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**Tant01** · 04-08-2009, 11:54 AM

Think the martial arts forums are the best place to work on it? Maybe we should be exempt? LOL Kinda sad when pretend "crimes" can be prosecuted in the real world...

It's all virtual KOTF...

**kingoftheforest** · 04-08-2009, 01:46 PM

Originally posted by Tant01 View Post

Kinda sad when pretend "crimes" can be prosecuted in the real world...

It's all virtual KOTF...

Well with that kind of attitude it's no wonder these people run rampant on the internet.

Kinda sad how since everybody at some time in their life has bullied others, they just want to ignore it.

Some things are acceptable, but some people take things too far.

Racism is a type of bulling so is sexism. It may not involve physical confrontation just verbal but i see no difference.

Apparently we differ on this point. I gnoring obviously doesn't make it go away.

**kingoftheforest** · 04-08-2009, 01:53 PM

it's starts at home and snowballs.

It really doesn't stay virtual. These habits learned young follow people. it creates these problems.

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Bully in the Office
By Joy D. Russell
VARBusiness Magazine
March 5, 2001

Horrifying, bloody incidents in the workplace earn bold, front-page headlines. Such tragic events are not senseless and unpredictable acts of violence, some experts say. They are unresolved conflicts that have been allowed to brew over time until an employee explodes. The recipe for disaster: Take the ridiculous workload of IT professionals combined with a shortage of qualified workers and mix with unresponsive or bullying bosses.

"The high-tech industry, especially, has a lot of the characteristics of high-risk factors for violence," says Richard Denenberg, co-author of the book, The Violence-Prone Workplace. "Tight deadlines, a highly competitive atmosphere and being worried that your company might go out of business tomorrow are the very things causing high stress for technology workers," he says. Workplace stress is found in virtually every sector and is not a new issue. But it seems to become a notable problem only after a shooting, stabbing or other violent act has occurred.

Denenberg cited a 1999 study by Yale University's School of Management, which surveyed workers throughout the country. When asked, "How often are you angry at work?" more than 20 percent of respondents answered, "All the time." That seed of dissatisfaction often grows as time passes. "People are afraid to confront the person directly. They tip-toe around him or her, and it makes their work life unpleasant," Denenberg says.

The Belly of the Beast

An underlying force is destroying work environments every day. "The more pervasive problem is this lurking noncivility, intimidation and insecurity, which greatly affects the workplace," says David Yamada, professor of law specializing in labor and employment issues at Suffolk University Law School in Boston. A workplace bully, Yamada says, is someone who repeatedly mistreats either a co-worker or a subordinate, often in subtle ways.

Tim Brandenburg, a former network administrator at a North Carolina steel company, escaped to the parking lot for walks or climbed the stairway so he could relieve stress. After a scant three months, Brandenburg quit his high-paying job. That happened two years ago, but Brandenburg distinctly remembers it was the first time in his career that he left a job under such circumstances.

Stress from a heavy workload wasn't entirely to blame in Brandenburg's case. It was the people he had to work with and take orders from--sometimes for 15 hours a day.

"I remember losing sleep over it," says Brandenburg, 32. "A co-worker really wanted my job and she would do things like change the settings on computers while I wasn't in the office. I got blamed for things not working. I told my boss about it, but he didn't do anything to resolve it." An out-of-control vice president at the company also tried to intimidate Brandenburg and others with adolescent tactics. "He would stand up on his desk and yell, 'I'm just getting itchy to fire somebody!' He had a terrible temper, and everybody that was under him was just paranoid."

Dr. Gary Namie, a social organizational psychologist and president of the Campaign Against Workplace Bullying, says a bullying boss can cause people to commit violent acts at work. Namie, who co-authored the recently published book, The Bully At Work, says most company managers aware of potentially violent situations do little to diffuse them. Instead, managers who use bullying techniques toward their employees are often rewarded by top managers for having a strict management style.

"It's really critical to understand this pressure to produce is investor-driven," Namie says. Companies "need to turn around profits really quickly. Truth be told, we should be concerned with psychological violence that happens in the workplace every day. Everybody knows it's happening, but nobody does anything about it."

A Trail of Tragedy

After years of mistreatment, a state agency worker finally lost it, Namie recalls in his book. The man had returned to work after recuperating from a heart attack, reportedly induced by his manager, who greeted him in the parking lot and provoked him before he even entered the building. The employee, who has been described as gentle and caring, left in his car. He returned with a gun, killed his manager, and then himself. Co-workers considered the incident a tragedy only because of the suicide. Most people who become victims of bullies, as the state worker did, will more likely commit suicide rather than kill the bully, according to Namie.

After the incident in December at Edgewater Technology, the company released a statement saying McDermott's actions "apparently stem from occurrences in his personal life. There was no way to anticipate his actions or any apparent reason to restrict his access to the building." But McDermott reportedly had an outburst over the issue regarding his wages the week before the shootings.

"People don't just snap out of the clear-blue sky," says Lewis Maltby, president of the National Work Rights Institute in Princeton, N.J., an organization that spun off from the ACLU.

"People don't normally go from happy to dissatisfied right away," Maltby says. "They get more and more unhappy, and then they go over the edge. But there are always signs that a person is starting to unravel." A sign could be subtle, such as a person becoming more reserved or projecting aggressive behavior that is out of character for the individual, he says.

Preventing the Violence

Nearly 7,600 workers were victims of homicide in the workplace between 1980 and 1989, according to available data from the National Traumatic Occupational Facilities Surveillance System. Eighty percent of the victims were males, although homicide was the leading cause of occupational death for women. Companies can do something to reduce the risk of violence while preserving their most valuable assets--their employees. Denenberg, co-director of Workplace Solutions, a nonprofit organization that creates violence-prevention programs for companies, notes that acknowledging the potential for violence in any workplace is the first step for companies. "Typically, you can increase understanding [through] role-playing situations in the workplace where an employee, let's say, is having problems with a manager," Denenberg says.

Randomly selected high-tech companies chosen by VARBusiness were reluctant to discuss whether they had any policy to address workplace violence. But some are talking about the subject with their workers. Hewlett-Packard, for example, distributes a pamphlet to its employees on its violence-prevention program.

"The security of HP employees is vital," the pamphlet states. "Violent threats or acts affecting HP or occurring on HP property will not be tolerated." If trouble arises, HP employees are asked to fill out and sign an incident report form.

In reality, though, most people tend to look the other way. "It's a hell of a lot easier just to ignore the person because you don't want to be the one to tell HR, 'Listen, I think this guy's about to crack.' We don't trust our judgment," Yamada says.

Companies should also be concerned about mistreated workers sabotaging their systems. Respondents to a 1998 survey by the Computer Security Institute in San Francisco, an association of information security professionals, found computer attacks by their own employees were a serious threat. As cited in Namie's book, the survey found 70 percent of those who were authorized to use their companies' networks reported one to five incidents originated inside the company that year. Companies that could place a dollar amount on such damage reported an average annual total of nearly $137 million in losses.

Correcting Old Ways

There is a common management belief that to be productive, workers must be cracked with a whip, Maltby says. "You can be a tough boss, but respect your employees," Maltby says. "Meanness becomes a desire to be valued, and that's crazy. How can a company say people are their most valuable asset, and then be mean to them?"

Yamada and Namie are working on introducing legislation, first in California, to provide legal redress for targets of workplace bullying, abuse and harassment, without regard to protected class status. "Bullying is the sexual harassment of 20 years ago; everybody knows about it, but nobody wants to admit it," Maltby says.

Needless to say, not all managers are bullies. And once-abused IT professionals like Brandenburg are beginning to see that all of corporate America is not cruel. Today, Brandenburg works full time as a call analyst for a large software company in North Carolina and part time as a network administrator for an insurance company.

"My managers, for the most part, are easy-going," Brandenburg says. "But the less they yell in my ear, the more time I have to get the job done."

**kingoftheforest** · 04-08-2009, 02:37 PM

There is a definitive difference between having diffrent points of view, and just being an asshole for the sake of being one.

I personally have learned to ignore the clowns. However it's funny to see people defend ignorance and ill behavior over common courtesy.

Yes people these days don't take criticism lightly I'll agree. Propagating this anonymous shit talking attitude however is a more deep seated physcologial problem.

People who feel the need to troll, and flame are expressing inner problems that they have.

This may lead to more people acting out their inner problems through violence.

**jubaji** · 04-10-2009, 08:41 PM

Is there a doctor in the house?

Originally posted by kingoftheforest View Post

There is a definitive difference between having diffrent points of view, and just being an asshole for the sake of being one.

I personally have learned to ignore the clowns. However it's funny to see people defend ignorance and ill behavior over common courtesy.

Yes people these days don't take criticism lightly I'll agree. Propagating this anonymous shit talking attitude however is a more deep seated physcologial problem.

People who feel the need to troll, and flame are expressing inner problems that they have.

This may lead to more people acting out their inner problems through violence.

Is this your way of crying out for help?

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