How To Raise A Desi-Bully

This post is a detailed guide to raise a bully in a normal fully functional family with loving parents. I gained all the material to write this by observing kids at my daughter’s playground and by talking to their families and their ways of parenting.

General guidelines:

1. First and foremost, no rules and no boundaries apply when it comes to the kid. Never say “No”.

2. Don’t enforce discipline for there is whole life left to learn the ways of life.

3. Praise the kid that he is a class above the other kids and that he is right all the time.

Guidelines for home:

1. Allow the kid to manipulate you and give in to all the requests from the kid.

2. Have a culture in the family where the kid can pitch adults against each other and find an escape route all the time.

3. Keep the opposing parent and grandparents at bay.

4. Do not allow anyone else to develop strong emotional attachment. Let the kid be completely dependent on that parent.

5. No space in house is off limits to the kid. Let the kid create havoc in the house by throwing things all around the house, messing up newspaper and books and in general spoiling anything that the kid has access to.

6. Expose the kid to age inappropriate videos games, apps and TV content – particularly the ones with violent scenes. Let the kid have free access to TV/smart phones.

7. Let the kid lose in other’s house, kids are kids after all. Remember? Never say “no”!

Guidelines for playground:

1. Be a helicopter parent and always, always stick to your kid.

2. Take your kid to playground when there is not much crowd, less danger thus.

3. Shoo away any kids who try to approach yours as they might hurt your kid. Treat the other kids as an inherent threat to yours.

4. Always interfere in your kid’s fight and win the fight for your kid.

5. Reprimand other kids for your kid’s bad behavior. Remember, your kid misbehaves only because other kids instigated yours.

6. Enforce gender differences in kids at a young age. Teach your boy to dominate a girl in the playground. Make fun of your kid for playing with a kid of opposite gender.

7. Encourage hitting, biting and other forms of rough physical play as a means of teaching self defense.

8. If matters go out of hand, isolate the kid – keep away from playground for a few days.

If you haven’t already noticed, this article is a satire. Also, this is not a complete research about bullying. There are plenty of articles out there to read about bullying and its various forms. This subject is a must read for all parents. I am just venting out my frustration of having dealt with one up and close.

My daughter (and her friends) had to deal with a playground bully few days back and it broke my heart to see how she struggled for several days. The bully kid just didn’t know how to get along with the peer group, thanks to the parents. So the kid took out frustration on other kids. This bully yelled at others and pushed them around the playground calling names. My kiddo started getting aggressive in the playground and these sessions left her angry, upset and sore. I and other parents in the playground had to interfere finally and cornered the bully’s parents and forced them to take some action.

Kids need parents to teach them how to behave; they need to be disciplined to be acceptable citizens in the society! Also, kids need to be taught how to identify and deal with a bully. It’s sad to see bright kids becoming playground/school bullies at an age as young as 3 years!!

Divya Rao is a mother to a 4 year old bundle of joy. She has one eye set on growing her career and the other watching and enjoying her little one grow up.