Am I a bully?

“Bullying” in Delaware means:

any intentional written, electronic, verbal or physical act against you that: (1) instills reasonable fear of substantial harm to your emotional or physical well-being or substantial damage to your property; (2) creates a threatening, humiliating or abusive educational environment (meaning – you are afraid to go to school); (3) interferes with you having a safe school environment; or (4) coerces others to demean, embarrass or cause any harm to you.

What does that mean? Here are examples of bullying – what it might look or feel like:

• I tease others a lot, call them names, insult them, or spread rumors about them.
• I leave others out (like excluding them from my lunch table) or try to make others not be friends with them.
• I use texting, tweeting and/or Facebook to spread rumors about people to insult or embarrass them.
• I do these things over and over.
• I take things from people or make them give me their stuff by threatening them.
• Other kids seem really upset when I do these things.
• Other kids avoid hanging around me or seem scared of me.
• Doing these things makes me feel cool or powerful.

If you experience any of the symptoms below, your behavior needs to change before you hurt others and yourself.

• no lasting friendships or constantly changing groups of friends
• feeling angry, depressed, anxious, lonely
• making yourself feel better by teasing and taunting others.
• hang out at specific locations such as a neighborhood store, playground, or school to make fun of others and take their money and belongings
• blame others for your problems and take your frustration out on them
• gossip about others to make yourself look better
• put others down so you can look “cool”