‘Just Kidding’ and ‘Ganging Up’ from Odd Girl Out by Rachel Simmons

A time when I was part of an alliance that made someone feel bad was when my friends and I were picking on a classmate.  We threw small insults at him, and we would be exclusive, and be mean to him whenever he tried to sit with or near us at lunch.  We were nice to his friends, but to him, we were mean.  Acting like this made me feel powerful and in control of him.  I felt like I had power over him, and I was able to influence him, and make him feel bad, which also made me feel like I was better than him, and much more powerful.  My options in the situation was to either bully him with my friends, ignore him and what my friends were doing, or stepping up to my friends and telling them to stop.  Most of the time, I bullied him with my friends, or ignored him, because I wanted to prove to my friends that I was just as cool as them and had power in situations with “annoying guys”.  I never stepped up and told my friends to stop bothering him, until two years after we bullied him, and we became good friends.  Now, whenever I tell my friends that he and I are really good friends, and are best friends, they are still surprised.  They stopped bullying him, but still talked about him behind his back, and complained about how rude and annoying he was, but they respect him and stopped bulling him whenever I am around.  People probably bully others because they want to feel like they are in control of the situation and want to feel like they are more powerful than others, and also because they want to make others look bad, making themselves look and seem better.  They want to hurt their peers because they want to point out the flaws of their peers that they do not have, and show others that the person isn’t as good as they are, and that they are better.  They demonstrate power when they can intimidate others and show that they are “better” than the people they insult, harass, and bully.  Bullies might not want to hurt their peers necessarily, but just want to prove to others that they are powerful and “cool”.