October 8th, 2012

Workplace Bullying: Back to Basics About Underdogs

Let me be clear. There are not “2 sides” to this story. Bullying is not conflict of an intellectual nature between two people with equivalent power.

Bullying is an uninvited, unwanted assault that is initiated unilaterally. Sometimes by committee as when there are several perpetrators. But it is never started at the invitation of the targeted person.

It’s assault, a non-physical series of repeated attacks. It stops short of battery, physical contact. But it is a form of workplace violence. The cruelest bullies are innovative. They are harmful but rarely are held accountable. Instead, targets are blamed for their fate and held responsible. Strange?

Rape myths are fueled by the lie that for some reason a woman or girl wants to be raped. Only a foolish zealot would use the term “legitimate” rape. Responsibility for rape is split between aspects of the rapist’s personality and the social culture in which it happens. The existence of rape-free cultures proves that another reality is possible. Rape is not “inevitable” and a “normal, routine” or necessary part of a culture.

Rapists share many traits with a vocal minority in the U.S. that deems women second class. Rape would not occur if there were more positive, respectful societal attitudes toward women less aggression tolerated as routine in society. Even the personality traits of rapists are determined by a combination of family and broader societal learning experiences.

Believers in rape myths and shaming women who seek abortions by mandating transvaginal probing and seeing pictures of aborted fetuses are the same kind of folks who believe bullied targets must have deserved their humiliation and all the negative health consequences that bullying brings.

Blamers and haters would rather defend bullies, as lovers of aggression, than show compassion for targets. They utter senseless statements such as, “targets have the personal responsibility to stand up for themselves and stop the bullying when it first starts.” They are wrong. Our research shows that targets are relatively powerless to stop the bullying beyond a success rate of 3.5%.

All of our work since we started 15 years ago revolves around supporting, empowering, and telling the story of bullied targets so the world better understands their experiences. We are unapologetically target-centric. We help the underdogs.

Bullies are backed by the entire corporation.

How do bully apologists sleep?

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Tags: assault, bully, personal responsibility, rape myths, target

This entry was posted on Monday, October 8th, 2012 at 11:05 am and is filed under Tutorials About Bullying, WBI Education. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.