I’ve already linked to this amazing Guardian article from my Education Blog, but it deserves wider blog-reader notice than that.
Sandra Thompson was used to her son’s weekend rhythm – the immediate relaxation and laughter of Friday afternoons, the dark mood that descended every Sunday as another week loomed. “With the first mention of school, Thomas must have had the same thoughts – are they going to be at the bus stop, are they going to get me today, do I have enough money on me to cover what they take?
He should have been out of there.
Mother and grandmother offer a picture of a boy whose main problem seems to have been his inability to behave like a child. “He loved being one-to-one with adults,” says Sandra. “He loved to have conversations, but you couldn’t talk about something silly. He always wanted to know adult stuff, and sometimes I didn’t have the answers. He was constantly asking about the war with Iraq, and wanting to know the ins and outs of what countries had been attacked in the past. He always wanted to know what it was like to be older. He couldn’t wait to learn to drive, get his own place, go to college, make his fortune.”
So why the hell did he have to wait? Okay, I will give you the driving, but why not his own fortune, his own place, his own life?
While waiting about to make his fortune and start his life, he filled in time by going to anti-Iraq-war demos. He was pretty good at that apparently.
This is the bit that made me most angry about being a member of this pathetic dim-witted species of ours.
In his final report, the headteacher of his primary school described Thomas as one of the most courageous boys he’d ever met because of the years of bullying he’d survived.
What is so depressing is the sense you get from all the adults who presided over this disaster that there was simply nothing they could do about it. “He couldn’t crack it in school.” And I couldn’t crack it when I tried to make it in the building trade half a lifetime ago. As soon as I realised I was hopeless at doing building I stopped doing it, and did something else. It really wasn’t a difficult decision to make.
Here’s this teacher, the Head of his School no less, and he is well aware that this poor kid is being driven crazy, but what could he do? Birds gotta fly. Fish gotta swim. And boys gotta go to school, no matter how completely horrible it is for them.
No.
More than 200 mourners packed St Paul’s Church, Wirral, to say goodbye to Thomas Thompson, many of them children. By the day after the funeral, Sandra had received so many cards that she had to display some of them on the floor around the mantelpiece. “He was a lovely lad,” says his grandmother, “and he touched a lot of people’s hearts.”
So why the hell didn’t they do something to help the poor kid while he was still alive?
I have to force myself to be sympathetic to mother, because frankly, it doesn’t come very naturally to me.
Her eyes get wet. “It’s hard. You’re empty. There are no words to describe it. You start asking yourself all sorts of questions. Were you a good parent? Did you do everything you possibly could have done? Should you have bypassed his decision and gone up to the school? But how would you ever have let him grow up if you’d done that? You go round in a circle – if only, what if? You do live through but the one thing that you can never get over is that you’ll never see him again in this life.”
You were a bad parent. You didn’t do anything like all that was possible. You shouldn’t just have “gone up to the school”, you should have yanked him out of there. And any world which didn’ t tell you that loud and clear is crazy.
Where were all his “friends” when he was getting bullied and driven crazy, his mom asks.
Well, where were we, the people who care about kids?
I guess I shouldn’t, but I feel guilty.
Brian – your last paragraph is exactly what I thought when I heard about this. What sort of a mother doesn’t realise something is SERIOUSLY wrong when her child is that wary of going to school? Every week? I know it’s easy to judge, but I just can’t begin to comprehend it.
I hope Thomas has some peace at last.
There but for the Grace of God go I.
I don’t blame the parents. If my Mum hadn’t walked in when I was taking a bath, and seen the bruises, the cuts, and the cigarette burns, she wouldn’t have known what I was going through at age 8. She yanked me out of that school immediately. Kids don’t talk about being bullied, even the best parents can miss it.
Unlike this poor kid, I was getting mean – I’d get beaten up by a gang, then later would ambush them individually. If I hadn’t been stopped, I would have become indistinguishable from them, a violent little thug. OK, unlike them, I wouldn’t “stand over” little kids and take their lunch money, but I had no qualms about breaking bones, or turning a knife that had been used on me against my attacker ( that’s not hypothetical by the way, I did both, and can’t say I regret it, even now. )
One kid that was getting the same treatment I was “fell” under a bus (though he lived). I was told that I’d get pushed under a train. I know what it’s like to plan in advance a new route to and from school every day. And this wasn’t in the inner city, but the commuter belt.
That was nearly 40 years ago; but it seems the problems remain.
Who do I blame? The teachers, especially the Head. What is a Teacher paid for, if not to stop this culture of barbarian violence from taking root? I’d bet dollars to doughnuts that any observer at this school could see teachers on “playground patrol” with lots of the younger kids always in front of them, desperately racing to stay in eyeshot when the teacher turns.
As for the bullies who drove this kid to desperation? Well, maybe my mother left it too late, because if I was in the same room as these little scrotes, they’d require hospitalisation, probably permanently. And I’d regret that in my saner moments afterwards – because they’re just kids, and could probably be straightened out.
I had problems that way as a kid. Honestly I think that the culture that treats defensive or justly retributive violence as “barbarian” is a part of the problem. Good kids always outmass the bullies, in aggregate.
I was bullied terribly at high school, and I think for much the same reasons described here. In my case, teachers and parents tended to tell me to “just ignore it”. I think some of this was that they thought it was mostly verbal. Of course, I took this to mean that I should just walk away and do nothing, even after I had been physically hurt quite badly. The trouble is that when you are that age, you do not know what is or isn’t acceptable behaviour, and what you should or shouldn’t have to put up with. If the system simply operates on the basis that “boys will be boys” and this is normal, it is difficult for a child to realise that it is in fact outrageous and totally unacceptable.
As for parents, a lot of them simply don’t want to acknowledge that it is happening, because the consequences are difficult to deal with. When I was about 13 I recall being asked by my grandmother (who I didn’t see regularly) how I liked high school. I recall that I stated that “I hate it” at considerable length. Tactless perhaps, but my father’s response was to get extremely angry at me for being rude to my grandmother, and he made no attempt at all to find out just why I hated it with such vehemence. In retrospect I find myself asking “What was he thinking?”
(My parents were not unaware that I was being bullied but I think they had no idea how just how serious it was. My father did on occasion talk to my teachers about it, but that doesn’t help, generally. The fact that you are “unable to fight your own battles” just gives them bullies something else to bully you over. (My father was a schoolteacher himself, too. He really should have known). The fact is, I should have been taken out of that school, either to have gone to another school or to no school at all. (I could certainly have coped with the (maths and physics) university course I ultimately took when I was 13 or 14. Educators and governments are often opposed to people that age starting university, often on grounds that it is “emotionally damaging” or something for them to be so far out of step with their peers. This seems a pretty stupid argument to me, given that the existing enviroments such children have to live with is often hellish.
As to why the sort of assault that would (rightly) put an adult in jail is somehow accepted and tolerated when one fifteen year old does it to another, I simply do not know. The most dreadful thing here is that so many people simply have the attitude that “This is just how the world works” and never consider that it doesn’t have to.
And on top of that I got a lousy education. (Well, I did at high school. I got a much better one later).
Sorry. This doesn’t normally come out in public forums like this.
I would be wary of calling the Mother BAD in this case: One thing struck me when I read this article… to me it appeared that the child was one of those children who appear “odd” to everyone… even to their parents and siblings. The sort of child that gets diagnosed with “aspergers syndrome” or other “personality disorder for no other reason than because they’ve learned “anti-social” skills that make them have increasing difficulty in forming friendships.
Once they start to have problems interracting with children it gets worse because they tend to spend more time away from children and do their own thing making them even less childlike. So they don’t know how to MESS around and PLAY like kids with other kids.
This child obviously had problems for years yet his way of dealing with his problem – by trying to be a small adult – may have been the cause of his own downfall. His mother might well have thought of his “small adult” ways as good and useful – and thought of him as mature for his age. But the other kids obviously found his habits annoying and ODD!
Its difficult to blame the other kids for being annoyed by someone who is annoying (though bullying is a different matter and should have been stamped on quickly)- and its difficult to blame the mother for not noticing how badly things were going for the child – as this child with his adult ways would probably have done his best to hide that from her- or to act “mature” and pretend he was dealing with it.
There is a lot of stupidity evident here- but there is a lot of possibilities that this child accidently caused much of his own misery by trying to be too adult.
The school presumably reassured the mother and most people assume that their school knows what its doing (hahaha)
The mother was naive and stupid – but not necessarily BAD. The only BAD people were the bullies (and the school – but only if the school knew that something was wrong and took no action).
I think you can only call that mother a bad parent if you regard naivety as BAD… and to do so is harsh.
There is a lot of stupidity evident here- but there is a lot of possibilities that this child accidently caused much of his own misery by trying to be too adult.
What in the name of God is wrong with that? The child is bored shitless with his peers and would rather have a conversation with someone interesting. Sounds fine to me. The kid was a little different. So bleeding what? The world is full of people who are a little different. It isn’t a crime to be young and a little obnoxious. For this, you do not deserve to have your childhood turned into a living hell. If our system of compulsory education tortures people like this, then the fault is with the system, not with some poor kid who has been driven to suicide by it.
I’m reminded of an essay by Paul Graham about school society. It’s ostensibly about why smarter than average kids are unpopular at school, but it touches upon some deeper truths about what school is really like. I hope I’m not quoting too much, but it seems relevant:
They know, in the abstract, that kids are monstrously cruel to one another, just as we know in the abstract that people get tortured in poorer countries. But, like us, they don’t like to dwell on this depressing fact, and they don’t see evidence of specific abuses unless they go looking for it.
Public school teachers are in much the same position as prison wardens. Wardens’ main concern is to keep the prisoners on the premises. They also need to keep them fed, and as far as possible prevent them from killing one another. Beyond that, they want to have as little to do with the prisoners as possible, so they leave them to create whatever social organization they want. From what I’ve read, the society that the prisoners create is warped, savage, and pervasive, and it is no fun to be at the bottom of it.
[…]
And as for the schools, they were just holding pens within this fake world. Officially the purpose of schools is to teach kids. In fact their primary purpose is to keep kids all locked up in one place for a big chunk of the day so adults can get things done. And I have no problem with this: in a specialized industrial society, it would be a disaster to have kids running around loose.
What bothers me is not that the kids are kept in prisons, but that (a) they aren’t told about it, and (b) the prisons are run mostly by the inmates. Kids are sent off to spend six years memorizing meaningless facts in a world ruled by a caste of giants who run after an oblong brown ball, as if this were the most natural thing in the world. And if they balk at this surreal cocktail, they’re called misfits.
Rob: That whole essay is very good. Thank you for pointing it out.
Edward Turner, – you’re dead right – “It isn’t a crime to be young and a little obnoxious.”
– and that isn’t what I said.
Blame is being put on the mother and on the other kids for something that was also largely the fault of the growth of this child’s “obnoxious” differences.
You say: “The kid was a little different. So bleeding what? … well the nature of the difference in this case was obviously contributing to the kids problems – and that was something that was changeable. Somewhere along the line someone is bound to have noticed that the child was having problems playing with other children. That is when this whole problem could have been sorted… by sorting that one problem. An opportunity was missed. That is sad but that’s not a crime either.
Maybe the mother should have noticed something -but the nature of this childs “differences” were that the child acted more mature. How can you blame a mother for thinking the child is doing ok when the child itself would do anything to make sure that it appears that everything is more or less ok.
Sadly the child was the architect of his own downfall. Everbody loves to blame somebody… yes the mother and the school and the other children all let this boy down…. but he let himself down too!
Some of this case was due to maliciousness but most of it was due to avoidable ACCIDENT.
On the one hand, the modern theory is that one is supposed to prize “self-esteem ” very highly; on the other hand, when one tries to enjoy what one likes about one’s self, if it doesn’t conform, even though not causing harm, one is punished for it. The lad enjoyed the fruits of his mental processes, but was bullied for it. And the so-called adults permitted that to happen.
DISGUSTING !!
From my experiences as a kid, I know EXACTLY how this poor kid felt. I also was very mature for my age, from day one. My parents called me the “35-year old midget” . (U.S.) Public school was hell. Utter hell. I ALSO had the good fourtune of going to a private school for two years. It was a school specifically for very talented and/or very high IQ kids. about 80% of the students there were “over-mature” There were NO troubles with socialization there. The kids weren’t isolated, and there was none of the unending harassment of the public schools. The kids there weren’t trying to be over-adult in compensation for anything, they were just being themselves, and when put together with others of the same level of maturity, they were FINE. Kids who had been doing HORRIBLY grade-wise (including me) got top grades. Some of the kids there had been getting violent out of frustration at public school previously. There was none of that at the private school.
The public schools’ political agenda simply won’t let them recognize several basic facts:
1) People mature at different rates, mentally, emotionally, and physically.
2) For kids, being in a large group consisting of exclusively the same physical age as themselves is UNNATURAL, and not very good for their development (my private school divided kids into groups by broad age-ranges. kids 4-5 years apart were in the same group)
“Modern” public schools foster a “Lord of the Flies” atmosphere that does harm to many and may lead some to violence, either against themselves, as in this case, or against others.
Where was the Dad during all this?
I’m not sure I’d blame the mother too much. I know what it was like to be bullied, and the ‘rents were the last ones I would have told.
I do blame the teachers. They knew I was being bullied, and did nothing about it. Worse, they tried to tell me I was the problem. Stupid shits. I can’t believe how angry this is making me thinking about it after 30 years.
God, what an ugly thing it is.
What I hated about it was the rank hypocracy. I defended myself once and got punished and later teachers would tell me to do something about it myself.
Sadly there’s no easy fix for this.
We should try to temper our criticism of the parents with compassion. There is no grief comparable to the loss of a child whether you’re a good or a “bad” parent. I know as a widower who lost a step-child these parents will never be the same.
I learned by experience that bullies don’t like pain. I made every effort to inflict pain, win or lose. More losses than wins, but very few repeat episodes.
Discipline in US public schools is a disaster. School authorities are more concerned about litigation from bullies’ parents than about stopping the bullies.
I was bullied as a kid, almost constantly from the age of 9 until I was 15.
It turned me into a colossal asshole from the age of 18 until about 22. It sucked.
My parents had my six, which was nice, and I had a number of friends and we all stuck together. And one important thing the bullies learned: don’t mess with a kid with a thirty-pound backpack on his back or a saxophone case in his hand who can swing it like a baseball bat.
But ultimately, I would have been a better person but for my response to the cruelties of others.
I was bullied when I first started school in the UK at the age of 15 after returning from the US. Predominantly because I was different and spoke with an American accent. The other reason was pretty much caused by the schools mismanagement. When I first arrived I was placed in “set 4” (out of 5) simply because the School didn’t understand the American grading system, after about 4 weeks they moved me into the top set (1) which several people in “set 4” took severe umbridge at, and began a vendetta against me that lasted 2 years, which ended when the principle antagonist left after completing his O-Levels.
“School authorities are more concerned about litigation from bullies’ parents than about stopping the bullies.”
I think that’s because the bullies’ parents are also bullies, and probably passed on this trait to their children.
Matt
For most of my childhood, I was a pacifist. I think this stemmed partly from a general (and inexplicable) optimism about human nature, and partly from empathy: I didn’t like being on the receiving end of violence, so didn’t believe it was right to mete it out. Also, I was ungainly and weak, so, even if I had fought back, I’d’ve lost.
In retrospect, this was all completely wrong. Absolutely the best thing to do with bullies is to beat the living shit out of them. When I have a child, I am going to teach them that violence is OK, sometimes even necessary, when it’s in self-defense, and also that pre-emptive self-defense is sometimes justified. And I’m going to make sure they know how to inflict pain and embarassment. In a nice world, this would be a fairly bad way to bring up a child, but we don’t live in a nice world; we live in this one.
Of course, this will backfire horribly and my kids will probably join ANSWER in their 20s. Grr.
I was another one of the bullied, although not nearly so bad as some. I was fortunate that I was big for my age, and for a girl, so I didn’t really have any problems until I was much older.
I don’t think that pulling him out of that school is the solution of choice, although that should be done as a last resort. Brian’s suggestion that he should be started off—at 11!—on “his own place, his own life” is ludicrous. Even the most mature 11 year old is not ready for that.
They’d have been much better off teaching him judo. Yeah, I know that’d bring up other problems.
Joe, I thought Edward Turner was unfair in his criticism of you. But once you explained yourself, I decided he was right the first time. You seem to think that kids beating up those who are different is perfectly natural (right), and that this is inevitable and should be tolerated (wrong).
While there were doubtless things young Thomas could have done to be less annoying (e.g., don’t be such a damn know-it-all; don’t go preaching your political beliefs), you sound as if you think he should just be made to conform to whatever the bullies were. When I was a kid, this would’ve meant giving up my interest in science fiction and astronomy in order to take up sex, drugs, and rock n roll. I really don’t think that would have been the right solution. Besides, bullies don’t always bully for reasons, they do it because they can.
Sadly the child was the architect of his own downfall. He was eleven friggin’ years old, for the love of God, and his biggest problem was that he wasn’t like the other kids. It wasn’t like he was a drug kingpin or gang banger. Jayzus, show some sense, man.
For most of my childhood, I was a pacifist. I think this stemmed partly from a general (and inexplicable) optimism about human nature, and partly from empathy: I didn’t like being on the receiving end of violence, so didn’t believe it was right to mete it out. Also, I was ungainly and weak, so, even if I had fought back, I’d’ve lost.
Yes, I was the same, at least in terms of my viewpoint. (In quite a few cases, I probably wouldn’t have lost. I was ungainly, but not especially weak).
In retrospect, this was all completely wrong. Absolutely the best thing to do with bullies is to beat the living shit out of them.
Once again, I now agree. This experience rather strongly influences my view when the bully is someone like Saddam Hussein, too.
Angie, you said” You seem to think that kids beating up those who are different is perfectly natural (right), and that this is inevitable and should be tolerated (wrong).
No I don’t think bullying is either inevitable or should be tolerated. As for it being natural -now there’s a question!!! – it happens – therefore it is part of the current natural pattern of school-life (horrible though that idea is). Take a look at my first comment again and you will see that I did say that the bullying should have been stamped out. That it existed is entirely the fault of the school and parents of all the children concerned.
This is only a blog comments – I don’t check my every word rigorously for all interpretation- so yes I’m probably quite often misunderstood – that is ok – I’m happy with that – I find I often learn more when that happens.
My opinion is that there should be absolute zero tolerance of bullying in schools and children should be taught to have respect for, and to understand the value of, differences in others.
That all said – I do understand that I appear to be harsh on the boy. Children rely on adults to provide them with the necessary skills for surviving life. The reason I’m so harsh is that we are not talking about a baby…This child had been taught enough necessary life skills where he felt he could take part in adult politics – he went to a political meeting on his own. He chose adult company and he chose suicide. He was old enough to make those choices and he paid an awful price for those choices… yes he was a victim of bullying – but he also made himself an even greater victim by his own choices.
Basically his “adult” choices were part of what hurt him. No that doesn’t mean I expect him to change and become like the bullies – it only means that as an adult I can see that he had other choices available but that he chose the very ones that helped destroy him. That is why I said that so much of this case was ACCIDENT!
Angie, I meant to say:When teaching parents or teachers – we concentrate on the parents or teachers mistakes… but when teaching children we need to make use of the boy’s own part in his suicide as well as the bullies part.
The boy’s choices were such that they could have had gone either way – he might have survived and grown up happy. He didn’t – so if we are teaching other children – we can learn from his mistakes and they can be shown how those weren’t good choices.
“In retrospect, this was all completely wrong. Absolutely the best thing to do with bullies is to beat the living shit out of them. ”
Absolutely Agree.
I was bullied mercilessly in primary and high school until I worked this out for myself. Never in my school experience did my parents or teachers suggest that I should stand up for myself. As soon as I did, the bullying stopped.
The best thing a parent could do for a bullied child is teach him how to defend himself.
I can’t make any kind of judgement against this parent or the poor kid—except that things were obviously allowed to go on too long for his ability to deal with them.
I dealt with this business myself when I was in school, and found resistance, and having friends that would back me up, to be the best solution.
When my own older boys ran into it, I counselled them to decide when they had had enough, tell the bully to stop very loudly and clearly so everybody heard it, and then punch him right on the nose, and keep punching, until he went down or otherwise quit. My older son was facing a group, and a change of schools was the solution. He made some good friends and the situation resolved itself.
The second son had a specific antagonist, but the problem ended when that kid left the school for, as we found out later, treatment for mental health problems. This one was an athlete, and began working out to improve himself in sports. Oddly enough, after about age 13-14, no one bothered him anymore. He topped out at 6-1 and 210 lbs, and played hockey, soccer, and baseball all through these years. He is also as gentle and peaceable as anyone you might ever meet.
I have one more son aged 11 who has had some problems, but he has a good group of friends who back him up, so he has had some success just telling the playground bullies to knock it off and leave him alone. It hurts to see him upset, however, when he’s been teased or pestered somehow. He truly doesn’t understand why anybody would be mean to him for no reason.
My children are much better people than I ever was. More peaceful and less hot-headed. I’m still trying to talk my daughter into taking some basic martial arts, so she can protect herself if the need arises. She’s a dancer and athlete though, probably stronger than most of the boys in her grade. I told her to kick certain places and just keep kicking and yelling until she felt safe.
Doubt if any of this kind of “parental advice” will turn up in the parenting mags, but what the h—.
Joe:
“Sadly the child was the architect of his own downfall. Everbody loves to blame somebody… yes the mother and the school and the other children all let this boy down…. but he let himself down too!”
No Joe. This 11 year old child died because his mother, with the complicity of the headmaster, forced him to attend school for many years, knowing that he was being tortured there. It apparently never occured to either of them that it might be better not to force the child to attend such a place.
The mother’s failure is perhaps excusable on the grounds that she may have been unaware that school attendance is not compulsory.
The same cannot be said for the headmaster whose words of praise for the child are as foul and hypocritical as anything I have read for a long time The headmaster would have known that the child did not have to attend the school. Did he inform the mother of this? If not, what is his excuse?
Brian, thank you for this outstanding post.
Julius
Julius, What is the purpose of blame. Generally I think BLAMING anyone is generally a useless and foul concept unless it is used to find where faults lie so that we can learn from them and avoid them happening in future.
You said: “This 11 year old child died because his mother, with the complicity of the headmaster, forced him to attend school for many years, knowing that he was being tortured there.
Isn’t it so nice and easy to have someone to blame for the death of a child. The mother made mistakes and the school made some dreadful mistakes, the bullies were bastards- so all of them can easily be blamed…. well – I hate to be the nasty SOB that breaks it too you – but the boy made mistakes too!
Yet because he is a child and was a victim you refuse to notice any faults of his. Well I’m sorry but- If you don’t recognise that simple fact- that the boy was practically his own worst enemy- then how can you hope to teach children in the same position as that boy how to help themselves.
Being a child does not make anyone an angel. Being a victim does not make anyone an angel.
Being a bully does not make a child completely evil.
Being a mother that made a mistake does not make you a BAD mother.
Blaming people to for no other reason than to make them feel bad and guilty is WRONG.
If you are going to find fault then it is best to look for all the faults and deal with them ALL appropriately to stop them recurring.
To believe that child victims are by some magic means sacredly innocent of all faults – is a complete load of bollocks. It is patronising and ignores the basic reality of the situation.
You can say that: If the mother had been perfect this might not have happened – yet she raised a child capable of going on his own to take part in a political meeting- that alone shows that the mother did pretty well in some respects.
You can say that: If the school had been perfect this might not have happened. While schools tolerate bullying in any form this will remain a problem – but schools are currently under a cloud of bad management from government level down- this bad management makes the disciplining of troublemakers a very complicated business.
The people most at fault were the bullies. That is something that the school and the parents of the bullies and the bullies themselves need to fix.
As for the boy – do you realise why he might have been so into politics… his life wasn’t working – politicians control lives…. he was looking for ways to control his life by controlling others and so stop them tormenting him. Yet by doing so – He missed the fact that he might be able to control them by controlling himself first and foremost. He made mistakes… and he paid heavily for it. Get other kids to recognise that fact – the fact that to change the world you start with changing yourself…. then they might really learn something!
Julius, something I forgot to say:
If you show children that you think that their commiting suicide absolves them of all faults… then you help create a situation where children with problems will see suicide as a “good” thing. Suicide fucks families. It is a bad thing. Better to teach the children how to deal with problems and how to ASK for help when they cannot cope.
If a school bully did to one of the teachers what he regularly does to other students, he’d be facing felony assault charges. Adult teachers don’t “fight their own battles”, they call the cops and get their attackers arrested.
I was intermittently bullied at my state comprehensive school in Britain, particularly from about the age of 10 to 14. Most of it was fairly heavy-duty teasing about my glasses, thinness, etc. A few of the local toughs bashed me up a few times and on one occasion I got stabbed by a kid playing around with a small box-cutter knife. At this point the deputy headmaster of my school realised that, er, yes, we have a problem. Corporal punishment was still enforced at the school though in this case the person concerned was suspended, and I don’t know what else happened.
My parents were pretty supportive throughout. My folks made it clear they would not tolerate my being bullied, but there was not much chance of my being moved to a different school. In retrospect, the attitude was that bullying goes on and we should deal with it.
I haven’t really reflected on my school years for some time. I enjoyed my mid- to late-teen period at school and when most of the yobs had left the school with their measly collection of grades, the rest of us got on much, much better.
In reflection, being bullied and going to one of Britain’s schools for good little socialists was a key milestone in my coming a libertarian. On a few occasions I recall being known as a “loner”. At a very early stage teachers love to impart the importance of conforming and “fitting in”. Many of such teachers were leftists in their political-cultural orientation.
The case for lowering the age of compulsory schooling, say initially to 14, is unanswerable.
I guess I am not alone in this regard.
Adult teachers don’t “fight their own battles”, they call the cops and get their attackers arrested.
Indeed. That’s what the cops are for. Once in a while I hear a story about a school student who has attempted this. It’s an extraordinarily difficult thing to do, because there is normally a tremendous lack of support for it from most teachers, not much from police, and extreme hostility to it from other students – even non-bullies. I always admire the guts of people who try it, though.
Joe:
“You can say that: If the school had been perfect this might not have happened. While schools tolerate bullying in any form this will remain a problem – but schools are currently under a cloud of bad management from government level down- this bad management makes the disciplining of troublemakers a very complicated business”
This is not something I said or would ever say. I agree that State control makes dealing with bullies even harder than would otherwise be the case, but it is foolish to suppose that bullying can be eliminated from schools. It is an inherent feature of the beast. Even the best run private schools have bullying.
That is why the point of my comment was NOT that the adults involved failed to deal with “the problem” posed by the bullies. The point is that they continued to require the child to attend school, even though he was being tortured. If that is not blameworthy, I cannot imagine what is.
Do you not see this?
Julius
Julius, Of course the mother had faults and made mistakes but she wasn’t the only player in this sad saga the other people “worthy of blame”(if you must blame someone) were the bullies (and their parents), the school …and the boy himself.
Removing the child was not the only available solution nor was it the best available solution.
Removing the child leaves the bullies and poor school system intact to keep the problem going for other children. If we are going to apportion blame then the only good way to do it is to use the blame to discover where ALL the faults lie and apply fixes to ALL of them. To the education system, to the school, to all the parents, and to all the children.
We pay for the damned education system – we deserve a far higher quality end product. Home schooling is just not possible for most people… nor do most children want it. They just want to be happy at school. That is fairly easily attainable by enforcing a zero tolerance of all cases of serious bullying. The bullies only do it because they know they can get away with it.
Joe:
“Removing the child was not the … best available solution … Home schooling is just not possible for most people… nor do most children want it.”
Joe, do you think Thomas Thompson was given the choice?
Do you think he should have been given the choice?
What do you think he would have decided, if he had been given the choice?
“Removing the child leaves the bullies and poor school system intact to keep the problem going for other children.”
How does forcing children like Thomas Thompson to atttend school help in dealing with the “bullies and poor school system”?
Even if it does, what kind of morality can justify forceing children like Thomas Thompson to endure being bullied to death so that the “system” can be improved after their deaths?
Julius, It all depends on what solutions you can use… if you as a parent find yourself in that position and honestly think that the only solution is to take the child out of school then you should take the child out. If you can see other solutions and have the determination to see those other solutions through then you have a greater variety of options to choose from. The child should obviously have a say in any solution you as a parent finally decide on.
To say that my opinion is one that justify’s forcing children to be bullied to death is twisting outcomes to suit an agenda – its exactly like saying that I am in favour of getting children knocked down by traffic to improve road safety. Yes sure I am – and I kick small dogs and grannies at every opportunity.
Sorry Julian but I’m just looking for ways to make the best outcome for all from a bad situation. To do that I find it is best to start by looking at the realities involved from the viewpoints of all that are involved… not just the viewpoint of the bullied child.
Joe wrote:
Accident? What planet do you live on? Choice is obviously important to you, so it’s odd you haven’t mentioned some other choices. The bullies chose to bully this kid to death. The headmaster chose to do nothing. You’ve chosen to be an apologist for the bullies. And the bullies know lots of people like you. That’s why they’re so bold. And Thomas Thompson knew all of that.
Isn’t it so much nicer and easier to sit back and blame the dead child himself. No pesky objections to listen to.
It’s impossible to ascertain whether or not you actually hate to be a nasty SOB, but there’s no doubt you are one, and probably not just in this matter.
NO, THAT’S NOT THE REASON. IT’S BECAUSE NO FAULTS – REAL OR PRESUMED – ON HIS PART COULD EVER POSSIBLY JUSTIFY THIS EXTREME BULLYING. NONE. NIL. NADA. ZIP. ZILCH. You’ve said yourself there should be zero tolerance for this, but your persistence in putting the focus back on the victim tends to indicate that’s mere lip service.
I’m sure Thomas Thompson would understand we just couldn’t do anything to stop the bullies until we found the best outcome.
If he lived in New York, was of high school age and was gay or transgendered, he could go to that new special school where he would be safe. Just his bad luck.
Thank you, Jim C! I’ve just returned to this thread and I am shocked to see Joe blaming an eleven year old boy for the revolting way he was treated. In what way was it Thomas’s fault that he was better spoken and more advanced than his peers? I have no doubt he was also more intelligent than his bullies. It is THEIR fault, THEIR PARENTS’ fault, and the TEACHERS’ fault that poor Thomas was bullied for so long: the bullies’ fault for deriving pleasure from getting their kicks out of someone else’s misery; the bullies’ parents’ fault for not having taught them right from wrong; and the teachers’ fault for ignoring a problem like this.
Joe – your point of view seems to be “Well, the kid had it coming, he shouldn’t have been different.” I can’t even begin to elaborate upon how wrong that is, on so many levels.
Jim C + Liz, Sorry to SHOCK you so horribly, but I absolutely refuse to ignore part of what happened just to make a child victim conform to your ideas of perfect innocence!
Yes Jim part of what happened was ACCIDENT- the reason the child couldn’t interact well with other children was part accident, the fact that the mother didn’t realise the child would go as far as to be suicidal was part accident, the fact that the child didn’t ask for help was part accident, the fact that the child propably didn’t realise that he wouldn’t be saved was part accident, the fact that the medicines interacted badly was part accident.. etc etc…
Jim at no time did I try to justify the bullying – quite the opposite the main cause of this whole sorry saga was the bullying and as I’ve said again and again that should have been stopped immediately by the school.
But sorry Liz and Jim I refuse to sit back and apportion blame for the sake of blame. That is a sorry thing to do.
I look at the realities of what happened and try to spot the faults that cause it so that we can learn from them.
And No I am not saying the child shouldn’t have been different – as I already said – quite the opposite…. differences should be cherished – up to a point. Differences that are destructive should be modified. You all seem to think that a child who cannot play with other children but can freely associate with adults is something to be cheered. I don’t believe that – I have seen too many such children grow up suffering with major relationship problems. While they are children (even though they can’t form friends with children) they are treated with respect by the adults – but this often changes when they become teenagers… the adults stop treating them with the kid gloves they used while the child was the “cute little prodigy” and start to treat them in more adult ways – and eventually the anti-social aspects of the childs behaviour, that prevented them from forming friendships with children, starts to affect their adult relationships.
Children that can’t form friends with other children desperately need help to learn those skills. If you leave it until they are adult – they are often left with massive self destructive or anti-social problems.
This child needed the bullying stopped and to be given help to form friends – Those were the EASY things that needed to happen here – he didn’t need to be jerked out of school and tutored at home.
Basically that child needed to be taught how to be a child… and given the security to enjoy it!
Liz, I forgot to say- that by teaching a child how to be a child you are not removing those parts that allow them to associate with adults – you are giving them another aspect to their personality. You are not removing differences – you are giving them more to play with!
Julius, apologies for getting your name wrong earlier.