I found over the years. Through conversations with friends of my bullies, or with some of them directly, that a lot of it has to do with their own personal lives. I found out that one of my worst bullies' father used to verbally and physically abuse him. A girl who was a close friend to him told me about how he used to have to invent reasons to skip gym and swimming class because he was too embarrassed and afraid to get undressed for fear that someone would see his bruises. Now, as an adult, there's a part of me that feels bad for him. And it makes me wonder if the reason he had to make me feel so bad was because he needed something to make himself feel more powerful than someone else because of how helpless he was at home.
I don't know...perspective I guess. He was creating a social ladder that he was trying to climb and his only way up was to step on me to get to the next rung in the ladder. It doesn't excuse what he did, but it does put it in a different perspective.