Victims of Bullies: Anyone You Know?

How does the bully choose a victim?  What are the characteristics of victims?  What makes them a target?  These are some of the questions I hope to answer in part 3 of my series on Bullying.

First- How Does a Bully Choose their Victim?

There a multitude of reasons why a bully chooses their victim(s) but the main purpose is to empower themselves through clever, indirect and devious actions causing physical, emotional, and/or mental harm to their victim. 

·         A person may begin by being a friend to the bully without knowing their true nature but if the person shows any disrespect to the bully whether intentional or not, the friendship will cease to exist in the same pretense as it has because the bully no longer feels in control and no longer “owns” that relationship.  The bully will then either disown and spread rumors about the person or begin planning a series of manipulative actions that will ultimately destroy their ‘friend’ long before the ‘friend’ realizes what is happening.  This can happen with children, adults, or in the workplace with both employees and bosses.  The ultimate goal of bullies manipulation becomes payback for the incident they found to be disrespectful or unacceptable.  These type of bullies are extremely dangerous and can cause the most long term harm to their victims because they are very good at keeping their intentions isolated towards their victim(s) and may appear as a completely different person to everyone else they come in contact with which helps them to carry out the deception; create fabricated rumors; and undermine everything their victim attempts to accomplish through their manipulative actions.

·         You may also become a victim when you exhibit any kind of independent ideas or actions if you are a follower and the bully is your leader because you have attempted to take the power from the bully.  The bully may choose to chastise you in public either physically or emotionally or choose a plan to destroy you through manipulation.  See yesterday’s blog for details on the rational non-verbal abuser for details.  It’s important to remember that many of the bully’s friends or followers remain loyal for years; entire careers or life.  These friends/followers are provided with return friendship and camaraderie without the threat of becoming the victim.

·         The bully has special radar that identifies the weak and vulnerable.  He is a true predator and these people are easy targets for the bully.  They are easily exploited and controlled.  Many become future followers.

·         Anyone with negative characteristics is a perfect target and it immediately stirs that innate radar they have developed.  They find it extremely easy to target victims who are greedy, submissive, or even anxious to achieve or please.  They also look for victims who are willing to make sacrifices for others providing unconditional support or those trying ‘too hard’ (in the bully’s eyes) to please or succeed.  The bully will use whatever means necessary including outward charm to woo his potential victims to befriend him while unknowingly the bully has already began to calculate his cold-hearted plan to dominate and control the situation at all times.

·         A bully who believes you can see through the false mask he wears will create a plan to destroy your credibility if he can because he is afraid others will join you.  He cannot take the chance that many will realize the truth of his ways- scheming, deceitful, aggressive and competitive.  You propose a challenge and his true characteristics cannot allow you to succeed.  Consequently you may never realize this until it is too late because this type of bully appears to be behind you and wants you to trust him when he is really thinking the opposite always trying to undermine or derail your actions because you are a threat to his status quo either at school, the neighborhood, groups, or at work.  Victim beware he will work hard to get you excluded from activities, functions or even get you fired.  If he is your boss, he may verbally reprimand you in large groups but dismiss it at other times keeping you off balance until he chooses to destroy you which is the ultimate goal.

·         A bully learned early that people who are made to feel guilty or just weaker in nature are the easiest victims to manipulate into accepting inappropriate behaviors or even submitting to domination.

·         A bully feels that other people around him are his sheep and it gives him a feeling of ownership of them which boosts his ego.  Although beware of making them look bad in anyway.  They will become extremely angry feeling betrayed by your loyalty causing jealousy and retaliation.  At this point the bully begins to develop their plan to destroy- instantaneous combustion with physical outbursts or slow burning manipulation to destroy without detection.

·         Newcomers looking for social acceptance at school, neighborhood, groups or work are another great target for the bully looking for followers or victims.  They can either play up the need for camaraderie or threaten to isolate them from others if they do not submit to the bully’s demands.

·         People that back away from aggressive behavior or fights are also get targets for the bully.  All the bully needs to do in some cases is illustrate how angry and aggressive they can be if anyone betrays their trust or demands.  All the bully does is wait until the potential victim shows a little independence or success of their own to illustrate a problem with the bully’s control of the situation.

Many people are unwilling and embarrassed to admit they are a victim of bullying.  Children may especially be afraid to tell an adult since they think telling an adult will only make the bully increase their torment.  It’s important for adults to recognize the signs of bullying (previous two blogs); the signs of victims (below) and taking a proactive stance on bullying by learning how to deal with bullying (tomorrow’s blog).

It is not uncommon for a person especially a child who is a victim of bullying to complain of frequent ailments; to make every attempt to avoid certain situations including school; often comes home with  missing possessions or broken items; becomes withdrawn; and loss of appetite.  There are two major types of bullying victims:  those that are passive and responsive.

                Passive Victims

·         Exhibit quite a bit of emotions

·         Rarely tell others about the bullying

·         May start to carry weapons for protection

·         Never encourage an attack by a bully; they go about their own business never intentionally aggravating the bully

·         Very sensitive in nature (may cry easy or become overly anxious or easily upset- may keep feeling inside)

·         May be shy and lack needed social skills

·         May be insecure and lack self-esteem

·         May be chosen last or left out of group activities

·         May appear to lack humor or the ability to understand or accept sarcasm

·         May have few or no friends

·         Typically bullied repeatedly

·         May use possessions (money, toys, favors, etc.) as bribes for protection from the bully

Responsive Victim

·         May be pesky and repeatedly irritate others

·         May be quick tempered

·         May fight back

·         Can easily get others fired up

·         May be clumsy, immature, and restless (class clowns…)

·         May provoke the bully or be appear to be bullies themselves but aren’t just possess some of the same outward aggressive characteristics

·         Usually lose in the end

·         May try to work with the bully but doesn’t succeed

Remember you will not be harmed by a bully if you are with them but they will attempt to dominate you completely through their demands and actions.  If you are against the bully from the beginning or disagree at any length, the bully feels he must undermine you causing you difficulty in school, at public functions, with your friends or at work.  At no time does a bully feel you have the same rights as they.  In the bully’s mind you do not have the same right to achieve success or happiness as he.  It’s important to remember that the bully lacks all positive personality characteristics associated with empathy- no real concern for anyone but themselves but will use any skills they possess to maintain control and power which helps to fulfilled their ego-centric needs and ambitions.  The bully never sees anything like others but rather chooses to unconsciously crate their own sense of reality, which is centered on them.  A true manipulative bully bases their plan of attack on deception because if they were straightforward it would be counterproductive revealing their true character which would not be approved of by anyone else.  The most savvy bullies are passive-aggressive in nature never showing their true character to everyone often even acting the role of victim to gain others empathy claiming that no one appreciates the work they have accomplished or the things they do in the group or class never acknowledging all the sacrifices they have made to accommodate the group.  The woe-me syndrome to gain empathy and conceal their ruthless ambitions.   They often claim to they haven’t done anything wrong and have no intention of working out the situation in any compromise.  The true bully only sees the situation through their eyes but will work on others to win them over with promises, kindness and behaviors the victim never experiences.  It may even appear to the victim that the bully has a split personality-“ Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”.  Unfortunately the victim will be the only one to experience this split personality while the bully baits everyone else involved in the situation.  Remember the bully has many hidden traits and tools to use to cause the victim distress.  These can be reviewed in the previous two blogs.  Tomorrow we will discuss how to deal with a bully.  Stay Tune!!!