School bullying is a large problem that needs to be assessed and prevented from happening. More often than not, school counselors and teachers are totally unaware of bullying, because more often than not, it takes place out of the classroom, either at lunch breaks, or right before and after school. Because it goes undetected, the victims of bullying often suffer in silence with no one to talk to and nobody to help them or defend them. Both John Cloud, the author of, “ The Myths of Bullying,” and Susan Parault, Heather A. Davis, and Anthony D. Pellegrini the authors of, “The Social Contexts of Bullying and Victimization,” explain that bullying is a problem and what it does to its victims. Bullies give peoples excuses to why they bully, but in the long run it will only effect the little guy.
There are so many reasons which accumulate into a child becoming a bully. Most often, bullies will target children who have physical differences such as being overweight or wearing glasses. The real reason bullying happens is due to a power imbalance between the children. For example, in Parault’s, Davis’s, and Pellegrini’s journal they state that “physically strong bullies will almost always choose victims who are physically weaker than themselves and will not tend to pick on other children who might retaliate.” This is why the victim is usually always smaller, because the bullies knows that they will not defend themselves. In addition, domestic problems such as abuse or neglect may manifest as bullying behavior, which the child uses as a coping mechanism. Many bullies believe this type of abusive behavior is normal because they experience it daily at home; children learn by example and mimic what they see. Sometimes bullying behavior can be caused by a need to gain acceptance within a peer group, or to gain attention from adults. Whatever the cause, bullies almost always have some underlying emotional reason for their behavior. Unfortunately, many child bullies do not grow...