A question recently posted to Quora asks, “in female prisons, how do inmates bully each other?” Check out the anonymous response posted below, and add your own thoughts in the comments.
My experience as a staff member in a female prison has shown that it’s similar to any other kind of bullying, but sometimes the games just take on a different form. Those women who aren’t as firm about their boundaries will get taken advantage of. A common behavior is for one to complain loudly about an individual they have an issue with to everyone except the person they have an issue with. It gets twisted and mutated throughout the gossip and things tend to get ugly.
Some are very good at convincing others of their point of view, which has led entire tiers or pods turning against one or two people over something only one person experienced. If that one is loud enough and convincing enough, others will buy into it without experiencing anything on their own.
There are a lot of romantic relationships that end very poorly which leads to violence; sometimes that violence is at themselves with self-injury and suicide attempts. For example, there was one who used chemicals to burn her girlfriend’s name into her chest in an attempt to get her girlfriend back. She did this in order to convince her girlfriend that she only had eyes for her after a bully was spreading rumors about her cheating. The bully in this case was trying to edge her out because she wanted to be with the girlfriend. There are a lot of issues with jealousy, and again, the bullying behavior will kick in every so often.
