What happens when standing up to bullies becomes controversial or is considered wrong?

Then one typical day while he was pushing me around, I turned around and kicked him in the balls. It hurt him, surprised me, and taught both of us a valuable lesson. It was a long time before he bothered me again, and I stopped being afraid of bullies. They might beat you up, but if you stand up to them, they'll leave you alone. If you don’t, they’ll dominate and take advantage of you every chance they get.

People who stand up to bullies make their community a safer place to live; but what happens when the law protects bullies and vilifies those who confront them? Fear haunts the night, darting eyes the day in communities subordinated by thugs.

Protecting the bullies
My neighborhood grocery store is a case in point. Little bullies (who will grow up to be big bullies) from upper-middle-class families make a game of shoplifting. Years ago, getting caught meant trouble. Not here. Not if you're white. In fact, at my neighborhood grocery store just down the street from Microsoft, they have to be careful how they go about asking (yes, asking) the little bullies to return the stolen merchandise. If they're not respectful, they can get sued.

Maybe this began with women "browsing" -- scooping up handfuls of fruit or granola as they walk around the store eating while attending to their shopping. Regardless, the Bellevue police can’t do much about it because the little bullies' big bully parents (many of who are millionaires, almost millionaires or, worse, lawyers!) are liable to sue.

I asked one Bellevue police officer (who asked not to be named) about this. "When it comes to residents," he sighed, "our hands are tied." Except in domestic disputes; regardless of who the aggressor is, they can arrest the man involved with impunity.

So, what if you're minding your own business when out of the blue someone threatens you? The police are empowered to protect you, but vandalism? That’s iffy. If you’re a merchant, don’t even think about it. Bullies rule.

Never women
Like everything else in life, bullies come in varieties: stereotypical big-gutted blow hards, rich bitches, arrogant snobs, whiners who, like Cousin Sid in Mark Twain’s classic, Tom Sawyer, cry to a higher authority every time they don’t get their way. Punch in the face, stab in the back, pull the rug out from under, go over your head, outmaneuver you in games you don’t even realize you were playing, and through it all the one constant is that we know them for what they are: bullies.

Except, now we are allowed to recognize only men as bullies, white men as the worst, and regardless of how humane, gentle, powerful or powerless you are, you’re all of a kind, the only kind who gets called a bully.

Which means we generally ignore all other kinds, who can get away with just about anything, even murder. Anyone who tries to stand up to them is cast either as the aggressor, or is simply dismissed as a...bully.

Drawing the line
What becomes of communities that let bullies get away with being bullies, and denounce most who stand up to them? The little bullies become big bullies. Some run corporations, others join gangs and terrorize neighborhoods, become politicians or professors, social pundits or butterflies, professional whiners, inveterate blamers who shower shame like a defecating hippo in the face of everyone they can. Whatever position they acquire, whatever they do, one characteristic unites them all: they dominate, control and diminish others to elevate and empower themselves.

Cowards may simper this is just the way things are, and you have to go along to get along, but bullies are hateful to Americans. We admire fair play, good sports, people who get ahead honestly, on their own merits rather than on the stolen or ignored merits of others.

That is why white American men enacted Affirmative Action and the Equal Employment Opportunity laws -- to incorporate a legal bias in favor of fairness and against bullies. Unfortunately, the bullies found ample opportunity to take advantage: an African-American HR director at one major US corporation brags that she has implemented hiring quotas, almost daring white guys to sue; Patricia Ireland, president of the National Organization for Women (NOW) demands that we dismiss female criminal violence, she endorses young women taking power "by whatever means necessary", and she lobbies to force those of us who behave responsibly to pay for the sexual irresponsibility of the young women and men who conform to the NOW credo of sexual hedonism.

All bullies
Whether the bullies are minority pundits who prey on the good-intentions of others, establishment bullies abusing their inherited advantage, or any in between, they create problems for the rest of us that, should we choose to ignore them, only grow worse.

The answer to this should be obvious: you don't keep the peace by ignoring the bullies. If someone acts like a bully about a little thing, confront them about it today, or don't be surprised when they act like a bully about a big thing, tomorrow.

What to do about them once they've become a big bully? Same principle applies: confront them about it today, or suffer greater consequences tomorrow.

You have to draw the line somewhere. I drew mine with Phillip. Where will you draw yours?

Regards

Rod Van Mechelen

Rod Van Mechelen is the author of What Everyone Should Know about Feminist Issues: The Male-Positive Perspective (the page now includes several articles by other authors), and the publisher of The Backlash! @ Backlash.com. He is a member of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and served for 9-1/2 years on the Cowlitz Indian Tribal Council.