Bullying and Emotional Abuse
Verbal intimidation, well recognized as “bullying”, is a powerful form of behavior. It is often subtle and focuses on intimidation of one person by another. Its symptoms are found in verbal abuse, emotional blackmail, threats, manipulation, blaming, labeling, ostracism, bad mouthing, threats, isolation, assignment of undesirable tasks and denial of awards and aggressive behavior aimed at domination in various forms. The image of the “bully” is not restricted to the playground, nor is it strictly male related behavior. The bully can take many forms and is a behavior that can be exhibited by both those who are in positions of legitimate power and those who have no official power, but create their own. This behavior known as emotional abuse is worse than physical abuse because the scars are invisible. Bullying causes tremendous emotional pain and lost opportunities, it destroys democracy and fairness and the financial burden is high. Obviously, it undermines or even makes teamwork impossible. It decreases a person’s ability to be productive.
The bully carefully selects the victims to be harassed, humiliated or intimidated. They chose those individuals perceived as weak, as powerless or as a threat. The bully instills fear and humiliation and believes that their victims will not fight back. Frequently their victims are so carefully chosen that this behavior often goes undetected. The victim would rather discuss this problem with family members or friends rather than bring negative attention to themselves.
It is difficult to distinguish a bully from someone who is considered tough. But many deny the problem or worse exacerbate the situation unknowingly creating a toxic atmosphere through ignoring the situation-thereby perpetuating the behavior. The bully feels justified in intimidating others as a matter of self-interest. Unfortunately, the intimidator occasionally accelerates the problem based on this offensive behavior because they are masters of manipulation. Many people do not know how to handle this situation, are fearful of the bully’s anger, and would rather accommodate rather than concede.
Some employees may cross the line to threaten or even commit violence if bullying and intimidation are tolerated. The bully behavior is destructive creates a hostile working environment and thereby opens a company up to litigious claims. As a result of denying that this could never happen to them or worse claiming that this problem does not exists accelerates this possibility. In a recent decision of 7 to 2, the United States Supreme Court ruled that employers could be held liable for supervisor harassment even though they may have lacked notice. The court ruled that it might be viewed as possible abuse of authority.
Although frustrated people usually stew, sue or both, a person need not have a knee-jerk reaction to this situation. The high cost of this behavior is obvious. It is far better to be pro-active and prevent the problems that occur from such destructive behavior. There are solutions that prepare individuals in identifying bullies and preventing this behavior from polluting the welfare of innocent victims.
For example:
- Increasing the awareness that such behavior is unacceptable and that it will be investigated in a confidential manner by a third party.
- Behavioral modification training where appropriate.
- Insisting on counseling for the offensive parties.
- Teaching individuals skills that will enable to defend themselves in a skillful manner.
