How do I get my 13 year old sister into martial arts? (She's getting bullied)

[Fire of Youth]

If their bullying is verbal and social in nature, then she will need to defend herself on those terms; with her words. Bullying often has power because the bully has their passive bullies standing around enjoying the taunting or just too afraid to stand up to the bully when they aren't being bullied themselves. This means that she needs to disconnect the social aspect of the passive bullies from the verbal taunts of the main bully. The best way to do this is with humorous insults. If she can stand her ground verbally against the bully and then make the surrounding observers laugh at the bully, then she takes away the social reinforcement of the bullying acts. The bully has less incentive to keep it going. The bully then has the choice to up the ante and get physical or to say something to save face whilst withdrawing (e.g. "you're not worth it). So make a game with your sister to creatively insult each other (e.g. "you are dumber than the offspring between the village idiot and the tv weather girl", "Let's at least ask someone who's at least going to give us a slightly more intelligent opinion. Hello, wall! What do you think? ". This is a game that you can play over the phone or even by email. Have fun, make each other laugh and give her the ammunition to help her defend herself from the ostracism of bullies.

 

[rmongler]

Consider looking at it in terms of pure cynical consequentialism.

When push comes to shove authorities are more likely to side with a female party over a male party, ceteris paribus, so if she simply forces things to come to a head in a way that can't be ignored, like just punching one of them in the nose the next time they try to mess with her, that will likely get the matter quickly settled in a manner you find satisfactory ('group of boys engage in protracted bullying campaign of little girl' is a narrative you can't lose with, that'll poke people right in their virtue signals).