Behavioral Analysis of a Bully
- 25020388
- Jun 15, 2024
- 3 min read
It is indisputable that there have been more instances of bullying and cyberbullying in schools in recent years, and these incidents are now considered to be severe public health issues. Not only do traditional and cyberbullying plague Pakistan’s higher education institutions, but elementary and secondary schools also face these issues. Policies and measures to manage the consequences of traditional and cyberbullying are rare in the Pakistani setting, despite statistics showing an elevated incidence of bullying and cyber-risky behaviours among youth.
Bullying more likely affects women in Pakistan. In Pakistan, a woman’s actions are closely watched since she is typically the source of her family’s “honour”. Such a woman finds suicide to be a convenient way out when she is bullied. According to an article in Dawn, a 16-year-old girl in Karachi killed herself by hanging herself from a ceiling fan after being harassed and mistreated by the owner of the home where she was employed. There are a tonne of additional bullying incidents involving girls that have never been documented.
Bullying is not exclusive to any one location, including the internet, schools, colleges, or universities. Bullies are now present everywhere. Dawn published a story in 2005 alleging that a contractor in Hyderabad had harassed bus owners. The contractor was required by law to charge no more than 100 rupees for parking, but he made the owners pay 800 rupees instead. The contractor harassed one of the drivers and broke the windows of his coach because he refused to pay the money owed. Why bullies bully is the question. It is a result of several societal problems. Family, cultural, and social issues are all relevant. Bullies in our society are typically the product of families who are cold and uncaring towards their kids and that fail to express or communicate their emotions to one another.
However, my take varies form the one stated above. I believe that bullies bully because they are insecure themselves andproject those insecurities onto others to make themselves feel better. Projecting insecurities is a coping strategy whereby one person uses the mind of another as a place to store emotions. Projections are therefore a type of uninvited interaction. If this is even a word you can use… You could even call it “false communication,” or an unravelling in communication stemming from feelings of guilt, anxiety or hurt. If you fail to address it, it can trap you in a never-ending cycle of reliving the exact same drama, which is almost always caused by childhood traumas that need to be reparented. Like other behaviours, projection is taught. It is the outcome of the impact of our family, surroundings, society as a whole and culture rather than something that appears on its own. Therefore, projection is a trait we frequently inherit from our parents but never fully overcome emotionally when we reach adulthood. It serves as a defensive system, one that aims to deny emotions that our mind deems too harmful for us to manage or that we are unable to cope with.
Let me explain this by an example. We are going to call this little 7-year-old child Shagufta. Her parents are quite forceful and stern with her. They want her to eat less. Her mother discerningly says not to eat too much or she will get fat. Even for someone so young, they have put so much pressure on her. And they show her a great deal of disapproval when she eats a lot even though she is a growing child. Shagufta receives constant criticism and is frequently unfairly penalised for falling short of expectations. She feels guilty and ashamed for not adhering to their expectations.
Now this little girl will grow to be a self-consious, insecure girl because that is what has been feeded into her developing mind since she could barely create her own perception of the world. Now, not only does she aggressively keep herself in check by eating less and less or maybe develop a eating disorder, but she will also project that insecurity onto other. What if she sees a fellow student who is a little overweight, with the lens she borrowed from her parents to see the world, she will see someone who is a failure and naturally unload all the negativity she had directed towards herself on the unknowing fellow.
What needs to be done is a rigid approach to break the cycle of trauma. To create your own perception of world and extend the love they never got in the first place. Bullies should look inwardly and find peace and acceptance for themselves first and practice self-love so they can be accepting of everyone else too. Because lets be serious, you do not hurt people without any reason, there is always a reason and most times, it is unresolved negativity.