with video: Don't be a victim, says anti-bullying instructor Keith Copeland

People often come to martial arts instructors for the wrong reasons, he said. “We’re in the business of training protectors, not predators,” he said before a recent anti-bullying seminar.

The distinction is important. Copeland laments the bad rap that ninjutsu, Quest's martial art of choice, has developed in the popular culture.

"Ninjutsu's been around for 900 years, but it's only the hundred years of ninja assassins that people know it for," he remarked.

One time two guys came in for classes. First thing they wanted to know was when they'd learn to kill people.

When Copeland replied that it would take six or seven years, he never heard from them again.

The scene was a bit different when the seminar began. The eight children in attendance came not to break bones, but to gain the freedom to go to school and the playground without fear of being pushed around.

The aim of Copeland's 90-minute seminar is to teach students to stop seeing themselves as victims. His first lesson is that everyone has the capacity for bullying — even kids who are normally on the receiving end.

“How many people here have ever been a bully?” he asked.

Two brothers conceded that they bully each other sometimes. Another student asked if bullying his sister counted. It did. He raised his hand, and the rest of the students followed.

"Parents, you too, be honest. I’ve been a bully myself," Copeland encouraged the mothers in attendance.

Every hand went up.

“The reason I ask is I want you to see how universal bullying is,” Copeland explained. "Most bullies aren't bad people, they just need to learn a different set of behaviors," he continued. "But today we're going to teach you how to not be a victim, because that's who bullies target, people who look weak."

"Everybody, grab your chest and pull it up, toward the ceiling," Copeland instructed. "Chin up. Stand up straight."

“How does a confident person look? Loose, relaxed. Now, bounce on your toes. Be real loose,” he says. The children go along gladly. With some prodding, the moms follow suit.

“The best way to get treated like a victim is to look like one, act like one,” Copeland repeated. Earlier in the drill he’d taught the class victim body language — eyes low, head drooped, shoulders slumped.

Copeland snaps his fingers and the class snaps back to attention, projecting confidence. Then he leads the newly confident crew in a march around the dojo, practice for the schoolyard.

"Let me tell you a little secret: The brain and the body are connected," Copeland said at the end of the march. A number of the students made a point to retain their new and upright posture.

"This means that if you can look confident, the mind will begin to think confidently. And if you can think confident thoughts, you'll look more confident, too."

Part of handling any bully is knowing your own response to fear, Copeland said. He and instructors Clayton Macy and Ryan Sullivan drilled students by walking up and getting right in their faces. Some people’s eyes watered with the proximity. Others squirmed. One woman was unaffected by all of it.

"Once you know how the body responds when it's afraid," Copeland said, "then you can go about changing those reactions so you control what you project to other people."

Copeland might be in the business of training protectors, but all the students of the anti-bullying seminar learned to protect themselves was a bit of verbal judo and a new mindset.

When Copeland asserted himself in bullying simulations, his pretend tormentors slinked off more quickly and quietly than one remembers from childhood. In cases where the threat goes beyond words, Quest offers classes.

The anti-bullying seminar is as much for the parents as it is for their kids. Not only can parents face bullying in the workplace and, yes, even on the playground, it's also their duty to make sure that schools aren't allowing bullying, Copeland said.

"Your kids shouldn't be coming home with their clothes all torn up. Schools can’t legally allow students to be bullied. Hold them responsible. Go through all the proper channels, but hold them responsible."

Local author Rose Ann Tracy attended the anti-bullying seminar with her son J.J., who will be entering the second grade this fall.

"He's going to a new school this year, so I just wanted to give him some tools so he knows the words for those situations," she said.

"I learned that I have to say stop, and tell (the bully) to leave me alone and go away," J.J. said.

Copeland said that the optimal outcome of any bullying interaction is for the bullying to stop and the kids to either co-exist or become friends. Even when Quest teaches martial arts tactics, Copeland said, it's in the belief that they should be used sparingly — and preferably not at all.

"Violence is the absolute last resort. It has to be," Copeland said. "But it's not always avoidable. Sometimes the very best thing to do about a bully is not be where they're at."

Quest Martial Arts will host its next anti-bullying seminar on Saturday, Sept. 18.

James David Dickson can be reached at JamesDickson@AnnArbor.com.