A cautionary tale...
It use to be a pretty nice school, sure it had its problems, it had its in-groups and its out-groups, it was inefficient, kinda messy, kinda archaic. Like all public schools it was far from perfect, but all in all it was trying to do the right thing, sorta swinging back and forth between being too lenient and too strict…Then he shows up in September, on Day One of the school year…
He is audacious, obnoxious, braggadocios, also sadly, he is a bully. Yet an “atypical bully,” meaning not your normal, run-of-the-mill bully, but one that is bigger in statue (and in scope) than the rest of the kids (but he is not an athlete, for he is un-coachable), he is especially mean-spirited (he likes to make other kids cry), he treats his girlfriend(s) like dirt (maybe even smacks her around), and he cheats his way through school (and brags about it), resulting in good grades, (maybe even makes the Honor Role, to the delight of his ardent followers and to the chagrin of his teachers). To make matters worse, he comes from a successful family of bullies and their bullying has made them rich in terms of money and land. In other words, bullying, as a strategy for the acquisition of wealth, has been very good to them…A lesson learned and implemented by our Bully; for this bully, unlike most bullies, is no ones fool.
This bully (lets call him the Alpha-Bully), as indicated above, is unencumbered by the need for material wealth, he has no convictions or motivations, no ideology, no higher purpose, other than working to gain broad attention and a wide recognition from both students and staff. His goal is to be noticed, to be recognized, to be a BIG DEAL.
He is not intellectually curious about how things work or why things are the way they are and yet he really wants the teaching faculty to notice him, but he soon finds that its difficult to be noticed because he is not as academically gifted as many of the other students. So as a kind of consolation prize, he learns to accept, then eventually cherish the feeling he gets when a teacher is forced to stop a lesson (a lesson designed for and directed solely to the smart kids in the front of the class) in order to handle his disruptive behavior from the back row.
Realize that he disrupts the class, not as a personal affront to the teacher, for its not personal, but simply as a mechanism by which he can elicit the euphoric feeling he gets when he is in the lime-light, when he is noticed by all, when he is a Big Deal. He loves that all eyes are on him as he forces the teacher to confront him. Mind you, the school is not without it faults for the institution has, over the years, become somewhat unresponsive to the needs of many of the students, focusing instead only on those “top” students that conform to an idealized notion of what a perfect student should be. Over the last twenty years or so, it has come to idealize itself as a college-preparatory school, (sadly by doing so, the school is now serving the needs of only maybe 30% of the student population).
Realize that he disrupts the class, not as a personal affront to the teacher, for its not personal, but simply as a mechanism by which he can elicit the euphoric feeling he gets when he is in the lime-light, when he is noticed by all, when he is a Big Deal. He loves that all eyes are on him as he forces the teacher to confront him. Mind you, the school is not without it faults for the institution has, over the years, become somewhat unresponsive to the needs of many of the students, focusing instead only on those “top” students that conform to an idealized notion of what a perfect student should be. Over the last twenty years or so, it has come to idealize itself as a college-preparatory school, (sadly by doing so, the school is now serving the needs of only maybe 30% of the student population).
Take note, that this type of bully can be a bothersome nuisance by himself, but he can be dealt with by the school’s power brokers if handled correctly. For example, only deal with this kind of bully in a closed, nonpublic, environment. A bully such as this withers when placed in a confined, one-on-one confrontation with his/her superiors. The bully can only be an effective communicator when allowed to be in front of a crowd of equals or like-minded bully-wannabes, (or simple folk, looking desperately for guidance and/or leadership) for his simple-minded proclamations resinate with such groups. We are talking about the bottom 20%. “This place SUCKS!” is a favorite of his and this crowd goes nuts every time…and at the same time the smart kids hide their heads in disbelief, while at the same time the “C” students hide their pleasure. Over time, however, the crowds continue to grow as the other marginalized students begin to take notice of the Alpha-bully’s simplistic, yet easily recalled message that “This place SUCKS!”.
So it stands to reason that a far-reaching and troubling conundrum arises when the Alpha-bully starts to develop not only a following amongst his peers, but also when the more mainstream students start to take notice. Of course, the college-bound “A & B” students find him coarse and revolting, but they represent only thirty, okay maybe at best, forty percent of the school’s population.
This type of charismatic bully can attract lots of lesser banal-type, intellectually slow, minion-bullies (usually in a grade or two below their leader). You know, the types of teenagers that are initially attracted to this kind of bully-leader are mostly indifferent and apathetic when it comes to school. They are essentially nonparticipants within school functions and thus they stay sheltered amongst themselves, they are essentially cast outs. They are what the noted sociologist, Robert Merton would refer to as Retreatists, (they reject both U.S. traditional cultural goals and the means to obtain them, then find a path of least resistance as a way to escape both the goal and the process). In other words, they feel at their best when racing four-wheelers into the woods to shoot holes into road signs, small animals, and the like. At school, they retreat together into the shadows and/or corners of the play-ground and the fringes of the lunchroom. When they do poorly, they blame only the school.
Unsurprisingly, the minion-bullies are easily rallied and manipulated by false promises in the short-term and thus can become disruptive and dangerous (for a time) should the right leader-bully come along and offer to acknowledge their grim existence. In this particular situation, they admire the Alpha-bully because of his fancy cars and his beautiful, albeit subservient girlfriends. They love how he disrespects the teachers (sadly, their natural foes), they are amazed that he seemingly never gets caught cheating, and never gets detention or suspended. It is not lost on them that they could never get away with what he gets away with. At first they resent him, they are jealous, because jealously is a common trait amongst this cohort and yet oddly, inexplicably, incredibly, they come to worship him because he is everything they will never be. Note: I know that this is a confusing mindset, I don’t expect you to understand, because you are not a Retreatist. I know that you are NOT a Retreatist because you are reading this and they do not read.
The Alpha-bully, of course, never offers to share the wealth, nor the lime-light, or any power with the dullards, but he does promise to return to them the whole playground and the whole lunchroom and even the whole school. He makes big promises, including a promise to replace the teachers with himself. Once they make him their new leader, he promises them straight A’s without having to do any work and he also promises them “money for nothing and chicks for free.” They are initially inspired as they begin to feel as if they can start to venture out from the shadows of the perimeter of the playground and even the corners of the lunchroom. They admire him because of his fancy cars and his beautiful, albeit subservient girlfriends, they love how he disrespects the teachers, how he mocks them and belittles them. They love it that he seemingly never gets caught cheating, never gets detention or suspended. It is not lost on them that they could never get away with what he gets away with and thus they begin to worship him.
Remember that the bully-minions did not get to their lowly position by being motivated and hardworking, so it is likely that their energy levels will be short lived, momentary, as they are easily distracted and even more easily confused. And when they become distracted and confused they begin to become angry. But anger, real anger, reactive anger requires an extraordinary amount of energy, so their anger is short lived, for they tire quite easily. As stated above, the Alpha-bully is no ones fool, so he knows all this…
He knows that his school bullies did not really want to control the school, he knows that they will soon become tired, unmotivated, soon to go back to default mode, and thus will soon retire back to the woods, back to what they know—complaining about how hard that got it, racing four-wheelers, shooting road signs and smallish semi-domesticated animals. He knows that they will not be there for him in the long run, because they are lazy and impotent, so he is, in reality, hoping to stir and gain support from the “C” students, that 30% group, the Conformists (Merton’s term to describe that large group within a given society that wants to do the right thing, but also that same large group that can easily be manipulated because they lack motivation and more importantly the courage to break from the prevailing norms, for them it is easier and less risky to conform to the status quo).
Well as you probably know, he won over the Conformists and he now controls the school. He made a lot of promises to get the top spot.
What happens next is anyone’s guess…But I am not worried about the influence of the Retreatists, the minion-bullies, because they will not be able to muster the collective energy to move forward. So, for the The Alpha Bully to prevail in his quest to be always noticed, he will need to garner continued support from the Conformists…If he is able to get them on board for the long haul, we will be in some serious trouble (unless he can get “noticed” by doing good deeds?)…It will be like what Alice Cooper called for in his very average, even mundane, even stupid, nonsensical, but highly popular 1972 Anti-school Anthem…”School’s Out!” (see the lyrics below…they make no sense).
Well we got no choice
All the girls and boys
Makin' all that noise
'Cause they found new toys
Well we can't salute ya can't find a flag
If that don't suit ya that's a drag
School's out for summer
School's out forever
School's been blown to pieces
No more pencils no more books
No more teacher's dirty looks yeah
Well we got no class
And we got no principals
And we got no innocence
We can't even think of a word that rhymes
School's out for summer
School's out forever
My school's been blown to pieces
No more pencils no more books
No more teacher's dirty looks
Out for summer
Out till fall
We might not come back at all
School's out forever
School's out for summer
School's out with fever
School's out completely
