Everything they taught you in school is a lie. Carthage was not salted, Canute knew he couldn’t control the tide, Marie Antoinette never said ‘let them eat cake’, and Mrs O’Leary did not start the Great Chicago Fire. Yet the biggest fallacy of the best years of your life is peddled not by teachers but by parents and schoolmates: namely, that you must always stand up to bullies. The logic is tempting. It sounds right all of the time, proves right some of the time, but gets you punched in the face most of the time. Bullies are bullies because they have power and should only be confronted directly if you have, or can amass with others, a greater quantity of power. The most dangerous bullies should be avoided, flattered, bribed or placated unless and until you can hit them so hard they daren’t hit you back.
Donald Trump is a bully, which is why some – the SNP’s John Swinney, the Tories’ Alicia Kearns – want his second state visit to the UK cancelled.
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