bullying humiliation bullying power bullying decency bullying bulling bullying

“It [humiliation] is based on the fact that the perpetrator–especially the institutional humiliator–has power over the victim he assails. It crucially involves the sense of utter helplessness that the bully gives the victim.” (Margalit 1998, 122

“Sometimes directed efforts are made to bring the victims of aggression to a state where they can be seen as nonhuman, [...] A humiliating look thus does not consist in seeing the other as a thing or a machine but in seeing the other as subhuman“ (Margalit 1998, 100-101)

“That all men are human is, if a tautology, a useful one, serving as a reminder that those who belong anatomically to the species homo sapiens, and can speak a language, [...] are also alike in certain respects more likely to be forgotten. These respects are notably the capacity to feel pain, [...], to feel affection for others, [...]. The assertion that men are alike in the possession of the characteristics is, while indisputable and (it may be) even necessarily true, not trivial. For it is certain that there are political and social arrangements that systemically neglect these characteristics in the case of some groups of men, while being fully awareof them in the case of others [...]” (Williams 1973, 232)

“My central claim is that humiliation typically presupposes the humanity of the humiliated. Humiliating behavior rejects the other as nonhuman, but the act of rejection presupposes that it is a person that is being rejected.“ (Margalit 1998, 109)

 “Seeing a human being as human means seeing the body as expressing the soul, as Wittgenstein put it. In other words, it means seeing the human body and its parts in the mental terms they nonliterally exemplify [...] We see persons as human when we see their expressions in human terms: this person has a friendly or a thoughtful face, a worried or a happy expression.“ (Margalit 1998, 94)

Margalit defines humiliation as “[...] any sort of behavior or condition that constitutes a sound reason for a person to consider his or her self-respect injured” (Margalit 1998, 9).

: “Overlooking human beings means, among other things, not paying attention to them: looking without seeing. Seeing humans as ground rather than figure is a way of ignoring them.“ (Margalit 1998, 101) “Overlooking humans thus does not strictly mean seeing them as things, but rather not seeing them fully or precisely” (Margalit 1998, 103). But not only can people ignore others, they often see them as subhuman. They see them “as stigmatized – that is, to see some physical ’anomaly’ of theirs as a sign of a defect in their humanity” (Margalit 1998, 103).

“That other human beings have souls – that is are subjects of psychological predicates – is not a hypothesis but the provision of a framework for representing human beings as such“ (Margalit 1998, 109).

“A human way of seeing means seeing the other under the descriptions of human psychology. It means seeing the human body, especially the face and the eyes, as expressing psychological states.“ (Margalit 1998, 100-101


“Sometimes directed efforts are made to bring the victims of aggression to a state where they can be seen as nonhuman, [...] A humiliating look thus does not consist in seeing the other as a thing or a machine but in seeing the other as subhuman“ (Margalit 1998, 100-101)

“It [humiliation] is based on the fact that the perpetrator–especially the institutional humiliator–has power over the victim he assails. It crucially involves the sense of utter helplessness that the bully gives the victim.” (Margalit 1998, 122)

“Treating someone in a way that denies her capacity to be free is rejecting her as a human being.“ Margalit (1998, 118)

Margalit, A. (1998), The Decent Society, Harvard University Press.

Williams, B. (1973), Problems of the Self, Cambridge University Press.