The Bullying of a Future Supermodel: A Great Lesson for Kids

In the recent Apple TV+ documentary The Super Models, Cindy Crawford told how, as a high school student, she was teased and mocked by her peers after she returned from her first modeling job. That’s right, she was the target of aggression simply for taking the first step in what would turn into one of the most successful modeling careers and worldwide fame. What her peers were doing is what I call “rejective aggression.” This is a new term I’ve created for the bullying lexicon, a term that describes behaviors that are used to make a target feel that they do not belong to the peer group. Rejective aggression is distinct from dominance aggression (intimidation) and relational aggression (friendship harming). What’s so instructive about Ms. Crawford’s case is that the rejective aggression was intended by her peers to minimize a positive characteristic, i.e., her work as a model, one that had the potential to raise her popularity. Those who teased Ms. Crawford likely felt that her increased social standing among her peers would detract from their own.

Ms. Crawford’s experience is important for kids to understand because rejective aggression often uses a characteristic of a person that cannot be changed, such as their body type, skin color, gender identity, or cultural background, to indicate that the person is different from those in the peer group and does not belong. Rejective aggression can also make a target feel that the characteristic used in the aggression is a flaw. That can make the target ashamed of the characteristic and even try to change it. Targets who are convinced that a characteristic that can’t be changed is a flaw can suffer significant harm, as they might feel that they will never be accepted by peers. They may also develop strong negative feelings toward that characteristic. The lesson from Ms. Crawford’s experience is that characteristics that peers use in rejective aggression are not flaws; instead, they are unique differences, ones that may even be rather positive. While this understanding may not make kids feel better about the peer rejection they are experiencing, it should help them to recognize that the characteristic that makes them different is not a flaw. It’s merely something that’s unique. And it may even be extremely positive, one that peers are using because it threatens to reduce their own social standing.