In the thousands of years that I have been speaking to parents about their children, my children, what is happening at nursery or in the playground or in the school, many have told me that their child is being bullied. This is causing both them and the child deep distress.
Not one parent has ever told me: “You know what? It is really difficult for me, as my child is a bully.” No one. It’s as if there exists only the bullied, with much emphasis in schools about this issue and how to tackle it. But where are the bullies? Do they also need help? They live as ghosts passing between walls, almost unreal until somehow they make another person’s life hell.
It cannot be nice to be them, can it? We must pity the persecutors. Yet no one is more full of self-pity than the persecutors themselves. Nowhere is this strange but familiar dynamic so clearly played out than on social media, and Twitter especially. Certain bullies ,when challenged, like to present themselves as victims. Do I need to name names? Probably not, but here are a couple for starters: Laurie Penny and Owen Jones.
Competitive victimhood is the name of the game. I am sure I am guilty of this at times but I have done enough therapy, particularly group theory, to have a handle on the games people play. Eric Berne, a Canadian psychiatrist, literally wrote the book: Games People Play:The Psychology of Human Relationships. In the 50s he developed what is called Transactional Analysis.
Whereas Freud had his patients talk about themselves, Berne thought far more could be gained by watching how an individual behaved in a group. What he wanted to observe was how someone related to other people. He observed their body language, their facial expressions, as well as what they said.
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