How are you supposed to respond to school bullies? The advice «fight back» or «just ignore it» is often touted as a solution, but I don’t think either is effective for ending verbal harassment. When kids teased me in school, I gave them neutral-one-word responses like «cool» or «okay.» They wanted to get a rise out of me, and once they realized that it wasn’t going to happen and I wasn’t seething in silence, the teasing swiftly stopped. 

But what do you do if someone isn’t just teasing and they’re actively violent? It’s dehumanizing to tell someone, even a child, that they shouldn’t stand up for themselves and should take the punches and turn the other cheek. 16-year-olds aren’t Christ, and they shouldn’t have to be pacifists to not get in trouble, but school administrations don’t tolerate any violence, even if it’s in defense of much crueler and invasive violence.