Fred and George: The Bullies You Do Know

[ssk7882]

No: HPFGUIDX 43162

My goodness!

I get busy for a couple of days, and when I come back, what do I find?

Um.  Well.  It's really difficult for me even to know how to 
*approach* this now, honestly, because I get the distinct impression 
that my original argument was, er, not very well understood.  To say 
the least.  

That's my own fault, of course, but it does make it quite difficult 
for me to know how now to respond to what has been posted on this 
thread, as the vast majority of the arguments strike me as rather 
tangential, if not completely irrelevant, to the issue I was hoping 
to discuss.

However.  I will try.

First off, it seems to me that there is a rather severe discrepancy 
between my own understanding and that of the rest of the list when it 
comes to the questions of both what bullying is and what traits 
typically characterize those who engage in it.  

Many of the operative definitions of bullying that others have either 
stated outright or implied in their responses on this thread are ones 
that I have *never* seen or heard of before.  *Anywhere.*  And while 
some of them seem reasonable enough to me, others, I must say, strike 
me as simply bizarre.  

Elsewhere, people seem to be in possession of a *very* different (and 
indeed, in many cases diametrically opposed!) conception of what 
bullies are like -- what characterizes them, what traits they 
typically exhibit, and so forth.

Because the question of "what bullies are like" was absolutely 
*essential* to my original argument, this is an enormous problem.

So.  First off, a bit of clarification.  What is bullying?  What 
is "bullying behavior?"  And what are bullies typically like?  What 
traits typically characterize those who engage in bullying?


**WHAT IS BULLYING?**

The definitions of "bullying" with which I am most familiar are those 
which derive in one way or another from the definition used by the 
Norwegian Dan Olweus, whose research into the dynamics of schoolyard 
bullying has formed the basis for nearly all of the work done in this 
field in both Scandinavian and English-speaking countries over the 
course of the past thirty years.  

The Oregon Youth Violence Project, for example, uses the below 
definition when trying to evaluate whether or not conflict between 
students consitutes bullying:

-----

A social, verbal or physical action is "bullying" if it fit the below 
criteria:

-- is it behavior that could be reasonably assumed by a person of the 
instigator(s)' age, intellect, and experience to cause pain, 
discomfort, humiliation or embarrassment to the victim?  

-- has it happened more than once?

-- has the instigator persisted in the behavior even after the victim 
has demonstrated that s/he resents this behavior or is bothered by it?

-- is there a real or perceived power imbalance between the victim 
and the instigator(s), is the victim incapable of retaliating 
effectively in kind, or is the victim unusually and specifically 
vulnerable in the arena targetted by the behavior?

If the answer to all four of these questions is "yes," then bullying 
is taking place.

-----

This is a rather standard definition.  Some variation or another of 
the above is used by nearly all professionals in the field of 
bullying prevention across Scandinavia, as well as in the US, 
Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the UK.  I am unfamiliar with the 
definitions used in other places.

Although this is a clinical definition, it matches my own layman's 
experience of what bullying is and what it entails perfectly.  
Indeed, I find it so intuitive that it honestly hadn't even occurred 
to me that it might not match up with the understandings of others on 
this list.  My bad, apparently. 

So.  According to this definition, have we seen the twins engage in 
bullying in canon?

I would say that their treatment of Percy definitely qualifies as 
bullying.  However, I register the objections that some people have 
raised on the grounds that special considerations must apply when 
considering the question of bullying between siblings. This is very 
true, and in fact, materials designed to help educators and other 
concerned adults to help prevent childhood bullying often have an 
entire *chapter* devoted to the question of bullying between 
siblings.  Nonetheless, bullying can and does happen between 
siblings, and in the case of Percy and the twins, I think that it 
definitely *is* happening by the time of GoF.  This is a complicated 
issue, though, and it's one that I have a LOT of thoughts about, so 
I'd like to return to it in another post, if that's all right with 
everyone.

So outside of the family unit, have we seen the twins engage in 
bullying?

No.  I would say that we have not.  We have seen isolated incidents 
that hint at bullying, but since one of the criteria for "bullying" 
is that the behavior be repetitive and persistent, one cannot 
positively identify bullying on the basis of such isolated incidents, 
no matter how suggestive they may be.

One *can,* however, draw certain assumptions about character and 
inclination from isolated incidents, particularly when there are a 
number of these incidents in the canon and very little evidence to 
contradict them.

This was the basis of my original argument: the twins *behave* like 
bullies.  They act like bullies.  They engage in bullying behavior, 
and they also exhibit nearly every one of the character traits that 
researcheres over the past forty years have identified as typical of 
people who bully.  Therefore it is very difficult for me as a reader 
*not* to assume that, even if we do not see enough of their 
interactions with students outside of their in-group to form a 
definitive diagnosis, nonetheless they very likely are indeed bullies.

This argument, however, depends on a certain understanding of what 
constitutes bullying behavior, as well as one of what bullies are 
typically like.

So what *is* "bullying behavior?"  



**WHAT IS "BULLYING BEHAVIOR?"**


"Bullying behavior" is behavior consistent with any *one* of the 
criteria listed in the above definition of bullying.  In other words, 
although we cannot say for sure that bullying is taking place until 
all four of the criteria have been met, action that fulfills any one 
of the four should be considered a "red flag."  It is behavior 
consistent with that of bullies, and it therefore ought to alert the
witness to the possibility that bullying may be taking place, or that 
the person responsible for the behavior is at serious risk for 
becoming a bully.

Bullying behavior would therefore include: targetting the weak or the 
vulnerable; disregard for signs of distress or protest on the part of 
a victim; any persistent and repetitive instigation of actions which 
might reasonably be assumed to cause pain, discomfort or humiliation 
to others; insensitivity to the emotional condition of other people.

The twins exhibit all of these behaviors.  If they are not *actually* 
bullying anyone outside of their family -- which they may well not 
be -- they nonetheless do exhibit all of the behavioral symptoms of 
those prone to bullying.  They may or may not technically 
be "bullies."  But do they engage in "bullying behavior?"  

Oh, yes.  No question.  That they most certainly do.



**WHAT ARE BULLIES LIKE?  WHAT CHARACTER TRAITS DO THEY MOST OFTEN 
POSSESS?**


Here is where we seem to have run into the most profound difference 
of opinion.

This is unfortunate indeed, as the understanding of what bullies are 
like was absolutely central to my original argument.

There's been an enormous amount of research done on this subject over 
the past thirty years.  Olweus' findings are commercially available.  
There's a nice overview of this research in Adair article from the 
New Zealand "Children Issues," v. 3 no. 1, 1999, which is available 
from the Children's Issues Centre of the University of Otago.  
Alternatively, the recently published (if rather insultingly and 
misleadingly titled) _Your Child: Bully or Victim?_ by Peter Sheras 
is a good layman's overview, as is the somewhat older _Bullies & 
Victims,_ by Fried and Fried.  Both of these books are currently in 
print.

Research into the psychological profiles of bullies in both 
Scandinavian and English-speaking countries has found that cross-
culturally they exhibit the following traits:

-- physically strong and/or coordinated
-- socially popular
-- assertive with both peers and adults
-- high levels of physical courage
-- very high levels of self-esteem
-- impulsive
-- feel little or no sympathy for victims (lack remorse)
-- positive attitudes towards violence
-- low levels of empathy
-- difficulty recognizing or understanding their own and others' 
emotions
-- competitive
-- lack self-reflection
-- resistant to compromise

("Empathy," in this context, refers to the ability to project oneself 
into the situation of someone very different from oneself and then to 
imagine how that person might feel or think.  People with "low levels 
of empathy" find this a difficult imaginative exercise.)

Eron et al at the University of Chicago, who have conducted a thirty 
year longitudinal study of schoolyard bullies and victims, also claim 
that bullies show a much higher tendency than other children towards 
dualistic thinking, and specifically towards thinking in terms of 
self-other dichotomies: us vs. them, in-group vs. out-group, etc.  

David Elkind of Harvard, whose findings confirm this, suggests that 
it may be this tendency which accounts for bullies' low empathy 
levels: they do not, he suggests, ascribe to "outsiders" quite the 
same human status they do to those they consider to be "like them," 
and they therefore not only find it difficult to identify with 
outsiders, but also resist attaching any real credence to their 
emotional responses, thus leading them to be able to make claims 
like "oh, it wasn't really bothering him," even when their 
victim has in fact loudly and repeatedly objected to mistreatment or 
even been reduced to tears.

Eron and Elkind's findings are hardly as universal as all of the ones 
listed above, though, and Elkind's theory is by no means anywhere 
near universally accepted within the field.

Apologies for this rather long digression, but I really felt that it 
was necessary, as so many of the objections to my claim that the 
twins are bullies seemed based in a *completely* different 
understanding of what traits are characteristic of bullies
in the first place.  


--------


Now, back to the topic at hand.


In my original message, I posited that Fred and George are 
characterized quite clearly in the text as bullies.

They are popular, charismatic, athletic and self-confident, loyal to 
those they have designated members of their in-group, disdainful and 
hostile to those outside of that magic circle, poor at recognizing 
when their behavior is harming others, insensitive to others' 
feelings, lacking in any apparent self-reflexion, and prone to 
targetting the vulnerable and the weak without remorse.  

I pointed out places in the canon that had conspired to create this 
impression in my mind, places where we see hints to this aspect of 
their character, hints which strongly suggest to me that the twins do 
indeed engage in bullying, even if we have never actually seen firm 
evidence of this in the canon.

I pointed out that while the Twins are indeed helpful to Harry, we 
have yet to see them be in the least bit pleasant to any student 
outside of House Gryffindor.  Indeed, every single one of their 
interactions with an "out-group" student that we have yet seen in 
canon has been disdainful, mocking, unfriendly, or in some other way 
aggressive.  This holds true not only for their interactions with the 
members of House Slytherin, but also for their interaction with 
Cedric Diggory, of House Hufflepuff.  This is behavior characteristic 
of bullies, who tend (according to Eron and Enkind) to think in terms 
of "us vs. them," and to deny outsiders the same considerations
that they afford to those within their own circle.

Not only is their behavior towards people outside of their group 
hostile; their manner of speaking about those people is both 
disdainful and dismissive.  This was my point in bringing up Draco 
and the dementor on the train.  My point there was not to claim that 
the twins ought to go out of their way to be "nice" to Draco.  (Who 
would *want* to go out of their way to be nice to Draco?  He's 
horrid!)  Rather, it was that the particular *tenor* of their disdain 
is utterly consistent with the way in which bullies think and speak 
about people outside of their in-group.  (It is also, I might point 
out, very similar to the sneering tone with which Sirius Black always 
speaks of Severus Snape -- a character touch which has led more than 
one reader to deduce that Sirius himself might have been a bit of a 
bully back in his schooldays).

I also pointed out that the twins -- large, strong, and self-assured 
teenaged boys -- have on more than one occasion been shown targetting 
boys much younger than themselves for mockery.  They do not seem to 
have much of a sense of noblesse oblige.  They do not balk at 
attacking people much younger or less powerful than they are, 
nor do they seem to see anything wrong with this behavior.  This too 
is characteristic of people who bully others.

When we do see the twins applying their "mischief" to an authority 
figure at Hogwarts, they have selected as their target the most 
vulnerable professor in the entire school, a man who is (as far as 
the twins know) in a state of magically-induced shell-shock.  Knowing 
this about him, they nonetheless choose to throw snowballs at the 
back of his head from a hidden location. Bullies tend to hone in on 
other people's vulnerabilities.  Even Harry, who is friendly with the 
twins, is aware of this aspect of their character: he fears to reveal 
vulnerability to them, for fear that they will exploit it in a way 
that he will find painful.

In both the canon and the semi-canon of the schoolbooks, the twins 
are shown to exhibit a marked callousness towards animals.  This 
applies not only to "wild" magical animals, like the salamander, but 
also towards their own brother's pets.  They have already killed (or 
perhaps merely "lost") one of Ron's pets, and they dismiss his grief 
over the assumed death of Scabbers as insignificant and rather 
foolish.  Callousness and lack of empathy are characteristic traits 
of those who bully others.

In their harassment of their siblings, the twins seem to lack insight 
into the harm caused by their actions.  The damaging effects of their 
behavior on their little sister Ginny must be pointed out to them 
before they are capable of appreciating that they are causing her 
injury.  They similarly are either incapable of seeing the damage 
that their continued harassment of Percy is causing, or simply 
disinterested in it.  If their treatment of Percy is not, in fact, 
malicious, then they must be turning a willfully blind eye to its 
effects on both his behavior and his emotional condition.  This, 
too, is typical of bullies, who often lack both insight into their 
own motivations and attentiveness to the suffering of others.  

On the one occasion where the twins are called upon to display adult 
behavior -- in the train at the end of GoF -- they fail the test.  
They do not show much inclination to take on the mantle of 
adulthood.  This immaturity is typical of bullies, whose lives tend 
to take a sharp downturn at the age of seventeen or eighteen, when 
they are forced to join the adult world, a world in which their 
manner of interacting with others does not reap at all the same 
rewards as it does in the school environment.  People who were 
bullies as children are five times as likely (in the US) to develop a 
criminal record later in life than are children who did not bully 
others in school.  Indeed, in GoF, we see the twins contemplate 
blackmail -- a criminal activity rather above and beyond the level of 
childish pranks -- when they find themselves frustrated by the adult 
world.  


Now for me, as a reader, all of these factors combine to create a 
certain impression of the twins.  Namely, that they are bullies.  
They look like bullies, they act like bullies, they speak like 
bullies, they react to things in the same way that bullies typically 
do.  In fact, the *only* way in which they are not written as bullies 
is that JKR has not actually shown us the twins *bullying* anyone.  
Then, she has not shown us very much of their interactions with the 
student body outside of House Gryffindor at all.  For behavior to be 
technically bullying, it must happen repeatedly, and we have not been 
shown nearly enough of the twins' interactions with the rest of the
school to know whether or not this has happened.  

I think, however, that all of the signs are there.  If the twins are, 
in fact, *not* bullying students at Hogwarts, then they have done a 
remarkable job of showing every last sign of being bullies 
without...yet...quite...becoming such.  They certainly fit the 
personality profile.  They certainly exhibit bullying behaviors.  
They certainly are *depicted* as stereotypical bullies.

In this respect, I tend to feel that the twins reflect a basic fact 
of life: you never perceive the Bully You Know as a bully at all, no 
matter how obviously he might fit the profile, because you are 
conditioned to take heed of the signs *only* when they appear in 
someone who doesn't like you, and who therefore seems likely to 
direct his hostility against you and yours.  My Brave Defender is 
your Big Mean Bully.  My Big Mean Bully is your All-round Nice Guy.


Clearly, though, my reading of the twins is...er, idiosyncratic.  To 
say the least. However, I must say that many of the objections to my 
reading strike me as a little bit difficult to understand.  They seem 
to revolve on some *very* different ideas about bullies and bullying 
than the ones which I possess.  I'll try to address a few of them 
here.


1) It's only bullying if it is motivated by malice.


Hmmm.  A tricky issue, this.  

See, some definitions of bullying do indeed include malice, 
the "intent to harm," as one of the requisite criteria.  Others 
include it as only *one* of many the possible criteria on a "if five 
of the seven of these are true" type list.  And then there are others 
which omit it altogether.

You can make a case for malice as a requisite criterion for bullying, 
yes.  I think, though, that there are very good reasons for omitting 
it as such.  

One of these reasons is simply that there are in fact *many* reasons 
that a child might choose to bully another child, and that many of 
these reasons often take precedence over the desire to do harm.  A 
children might choose to bully, for example, primarily to ensure her 
own social popularity, or because she is afraid that if she isn't 
perceived by other children as a bully, then she might herself
become the next victim.  These motivations often supercede the desire 
to do harm.  But does that make the bullying any less bullying?  I 
don't think that it does.

Another reason for discounting motive as a relevant factor here is 
that intent is impossible to prove.  Bullies themselves very rarely 
explain their actions in terms of having wanted to hurt someone.  
Instead, they usually fall back on the old stand-bys: "he deserved 
it," "she was asking for it," "it didn't really hurt him," "it was 
all in fun," "can't she take a joke?" and so forth.  Sometimes, when 
called upon to account for their actions, bullies will say that they 
just did it because they were bored, or because they thought that it 
would be funny.  "Because it was funny" is not necessarily the same
thing as malice.  It could reflect simple callousness.  But again, 
bullying is no less bullying just because its perpetrator is merely 
callous and insensitive, rather than malevolent or sadistic.

This relates to the psychological characteristics of bullies, of 
course.  Bullies tend, as a class, to be exceptionally poor at 
understanding their own emotions and motivations.  They not only lack 
insight into other people's feelings, but also into their own.  They 
are not self-critical about their behavior.  So another problem with 
insisting on "intent to cause harm" as a proof of bullying is not 
only that it is impossible to prove malice, but also that even if 
malice *were* the primary reason for a bully's behavior, he would 
still likely to deny this not only to you, but also even to himself.

I firmly believe, for example, that the twins' behavior towards Percy 
in the third and fourth books of the series is indeed quite evidently 
intended to cause him harm.  If asked, however, I am equally sure 
that the twins themselves would attempt to rationalize it by claiming 
that they are trying to "help" Percy by their continual harassment.  
Similarly, I don't think that they'd be likely to show any great 
insight into the significance of the fact that they consistently 
target Percy on the exact same grounds for which Percy is praised or 
rewarded by their parents, or that every time Arthur or Molly give a 
sign of approval to Percy, retaliation from the twins is quick to 
follow.  As readers, *we* can recognize these patterns and interpret 
them, but the twins do not recognize them, and likely would not 
acknowledge them even if confronted with them.  Relying on the word 
of the aggressors as to their real motivations is really only of 
value if the aggressors are exceptionally self-reflexive, self-
critical, and honest with themselves.  Very few of us can claim to be 
all of those things -- I certainly can't -- and bullies as a class 
tend to be even less so than most. 

Bullies also tend to be *insensitive* to other people's emotions.  
They are not skilled at anticipating others reactions, and they lack 
impulse control.  This is a dangerous combination, because it does 
make it quite possible for people to cause tremendous harm to others 
without really "meaning to."  That doesn't mean that they aren't 
bullies.  They are still bullying, so long as they *ought* to have 
known that their behavior would be harmful.  In fact, one of the 
reasons that so many countries funnel so much money into bullying 
prevention programs for their schools is really not so much to 
protect the victims as it is to teach bullies to behave themselves.  
Bullies don't tend to fare very well in later life.  They all too 
often wind up in prison.  This could just be because they're 
malicious, of course, but to some extent, it may also reflect a 
profound failure of the sort of people who bully to comprehend the 
ramifications of their actions.  People like that *need* to be taught 
to anticipate how their behavior affects others, as well as how to 
control their desires to engage in hurtful behavior, not only for the 
protection of their victims, but also for their own protection.

The main reason, though, to leave aside the question of intent when 
evaluating bullying behavior is that to take intent under 
consideration privileges the experience of the bully over that of the 
victim.  Cindy touched on this issue here, when she wrote:

> I have to wonder whether the conduct of the twins is every bit as 
> hurtful to those on the receiving end as Draco's taunts about the 
> Weasleys' poverty.

Well, yes.  That's just it.  Whether or not behavior is "bullying" 
depends on whether or not it is bothering the *victim,* and that's 
not a question that it is the aggressor's job to answer.  Draco 
Malfoy, for example, cannot get off the Bully Hook by claiming that 
taunting Muggle-borns isn't really bullying because those Mudbloods 
aren't fully human and therefore don't really feel pain the way we 
purebloods do.  That *is* indeed one of the classic justifications of 
bullies.  But it's a poor justification.  An adolescent boy of
normal intellect really *ought* to know that taunting causes distress 
to other human beings regardless of their heritage.  That is 
knowledge that someone of his age and experience "can be reasonably 
assumed" to possess.  Furthermore, the reactions of those he has 
taunted *show* that his actions cause them pain.  His actions 
therefore constitute bullying, no matter what he might self-report as 
his true intent or degree of intended malice.

Similarly, in GoF the twins *ought* to know that their pranks cause 
Percy distress.  They are old enough and bright enough to understand 
that continual harassment bothers and upsets people.  They have had 
ample opportunity to observe that Percy *is* distressed by their 
actions, that they have a marked and negative effect on his ability 
to cope, and that they are causing him harm.  He protests and he 
objects; he complains to his parents; he locks himself in his room.  
He is not capable of retaliating in kind -- indeed, he does not 
retaliate in any way at all.  He is rendered vulnerable by virtue of 
having no real allies among his siblings, as well as by virtue of 
being under unusual stress due to having just started his adult 
life.  And yet the twins do not desist.  To my mind, this constitutes 
bullying.  The twins' claim (or the claims of their apologists) that 
they "mean no harm," or that they are "only trying to help him" is 
not a relevant factor here, because in fact, they ought to 
be capable of recognizing that they are *doing* harm, and that their 
actions are not helping him in the least.  Yet, they still do not 
desist.  This makes their behavior "bullying." 

Turning a blind eye to the *actual* (as opposed to the intended) 
outcome of your actions does not make you not a bully.  Indeed, this 
sort of behavior is absolutely typical of bullies.



2.  Bullies suffer from low self-esteem.  

Abigail wrote:

> A bully, to my mind, is a power freak. A person who feels the need 
> to humiliate and terrify others in order to feel powerful. This 
> behaviour usually stems from low self esteem...

It's very comforting to think that bullies must suffer from low self-
esteem, but I'm afraid to say that it's a myth.  Study after study 
has shown that bullies actually have *much* higher levels of self-
esteem than other children do.  It is one of the distinguishing 
characteristics of children who bully others.

(There *is* a type of bully, often known as the "victim bully," who 
typically does suffer from low self-esteem.  Victim-bullies
::coughSnapecough:: only account for a small percentage of bullies 
overall, though.)  

That Fred and George do not seem to suffer from self-esteem problems 
does not mean that they can't be bullies.  On the contrary, it helps 
to support my impression that they very well might be.


3. Bullies Aren't Callous


Abigail wrote:

> At their best, Fred and George are being playful and high-spirited, 
> and are unaware of the fact that they might be causing pain to 
> others. At their worse, they are almost unbearably callous. 

Actually, being "unbearably callous" is a very common trait found in 
bullies.  Lack of sensitivity to others' emotions is one of the 
classic characteristics of bullies. 

Again, this doesn't necessarily mean that the twins *are* bullies -- 
you can be insensitive and still not be a bully -- but it does mean 
that they match the profile.


4. If your intention is to change someone's behavior, then it isn't 
really bullying.

Darrin wrote:

> Inter-sibling rivalries are normal and this is Fred and George's 
> way of dealing with "perfect Percy", who is obnoxious.

Actually, "because he was getting on my nerves" is a *very* common 
reason for bullies to give when called upon to account for their 
actions.  It's also a defense that adults often find highly 
sympathetic, because the sad fact of the matter is that many children 
who are the victims of bullying really *are* irritating, annoying, 
rude, or in some other way socially obnoxious.  In the literature, 
children who match this description are referred to as "provocative 
victims" -- which is really just psych-speak for "those kids who are 
just begging for it." 

What makes bullying maladaptive behavior, however, is that fact that 
it does not address the problem of social irritation in an acceptable 
or an effective manner.  Not only is it intrinsically damaging; it 
also doesn't solve the problem of social friction.  In fact, it 
usually just makes the problem much worse.

Intervention for bullies is often designed to focus on *precisely* 
this problem. If someone's behavior is irritating you, there are a 
number of useful ways to go about trying to get them to stop.  
Bullying is not one of them.  It is maladaptive behavior, and it 
often reflects distorted thinking. 

We see this in the canon, I think, with Percy and the twins.  The 
more the twins tease and harass Percy, the more pompous and stuffy he 
becomes, because pomposity and strutting is Percy's way of dealing 
with stress.  The twins, however, are incapable of recognizing this 
fact.  Their "way of dealing" with Percy is therefore inherently 
counter-productive, and their inability to realize this fact is 
extremely typical of children who bully others in real life.



5.  It's only bullying if physical assault takes place or is 
threatened.

Darrin wrote:

> There is no evidence they have physically harmed Percy, or even 
> seriously attempted to. 

Bullying does not have to involve physical assault or physical 
threat.  Verbal bullying (teasing, insults) is by far the most common 
type of bullying.  

Fred and George don't have to beat people up to be bullies.



6.  All Children Are Bullies.

No.  All children may be nasty little rotters with the *capacity* to 
bully, but they aren't all bullies.  Most kids take part in a spot of 
bullying at some point in their lives, but that doesn't make 
them "bullies."  Bullies are the kids who *regularly* instigate or 
take the lead in bullying behavior.    

Abigail wrote:

> Am I the only person who is flashing on an early episode of Buffy 
> the Vampire Slayer, in which Xander is possessed by a hyena spirit 
> and begins acting quite cruelly? 

<smile>

Oh, I just loved that episode, in spite of its cheese factor and 
its "spotted it a mile off" plot resolution.  

But one thing to keep in mind about Giles' line there, Abigail, is 
that for once, he was actually *wrong.*  Even before they got 
possessed by the hyena spirits, those kids really weren't just your 
average normal sixteen year old students.  They *were* the class 
bullies, and all of the other kids knew that they were the class 
bullies.  Giles just didn't get that, because he didn't share the 
students' understanding of how the school's pecking order worked.

Of course, I do take your point that the plots of early Buffy 
generally *are* rather blatant metaphors for real life high school 
horrors: in this case, one of your non-bully friends suddenly 
deciding to hang with the bullies, and then being mean to you in 
order to cement his new social status.  But I think that there's a 
very big difference between "sometimes a student will decide to 
become a bully, and it's really scary and awful when that happens -- 
just like he's been possessed overnight by some evil spirit" and "all 
kids are bullies."  I mean, I see a very big difference there.

Draco is a bully.  Dudley is a bully.  Harry has the *capacity* to be 
a bully -- but he is not one.  The verdict is still out on Fred and 
George, but much about their canonical depiction strongly *suggests* 
to me that they are indeed bullies.



7. Bullies can't themselves be the victim of bullying.

Yes, they can be.  In fact, they very often are.  An important 
component in bullying is the power discrepancy between the bully and 
the victim.  A kid who has the strength and size advantage to bully 
other children his own age can then be the victim of bullying 
when he relates to children older, stronger, or more powerful than 
himself.
 
Darrin wrote:

> And forgive me, but I have a hard time shedding a tear when a bully 
> like Dudley...gets it from a bigger bully.

> That is what is happening. 

Yup.  That's exactly what's happening, Darrin.  I quite agree with  
you.  Dudley is getting it from bigger bullies: namely, the twins.  

Quod Erat Demonstrandum.



8. Teasing between siblings isn't bullying.

Yes, it can be.  Teasing between siblings crosses the line 
into "bullying" when one of the siblings has repeatedly registered 
protests against the teasing, can not or does not retaliate in kind, 
and is obviously suffering on account of it -- and yet the teasing 
continues.  That is bullying, even when it happens within the family.

Christy (who I am sure would *never* take things as far with her 
siblings as Fred and George have taken things with Percy by the 
beginning of GoF) wrote:

> I think it is safe to say that we can discount any pranks on Percy 
> as "proof" of the twins being bullies. . . .I constantly pull 
> pranks and spout wisecracks at my sisters. This is simply the 
> dynamics of the modern family. 

Yes, it is...up to a certain point.  But by GoF, I think that things 
have gone *way* beyond that point.  It seems clear to me that the 
Weasley family dynamic is in a good deal of trouble in GoF.  Percy 
has become so deeply alienated from the rest of his family that he 
has chosen to transfer his filial loyalties onto his employer Crouch -
- a man who doesn't even know his name.

Indeed, when speculating about Percy's role in future canon, readers 
regularly phrase the issue as "will Percy side with Fudge or with his 
family?" rather than as "will Percy side with Dumbledore or with 
Fudge?" which might, one would think, be the rather more logical way 
to frame the question.  We don't frame it that way, though, and I 
think that there is a reason that we don't.  Percy's struggle 
throughout the series has always been one between his allegiance to 
his family and his allegiance to his extra-familial relationships 
(his prefect friends, the staff of Hogwarts, Penny, Crouch and the 
Ministry).  I think that as readers, we are so often concerned about 
Percy precisely *because* we sense that the Weasley family dynamic 
has gone sour -- that it is no longer the benevolant or harmless or 
even beneficial dynamic that it used to be.

Nicole (who really must never worry about disagreeing with me; after 
all, given the ban on "me toos," if we never disagreed then we would 
never get a chance to interact with each other!) wrote:

> I really think that this is perfectly normal sibling rivalry.

It struck me that way in PS/SS, certainly.  The twins' teasing of 
Percy seemed very loving and good-natured to me there.  I love the 
Christmas sweater scene and always have.  It's touching and funny and 
sweet.    

But by the time we reach GoF, it seems very different to me.  It 
doesn't seem "normal" at all to me anymore.  The family dynamic in 
GoF comes across to me as very ugly, rancorous, and very damaging.

This is subject matter for a post all its own, though, and I do plan 
to write one, as soon as I can get around to it.  For now, though, 
let me just say that I really don't see the twins' interactions with 
Percy in GoF as normal or acceptable at all. By GoF, I think that it 
is bullying.


9. Bullies Are Cowards

Darrin wrote:

> A bully is a coward deep down. . . . .F&G aren't cowards.

Sometimes they're only cowards *very* deep down.

Bullies are cowardly, in that they pick on people weaker than 
themselves, but they often exhibit cowardice in no other arena.  A 
high degree of physical courage is in fact one of the traits that 
consistently emerges as one shared by bullies in psychological 
studies.  

That Fred and George are brave does not mean that they can't be 
bullies.  Many bullies are brave in every way *other* than in their 
habit of singling out the weak and the vulnerable for abuse.



10. There can be only one bully in any given school at one time -- 
and Draco is Hogwarts' bully.

This, at any rate, seems to be the argument that Darrin has proposed 
for why Fred and George cannot be bullies.  I can't say that I really 
understand this argument at all.  Schools, even small schools, almost 
*always* have more than one bully among the student body.

Then, I didn't understand a very similar argument when it popped up 
on the Hagrid thread a while back either.  There, the argument seemed 
to be that Hagrid couldn't be a bad teacher, because Snape is a bad 
teacher.

I didn't understand that one either, really.  If Snape's teaching 
style is flawed, then how does that make Hagrid a good teacher?  If 
Draco is a bully, then how does that make it impossible for Fred and 
George to be bullies?

There can be (and usually is) more than one bully in a school at a 
time.  More's the pity.


10.  Whether or not it's bullying depends on the moral standing of 
the victim.

I have no idea where this notion comes from.  I have never seen a 
definition of bullying *anywhere* that takes the moral virtue or lack 
thereof of the victim into consideration.  Relative power to bully?  
Yes.  Degree of vulnerability? Yes.  Ability to retaliate effectively 
in kind?  Yes.  Repetition of dynamic over time?  Yes.

Moral standing?  

Er...no.  I don't see that as ever relevant to the question of 
whether or not bullying is taking place.


11. All bullies are racists.

No, of course they aren't.  You can be a bully without being a 
racist.  

Again, I have no notion where this one came from, although I get the 
impression that it derived from a faulty syllogism, one that went 
something along the lines of "Draco is a bully.  Draco is a racist.  
Therefore, all bullies are racists," and then concluded with the 
assertion that in order to argue that Fred and George are bullies, 
one would therefore first have to prove that they are racists.

Um.

It's, er, a bit difficult for me to know how to address this, 
actually.  See, I'm just not very good with arguments like this.  
Whenever I read them, they tend to make me feel just a bit like one 
of those computers in the cheesy old science fiction movies -- 
the ones that explode if you hand them a paradox to parse.  

"...does...not...compute...does....not..."  

::hiss:: 

::crackle::  

<sparks begin to fly>)

But I gather that there actually *has* been some dispute over whether 
or not this is actually a logical fallacy.  So I suppose that I'll 
try to address that issue.  

Only once, though.  Only once.

Okay.  The best that I can really come up with here is to suggest 
that when one is in some doubt about the logic of a series of 
statements, it can sometimes help to replace the relevant variables 
with others that have less emotional resonance and about which the 
truth is in fact known -- and then to check to see if it still makes 
sense.

So, for example, as a substitution for the syllogism above, we might 
try:

"Elkins is a woman.
"Elkins is an American.
"Therefore, all women are Americans.

"In order to prove that Pip is a woman, therefore, you will first 
have to prove that Pip is an American."

I think that we can all agree that this doesn't really make any 
sense -- and that Pip, moreover, might greatly resent it if we tried 
to prove her American citizenship.  (And if she expressed that 
resentment more than once, and yet we still persisted, we would 
be engaged in bullying behavior.  ::apologetic grin at Pip::)

So I'm afraid that I still don't understand the argument.  That Draco 
is a racist has no bearing on the question of whether or not Fred and 
George are bullies.  


12. Bullies are Unpopular.

No.  They usually aren't.  

Bullies usually enjoy a higher than average degree of social 
popularity up until their late teenaged years, when they start to 
lose their cache.  It has been hypothesized that this happens in part 
because as children mature to become adults, they become both more 
idealistic and more empathic, and therefore stop finding the sort of 
behavior that bullies exhibit nearly so amusing or as appealing as 
they did when they were younger.

This tendency might also account for the discrepancy that has been 
raised on a different thread between how children and adults might 
differ in their readings of the canon.

HF wrote:

> I guess one way to look at it is this: Why haven't Fred and George 
> been left with their heads in a toilet somewhere? I mean, they are 
> bigger than the younger kids, but certainly not bigger than the 
> seventh-years. If their pranks are so intolerable to people, one 
> would think the law of the playground would have stopped it.

You must have grown up on a remarkably just playground. ;-)

Bullies are almost always more popular than their victims.  That is 
why they usually manage to get away with their behavior right up 
until the point at which some adult or other external authority steps 
in to make them stop.

> If F&G were mean, nasty, and generally undesirable characters given 
> to bullying and harassing the weak, I don't think anyone in 
> Gryffindor would have stood for it. 

But they do!  The times that we have actually *seen* Fred and George 
harassing the weak, everyone thinks that it's funny.  Harry isn't 
outraged by Fred and George feeding the toffee to Dudley.  No one at 
the Gryffindor table objects to them hissing at the Sorting 
Ceremony.  Nobody objects to their throwing snowballs at Professor 
Quirrell.  Everyone's having a blast with them while they send that
salamander zooming around the common room.  And Harry and Ron snicker 
right along with the twins when they persecute the stressed-out, on 
the edge, and *exceptionally* vulnerable Percy of GoF.

Richelle summed it up really well right here.

Richelle:

> Well, my opinion on Fred and George may not amount to much, but I 
> just find them down right likeable. They're rude to people, sure. 
> But they usually deserve it! They're mean sometimes. Often even. 
> But 9 times out of 10 they're mischeviousness is aimed at something 
> we'd really like to see happen anyway.

Yup.  That's precisely how bullies get away with it.  They select as 
their victims the people they believe that no one will bother to 
defend.


HF:

> Additionally, wouldn't it go against the grain to have people of 
> said description in Gryffindor, as "daring, nerve, and *chivalry*" 
> is their major descriptor?

Aw, come on.  The Gryffs are good kids on the whole, but they're 
hardly *saints,* are they?  The Trio and Neville get ostracized by 
their housemates for losing all of those points in PS/SS.  I don't 
get the impression that Lavender and Parvati are always perfectly 
sweet and kind to Hermione, either.  And let's not even get into the 
infamous Prank. ("Down, boy!")

Every group of kids has its bullies.  I don't really think that the 
Gryffindors are so absolutely perfect as to warrant an exception to 
this general rule.


Darrin:

> That tells me that their personal charisma and the fact that people 
> realize it's just a joke, all in fun, no harm done, are working in 
> their favor. 

Yup.  Bullies are usually charismatic, and they are usually popular, 
and the other members of their in-group usually *do* think that they 
are funny and harmless and nice.  It's the people *outside* of their 
in-group who would beg to differ.

One of the problems with bullying in the schools is that even the 
adults in authority often favor the bullies.  Jenny touched on this 
here, when she wrote:

> They are in Gryffindor, they are excellent athletes, they are 
> confident and they are nice to Harry. Is that why so many people 
> think they are funny and why people are so quick to excuse them?

That's usually the way it works.  

But not always.

Jenny wrote:

> As a teacher, I have zero tolerance for bullying in my classroom.

<smiles and raises glass to Jenny>

And *that* is how you put a stop to it.

50 points to Ravenclaw.



-- Elkins