The Complete Guide to Understanding, Controlling, and Stopping Bullies & Bullying

Forty percent of U.S. students voluntarily report being involved in bullying—as bullies or as victims—according to the results of the first national survey on this subject. Bullying is increasingly viewed as an important contributor to youth violence, including homicide and suicide. Case studies of the shooting at Columbine High School and other U.S. schools trace the multiple murders to bullying incidents.

In a survey of 558 students in a Midwestern middle school, 80 percent of the students had engaged in bullying behavior during the previous 30 days, verbally or in cyberspace by teasing, name calling, spreading malicious rumors, ridiculing, and leaving students out of social activities deliberately, or even physically by damaging belongings, aggression, extortion, beating, and use of deadly force.

Given that most bullying goes unnoticed and unreported, Americans have been slow to react to this behavior that is taking over our schools. Other countries deal with mean people while, in the United States, take-charge insolence, no matter how threatening, is rewarded in schools, in business, in sports, and in everyday life. Often those who stand up to a bully suffer retribution so that their only defense seems to be to turn to violence themselves.