Bullies bullies everywhere!

By Shannon

You know that kid who used to bully you on the playground - often for no reason at all.  Remember how your parents (if they were like mine) would tell you to "just ignore them and they'll go away?"  Remember how that only worked for a day or two if it worked at all?  I'm sure you parents are picturing the kid who's mean to your child.  I bet you never knew it was possible for a grown person to hate an 8 year old that much until that 8 year old started bullying your kid.

We had a neighborhood bully - I'll call him Manny for the purposes of this post.  We were in the same grade.  One day Manny and his best friend Cretin decided to steal a little girl's poster board in the school yard and my little sister who was in 1st grade bravely interceded.  The friend she was defending turned tail and ran.  When I came out of 5th grade that day, one of them had my sister with her arms behind her back and a large group of 5th grade boys surrounding her.  They kept us there for what seemed like hours, though I'm sure that less than a half hour passed before my father came looking for us.  (We walked to and from school back then.)  A teacher saw what was going on and offered no help.  In fact, she turned her back and went inside.  Finally we saw my father and tried to run to him.  This next part happened in slow motion.  My father seemed to grow about 3 feet taller while one boy tripped my sister to my right and caused her to scrape both knees.  When my father reached us we each grabbed onto one of his legs as he grabbed Manny's shirt collar in his left and and Cretin's shirt collar in his right and lifted them above his head.  I don't remember what he said, but I know that when he put them down all those boys scattered like roaches.  Later my father went to talk to Manny's father.  (We didn't sue bullies back then.)  I don't know what happened at that "talk" but I do know that Manny's family left the neighborhood when school ended that year and I never had problems with Cretin again.

I've thought about Manny over the years.  I'm sure if I remembered his last name I could find him in the prisoner database for the Department of Corrections.  Then it dawned on me... if bullies don't end up dead or in jail, do you know where they end up?

AS A JUDGE ON THE BENCH

That's right.  Judges often bully for no reason other than that they can.  They belittle you and insult you ESPECIALLY if you accidentally show that you are smarter than they are.  I never realized that judges are just bullies who make six-figures a year until last night when I was telling Ann about a particularly mean thing a judge did to me in court.  She commiserated and then said, "Judges are just bullies!"  Yes, my friend, they can be and are too often.  Power corrupts.