Bullying

redqueencoder.com

19 pointsingve3 comments

Dear fellow tech people, why do people bully? When the victims have overcome it, how did they thwart their bullies?

It’s ridiculous. I remember being bullied in a lab once for being an “outside” major than the lab. I left the class within the drop period. I’ve also suffered professional bullying at a workplace. The experience still haunts me and will for a long time. Luckily I could move out of state and industry.

To feel like they are at least one step higher than the bottom of the hierarchy. Sometimes simply to bond with their (fellow bully) peers, without necessarily considering the deleterious effect on the target.

Maybe its even more primal than that. When I was a kid, our canary somehow escaped, and an adult told me that it would be picked to death by other birds because it looked different. I don't even know if that's true, but it stuck with me.

How common is this sort of abusive/harmful behavior in tech?

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