Anti-Bully Poster Competition Rewards Intolerance

The anti-bully movement is the most uncontroversial social movement in the history of the world. Everyone throughout the entire political spectrum, and from every race and religion, think that anti-bully activism is a wonderful idea.

One of the things the anti-bully movement believes it is doing is promoting tolerance between children. This is how it is trying to promote tolerance: It is very, very important to be completely tolerant of everyone. And if anyone shows you any kind of intolerance, we will have no tolerance for them!

A brilliant new example of this process recently came to my attention. News headlines in Wales proudly informed us of the winner of a school competition for anti-bully posters. What did the winning poster say? "BULLIES AIN'T COOL--KICK THEM OUT OF SCHOOL." 

Isn't this a wonderful way to promote tolerance? Kick kids out of school. If they aren't cool, that is. I was never what you would think of as cool, and neither were most of my friends.  In fact, many of the most successful students are decidedly uncool. Should they be kicked out of school for not being cool?

And is it true that the bullies really aren't cool? If you look at the kids who get classified as bullies and victims, who is more likely to be cool? The victims? No way! If they knew how to be cool, they wouldn't be victims. The bullies are the cool ones, and most kids see it. In fact, research has shown that the bullies (not those called "bully/victims," who are really aggressive victims) tend to be popular and admired by most of the students. Even the teachers tend to like them.  In the bully/victim interaction, the bully is the winner, which is why the bully feels great and is admired by most kids, and the victim is the loser, which is why the victim feels miserable and is disrespected by most kids.

But it really irks the anti-bully researchers that the bullies are popular. So they instruct schools to encourage kids to ignore their natural instincts to admire those who are popular and powerful, and instead to have no respect or tolerance for them. In this anti-bully poster competition, the school rewarded the child who came up with the most clever expression of intolerance towards bullies. Can you imagine a school rewarding a student for creating a poster that says, "Gays/Nerds/Losers/Anorexics/Fat kids/Poor kids ain't cool--kick them out of school"? Such a school would be villified by all the nation's newspapers, and the principal would be fired. But when it comes to bullies, you can say the nastiest things you want about them (while using poor English--since when is "ain't" accepted in school?) and you'll win a prize and be honored by the press.

Now, before you express your outrage--How dare Izzy Kalman support bullies?!--I am not supporting bullies. I am simply reporting reality. I am a mental health professional and a scientist. My job is not to support one group of people against another. That is what the anti-bully people do--support victims against bullies. My job is to help people solve their problems. The best friend a victim has is yours truly. I don't help victims by fighting their battles for them. That would only reward them for victim behavior, and entrench them deeper in their sense of victimhood. I help them by teaching them how not to be victims--to become winners--and they do it all by themselves and without getting anyone in trouble. And I give them the solution for free. So please don't accuse me of being against victims. I'm pro everyone.