Anyone Experience This Bizarre Form of Bullying?

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When I was in sixth grade, I was being bullied pretty mercilessly. In addition to the usual name-calling, grabbing of possessions, and occasional hitting, the bullies were also pretending to be much stupider than they really were, so that they could watch me struggle to explain things. Of course, back then, I thought they were actually that stupid, as opposed to pretending. Those "bouts of stupidity" were often very sudden, catching me off guard. What was weird is that they happened only in sixth grade and nowhere else. It'll be easiest to explain it with dialogs.

Aspie1: (somehow talking about sticking a map to corkboards)
Bully: You just staple it.
Aspie1: Staples are no good; the maps are hard to remove. You should use pushpins.
Bully: Huh?
Aspie1: You use pushpins.
Bully: What are pushpins?
Aspie1: They're those things that you hold with two fingers and stick paper things to corkboard.
Bully: Stick to corkboard? You mean with glue?
Aspie1: No! Pushpins look like little nails, and they hold paper to corkboard.
Bully: Why would you use a hammer? (cf. nails)
Aspie1: <walks off in disgust>

Aspie1: Hey, it's was daylight savings time last weekend, and they haven't moved the class clock one hour ahead.
Bully: No, you move one hour back.
Aspie1: It's spring, so you move one hour ahead; spring forward, fall back.
Bully: No, it's fall forward, spring back.
Aspie1: No! It's ahead in spring, back in fall! <get into explaining day/night cycles>
Bully: You got it wrong. You move back in spring, and forward in fall to balance out the day length; you know that a day gets long in spring, and short in fall.
Aspie1: How can you not know this!? <turns around in disgust>

Aspie1: (somehow mentioning a bank while talking about money)
Bully: Bank? Like a pig made of ceramic?
Aspie1: No, it's a building where you keep the money.
Bully: You're calling a ceramic pig a "building"? Man, that's weird.
Aspie1: No, a bank building!
Bully: A pig building?
Aspie1: Ugh!! ! <leaves>

Aspie1: (talking about the solar system after an astronomy lesson in science class)... Saturn's rings are made of rock.
Bully: How can they be made of rock? They're solid plastic discs; you saw the pictures the teacher was showing everybody.
Aspie1: Those are telescopic images from far away, so they look like solid discs. Besides, there's no oil on Saturn, so where would plastic come from?
Bully: <interrupts> Exactly! They're solid, so they're made of plastic. Besides, no one ever saw Saturn's rings up close, and how do you know there's no oil there?
Aspie1: Satellites took pictures of Saturn from up close!
Bully: Are you saying you're smarter than the teacher? That's really stuck-up of you. If the teacher is showing us rings made of plastic, then she's right. You're 12, so listen to her!
Aspie1: Saturn's rings are made of rock!
Bully: Plastic!
Aspie1: <leaves in disgust at the level of stupidity in class>

Obviously, in retrospect, I realize that even the most hardcore bullies (for sixth grade) couldn't be that stupid. But back then, I honestly believed that they were completely devoid of intellect, and tried to get me to believe wrong information. And we all know how much aspies hate being given wrong information. I won't even ask how they knew I hated it, but I am wondering why exactly they pretended not to know elementary things like those. Post your thoughts.

Maybe they really were that stupid.

There are lot of stupid people in the world I often wonder if they were playing stupid to mess with people. I get surprised at how stupid people can be.

But I think they acted that way because they knew it annoy you and piss you off. I bet they got a rise out of you walking away. Maybe they also wanted to egg your intelligence by wanting to see it and the only way was to play stupid.

They might have wanted to set you up for later embarrassment. Like, if someone tells you that Saturn's rings are made of plastic, and then the next day during class the teacher is reviewing Saturn and you raise your hand and tell the teacher you thought the rings were made of plastic, people would laugh at you and think you're dumb.

I...actually used to get that sort of thing all the time. But I KNEW that they were screwing with me, because they always ended up laughing. It makes no sense that I kept "taking the bait".

Yeah I used to get that too.

Gawd, this was so funny. It reminds me of the time when my entire 9th grade science class believed that everything would be hunky-dory on Earth if the Sun suddenly popped out of existence. I had to explain how unhunky-dory it would be, and now I am wondering if they were all screwing with me. But my first reaction was that the people at your school were actually that stupid, but the pig/bank dialog is especially questionable.

I witnessed soemthing like that.

A girl on the train asked a boy what was the next station. She had to get off at Wollongong.
He said Bellambi. Me, not being able to tell he was just joking spoke up and said it's Coniston. Coniston is a stop before Wollongong and Belambi is like five stops past it.
So I felt I was right to reveal the truth otherwise she would have missed her stop.

Sometimes I have acted dumb though to see someone's reaction. Not in a bullying way, just to joke around. Sometimes I just hear someone say something and associate it with something else and I've got to say it. I haven't done it for awhile though.

I got some in-real-life trolling like that, although it was more like asking me for advice I obviously couldn't give.

That's called winding someone up.

It's common amongst people. I have had it done to be, and I do it to other people. I wouldn't call it bullying, the other person is just being a smart arse.

Mum: Michael is coming to do the garden
Me: Michael Jackson?
Mum: (gets annoyed)

My bullies were never that clever to act stupid.

I do this to my NT sister and she blows up with rage every time.

Ah yes, the "innocent" bully. They should simply not be engaged, or they should immediately be called on their behavior.

I remember in high school I used to play dumb just to see how far kids would go with their stories. One of them once said Michael Jackson was related to her but I knew he wasn't but she knew all his kids names. I pretended it was all true.

Sometimes it's fun to just play along with their games. These kids weren't really bullies but they liked messing with me and it was fun to mess with them back.


If someone is acting stupid, just keep correcting them to piss them off pretending you think they are actually that dumb.

IIRC, I hadn't been bullied that way while I was at primary school. Whenever I had the opportunity to explain scientific or other similar topics to one of my peers, usually I did it with no problem. They listened to me, questioned back, and I tried to give the answer according to my best knowledge at that time. I wasn't that smart, I suppose, and I tolerated being alone well, perhaps that helped. When they didn't believe what I'd said, I wasn't that upset about it. When something had started out a bad way, I usually withdrew (e.g. grabbing of possessions, I just took them back, said nothing). Later, I think it was in the period I attended the uni or shortly before, has happened a couple of times, that I was explaining or simply talking about something, and my audience expressed its doubts (or its lust for pleasure and boredom with me) by making fun of me.

Bullying at primary school mostly occurred due to my misbehavior, that bullies often took as if I challenged them. I did it sometimes deliberately, though.

What you describe sounds like both explanaitions are true. They were both ignorant, and making fun of you. The later being a conventional method of reducing one's self disgust for being the former. Or, being so certain of one's false information as to find it comical that someone would be trying to correct you.

Anytime someone combines personal ignorance and a delight in causing another distress...well, they are scum and to be ignored.

As you've realised, these verbal bullies were not being stupid. If anything, they were quite astute, because they knew how to get you into verbal traps and annoy you. I experienced a similar thing in school, if not exactly the same. A common ploy was people would make up elaborately made-up news stories and tell me them, often some sort of apocalyptic or doomsday scenario, and say they had just heard this on the news. Or any other type of story designed to insult my intelligence. I wouldn't say it's a bizarre form of bullying. If anything, it's rather common.