Mom Refusing to Punish Son for Standing Up to School Bully Applauded

A mom refusing to punish her son for injuring his school bully is being backed online.

In a post to Mumsnet's Am I Being Unreasonable? (AIBU) forum on November 30, user Spreeofthemoment said that another child had been making her son's life "hell" for a while, but the school had not stepped in to protect him.

After the bully pushed him over, the poster's son retaliated, "flooring" the bully and giving him a bloody nose.

The school rang Spreeofthemoment to inform her of the incident, but the mom told them that she won't punish her son for "standing up for himself."

Although some users felt the mom is encouraging her son to be violent, most applauded Spreeofthemoment for supporting her son.

The Long-Term Effects of School Bullying

According to the latest figures from the National Center for Educational Statistics, one in five students experience bullying at school.

While male students are more likely to be physically bullied (6 percent of boys compared to 4 percent of girls), female students are more likely to become the focus of gossip and rumors (18 versus 9 percent) or to be purposefully excluded from activities (7 percent versus 4 percent).

Parenting consultant Roma Norriss said that school bullying can affect a child's academic performance.

"Bullying can erode their self-esteem and create difficulties in their ability to form friendships," she told Newsweek. "Because children's ability to access their intelligence is very much linked to how safe and welcome they feel in the school environment, bullying often creates learning issues such as impaired academic performance or school refusal altogether."

Bullying during childhood can have a lifelong impact on victims, according to Norriss.

"Adults who I've worked with that have a history of bullying are often still impacted by their early experiences. Bullying is the kind of thing that can be underneath an adult's difficulties in the workplace, such as imposter syndrome, or inability to get on with peers for example," she said.

"It can also show up in intimate relationships as not being able to trust, or a sense of neediness that displays either as clinginess or a tendency to push loved ones away, based on not feeling loveable."

Norriss said that therapy can be beneficial for both children and adults who have suffered through bullying, so the painful experiences no longer impact their life.

'I would also be very proud of him'

In her post, Spreeofthemoment said the bully had been picking on her son, as well as a few other children, for a while. As a result, her son, who is in the 5th grade, has stopped wanting to go to school.

Fed up with the bullying harassing him, Spreeofthemoment's son retaliated.

"Well today, he snapped and floored this boy after he came and pushed [son] over (he's always pushing him!)," she wrote. "This boy's nose was bleeding."

The headteacher called Spreeofthemoment, but she informed him that she won't be punishing her son for defending himself.

"I'm proud of him for standing up for himself and showing this boy he won't be bullied anymore, as clearly the school weren't doing anything to protect my son!" she said.

In the poll attached to her post, 87 percent of users believed that Spreeofthemoment was right to be proud of her child.

"Well done to your son! I am sure he won't be bullied any more!" commented Temporaryname158.

"I would also be very proud of him," said bossybloss.

"Schools seem to do absolutely nothing about bullying, which goes on over years, and are then surprised when the person snaps," wrote GertrudePerkinsPaperyThing.

Funinthesun19 added: "I hope they haven't been overlooking the bully's behaviour all this time and now see the bully as a big poor victim and your [son] the bad guy."

However, MolesOnPoles said, "I'd be ashamed if my son used violence."

TicketToParadise agreed, writing: "It's a shame you haven't taught your child how to be confident and stand up for themselves without resorting to violence."

While NHSmummy84 commented: "It's a shame that your son has been put in the position where he feels that this is the only thing left that he can do. I would probably say to my son that violence is still wrong in any situation, but highlight that he had been failed by it not being stopped before it got to this point."

Spreeofthemoment's story isn't the first to spark debate online. A woman shared her "proud auntie" moment with Twitter after her nephew used an "arm lock" she'd taught him to defend himself against a boy who punched him.

A mom was recently backed by Redditors for not inviting her daughter's bully to her birthday party, despite inviting the rest of the class, while a mom refusing to pay for her son's homophobic bully to attend summer camp was praised by users on the AITA (Am I the A******?) forum.

Newsweek was not able to verify the details of the case.