The wife of a professional soccer star has divided opinions after she praised her daughter for fighting back against her bully.
Seeing your child get bullied can be a painful experience, but it's often debated about how to deal with the perpetrator.
Some believe that children fighting back is the correct form of action as it teaches them to fight their own battles, whereas others disagree with violence and think informing an adult is the best course of action.
Bianca Austin, the wife of the professional soccer player Charlie Austin, has split opinion after she praised her daughter for punching her bully in the face.
Bianca took to Twitter where she revealed: "After weeks of being bullied by the same girl, numerous phone calls to the school and nothing changing, today when being called names my daughter finally punched the bully in the face [...] proud mum."
The tweet, which has been viewed over two million times, had people posing questions and enquiring as to how Bianca's daughter is feeling after the scuffle.
One person asked: "We all have [our] breaking points and can only be pushed so far. Does she feel better now she’s stood up for herself?"
Bianca responded: "No, but shes hoping the girl will leave her alone now."
The initial tweet caused a lot of debate amongst Bianca's followers, with some supporting her daughter's decision and saying that the mother is right to praise her.
One follower questioned: "I think she was wise defending herself. What about the bully? Has she been sanctioned?"
To which Bianca responded: "[My daughter] is in a school exclusion at the moment whilst the other child is in class. I asked what sanction she would be receiving and was told she was only verbally absusive [sic] but other students sanctions are not allowed to be discussed with me, so who knows."
Another person wrote: "Probably deserved! Hopefully you don't get in trouble for this tweet though," to which Bianca doubled down on the pride she has in her daughter.
"I told the school how proud of her I was for standing up for her self [sic] when they rang up to tell me Mallayla would be sanctioned for retaliating violently. No child should be able to make school hell for another child day in day out," Bianca wrote.
It would seem that not everybody was in favor of the act of violence, however. As a Twitter user wrote: "I commented on this earlier: your daughter should not be hitting anyone--ever. I get that bullying is awful and harmful but when I said that your daughter's actions would make things worse, you can now see where I was going. Bullying someone ‘back’ by hitting is also bullying."
Bianca questioned the comment on how they would have their daughter deal with a bully, claiming that the school couldn't stop it and it was causing detriment to her mental health and exam studies.
When the question was posed by the social media of a popular UK talk show, Bianca shared an image of her daughter’s leg which shows a foot mark, claiming that the bullying against her was both verbal and physical.
Do you think Bianca's daughter was right to fight back against her bullies? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
