Will you allow your kid to hit back?

[sba771]

I am not a mom but my FI and I have discussed this at length in light of recent news events. Heck yes my kid can hit the bully back and I hope they hit them really hard so no one will ever mess with them again. My kids, as soon as they can walk, will be enrolled in martial arts in order to empower them and hopefully make it so they aren''t even a target. However with all the bullying I have read about in the news lately, I have ZERO faith in the system of telling adults and thinking they will intervene. My child is on his or her own. For the record, I have never hit someone nor been bullied myself, but my FI claims I was sheltered in private school and I used to be like well I would tell my child to not hit back and tell an adult, but now I have done a 180 since I have also heard stories of teachers being as bad as the student bullies.

 

[pennquaker09]

Personally, I''m not into violence, so I would prefer my kids to inform the closest adult if someone hits them. Nate disagrees with me, and I suppose we''ll revisit this when the time comes.

I was always an easy target because I was always the smallest boy and I happened to take ballet. I was lucky though, I just told my older cousin and he''d handle them for me.

We moved right before my freshman year, so I was a new kid in school, and as I mentioned above, I was still small. I don''t think I grew until the end of my sophomore year. Being a nerd (and otherwise totally outgoing nice guy) helped me out. I tutored a LOT of athletes.

 

[somethingshiny]

This is timely for me and I''m glad to have so many thoughts and responses to look at.

JT is 4. He has always been bigger than the other kids so we really stressed NOT hitting back. He could have really hurt another child. However, now that he is more in line physically with the other kids his age, we''re debating allowing him to hit back. We''ve felt that we should encourage non-violent behavior, tell them you don''t like it, etc. But, it seems some kids will just start bullying the one that doesn''t hit back. At this point, we really don''t know what to do. We don''t want him to think it''s right to hit, but on the other hand, we don''t want him to think it''s right to BE hit.

As far as only hitting back in self defense, a 4 yr old is just too young to KNOW what that means. And unfortunately, it seems the hitting starts young.

Recently I witnessed JT fight back during preschool. One little boy always messes with him and JT finally reached over and gave him a twisty-pinch. (I''m not sure where he even learned that move) The other kid left him alone. I didn''t say anything about it. I was on the other side of a two way mirror when I saw it. I was curious if this would lead to a new behavior but it hasn''t seemed to.


I was encouraged to hit back as a child. If my dad found out someone hit me and I didn''t hit back, I would get hit by him. Obviously this is ridiculous but I don''t have any other experience besides my own to draw from.

 

[Mara]

My jury is out on this one initially...but I do think it's right to defend yourself and for kids to learn that they can. What I am on the fence on is... do I want him to come tell an adult first or just fight back if he is being bullied. I lean towards just fight back because sometimes kids won't want to come tell an adult, it's like tattling and that can make it worse if it's an ongoing thing. And I don't want him to feel like he has to choose between being a tattler or standing up for himself if he thinks he can do it alone, I want him to know he's empowered. I guess we'll take it when it comes but Greg was a small boy and quite mild as he was raised mostly by his mother who stressed taking the higher road and just walking away. He was bullied a lot until he finally fought back and then was never bothered again. He says he wishes he didn't wait so long and no kid of his will ever stand there and take it, so he definitely wouldn't want the adult involved, he would just want J to fight back if he felt he could. His take...you don't start the fight, but you can finish it.

I figure we have some time to mull over this one.

 

[cara]

Yeah, I think there are shades of grey in the fight-back against bullies options. Clearly from the stories posted here there is a case to be made for fighting back in some circumstances. Sometimes its the best way to end the bullying. But... adults aren''t always supposed to fight back. Sometimes you are supposed to walk away. There can be consequences to fighting (legal and otherwise). What if your kid hurts someone fairly bad? Even unintentionally, ie they fall over and hit their head on the curb. There are also ''zero tolerance'' policies at a lot of schools nowadays. What if your kid didn''t start the fight, but can''t prove it and is getting expelled anyways? Easy to say that''s just how it rolls but it can be mighty inconvenient.