On the subject of bullying, when I was in school, we (the meek and trodden-upon) put a frog in the desk of the class bully, a hulking sort with bad manners, a penchant for wickedness and laughing evilly at the misery of others. We watched — first with trepidation and pounding heart — as he lifted the lid on his desk and then with unquantifiable glee — as he turned a sickly shade of grey and fainted.
Granted, that was dim ages ago. But some memories survive time’s eraser. The meek, after all, treasure their little victories, especially if the weapon of choice has not been a sharp arrow or a similar flying missile, but a harmless hopping frog.
These days, it is harder to get hold of the bully because he may well be on another continent. It’s virtually impossible to even guess what he may look like, since the internet affords us this cloak of invisibility, this facelessness, while at the same time granting immense reach — over seas and deserts — into the room of another.
My friend Barney has come up with a strategy for countering the cyberbully, implemented recently with a fair degree of success. In this instance, the bully wasn’t abroad but nearby, and anonymous. The victim was Barney’s nephew. The reason had best be left unstated. Anyhow, over the course of six weeks the young tenth grader — let’s call him Joey — put up with intolerable abuse via ‘social media’ until Uncle Barney was called in for ‘consultation’. “Leave the dirty rat to me,” Barney is supposed to have said, with his usual air of confidence. Given that Barney told me this story himself I’d guess what he really said was, “Don’t pay it much attention, Joey. If you respond it will only add fuel to the fire.” Or, something along those lines. But Barney’s nature is to be seen as Mr Hero, especially if he happens to actually pull off something successfully.
And who am I to grudge him that?
Anyway, after having instructed his nephew to leave it to him and ‘ignore all you read on screen over the following days’, Barney apparently set about over the next four weeks cultivating a rapport with the bullying troll himself — via five or six aliases — inducing the troll to believe he was not alone, but that he actually had six others on his side. In other words, bully to the power of six!
In this time, the nephew was battered with all kinds of emotional torment.
“In this time, also, the ‘six’ friends grew closer to Mr Troll,” says Barney.
After four weeks, it was relatively easy to plan a get together so that this ‘group of Bullies Anonymous’ could go on to greater things. Spread things around a bit, target others. Vice is like jam, after all, it’s easy for spreading.
Plans were drawn up, plots hatched. Two black lines painted under each eye, and a hooded jumper — those, the ‘six’ agreed with Mr Troll, would be the standard identification at their meeting which was scheduled at 9pm behind a certain railway station, lit only by a single sodium light.
“Bring sandwiches, too,” urged Mr Troll, “It could be a long night of planning. I’ll bring the drinks.”
Barney by this time had no intention of venturing out there himself to be exposed by a dim sodium light.
On the night in question, two other men went in his place, hooded, with lines under the eyes and a pair of handcuffs in their back pockets.
“It all went so smoothly, there was no time in the end for sandwiches and drinks,” said Barney.
Turns out Mr Troll was a kid himself, a year younger than Barney’s nephew.
“After all that, I’ve been reprimanded,” grumbled Barney, “for indulging in vigilante tactics. Imagine that! I helped unearth a potential monster! Wasn’t I doing some good?”
The jury’s out on that, Barney, I reckon.
Kevin Martin is a journalist based in Sydney, Australia.
