How To Make A Bully (From Scratch)

0:00 After the shock of another school shooting, have you ever wondered, how on earth did we not see the signs? How could parents, family members, teachers and neighbors not have seen a problem in the making? Our best hope of preventing school violence comes from understanding the bully victim dynamic. Bullying is a relationship issue. Together, let's see how to make a bully from scratch.

0:34 It takes years to make a bully. In fact, all bullies start out as victims. A child doesn't wake up one day and decide I think I'll be a bully any more than a child wakes up and says, I think I'll be a victim. Becoming a bully is a journey of specific life experiences. Starting at birth. There are road signs along the way that signal intervention is needed. We must know the signs to effectively derail the bully life path.

1:01 To do this, it's important to distinguish between normal aggression and bullying. Children no longer say he teased me or she hit me. Instead announce, I was bullied at school. Even a president of the United States, Barack Obama, says he was bullied for having big ears. He probably was indeed teased, but not bullied. Bullying is a specific and very serious type of aggression. Let's travel together on a five stop journey into the heart of how a bully is made so we can learn to see the signs.

1:38 Missing them can be deadly. We will start at the beginning of human life. Years before you might have thought. Step into our transporter first stop the mother's womb. Lets imagine these children to be represent all the kids in the world. Of these children, a handful will experience some form of prenatal stressors and develop a difficult temperament. These little ones are hard to soothe and have trouble sleeping or eating.

2:09 You love them deeply, but they're a little hard to fall in love with. When you play peekaboo, there are no smiles or giggles. These children turn and squirm away. A parent at this time might feel like you've been crying since you were born. I tried blowing raspberries and you cried. I tried rocking you and you cried. I can't handle this anymore. Just shut up. This parent is really saying, I love you, but I'm having a hard time falling in love with you.

2:46 Help. This is so hard. Some of these children with difficult temperaments will have very out of control behaviors. They're defiant toddlers and later hard to manage 3 year olds. Feeling powerless, parents resort to chronic punitive discipline that victimizes their own children. I will count to three. You better get over here or else. 1. 2. By age three, we start to see two different types of victims emerging.

3:20 One is Aggressive, defiant and hot tempered. The other is passive, acquiescent and anxious. Let's get back into the transporter. Our next stop is preschool and kindergarten. During this time, our children find themselves in more complex social settings like school. They have trouble playing with others from a lack of basic social skills and the ability to regulate their own behavior. Other children often exclude them, finding them boring or being frightened by their aggression and outbursts.

3:54 Teachers don't have the skills either and further compound the problem by using their own exclusion strategies. Go to timeout. Go sit in that chair now. These kids are emotionally reactive when things don't go their way. The aggressive child goes from upset to rage in seconds. The passive child gives up just as quickly. Since they cannot self regulate, they are unable to learn appropriate social skills. The aggressive child hits, grabs and takes what he wants.

4:26 The passive child allows others to hit and grab without saying a word. Their chronically stressed brain creates mental distortions in the way they perceive themselves and others. The aggressive child sees hostile intent and and others everyday actions. The passive child believes he should be treated poorly and expects poor treatment from others. Adults tend to see the aggressive child as mean and the passive child as unmotivated or lazy. These judgments blind us to the road sign, allowing the aggressive child to move one step closer to becoming a bully and the passive child and becoming a victim.

5:11 All aboard. Let's continue on to first and second grade. Things get worse as our children move further into the world of friends. All human beings require a sense of belonging. These children, desperate for connection, are often pushed to the side by classmates, teachers and schools. They have been excluded from connections with others since birth. This immense social pain actually involves the same pathways in the brain as physical pain in the body.

5:42 Somewhere during this time, the social pain of rejection becomes so great, the brain undergoes significant changes for both bullies and victims. The brain compensates for a life of painful disconnection. Buckle in as we continue to see what happens to these children, ages 8 through 12. Both our bully and victim are still searching for connection and a place to belong. Since the mainstream tends to exclude them, they move towards one another.

6:14 The bully says, you're mine. I own you now. Do what I say or else. And the victim provokes or acquiesces because a bad connection seems better than no connection at all. Both our bully and victim are now immune to consequences because they simply don't care. One of the changes their brain has gone through is to shut down the caring system. Adults might threaten with. You're gonna get kicked out of school. Go Ahead, kick me out. I don't care.

6:45 We are going to call your parents. So what? I don't care. We're going to take away computer privileges. I don't care. I don't like the computer anyway. We are going to ground you, spank you, send you to alternative school. Yeah, so what? Since the part of the brain responsible for the motivation to care is literally turned off, there is no punishment or discipline that will help.

7:16 Rewiring this system can only occur through connections with others. When children say I don't care, their brain is unconsciously saying I don't feel cared for by anyone anywhere. Our final stop brings us to the teenage years continually trying so hard to belong.

7:47 The bully may join a gang of tough guys or hook up with some mean girls. They perfect their craft through cyberbullying, spreading rumors, physical action and day to day threats. At this point, the bully is now a dangerous teenager whose brain has changed in two very significant ways. The brain has become programmed to biochemically experience pleasure from hurting others. The bully's internal pharmacy provides him with opioids that act like morphine to deaden the pain of his life journey.

8:22 The teenager is literally addicted to causing others pain. The brain is immune to rejection and ostracism. This teenager no longer feels a need to belong or care. The skill of empathy is offline. Our victim, on the other hand, lacks the internal pharmacy that a bully has to provide him with relief. The teenager is prone to suffering quietly and then exploding. The pain can become so intense that he may kill himself or others.

8:56 As we have seen play out in school shootings. Bullying a bully with tough measures and excluding him with no tolerance policies compounds the problem. We are systematically applying the exact treatment that created the bully in the first place and then expecting it to help. Effective discipline consists of two the slow building of bonds and healthy relationships and the quick strategies needed in the heat of the moment when conflict occurs.

9:29 Bully prevention and intervention can only occur in the slow stages of relationship building. Our awareness of the five road signs and how a bully is made will save countless lives. Conscious discipline has effective, researched interventions for every road sign along the way. Join us on a journey to a better world. We can walk this road together. Are you willing.