How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
You learn to bully or be bullied, and you learn to do it really well. (1.1)
Bart breaks the students of Baileywell into two categories: the weak and the strong. Guess which category he falls into…
Quote #2
We knew we were both really sad about his being gone. We just didn't need to say it. It was almost as if saying it would have made us feel even more abandoned and pathetic. (1.33)
Bart and his mother seem to view their sadness about his father as a weakness. Bart tries to bottle his up, but it makes its way to the surface eventually. Pro tip: That's kind of how feelings roll.
Quote #3
It was hard to know if the admissions director had a secret preference for kids who looked like rabbits and chickens, or if they'd once looked normal and had been turned, by their experiences at Bullywell, into human versions of the most timid or stupid creatures in the food chain. (4.32)
This is what Bart thinks upon boarding the bus to Baileywell for the first time. Pretty harsh, right? Bart almost sounds like… a bully.
Quote #4
"Last year he was supposed to be this new kid's Big Brother, and he tortured him so bad that the kid had a total nervous breakdown and dropped out of school before the end of the first term." (4.147)
Bart's bully, Tyro, has picked on at least one other kid he perceived as weak. Sounds like it didn't end well. And yet here Tyro is being another kid's Big Brother.
Quote #5
At first I thought I was the only unfortunate victim, but then, from time to time, I'd catch a certain look in someone's eye, and I'd understand that it was happening to that person, too. (5.2)
Like a horse smells fear, Bart can somehow sense his fellow weaklings. Not that it helps…
Quote #6
I didn't want her to think that she'd raised the kind of kid who'd be singled out to be picked on by the other kids. (5.14)
Shame is at least part of the reason that Bart doesn't tell his mom that he's being bullied. He doesn't want her to think he's weak.
Quote #7
I didn't exactly like the "weaker and smaller part," but there was nothing I could do about it…. (6.32)
Bart feels uncomfortable even hearing someone else say the word "weak," as Dr. Bratton does in his anti-bullying speech. This kid has a pretty strong aversion to weakness, that's for sure.
Quote #8
All at once, I knew what bothered me so much about Bern. He didn't just remind me of the geeks I rode to school with. He reminded me of me. (7.38)
What's interesting is that, though Bart sees himself in Bern, he doesn't feel sympathetic. Instead he feels disgusted. Project much?
Quote #9
The minute I walked into school after Christmas vacation, I could feel the change, like a shift in the weather or a sudden rise in barometric pressure. I was no longer one of the bullied, no longer a victim. (11.1)
Bart reaches a point where he's no longer bullied. What do you think causes this shift—the way Bart feels inside, or the way other people are treating him?