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Comment by squigz | Hacker News Reader

Generally, once you leave high school, you have a lot more choice in when/where you are forced to interact with bullies.

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The exception being work, where a lot of people seem like they never left high school. Everywhere I've worked had the social totem pole, the cliques, the politics, the in-crowd and out-crowds. One place I worked was almost exactly like the movie Mean Girls. Lots of people just don't grow out of it.

Worst case you can switch jobs. It's not easy, but it's a lot easier than switching schools.

Also, bullying in school has no consequences, but outside it might have some.

Bullying in school absolutely has consequences, and they're mostly going to be much farther-reaching than those suffered as an adult - getting messed up psychologically is more impactful as a kid, not to mention any physical toll it takes, or the impact of it on one's education.

I think the user means that bullies in school face little consequences, but a bully at work may get called by HR and potentially disciplined.

Oh fair enough. My apologies Mr Worf. I don't fully agree - plenty of shitty behavior gets ignored (or even encouraged) even in a workplace - but there's definitely some truth here.

It's way easier to change workplace than to change school, so I don't think it can get so extreme.

With a workplace if you can gather evidence and document it there's a significant chance of a lawsuit with a payout.

Schools are generally protected against that, and your only hope is to replace the school board, who is commonly bullies themselves.

Yep, so HR people occasionally learn a hard lesson when they don't do their job to cover for their friends.

No consequence for the bully I mean.

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