Would you teach your children to “hit back” at school if somebody hit them?

Domina_Mollia Really it depends on the age and the area I live in. My kids go to a charter school that has a very strict policy on bullying. One strike, that’s all they get. In …

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Domina_Mollia
Really it depends on the age and the area I live in. My kids go to a charter school that has a very strict policy on bullying. One strike, that’s all they get. In my case I wouldn’t. But I used to live in a big city that has a lot of problems with kids getting seriously injured at school and school administration doing nothing about it. If my kids were going to those schools, then yes I would.
hemipenis

This. Which is sad. In my hs school you were allowed to defend yourself with shoving, but couldn’t punch back. I was jumped in class (nothing new sadly), so I picked up the toothpick bitch and threw her half way across the portable. She was pretty much instantly expelled and as the teacher saw her harassing me (I gave 0 reaction), then jump me, I didn’t even have to go into a meeting. God I hated school. Can’t fight back, but it’s totally ok to end up in the er ?

Domina_Mollia
We had a “3 hit” rule at my school. If you were hit by the same person three times consecutively, then you were allowed to defend yourself. You could hit them, restrain them or shove them. As long as your goal was to neutralize the threat without seriously harming anyone and you didnt use a weapon.
hemipenis
See, that’s a good rule. Most schools are dumb af sadly, and the victims get bullied baaaaad
Domina_Mollia
I agree. They put it into place because a boy I went to school with got hospitalized after getting jumped on school property. He was too scared to defend himself for fear of getting in trouble. It was really sad.
Domina_Mollia
On another note, I just saw your flair. Your son was born 11 days after my youngest and he is also giant. Must be a December thing. 🙂
Domina_Mollia

That would do it. Bahahaha. My husband and I are both small people. Our son is just huge.

nikilupita

Yep. After several episodes of bullying went disregarded by school employees, I told my son “First, tell a teacher. If they don’t listen, tell a different adult. Call us from school if you need to. If that doesn’t help, and the bully won’t listen when you tell them to stop, punch them in the face. Defend yourself as much as you need to. Don’t start the fight, but if you have to finish it, I will stand by you.” He’s only had to do it once. He was in kindergarten, the two boys in question were in 2nd grade, and we had been telling the school about it for weeks. A teacher actually told him that telling on a bully was tattling, and he’d lose privileges if he did it again, so when they lured him to an unsupervised area, he fought back.
klodi001

My father’s rule was simple.“If you start a fight, it doesn’t matter what the school does. I’m going to punish you worse than they ever could. If someone starts a fight with you, don’t worry about the school, fight back as best you can, I would never punish you for that. Never start a fight, never be afraid to finish a fight that someone else started with you.” A good lesson, I think. And one I intend to pass down to my children.

clhfr2016
I worked at a Pre-K center and we as teachers were not allowed to do anything. The school believed in conscious discipline so that entails us talking to the victim first, making sure they’re okay and then telling the hitter/biter that it’s not okay, they hurt someone, look at their face, what can you do next time instead of hitting/biting? Having them calm down and take 3 deep breaths. Kinda sounds great in theory but it does NOT work with the age group! We had parents sick to death of their kids being bitten or hit everyday. I hated the system because there was absolutely no consequences for physical harm(if they bit hard enough to break skin or caused someone a bloody nose or something, their parents were called but it did not good because they kids that are the offenders have parents that don’t care) and most of the time the victims we’re scared of getting in trouble with their parents if they hit back so they wouldn’t and the little bullies just kept getting away with it. One kid finally had enough with our repeat offender biter and punched him in the face. He was never bothered by the biter again. And I was proud of him for standing up for himself because seriously there was nothing I could do. My hands were tied.
SunnysideKun

I would if it was clear the school was not keeping my kid safe. If I did tell my kid to hit back though I’d probably also get them into a karate class or something so they’d get better at hitting back (I’m awful physically)

notveganlikesmeat
I’m actually teaching my son something along those lines. We have “rules” of when it’s okay to fight back. No hitting girls, no hitting kids younger than you, and never throw the first punch. Also, first offense you tell the teacher/adult/someone with authority. If it’s still an issue and they hit first again then you hit them back. I tell him that he will never get in trouble with me for fighting back BUT he is never allowed to hit first. My son is super gentle and pretty mature so I doubt this will even happen. He’d much rather walk away or let someone take advantage of him. In case it does, we got his back.

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