You're correct
bullies generally search out the easy targets. Like with any kind of security, you just need to make yourself look less attractive than the next guy.

People in positions of authority don't help much by telling you all kinds of bullshit about turning the other cheek, "ignore them and they'll go away" and, possibly the worst, "tell somebody about it".

Of course, there's limits to how far you can take it and your response will sometimes lead to you being punished more than the bully (I was once dragged from the playground by my ear for leaving the school's top athlete with blood gushing between his fingers from his bloody nose*) but life's not about easy choices unfortunately

* And, of course, the girls that used to cluster around him admonished me for doing that. I think that was a formative experience for me wrt the female kind.
(Richy_T hundreds if not thousands of dollars, Thu 14 May 2009, 19:53, Reply)