Julia Roberts Knows How to Deal with Bullies—and Some Kids Do, Too
Parenting advice from celebrities is typically as useless as parenting advice from random writers. (You’ve been warned.) So imagine my surprise when I discovered I was in the company of an Oscar winner when it comes to dealing with bullies.
“I just want to go and beat the s— out of them,’’ Julia Roberts told icelebz.com on Friday, when she was receiving the Humanitarian Award from the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, a nationwide advocacy group that works to make schools safe for LGBT students. “And you can’t because then there’s the second wave of bullying—‘Oh, your mom just beat the s— out of that guy.’’’
Call it “Eat, Punch, Love.’’
Unlike Roberts, most parents won’t admit their desire to punish the little brats that punish their little angels. I will. I often want to tune up—or terrify—a kid who is bullying my kids. I don’t, however, and I won’t. (And I doubt Roberts will, either.) But her story reminded me of a conveniently teachable moment with my daughter in which I, the alleged teacher, did very little teaching. She, however, learned a lot.
In the waiting room of my son’s gymnastics school, my 6-year-old daughter walked up to the Thomas & Friends play table and said hi to an older boy playing there. He ignored her. She reached for a toy train. He grabbed her arm and shook the toy loose. She walked back to where I was sitting. Tears were imminent.
I asked if she thought that was a nice thing for him to do.
“No,’’ she said.
“Why don’t you go back there and tell him?’’
She steadied herself, walked back slowly, and stood a few feet from the play table. He didn’t look up. She lost her nerve and came back to me.
“I was going to say something and then I got scared.’’
Before I could tell her that it was fine to be scared—before I could tell her some story from my childhood about being excluded, about standing on the edge of the baseball field and waiting for someone to ask me to play—before I had a chance to be a dad, she looked up and said:
“That’s silly. I shouldn’t be afraid.’’
I watched her walk back to the table, where another young girl was now playing with the boy. My daughter told the girl that the boy had been mean to her.
“Were you mean to this girl?’’ the girl asked the boy.
He said no, then handed my daughter the toy he denied her minutes ago. The three of them played on as if nothing had happened.
Then I was the one holding back the tears.
There are times for parents to be a shield, and there are times for them to be a sage. I am in no way suggesting children can handle every conflict on their own.
But I’m reminded of my old man telling me to hit back, to defend myself, and to never let anyone push me around. He told me those things, but I never had the After School Special moment with him that I shared with my daughter. I never got to employ those lessons in his presence. Few people get that chance.
(In one of the rare times in my life when I had use for his advice to hit someone back, the guy I hit ended up in the hospital. It was self-defense—witnesses and cops said so—and I felt terrible. I’ll tell my kids that story when they’re older.)
My mother, on the other hand, wasn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. She defended me on more occasions than I can count. An elementary school teacher who unfairly singled me out for ridicule in front of the class felt my mother’s wrath. The same went for the shop owner who accused me of stealing—removing my jacket and rummaging through the pockets looking for merchandise that wasn’t there.
Perhaps the stakes are higher for the LGBT community, or for any minority group. But these are my stakes. My kids. My immediate concern.
My kid handled her business. She got what she wanted. She did it with grace. I didn’t have to talk to the boy’s parents. And a boy saw a girl stand up for herself.
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