Southerly by David Haywood

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Southerly: Confessions of a Social Retard

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  • Lilith __,

    The most memorable (literary) tale of childhood bullying I can think of is Margaret Atwood's Cat's Eye. I think that story resonates with many, many people.

    Something that worries me about home-schooling is, what happens if you grow up without having to deal with lots of other kids all the time? Kids can be generous, they can also be brutal, and I think learning to deal with all kinds is one of the biggest things we learn in school.

    Or do home-schooled kids emerge into the adult world with robust, undamaged egos, and are then able to handle snarky, game-playing adults easily?

    Dunedin • Since Jul 2010 • 3895 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    Something that worries me about home-schooling is, what happens if you grow up without having to deal with lots of other kids all the time? Kids can be generous, they can also be brutal, and I think learning to deal with all kinds is one of the biggest things we learn in school.

    Don't forget that a fair bit of home schooling is for kids who have already found themselves unable to deal with the situations found in schools, and their behavior may have spiraled into highly dysfunctional habits. I can see your point when it's simply an elective, a judgment by parents that the academic teaching isn't good enough or something, or there's not enough religion being taught. But there's lot of pretty valid reasons for home schooling too.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Lilith __,

    @Ben, yeah I was meaning average kids, not kids with special needs. I've met a few parents who are convinced their (average) kids need it.

    Dunedin • Since Jul 2010 • 3895 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    Yup, I've got no problem that people have to convince the Ministry about a genuine need to keep kids away from school.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    inadvertently worn mismatched pairs in professional situations

    could be part of the test too, prehaps :)

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Joanna,

    The most memorable (literary) tale of childhood bullying I can think of is Margaret Atwood's Cat's Eye. I think that story resonates with many, many people.

    Ha, that's exactly what I was thinking of when Dyan was saying that there wasn't as much bullying in Canadia!

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 746 posts Report Reply

  • George Darroch,

    Yup, I've got no problem that people have to convince the Ministry about a genuine need to keep kids away from school.

    I do. There should be regulations about how education is provided, and standards to be adhered to (including levels of social interaction with other children), but having to convince ministry officials that a child is particularly "special" should not have to be one of them.

    I suppose I should disclose that I was largely homeschooled, for both educational and religious reasons - not that I endorse all of these postfacto.

    WLG • Since Nov 2006 • 2264 posts Report Reply

  • Lilith __,

    George - are you glad you were homeschooled? If you feel like sharing.

    Dunedin • Since Jul 2010 • 3895 posts Report Reply

  • Lucy Stewart,

    Or do home-schooled kids emerge into the adult world with robust, undamaged egos, and are then able to handle snarky, game-playing adults easily?

    Depends on both the kids and parents. I know some who did, some who spectacularly didn't.

    I think what bothers me about home-schooling as a concept is: in the real world, you will have to interact with people your parents haven't pre-approved of. And it's very easy for home-schooling parents to ensure their children *only* interact with people they have pre-approved of. I've seen home-schooled kids of whom this was true and home-schooled kids of whom it wasn't, and the ones of whom it was true? It was creepy.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 2105 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    but having to convince ministry officials that a child is particularly "special" should not have to be one of them.

    What if they are special? Who else should they be convincing?

    It's rather unfortunate that homeschooling is the only alternative to mainstreaming in NZ, but there are kids who can't function at school. I'm not being idealistic here, I'm being realistic. Some behavior is too antisocial for regular teachers to be expected to deal with. It's bad enough to deal with a 7 year old who bites kids fingers off, but when they're past puberty and capable of childish tantrums with adult bodies then it's a very real option to remove them from school.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • dyan campbell,

    How the hell did you score 27, dyan? There must have been some dimension you really hammered.

    I think it's the numbers thing, mostly. I like numbers, recognise patterns quickly. I like to do things with a specific, precise order of events - mainly to compare progress with former attempts. I notice thing like whether a number is prime, an integer and I enjoy subjects other people find dull or tedious. I have a freakish memory, especially for strings of numbers - or at least I did before my second head injury (which altered my personality quite a bit, actually).

    I got a nearly perfect grade in logic at university, because the mathematical nature of the arguments that are required in any defense of a position were second nature to me and I understood that any skill in essay writing that might be useful in metaphysics and epistemology would be useless in logic.

    I have always liked factual books - essays by anyone from Bertrand Russell to Maxim Gorky, George Orwell to George Eliot, history, mathematical books, books on neuroscience, economics - these all appeal to me much more than fiction.

    Small talk may bore me but people interest me, and I genuinely like just about everyone I meet, unless they give me specific reasons not to. I like people who are dismissed as odd, foreign or crazy and often find them interesting because they can give me insights into experiences I've never had.

    I was told (more than once) that I was difficult to flirt with, though I never meant to be difficult. Once, I guy I was crazy about came over (in a crowded room) and said, urgently, "we need to talk" to which I replied, promptly and confidently, 'no we don't." I was crazy about the guy, I was pretty sure I would have remembered if we had needed to talk.

    Year later, a mutual friend (male) explained to me that had actually been an attempt to engage in some serious discussion of a possible relationship, which was news to me but apparently would have been obvious to anyone else. So I was more literal and naive in that respect than people assumed, because of my apparently outgoing nature.

    The social and physical confidence is perhaps different from most who scored higher on this test, and this was the influence of older brothers; I had a very tough, physically challenging and male influenced childhood when growing up.

    Being physically strong is a big advantage in childhood, and the kind of confidence it gives a person just becomes part of your identity. I was never very shy or diffident, and really identified with the French writer Gabrielle Colette who described her childhood and personality in terms very similar to my own, if 100 years earlier. She said she did not understand shy children who hung back, and would herself run onto a field yelling "I'M PLAYING!" like she was shouting "FIRE!". That was what I was like too.

    auckland • Since Dec 2006 • 595 posts Report Reply

  • dyan campbell,

    Ha, that's exactly what I was thinking of when Dyan was saying that there wasn't as much bullying in Canadia!

    I didn't say there wasn't much bullying in Canada, but that it was a social convention that it be couched in much, much more subtle forms than saying nasty things within earshot of the intended victim.

    This sort of behaviour is pretty world-wide, but what was different in my culture is the censure of the opposite sex, and the reluctance to appear petty, cruel or insecure in front of people. The reluctance is motivated by not wishing to appear ugly. It's shallow motivation, but powerful all the same.

    Many years ago I heard a guy in Canada say something very similar about another guy (though not within earshot) and, describing him as "someone who had a fire on his face that somebody must have put out with a pitchfork" was rounded on by girls who were within earshot, and he was made to feel pretty small about his comment.

    So I'm not saying bullying doesn't exist in Canda. What I am saying is that openly agressive bullying is rejected as unacceptable and unattractive - often by the opposite sex. Here, a woman can behave in an agressive or cruel way and her attractiveness is not diminished, nor would she be ashamed to be seen behaving that way in public.

    It's like hitting kids. People in Canada hit kids all the time, maybe not as much as here, but certainly more than in Scandinavian countries. They just wouldn't do it openly like they do here, because they would be too ashamed to behave that way in public. Here I have seen tiny kids smacked viciously for all sorts of things, and the parents seem positively self-righteous rather than ashamed.

    So it's not that the impulse or even the behaviour is different; what is different is the culture's perception of the person engaged in that behaviour. In Canada an adult who hits a child will shock witnesses, just as an adult who bullies another adult will shock witnesses.

    So if someone is going to be bitchy in Canada, they tend not to surround themselves by their own sex and hold forth to an admiring gallery of harpies, for fear of appearing like a group of harpies. They try to be more subtle with it, and you do not see clusters of women talking about other women in such openly hostile ways. Not past the age of 8 or 10, anyway.

    Canadians behave in ways that are very different from NZers too. My friend Tracey visited here, and spotted a Mongrel Mob member - patched, tattooed and mean looking - giving his little boy (about 4) a huge candy bar and giant bottle of Coke outside a TAB, just as it was opening. Tracey marched over to them, angrily shaking a finger at the man's face, saying "what kind of breakfast is that for your little boy? Do you want to make this child sick? Do you want his teeth to rot out of his head before the permanent ones grow in? What kind of father are you anyway!?!" I'd lived here for a while, so I was desperately trying to pull her away, going "Tracey, Tracey, we don't yell at men here..." and she was going "I'm not finished... this guy can not seriously think it's okay to leave this kid out here with all this crap and let him make himself sick..." The mongrel mob guy was just laughing, fortunately. But in NZ it would not be normal or acceptable to go up to a person and criticise what they were doing with their kid, under pretty much any circumstances. In Canada her behaviour would have been quite normal.

    auckland • Since Dec 2006 • 595 posts Report Reply

  • Islander,

    "Being physically strong is a big advantage in childhood"

    -not wrong dyan!

    I was hefty _ _ and_ _strong as a kid, and it meant I kept my place in the family pecking order (I'm eldest) until I left home, and was never bullied at school, despite wearing very heavy glasses and being - odd.

    Knowing some interesting wrestling holds and being very good with words did help a bit too...

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    I understood that any skill in essay writing that might be useful in metaphysics and epistemology would be useless in logic.

    I dispute that. I only passed Stage 3 logic because of my essay writing :-)

    But yes, I can see that an obsession with numbers scores highly in that test.

    "we need to talk" to which I replied, promptly and confidently, 'no we don't."

    LOL. You need a hunky FBI agent to knock those mathematical angles off.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • dyan campbell,

    Being physically strong is a big advantage in childhood"
    -not wrong dyan!
    I was hefty _ _ and_ _strong as a kid, and it meant I kept my place in the family pecking order (I'm eldest) until I left home, and was never bullied at school, despite wearing very heavy glasses and being - odd.

    I was pretty small... usually the smallest or second smallest person in class, but fortunately grew to the reasonably normal height of 5'6. But being raised with older brothers was a bit like being raised by wolves, and I was not scared of much, least of other children. I was an avid skateboarder and in retrospect I can't believe I wasn't killed before I was 10. Children are not known for their common sense and I was no exception.

    LOL. You need a hunky FBI agent to knock those mathematical angles off.

    Hmm, well I've been happily settled down with my dear Paul for 27 years, so this is all distant history to me, but I never liked hunky guys. My type was the arty, sensitive milk-drinking boy next door. I avoided jocks and hunks like the plague. I was quite shocked to find (8 years into the relationship) that Paul had in fact been his school's biggest jock, a fact he hid from me, quite rightly guessing I would have rejected him as not my type .

    I like mathematical concepts and grew up around a lot of conversations with that kind of drift... but I was not really that good at math in school. I was never offered a scholarship in math, excelling instead in English and Literature, two subjects I heartily disliked because they seemed so pointless and arbitrary.

    auckland • Since Dec 2006 • 595 posts Report Reply

  • dyan campbell,

    Dyan, as a counter, I give you Sean Avery, born in Ontario.

    Kyle, this illustrates my point. The guy said something coarse cruel about his ex-girlfriends and bitchy about his teammates:

    "I'm just going to say one thing. I'm really happy to be back in Calgary; I love Canada. I just want to comment on how it's become like a common thing in the NHL for guys to fall in love with my sloppy seconds. I don't know what that's about, but enjoy the game tonight. ”

    and the retribution was swift:

    Within hours, the NHL suspended him indefinitely for "conduct detrimental to the league or the game of hockey". His comments were met with near-unanimous condemnation by the Stars organization, fellow players and fans alike. Stars owner Tom Hicks said that the team would have suspended Avery had the NHL not acted first.

    Just as I said... bullying in Canada is met with sharp censure and the bully is made to feel pretty crappy and unpopular... and would be found "ugly" by the opposite sex, no matter what their appearance. Which was kind of my point.

    auckland • Since Dec 2006 • 595 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    bullying in Canada is met with sharp censure and the bully is made to feel pretty crappy and unpopular

    Mmmh... you mean like Todd Bertuzzi?

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Ross Mason,

    I was quite shocked to find (8 years into the relationship) that Paul had in fact been his school's biggest jock, a fact he hid from me

    Umm....did Paul tell you this? or did someone he went to school with tell you. hehe.

    See, secretly, you like Jocks!!

    ;-)

    I was the weed. Usual, humour saved me. I think I only had one bully get on top of me. Had a few nicknames of course. The first one that stuck - and still sticks from those school mates - was Pommie. For some reason a Chch accent in Pukekohe sounded foreign. M Bee of course. Horse, shape of my head I gather. Getting strapped every day helped -no one picked on the poor bastard who the teacher picked on. It's what you get for sitting next to a guy who wouldn't stop talking and he didn't mind getting the cuts. The headmaster who did this recommended I take agriculture or general at High. The last six months of primary wwere spent at another school and that headmaster's recommendation was that I take the academic stream. Merv Wellington (yup...THE one), the Puke carreer adviser at the time couldn't comprehend the gulf between the two recommendations. We compromised and I did French but no Latin. Go figure.

    Homeschooling: The two common threads that I see with homeschooling is religion and "In my infinite wisdom, what school did to me isn't going to happen to you".

    Upper Hutt • Since Jun 2007 • 1590 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    See, secretly, you like Jocks!!

    And Jocks like Squints*....it's fate!

    * Bones slang for "scientists".

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Kyle Matthews,

    Mmmh... you mean like Todd Bertuzzi?

    Well he did get picked up by a US-based team (mine actually!) first!

    and the retribution was swift:

    You realise that the Stars who were so up in arms about it are based in Dallas right?

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    Well he did get picked up by a US-based team (mine actually!) first!

    Sure, the Ducks - say no more! - but in the end even back home his retribution for being a bully and a goon was a place in the Olympic team.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Ben Austin,

    British are more aggressive conversationalists than New Zealanders? I've not noticed that. The French though, now they are exactly as aggressive (in a good way) in conversation as I'd been led to believe.

    London • Since Nov 2006 • 1027 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    Parisians named one of their airports after the Internet slang for sarcasm, that really tells you all you need to know.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • dyan campbell,

    You guys realise I started with with a description of how a witnessed a group of women behave here and you have started talking about people who play a game I don't follow for teams that were invented after I left Canada ?

    But here goes anyway:

    The guy who said vile things about his ex-girlfriends and his teammates and...the reaction from the Canadian sporting body:

    Within hours, the NHL suspended him indefinitely for "conduct detrimental to the league or the game of hockey".

    And the guy that injured somebody:

    On February 16, 2004, during a Vancouver-Colorado game, Moore injured Canucks team captain Markus Näslund by elbowing him in the head while Näslund was reaching for a puck through center ice. No penalty was called on the play, but Näslund suffered a concussion and a bone chip in his elbow as a result of the hit, and missed three games. Moore's hit on Näslund drew much criticism from the Canucks and their fans, but the NHL ruled that the hit was not illegal and did not fine or suspend Moore. Canucks head coach Marc Crawford and general manager Brian Burke publicly criticized the non-call by the referees on the incident. Vancouver players indicated that they would get even with Moore, with left winger Brad May stating that he would put a bounty on Moore's head.
    During the next game between the Canucks and Avalanche held in Denver, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and NHL executive vice-president Colin Campbell attended the game, which ended in a tie and saw no major incidents break out.
    However, on March 8, 2004, during another rematch between the Avalanche and Canucks, things went differently. In the first period, Moore fought Vancouver player Matt Cooke in a fairly even brawl, and served the 5-minute penalty for fighting. The Avalanche would go on to build up a large lead in a fight-filled game. Late in the third period, Todd Bertuzzi was sent onto the ice. After failing to instigate Moore to fight, Bertuzzi skated after him and punched Moore in the head from behind and falling upon him along with several other players from both teams. Moore's head was driven into the ice during the fall, causing three fractured neck vertebrae, facial cuts and a concussion. Moore was knocked out, and lay motionless for ten minutes before being carried off on a stretcher.

    And the reaction from the Canadian sporting body...

    Bertuzzi was immediately suspended indefinitely by the NHL. The suspension also barred him from playing in any international tournaments or leagues during the 2004–05 NHL lockout.

    and

    On March 10, 2004, Bertuzzi scheduled a press conference where he wept and apologized to Moore and his family, as well as to Burke, Canucks owner John McCaw, Jr., the Canucks organization, his teammates, and the fans.
    Bertuzzi was suspended indefinitely by the NHL, and lost approximately $850,000 in salary and endorsements. The Vancouver Canucks were also fined $250,000, on March 11, 2004, for "...failure to prevent the atmosphere that may have led to [the incident]."
    .

    And all of this just serves to illustrate my point that bullying is met with censure in Canada, not that it doesn't happen.

    And in the context of middle aged, female, massively intoxicated publishing types... well in my country their bitchiness is required to be more subtle and they do not stand around egging each other on in groups. Perhaps not because they don't want to, and very probably because since early childhood some boy they liked would have expressed disapproval.

    Actually I'm saying Canadian women do not embrace the sisterhood and mutter among themselves because they are so shallow they won't stoop to look what our culture brands "ugly".

    I was witness to the Canadian brand of bitchy (much younger women, but that may be irrelevant) where one woman presented another woman with a bag of piping hot macadamia chocolate chip cookies from a local bakery. They exchanged effusive greeting, thanks and air kisses (I worked in a law firm with the recipient, and her friend was just dropping by the office) .

    After the cookie-giver left I said "gee that was nice of her" and the rest of the women in the office laughed uproariously and said "no, it wasn't... she's trying to make Martina fat". Which I have to say really escaped my notice, and is exactly the sort of thing that made people say I was odd or clueless. But I have to say, that kind of bullying is a lot less noticeable to me. I bravely and selflessly volunteered to eat the cookies.

    But what women and their ways have to do with hockey players on the ice escapes me... really different situations.

    auckland • Since Dec 2006 • 595 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    And the reaction from the Canadian sporting body...

    Er... the NHL is not the Canadian sporting body! It's a league comprising for the most part US teams. The NHL actually came down on Bertuzzi reasonably hard, but if you followed Canadian hockey forums or media in those days at all you'd know there were people quite literally falling over themselves to say that what he had done wasn't so bad. And the actual Canadian sporting body saw fit to keep selecting him for the national team, including the 2006 Olympics.

    But what women and their ways have to do with hockey players on the ice escapes me... really different situations.

    Bullying doesn't just happen to women, and what Kyle and I have been trying to argue is that the behaviour of Messrs Avery and Bertuzzi is actually more tolerated in Canada than it is in the US, if anything.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

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