A January 31st 2010 Boston Globe editorial about bullying proffers that:
No law will encompass all that needs to be done. Schools need to be pushed by parents and students to seize the initiative on bullying, and to develop well-rounded approaches to preventing it and defusing it when it does arise.
Direct or indirect assaultive or coercive behavior is the conduit that connects child, sibling, bullying, dating, spousal, intimate partner and elder abuse. Similar to all of these behaviors, bullying, at its core, is a use of direct or indirect assaultive or coercive behavior to change or alter the behavior of another person. Bullying does not spontaneously occur when children enter school. Rather than having schools pushed by parents and children to end bullying, the change must begin at home. All of these behaviors arise at birth. Parents need to teach children, from the day they are born, to understand that the use of direct or indirect assaultive or coercive behavior is wrong. Waiting until children enter our schools is often too little, too late. Parents must understand that children replicate what parents do, not what they say.
While there may be no law that can encompass all that needs to be done, surely a law that forbids the use of, and the condoning of, belts or other injurious instruments to beat children in attempt to change or alter their behavior is a simple but important first lesson for everyone. How does our society, including our schools and parents, expect to end the use of assaultive or coercive behavior, in the form of bullying or any of these other aberrant behaviors, while parents continue to use or condone the use of belts or other injurious instrument?
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