Chapter 4: Findings
4.6 Reasons for bullying
4.6.4 Poverty
In response to why people bullied, one respondent stated that, “Other children bully for other children‟s lunchbox because they do not have their own lunchbox or they do not have money to buy things to eat.” It seems as
if learners are bullying because they come from poor families and they do not have food. Thus they took younger children‟s food as the younger children would be less likely to retaliate. One sad finding that emerged from this project is the impact of poverty on the lives of the learners and on bullying behaviour. As an educator and a mother, it is very difficult to reconcile the fact that there are some children in the school environment who have to steal food in order to have something to eat.
Interestingly, when initially asked about bullying at the inception of the project, very few learners mentioned poverty. Two learners did however mention that bullying took place in the tuck shop area. Neither of these two learners mentioned that the bullying occurred as a need to buy food because the bully did not have any. This did not accord with my observations as educator and researcher. During my observations, I noticed that lots of bullying occurred because learners, who did not have lunch or spending money, forced/bullied other learners for these things.
Furthermore, many complaints made to educators were of money being extorted from learners. Some learners complained to friends, RCL members, as well as to educators, that their lunch was taken from them by other learners. I thus found it surprising that many learners did not mention these incidents in the initial data collection process. This could be because learners were socially aware of the plight of the bullies who took money for food. This social awareness could mean that learners found this form of bullying more acceptable than, or not as bad as, other forms of bullying as the reason for it was a need for food rather than a need to harm another learner. Perhaps learners also felt sorry for the bully because of his/her personal circumstances. It could also be that this type of behaviour where people did whatever they could to get food, was another form of a culture of silence, a taboo that nobody talked about but justified as acceptable as it involved a basic need. Such possible reasons require further investigation in order to verify and to plan appropriate
interventions. These could constitute possible future steps in an ongoing action research project.
It seemed to be that poverty was a concept that many learners did not speak about. Wangari Maathai (cited by John, 2008, p.4) revealed that it was important to note “the current state of a culture of silence and how poverty is manifested as psychological barriers”. Maathai found that,
“When people are poor and when they are reduced to beggars, they feel weak, humiliated, disrespectful and undignified” (John, 2008, p4). This could explain why, rather than begging for food or money, the poor learner would rather bully others to get his/her meal. It could also relate back to both the bully and to the other learners who internalise these feelings, that the poor learner has of humiliation and a lack of respect and dignity, and they therefore did not mention it in the initial data collection process. If so, this is an area requiring attention in the school.
Another reason for learners not mentioning being bullied for their lunch in the initial data collection process, could be that learners were initially not aware that forcefully taking lunch or money to buy lunch was a form of bullying. In response to the limited insight displayed regarding different forms of bullying, it was decided to involve the South African Polices Services - Community Youth Desk in an intervention strategy to discuss bullying with the RCL. The following is part of the discussion which took place.
Learner 1: Sir, is it bullying when someone forces you to give them your lunch?
Sgt: (To all learners) What do you think?
Learners: Silence …. Murmuring
Sgt: Well absolutely. If they take your lunch by force, you know, you didn‟t want to give it, ja, then this is bullying. Understand.
Insp: Why do you think they would take your lunch?
Learner 2: Balambile (They are hungry.)
Insp: Does that give them the right to take your lunch?
Chorus of learners: No.
Sgt: How did it make you feel.
Learner 1: Upset. I ... I didn‟t know what to do. I was hungry but I felt scared. Also I was sorry for him. Maybe he didn‟t have lunch and he was embarrassed to go to the feeding scheme. He was a big boy.
After this intervention, when learners were asked to write a paragraph on bullying, many mentioned that one of the reasons that people bullied was because they were either poor or had no food to eat. This seems to indicate a growing empathy and understanding about the reasons why bullying occurs. It also shows the impact of the intervention within an action research process.
While none of the literature reviewed for this project directly addresses poverty as a reason for bullying, it has been alluded to in discussions about family background. (See 4.6.1 Family Background)