Also, what are your favorite comebacks to bullies?
I need to stop trying to change unchangeable people. I’ve been through so many bad faith people who dehumanize at every turn whenever they feel they won’t get consequences. I need to make there be consequences for dehumanization.
Someone said to me “What if there’s a predatory creep that you don’t know how to socially shut down, and they feel emboldened because you don’t roast them?” I said that’s happened. They said i need to practice in lower risk scenarios. Maybe I get roasted for calling someone an asshole. One day that can turn into me and the dehumanizer going 50/50, me and them both getting half the roast. But to even get there I have to start by being roasted by bullies.
I won’t get anywhere if I don’t start clapping back and getting roasted many times by many assholes.
Gray rock can work, just be completely numb to everything they say, don’t react at all, ignore them even, no matter how in your face they get. They’re looking for a reaction. Especially if they’re with their buddies, no matter how good of a “comeback” you give them, by even playing their game, you’ve already lost.
The other option is breaking noses, but as Nakoichi said, it has mixed results.
Don’t try to be a martyr and act like a sponge for the bullies’ attention, in order to “save others.” It won’t change a thing, the bullies will still bully others and you will end up with severe psychological trauma the rest of your life.
The point in any case is to show them that you aren’t a worthwhile target to bully. It’s an unfortunate fact about our schooling system in the west that bullies can thrive and receive no comeuppance. The administration isn’t your friend in this matter. They’ll do whatever they can to make it “not their problem” rather than actually solving the problem. All you can do is either be too boring or too dangerous to bully. There has never been a situation in the real world where giving the “perfect comeback” shuts the bully up. That only happens in movies because it is cathartic and what people wish would happen. It never will, all you can do is make sure they don’t bully you.
I’ve seen people, kids and adults, get beat up for not responding to a bully before. It’s generally good advice, but I’d gray rock at your own risk.
That’s why I said “breaking noses” as an alternative. Grey rock should be the default reaction, but it needs to be backed up with violence unfortunately.
Breaking noses worked for me but like I said that was the 80s
I know someone whose good at both, giving withering roasts and grey rocking. They confronted my bullies. One avoided the confrontation by hiding in another room with the door closed. The other was smarmy and denied ever doing what they did to me. My friend is pretty impenetrable when it comes to gradeschool-level bullying. This was all done when we confronted them completely peacefully. He understands the quote, “no one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” I think the beginning of me understanding that quote is to learn how to speak up for myself. And that involves taking risks.
I understand there are abusers with personality disorders, but I’ve seen my friend shut down even those people. There are people who are simply immature abusers without personality disorders, and I mostly want to start standing up to them. Either way, when someone is incapable of taking accountability for their wrongs, I want to show they shouldn’t try to step on me to begin with. People avoid mistreating my friend and I want that treatment by being just as witty as him.