No difference between teen and 300- pound bully

In recent years, we’ve been reading a lot about the escalating crisis of teenage bullying, and if there is one recurring theme, it’s that adults must become more engaged in the process if we ever hope to stop bullying in its tracks.

But what happens if everyone involved — from the bully to the bullied to the bystander — is a grown- up? That has been painfully illustrated by the Miami Dolphins scandal, where 319- pound guard Richie Incognito has been suspended on allegations of bullying fellow offensive lineman Jonathan Martin, who has left the team. Incognito, a 30- year- old NFL veteran with a history of dirty play, verbal abuse, repeated fines and serial suspensions, was reportedly relentless in his cruel treatment of Martin.

Predictably, the unfolding drama has become fodder for an unending wave of news columns and editorials, all of them calling for a fresh look at the culture of professional athletics.

Hazing the same in schoolyard or in locker room

But that’s the irony: There’s nothing remotely new about any of this. It’s just plain, old- fashioned bullying, transplanted into the bodies of oversized, overpaid athletes who believe they can get away with it.

Yet there’s one difference: Unlike with schoolyard bullying — where parents, teachers and bystanders can reverse a dangerous situation — NFL coaches, managers and owners charged with keeping the peace often make the problem worse. “Coaches could care less about what happens in the locker room because they have a job to do and we have a job to do,” former NFL defensive end Trevor Pryce told The New York Times.

The Incognito- Martin faceoff so deftly fits the classic bullying scenario that it’s practically a cliché. Incognito is white, Martin is black; Incognito has been playing in the NFL since 2005, Martin is a secondyear player; Incognito was allegedly bullied as a child for his weight, Martin is the son of Harvard grads and majored in the classics at Stanford. And, most tellingly, Incognito was reportedly a ringleader in the kind of adolescent and vicious behavior that is not one iota different from the shoving and online gang- ups that have fallen upon our children.

And that’s how we should respond. Instead of interpreting the Dolphins debacle as some new kind of outbreak in the highly charged, highly lucrative realm of professional sports, let’s just reframe it as one more strain of an old disease.

Helping children to understand bullying, say the experts at Stop-Bullying. gov, is the surest way to prevent it.. That can be accomplished by listening to them and knowing their friends, and, most important, keeping the lines of communication open. Starting this Sunday, as we tune into the games, let’s use this opportunity to renew our conversations with our kids about bullying and remind our children:

Size doesn’t matter. When it comes to bullies, there’s no difference between a little girl or a 300- pound lineman. Cruelty is cruelty.

Whether it’s in the schoolyard or in a professional locker room, it is the responsibility of a bystander to help stop bullying as it’s happening.

Regardless of how brilliant he might be on the field, a bully is never a hero. Ever.

I hope this story continues to play out in the news media. The more attention that’s brought to person-against- person torment, the more we may begin to loosen the tight knot that has been choking the humanity out of our kids.

LYNNE SLADKY, AP Miami Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin walks on the field during an NFL football practice on Nov. 6 in Davie, Fla.