don’t allow themselves to be played or worse.

Sure, time and again, bullies, themselves, were bullied. We can feel kind-hearted about their pasts but we’re not obliged to rescue them—they need to attain that volition themselves or to reach it via the help of skilled, i.e., professional third parties. What’s more, healing journey or no, we oughtn’t to excuse their ugly conduct. It’s not a victim’s concern as to why a tormenter proceeds as they do.

In sundry circumstances, intimidators remain toolless people, viz., they’re insecure souls who compensate dysfunctionally for perceived advantages in affiliates and for perceived deficiencies in themselves. Their vindictive pronouncements might aim, in the least, at getting social spotlights shone on themselves.

Though all of us are flawed, fortunately, only a small minority (possibly subconsciously) use their defects as grounds for plaguing publics. Often, it’s sufficient to pity and then slough off such persons. As for me, when possible, I elect to not feed my energy to their maleficence; after their deeds of enmity, I only smile and nod.

Consider that a number of materializations of shaming or of spreading rumors, while bitter, can be jettisoned. These occurrences include folks making fun of someone’s fashion sense, or folks cat calling in public spaces. In both of these conditions stances, just walking away serves as a sound retort.

Sometimes, however, it’s insufficient to “take no notice” of harrying. On such occasions, I try to “set limits with love.” In other words, I attempt to disengage from those mortals who espouse dreadful things. I deflect their inimicality, which they mask as “humor,” especially when it’s served up in a group setting. It suits me to be intolerant of articulated meanness. Essentially, I cordon off that malice. Thereafter, when I’ve next created a safe distance between us, I allow myself to feel compassion given that healthy people don’t intentionally impair their fellows and that unhealthy people need help.

Examples of agitation best answered with restrictions include students’ hounding of professors, and siblings’ distressing each other. In the first case, when an especially troublesome undergraduate persisted in disrupting one of my classes, I called campus police to remove him. In the second case, when one of my offspring made repeated callous remarks about and to one of their kin, that wrongdoer was given a time out.

Nonetheless, at times, neither paying no heed nor creating parameters works. At such junctures, I’ve straightforwardly worked to shut down the minimalizing, denying, and rationalizing to which I’ve been subjected.

Narcissist gaslighting, for instance, can sufficiently distort truth for victims to start self-doubting. Likewise, “making jokes” at another’s expense can lead to the other manifesting depression, anxiety, or social withdrawal. Whereas emotional blackjacking is awful for adults, it’s that much more devastating for children. Thus, there are moments when assailants need to be unfalteringly blocked.

In so many words, every now and then, strong-arming requires ungentle deterrents. In my experience, there was a situation that required summoning representatives of the Anti-Defamation League to a public high school where Jewish students were sent to detention for not rising, during a winter assembly, when Christian songs were sung. Additionally, there was the situation that required filing a police report concerning, as well as showing up to testify against, a stranger who had not gotten his desired parking space and had subsequently threatened several people with bodily harm. Plus, there was the situation that necessitated contacting The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to investigate and halt a campus-wide, decades long, practice of sexism against female faculty.

Communal exploitations of authority, meaning pooled mean-spiritedness, endure, too. Am Yisrael just commemorated Yom HaShoah and will shortly be observing Yom Hazikaron. Although all dominions are flawed, only some of them try to damage select parts of the world.

Such united, disruptive forces aimed at homelands can be managed comparably to how we manage disruptive forces aimed at individuals. Videlicet, amalgamated belligerence can be ignored, fenced off, or countered.

Some orotund groups can be disregarded. Consider how little attention was given to the Arab song, “Nakba Day,” and, initially, to the peaceful, albeit anti-Israel protests on certain campuses.

On the other hand, cruel rhetoric that’s disseminated is dangerous since it can stir further and worse behaviors when it’s left to molder. Without being examined by fact-checking or corralled by counterstatements, such “grandiloquence” explodes beyond “mere” discrimination into popularized hate, exclusion, and persecution.

As a result, every so often, though, terrorization on the government level requires us to place clear margins that separate it from us. By way of explanation, weigh that Israel built a literal wall, the West Bank Barrier, to enhance security, i.e., to decrease hostile infiltrations. Moreover, when we fail to erect equivalent obstructions, massacres, such as Oct. 7^th, happen.

Per large scale pugnaciousness, per nation states that seek the “remedy” of destruction, of genocide, such savagery must receive unswerving, powerful consequences. Swords of Iron epitomizes this variety of reaction.

It’s unfortunate that individuals and realms live on that invest their resources in repetitive, intentional offenses. It’s unfortunate that lookers-on, both singular and intercontinental, are so afraid that they’ll become belligerents’  future casualties that they sidestep championing the innocent and evade confronting aggressors. It’s unfortunate that targets, from time to time, must rely on themselves to be the “moral rebels,” to be the ones to handle these horrific affairs.

All in all, we need to dispense with, check, and stand our ground against inexcusable presences. Their existence is unfortunate but real.