Aspie Niaivety: I used to think bullies were only children

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My point is your dad breaking your jaw because you broke the law, and your dad breaking your jaw because you drop a noisy plate are two very different things.

by meltdown I should of said temper tantrum, panic attack etc.

I agree, and the thread isn't about whether the bullies are Aspies or NT's really, it's about how the type of Aspie that is prone to get bullied does get bullied and the mistaken perception I had about bullies only being children, when I was a child.

I can't see why an abusive Aspie would be worse than an abusive NT, they are both capable of the same words and actions, it's just that the motives behind it may be different.

This.

Uhh a temper tantrum and panic attack are two very different things....and a meltdown is different from a temper tantrum and a panic attack though it is probably closer to a panic attack than a temper tantrum. Thing is temper tantrums are more along the lines of immature behavior panic attacks and meltdowns are more along the lines of psychological distress in which the person isn't in control of it.

And depending on the law your dad breaking your jaw for breaking the law would be simular to them breaking your jaw for dropping a plate...in that in both cases it could constitute abuse. like if a 17 year old smokes a cigarette when they are supposed to be 18 and their dad breaks their jaw that would be abuse. Now if the 17 year old is attacking the dad with a weapon or something crazy like that it might be a little different as then self defense comes into play.

I make a correlation between workplace harassment and school yard bullying.

I always wondered why one is illegal and the other one was always seen as fine, normal, kids being kids, etc.

If bullying is harmful and illegal it should be the same for all human beings no matter what their ages are.

I always knew adults could be bullies. My dad and uncle were obviously bullies. As an adult, though, I can press charges for harassment or assault, so that's a definite improvement. I can also quit a job more easily than, as a kid, I could have quit school.

I was very surprised when I reached the age of 34 and discovered that bullies exist in the adult world too. I always thought bullies were only in school and I always assumed bullying was a conspicuous behavior pattern.

I could not believe how underhand and behind the back bullying is rife in the workplace! In the so called professional jobs, and especially in corporate offices, bullying is almost part of the culture. I have even heard of school teachers bullying other school teachers.

It is scary in that a lot of these bullies in school grow up into very strong positions in our society.

But, on the whole, bullies are insecure people. They have to bully others to make themselves feel better. It must be a crap life they have.

Psychologically they may not fare too well, although many are probably in utter denial (surely how could they consciously do it otherwise) and they are often in better positions than the victims, so they don't have too bad a life.

I actually had no bullism issues in school.
Not big ones at least.
I was only teased, but I didn't suffer for it (bullism is supposed to be something that makes you feel bad, being teased didn't make me feel bad), also no one has ever beaten me up because I reacted aggressively even to the littlest things and I scared people a bit.
The only times I got involved in fist fights was in elementary school, but it has never happened after high school because people didn't want to get involved in fist fights with me but tried to avoid me (that it was actually good, because no one bothered me).

I've always known and been able to understand that adults can be bullies as much as younger people.
Some children I've known have stopped being bullies as they grew up, but this doesn't always happen.

This.

I was aware even as a young child that individual family members and teachers could be mean and horrible - but thought at the time that they must be exceptions, or that it was something I had done to deserve it. I still can not wrap my head around the fact that people will bully , manipulate, and hurt people simply because they can. Got very upset discussing it with my husband a while ago and his response was along the lines of " Most people will walk all over you if they think they can get away with it - don't you know that?" He wasn't being nasty, he just thought everyone knew it. Maybe it's a truth universally accepted but it doesn't make it right and I will never understand it.

I've been one of those other teachers.

I was 6 years old when I got introduced to being bullyed, by both children and adults so I knew both could do it although not at that exact time in my life. My main issue was learning what a friend was and was not and what bullying actually is. I never had a friend prior to being bullyed so I figured anyone interacting with me was a friend and that included both the children and teachers who were both just bullys, the children appeared to figure out how clueless and manipulateable I was, I would willingly follow their every command. While i've become much better at it I still struggle to figure out whats actually happening and who to trust in life. I'm figureing most of this out in retrospect as usual, i'm so uselessly clueless.

I've always been skeptical of people, and I never had any delusions about adults being better behaved or less nasty than children. I never thought you could hope for any more than coming to a better environment at best. (Not based on age, but on the individuals and the general ambiance).
Certain adults I saw gave me no reason to think they couldn't be nasty. I always saw it as a personality thing, not a maturity thing.

Of course adults are basically just bigger versions of their child versions; the basic personality is formed by the age of 5 after all.

I never had any trouble believing that violence is normal in criminal milieus, and what you talk about here is crime, not bullying.
I don't expect most adults to engage in physical bullying, though, so it's less to fear.


I never had any trouble believing that either, because we've had noisy neighbors at several points, so I knew some were just like that.


Nastiness, dishonesty, selfishness, they never surprise me the least. It's the opposite that surprises me.


*snort!* as if children/teens don't ridicule teachers no mater what they do!

I think that as a child I had a general idea that adults were more knowledgeable and sensible/responsible and that's now been completely debunked by my experiences as an adult myself but I was bullied a bit by my Dad so I didn't think they would automatically not bully, I was just shielded from it more by the fact that adults generally bully other adults more than children
as you aren't considered a threat to a person's place in the social hierarchy as a child.

These days I am pleasantly surprised when an adult doesn't conform to the general bullying/two-faced stereotype to be quite honest.

Read the Daily Mail website regularly and you'll soon find out what people are really like:-

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... ldren.html

Unlike a lot of people I prefer not to stick my head in the sand about it and realise that death could come very easily from one of my fellow humans, never mind bullying!

Overt and subtle bullying appear very different but both can severely affect the individuals involved. Subtle bullying can be an art of diplomacy. Often it is transparent in that both individuals involved know it is occurring, the person being bullied having little defense as the person "in power" can hide in plain view. This type of bullying is infuriating and often intentionally provocative.

@skilpadde: I'm aware physical attacks are not necessarily all bullying, although physical assaults can constitute part of a bully's behaviour, and that they are crimes (but so are much of bullying behaviour too). I just gave that as another example of things that I didn't think adults did.

I think even though I witnessed some adults being less than nice as a child, and aware of adults' anger (and also myself and my siblings were smacked as children), I still didn't equate that with bullying or physical attacks. When it's strangers, you just can't imagine someone would bully or attack like that for no reason.

If there is aggression or violence in your own family, I think victims of that somehow manage to rationalise it through context because often (although not always) it is associated with something they or someone else 'did wrong'. This is probably one of the reasons victims of domestic abuse put up with it for so long. The abuser uses emotional tactics to convince them it's their fault and they 'made them' do it.

It's a whole other scenario if you are assaulted or bullied by someone outside of your family. There is no comprehension of why, they don't know you (even school peers or colleagues only know the public persona of you) and why would they have cause to do that because you never did anything to them. This is what I am trying to get at. There was no reason I gave for peers at school or work superiors to bully me. I just find it hard to realise that adults can be like that, children doing it you can, like I said, rationalise it more, that they are being "naughty", it wouldn't happen under adult supervision etc. (technically any way). It's kind of unbelievable that adults can behave in a way, that involves bullying (of any form), violence, selfishness, law breaking etc. "They should know better", they went through their growing up and learning stuff already.