Fred and George: The Bullies You Do Know

lucky_kari lucky_kari at yahoo.ca
Tue Aug 27 20:39:10 UTC 2002


No: HPFGUIDX 43247

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "jferer" <jferer at y...> wrote:

> Have you ever met a real bully? someone who is 'A person who is 
> habitually cruel or overbearing, especially to smaller or weaker 
> people?' The kind that beat kids for their lunch money, steal their 
> clothes off their backs, and stick smaller kids' heads into 
unflushed 
> toilets? 

Yes, I have met real bullies. There is more to them than the 
stereotypical bully exemplified in the pages of Calvin and Hobbes. 
"Moe": Calvin's tormentor, is a type of bully that does exist, but is 
not really such a great problem as you would think. No, most bullies 
are quite different from Nelson in the Simpsons. Between Grades 3 and 
Grade 5, I went through hell with bullies at my very toney 
Hogwarts-like private school. Here is their profile.

- Rich. Upper-middle class. Well-dressed.
- Popular with students and teachers.
- High academic achievers.
- Physically unimposing.
- Overly sentimental in regards to animals and little children, while 
completely unempathetic to other weaker children.
- Cliqueish and elitist.

I actually began to draw up that list when I was being tormented and 
used it to turn the tables on them. By Grade 6, I had the upper hand 
of them, and I think I had a close escape from becoming Tabouli's 
"victim turned bully." I've already mentioned the life I lead my Grade 
 6 teacher, and there are many other things I regret. I think the day 
when I realized that I could make them squirm was when in Grade 5 they 
dumped one of their hangers-on (who later became my best friend at 
school), and I said, "Oh, the Chateau Clique is meeting again, is it?" 
 That got a great roar of laughter from the rest of the class, and 
suddenly they were the target of derision instead of me for the rest 
of break. (The Chateau Clique, btw, was the horribly corrupt colonial 
government of Quebec that lead to the 1837 rebellion, and our current 
topic of study in History.) I was always clever, and I could be quite 
cruelly clever towards them. 

But they weren't pushing people's heads down toilets. No. Or taking 
people's lunch money. They already had plenty of lunch money, while 
their victims generally didn't. But they were habitually cruel and and 
overbearing to weaker classmates. And Fred and George Weasley have 
always reminded me very much of them in some (though not all) of their 
attributes. They were the bullies that You Do Know, as Elkins put it, 
except I was one of the few who didn't. 

Eileen





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