用改进人际技巧来对付 Bullying

人都有恶的一面，Bullying就是孩子恶性的发作。作恶者都嗅觉视觉灵敏，专找落单和软弱的那一个下口，就像趟入斑马群的狮子那样，所以孤立无援的孩子最容易成为bullies作恶的对象。也正好是这样的孩子受伤害最深，因为他们孤立、软弱。教育资源网站bullyingproject.com 上说： “…limited popularity and social networks can be a precursor for victimization in an adolescent social setting. Limited support from peers and adults could show a child that bullying is not only right, but also admirable. The adolescents who are bullied feel as though the whole world is against them.”

所以对付bullying， 除了在学校里到处贴标语和展开群众运动，还有更根本的办法，那就是改进孩子的人际技巧。当然，根本性的办法都要下长时间的工夫才有效果，不能临时当创可贴来用。孔夫子说：人无远虑，必有近忧。用到这里可以解释成：如果不花长期工夫培养孩子的人际技巧，孩子就可能会遇到没法用创可贴解决的问题，比如bullying。

况且，Bullying 只是孩子之间关系的极端情形。即使孩子没有被bully，也不说明他（她）与别的孩子之间的关系就完全健康。

孩子之间的社交不是件简单的事，因为孩子没有大人那么多的客气和忍让。孩子的心理也没有成熟到能独自抗衡群体压力 (peer pressure) 的程度。说得不好听点，孩子的世界是很残酷的。这可能也是为什么有些家长怕把孩子放到这热火炉里去历练。《纽约时报》专栏作家David Brooks写的“虎妈读后感”就说学校的餐厅是比图书馆更挑战孩子智力的地方。文后摘出这篇文章中几段精彩的话。加下划线处是作者提到的人际技巧的一些方面。

移民的孩子还有另外一个挑战：他们的祖辈从大洋那头空运过来的价值观跟他们大洋这头土生土长的朋友同学的价值观有点水火不容。这从Brooks的文章里可以嗅出。我观察这两种不同价值观的一个结果是：美国的社会结构是基于人与人之间的一种基本信任，而中国的社会结构只能由一方打压另一方的威权来维系。在两种价值观的夹缝中长大的孩子是很辛苦的。虎妈的女儿们就生存在这夹缝里，尽管虎妈的价值观已经空运过来太久，开始有少许变味了。

其实把人际技巧叫作技巧是看轻它了。技巧听起来像是雕虫小技，人际技巧听起来像是玩弄一些两面三刀八面玲珑的花招，但是人际关系是个更基本的概念。思想家克里希那穆提的观察是人与别人的关系就是人的生活的一切，人生没有哪一件事不涉及到人与人之间的关系，所以搞清这些关系是人该学的第一课。克氏不相信隐遁到山中寺庙里能寻到人生的秘密。

孔子也有一句话：“弟子入则孝，出则弟，谨而信，泛爱众，而亲仁；行有余力，则以学文。”人该做的六件事中，前五件都是处理与别人的关系，学业排在最后一位。可惜中华民族已经把这样的宝训像空矿泉水瓶一样丢到街角去了。我是在来美国不少年后才第一次读到这话的。

我觉得孔子的话抓住了看起来错综复杂的人际关系的本质。如果能在孩子身上培养出两个素质：信（包含了谨）和爱（包含了孝、弟、仁），剩下的就都是技术细节了。这正好也是Scott Peck 在其名著The Road Less Traveled 中说到的人灵性成长的两个方面：discipline （信）和love（爱）。

From “Amy Chua is a Wimp”  (by David Brooks):

…I have the opposite problem with Chua. I believe she’s coddling her children. She’s protecting them from the most intellectually demanding activities because she doesn’t understand what’s cognitively difficult and what isn’t.

Practicing a piece of music for four hours requires focused attention, but it is nowhere near as cognitively demanding as a sleepover with 14-year-old girls. Managing status rivalries, negotiating group dynamics, understanding social norms, navigating the distinction between self and group — these and other social tests impose cognitive demands that blow away any intense tutoring session or a class at Yale.

Yet mastering these arduous skills is at the very essence of achievement. Most people work in groups… Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Carnegie Mellon have found that groups have a high collective intelligence when members of a group are good at reading each others’ emotions — when they take turns speaking, when the inputs from each member are managed fluidly, when they detect each others’ inclinations and strengths.

Participating in a well-functioning group is really hard. It requires the ability to trust people outside your kinship circle, read intonations and moods, understand how the psychological pieces each person brings to the room can and cannot fit together.

This skill set is not taught formally, but it is imparted through arduous experiences. These are exactly the kinds of difficult experiences Chua shelters her children from by making them rush home to hit the homework table.

Chua would do better to see the classroom as a cognitive break from the truly arduous tests of childhood. Where do they learn how to manage people? Where do they learn to construct and manipulate metaphors? Where do they learn to perceive details of a scene the way a hunter reads a landscape? Where do they learn how to detect their own shortcomings? Where do they learn how to put themselves in others’ minds and anticipate others’ reactions?

These and a million other skills are imparted by the informal maturity process and are not developed if formal learning monopolizes a child’s time.

So I’m not against the way Chua pushes her daughters. And I loved her book as a courageous and thought-provoking read. It’s also more supple than her critics let on. I just wish she wasn’t so soft and indulgent. I wish she recognized that in some important ways the school cafeteria is more intellectually demanding than the library. And I hope her daughters grow up to write their own books, and maybe learn the skills to better anticipate how theirs will be received.