Bullies at Home and Abroad?

[Mike]

Today I was told that, "...the reality is that in many ways interpersonal relationships and international relationships are the same. If you let bullies treat you badly and threaten you with no recourse (you are unarmed) they will escalate the situation until eventually they hurt you or you defend yourself. A statement of power is the best way to put an end to a bully."

Let's talk about what this means and what it doesn't mean. For instance, to say that interpersonal and international relationships are the same in many ways suggests that the same approaches that produce desirable results in one will also produce desirable results in the other. This seems very counter-intuitive to me on so many levels.

Obviously we can discuss it in the context of school yard bullies, and we can discuss it in the context of someone like Saddam Hussein, Idi Amin, etc. We can also discuss how relevant we feel our respective religious paradigms are, too.

[W.E.B. Du Bois]

Today I was told that, "...the reality is that in many ways interpersonal relationships and international relationships are the same. If you let bullies treat you badly and threaten you with no recourse (you are unarmed) they will escalate the situation until eventually they hurt you or you defend yourself. A statement of power is the best way to put an end to a bully."

Firstly, I want to say that analogies only go so far. They are necessarily an oversimplification that are often more about being useful to people unfamiliar with a topic, than they are about accurately describing the dynamics of the topic.

With that being said, I think there is much truth to this analogy. I think countries do take into account the disposition of their opponent when calculating their foreign policy. The classic example is Hitler and appeasement. Hitler may have been a genius in that he may have understood the attitude in Europe that they were in no mood to fight and he exploited that to the fullest. He might have also been a reckless idiot, but I think it's more likely that he was an incredibly skilled politician.

Another example would be the Vietnamese and the Tet Offensive, with the Vietnamese perhaps correctly guessing the extent of American political will to fight, and the Chechens and their initial successes in driving the Russians out of Chechnya. One might also point to the British and the leadup to the War of 1812, with their imprisonment of our sailors because we had tolerated that policy for so long.

[Mike]

"If you let bullies treat you badly and threaten you with no recourse (you are unarmed) they will escalate the situation until eventually they hurt you or you defend yourself. A statement of power is the best way to put an end to a bully."So right here looks like a weak spot in the analogy. Is a statement of power really the best way to put an end to a bully? I don't think that's always true, at all. Sure, I punched a bully in the face when I was six and that was that. But that tactic can just as easily escalate, too--like way out of control. What is a show of power in the face of a bully? A baseball bat? A firearm? I sure as hell wouldn't have given that advice to my son when he was in middle school.

[Wingnut]

School yard bullies are just a fact of life and always will be. Kids are kids and no amount of education or legislation will change that. You're right, Mike, that a punch in the nose may not always be the best way to handle things but, for sure, neither is running to a teacher. Usually that only makes things worse and now you're labeled a "rat" or "snitch". Bullies are really just a life lesson in handling your own problems.

[Mike]

School yard bullies are just a fact of life and always will be. Kids are kids and no amount of education or legislation will change that. You're right, Mike, that a punch in the nose may not always be the best way to handle things but, for sure, neither is running to a teacher. Usually that only makes things worse and now you're labeled a "rat" or "snitch". Bullies are really just a life lesson in handling your own problems.Yes, many times there is NO good choice, but only "how can I get past this" choices. But the more salient thing here is that this illustrates why I think it is overly simplistic (of the friends I was arguing with) to suggest that dealing with Osama Bin Laden, for example, is "just like" dealing with a bully. I think on some levels it actually trivializes the bad guys in a way that clouds one's examination of very complex issues. It's kind of like the, "Hell, let's just nuke the bastards and everything will be fine," sort of solution that I sometimes hear for every encounter we have with a bad guy out there in international land.

[Mike]

...a punch in the nose may not always be the best way to handle things but, for sure, neither is running to a teacher. Usually that only makes things worse and now you're labeled a "rat" or "snitch". Bullies are really just a life lesson in handling your own problems.Just to be clear in MY six-year-old experience the punch really was the best solution. It did solve the problem--that particular time. But that approach didn't solve the problem with subsequent bullies. In junior high I encountered another situation where physical retaliation really did escalate. I was loathe to "rat or snitch", and that (in hindsight) also helped the situation to escalate. When the bullying began to involve friends of the bully and the violence got to the point of vandalism to my parent's home, which was how my father learned about it, he stepped in and a mature father-to-father meeting was what resolved everything. So, I offer this basically to ask how these "interpersonal relationships" bear on "international relationships" and as examples of how skeptical I am that the get-tough-with-the-bully approach applies so universally to foreign policy.