Lately, bullying has been made the scapegoat for violent behavior and even for "kids killing kids" in school. Since a bully is habitually cruel to smaller and weaker people, bullying certainly is a violent act and usually directed against those that cannot fend for themselves. Generally, this type of violence starts with verbal demeaning attacks to scare and humiliate the victim and ends up in physical fights. It is deduced that the bullies are usually the instigators of violence but at rare occasions, the victims revolt and resort to violence. In any case, this bully type of violence can lead to tragedy.
The Ready-to-Use Social and Violence Prevention Skills books* that are used in the Social Skills Training classes and workshops, which the Society for Prevention of Violence promotes for teaching courtesy, appropriate behavior and violence prevention, contain only a few lessons which refer directly to "bully behavior." Bullying is a secondary phenomenon. Therefore the books have numerous lessons that rather relate to situations which are the prime cause for kids to bully. Bullying is inappropriate behavior. It includes unruliness, intolerance, theft, assault, request for money, destruction of property, joining gangs and crime, committing violence and other acts of aggression. Exerting strong peer pressure is also typical for bully behavior.
Bullying, for instance, can be the cause of hate against people of ethical and cultural diversity. A hate that might have been learned at home. Bullying is frequently directed towards people who are not able to willing to be part of the "in-crowd" and prefer or are forced to be different. Sometimes, children who are socially intimidated and/or live in families that are dysfunctional, become bullies in order to be in control of their classmates and to prevent that others bully them. Among other reasons for kids to become bullies are hunger for power, attention getting, sibling strife, neglect by parents, insufficient discipline at home, domestic violence, money problems and more. Therefore bullying in school is very common.
The lessons in the books describe real life situations which instruct children, including bullies and other violence prone individuals, how to behave appropriately. The children are asked to replay these real life situations, and to improvise similar role plays depicting everyday problems and conflicts through practice and by employing non-violent means, how to resolve conflicts and settle problems appropriately. These same real life situations, when actually experienced, can lead to bully behavior and fights if there is no proper guidance to teach how to resolve these conflicts peacefully. Therefore, these same lessons are tailored to make children aware that bullying does not solve problems and is unacceptable.
In addition, the lessons in the Social and Violence Prevention Skills books are pro-active and teach the children the skills they need in order to cope with those inappropriate behaviors, that often are the primary causes for the urge to bully. Therefore, teaching these skills in school can eliminate or will at least counteract bully behavior.
These skills teach, for instance, that diversity should not only be tolerated but considered to be of special value and that empathy, companionship and good friendship are preferred attributes for achieving and maintaining good relationships. They also instruct the students how to deal with peer pressure and how to render it ineffective.
In addition, the teaching of self-control, anger management, decision making, problem solving, understanding consequences and others are all lessons in those books. Role playing these situations and improvising similar ones train the students to recognize bullying before it creates problems and to cope with the bullies by ignoring them unless they change their behavior.