Is this bullying?

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This happened to me when I was in middle school and high school. All throughout middle school and high school, I had NT "friends", but they didn't exactly act like friends should. My "friends" called me a friend/best friend/BFF and acted like they liked me as a person(the reason why I THOUGHT they were my friends), but because i'm Autistic(I have high functioning Autism), they also liked to have fun at my expense. They would make me do stuff, sometimes weird, sometimes even gross, just so they would have something "funny" to laugh at. For example, once in middle school, my "friend" FORCED me to look STRAIGHT into her eyes for no reason at all as a way of torturing me, and my other "friends" laughed at me when I did it. That same "friend" told me to send her pictures of myself NAKED one night when we were messaging each other, because she thought it would be funny. I didn't even write back. I decided not to talk to her again after that. My mom even thought about calling her parents about what she did(my "friend" and I were only 13)! Little did I know, Amanda Todd would commit suicide 2 months later because the same thing happened to her. Not only that, but I told one of my real friends from high school(also high functioning Autistic) about the time my "friend" from middle school made me send her pictures of me naked, and HER response was "Never listen to people who make you do that!". Also, several times in high school, i'd be hanging out with my "friends" and they'd tell me to sing for them or do a dance for them. Of course, I listened to them because I was afraid they'd be mad at me if I didn't do what they said, and they just laughed at me when I danced or sung for them. One of them also asked me "When's my birthday?" over and over again no matter how many times I answered their question, just to bother me. Not only that, but one time in high school, I sat with my "friends" at lunch and I was having nachos and chocolate chip cookies for lunch that day. My "friends" thought it'd be funny if I dipped one of my chocolate chip cookies in the nacho cheese and ate it, so they told me to do so, just so they would have something to laugh at. I told them I didn't want to do it, but they just forced me to do it. That's when I decided to take my lunch and go eat in the nurses office(I had nowhere else to go, no other friends I could sit with in the cafeteria). Lastly, they would make me be disruptive in class(i've always been a well behaved student) and throw food at other people during lunch sometimes as a way to have fun at my expense. They only ever did it to ME, nobody else, maybe because I was the "different" one of the group AND I was too shy to defend myself. My "friends" constantly making me do stuff as a way to have fun at my expense has been making me uncomfortable since I was in middle school, so I finally told a teacher about it my Junior year of high school. My teacher said that it was bullying what my "friends" were doing, and she told the principle and my guidance counselor. They not only introduced me to some different people I could sit with at lunch, but they said to me "Those people can't make you do ANYTHING!" and I got a call home about it. My parents also considered it to be bullying.

If you don't know what i'm talking about, the same thing happened in this WWYD? scenario, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mt1JfmFb6Xg, when the teens are telling the homeless man to make them laugh by calling himself a loser and acting like a dog, and in the Nicky, Ricky, Dicky & Dawn episode "I Got Your Back" when Dawn's soccer teammates made her dump chocolate pudding on her brother just so they would have something to laugh at, but she didn't want to do it because she would get in trouble AND hurt her brother's feelings. Neither the homeless man from the WWYD? scenario or Dawn from Nicky, Ricky, Dicky & Dawn were Autistic, but I could REALLY relate to them when other people were having fun at their expense.

Not only did my "friends" like to have fun at my expense at school, but they excluded me from EVERYTHING! They would exclude me from conversations AND they never invited me anywhere(I saw tons of pictures of them hanging out together without me on social media). My "friends" from middle school didn't say anything like "You can't sit with us.", but their lunch table was ALWAYS full and there was never any room for me at their table. They would invite friends they weren't as close to to sit at their table. That's the main reason why there was never any room for me at their table.

All i'm asking is, is having fun at another person's expense a form of bullying? I know it's a form of peer pressure, but is it also bullying? If it IS considered bullying, I unfortunately never thought anything of it because they told me I was their friend/best friend/BFF and I always thought to myself "It's okay! They're my friends. They're just teasing me.". Did the same thing ever happen to YOU? If so, feel free to share your story.

Well: it’s an appalling way to treat another human being regardless of whether you use the word “bullying” to describe it or not.

I’m sorry you had to go through that.

Hope the people around you treat you better these days.

Certainly wouldn't have considered them friends. Nemeses? I'm still too sleepy... is that how 'nemesis' forms a plural?

Had a bunch who annoyed me in middle school. Finally got them to stop. Certainly didn't consider them friends.

It was finally communicated to me by adults I trusted that the opinions and social acceptance of these people wasn't important. That type of hazing isn't worth PTSD or suicide.

Do your own thing and ignore what others think. If you're physically assaulted or verbally harassed and adults allow it, those adults are complicit. Tell other adults.

All friends mess about with each other, but friends do not exclude each other. They include each other. So when you were excluded from their group, they are not friends.
The other things are just children or teenagers messing about. It can be difficult to work out. For example, I assumed I was bullied in collage, and at one time I almost jumped straight through a window hoping to fall into a tree below so I cojld climb down and make my escape. But they meant me no harm. They were pretending. They actually thought a lot of me. I did not know until years later. I had a terrible time while in the collage, and is only looking back that I saw that it was just their way of having fun. (I am not saying their behaviour was right). BUT excluding you is definately not being friends. Including you is being friends. This is the difference.

Some "friends"! If I had friends like that I wouldn't need any enemies.

That's a totally unacceptable way for people to behave in my opinion.

I had to force myself to complete the OP. Yes, it was bullying. It was also my high-school experience.

That is EXACTLY what happened to me. They were basically asking me to do stuff and I didn't really want to do it, but I did that anyway out of fear. Like back in the 3-rd grade, someone asked me to climb under the table and say cuss words and then he asked me to grab the teacher by her leg -- and she dragged me out of class. Then, around 7-th grade, someone asked me if I was hungry, I told her no I am not hungry, but she said she doesn't believe me and thinks that I am hungry -- so she asked me to eat grass. I was refusing to but she said she would hit me if I don't eat grass, so I ate grass. Also there were songs that they would ask me to sing for them as well. And I can go on and on.

To answer your question, yes I consider it bullying. Also they don't consider you a friend. The only purpose you are there is to entertain them. And calling you a friend is a form of bullying too. They are trying to laugh at how stupid you are that you believe them you are their friend. So its not like you are "odd one out" in their group. Rather, you are not part of their group to begin with -- and you are only "invited" there in order to be bullied. And if you look at it this way, that explains why you aren't invited to their activities: why would they invite you if they don't see you as the part of the group?

This also happened to me for a long time. Years and years of it. NT's know there is something different even if you can play normal as possible. I too had my friends commit s==cide. One was a musical savant, the other had ASPlike qualities. I find it funny that in theory many quote autism championing sloganeeringisms like a hashtag campaign but actual knowledge and support is lacking.

It's definitely bullying and calling you a 'friend' was a form of manipulation.

Yes, that is a form of bullying. I have had that used on me years ago. The best way to deal with it is to cut off all contact with those “friends” without telling them why. I found that doing so is a good revenge because it gets to them in a way that they cannot control. You take their power away from them and that bugs them the most. They may attack you directly afterword so be prepared. That will prove that you were correct in the intent of their behavior.

Yes, it's called Relational Bullying or Relational Aggression. It's used more by girls than boys.

I wouldn't agree with this. In my case it was done by both genders. The person that did it most often happened to be a girl -- but I got plenty of abuse from people other than her. And, as far as people other than her I would say I got more abuse from boys than from girls, although I got a lot of abuse from girls too. Perhaps boys are just bigger and stronger and that's why what they did scared me more. Although I was scared by girls too since I was weak as a kid.

I have just gone through a few possible bullying events that have happened in my life... Just a brief look at some of the extremes. A lot is not exactly bullying. Is more taking advantage. Anyway. Here are a few examples.

I thought this was normal. Well. Maybe not quite to those extremes. My English is limited in the words I know and use, so I could be vunerable. I was often thinking "Why do they want me to ask. They've got mouthes?
But I would ask anyway as I did not know what the term meant.... Like the time when I was in secondary school and we were having sex education lessons (Which I didn't have a clue what they were teaching or what the diagrams I had to draw were of) and a kid said he was embarissed and wanted to ask the lady teacher a question, and wanted me to ask it for him, so I did and asked the teacher "Can we have a practical lesson?" I did not know what practical meant. All I knew was that it had something to do with science.
But to me I did not know this was classed as bullying. Oh I was bullied lots of times. To me bullying was physical. I would take it as I could not punch back. I could not get my arms to move quick enough when I was stressed. But I had very powerful legs, but as my Dad knew that when I was very young I could get frustrating uncontrollable rages which stopped after many smacked behinds and the shock I had when I was told I could have killed a girl, so I stopped these rages when I was six... But after this, those rages turned into what I now know were shutdowns. I can't get rages now even if I try. Yes, if pushed I get annoyed, but not into a rage. However, the shutdowns have been a right pain to the point of being a physical dissability.. Well. As I could be lying paralysed on the bround whatever the weather etc and not just physically not able to move, but not be able to see or hear properly... They are a problem. But I usually get partial shutdowns which are around the halfway stage. Body movement is slow and takes a lot of effort to do anything physical... Minor physical tasks can be exhausting and take days to recover. That sort of thing.

But going back to the origional question. Yes. I had things like that almost daily. Not quite as extreme as to eat grass etc, but usually more exposing my gullability.
What really puzzled me was that I was classed as slightly above average intelligence. So how come I could be taken advantage of?

I often had this being taken advantage of in the workplace and I have left jobs after hitting burnout because of it. (Last three jobs in the same place I hit burnout anysay and were not taken advantage of, but the job before I worked up to 20 hours a week extra without getting paid so that others could steal my bonus. (I never knew I had bonuses. Aparently we were richly rewarded. I never saw one as all the work I did was recorded as if other people did the work. I was watching them get holidays and one guy had an expensive new car...).
Anyway. I did not mind as I was just greatful to have enough to keep an old car on the road but before that where I worked for the same company in their previous store, I was cycling into work, and I eventually left because I could jot afford ew brake blocks to keep my bicycle on the road, so I don't know why my pay did not cover it. BUT that job and the next job I did all those free hours with, I found out that I never was on the company books those years. (I don't know how they did that though I did find it odd that I didn't have a contract, and later when another new employee had one I asked for one and I had to sign it, but I was not allowed to have a copy (I never knew I was supposed to!)

So I have to watch because many, many times I have been taken advantage of. This is quite a corrupt area. I got into trouble once for being on the books of an employment training agency for five years after I left, and it puzzled me as someone had been getting the money for this. No wonder I was not allowed to sign on unemployed during those years as one can't sign on and be part of the training scheme...

It seems the more I wanted to do things right the more people took advantage? I had to sign blank sheets of paper once at the bottom as they said their printer was not working. Found out later that they were not even employees of the organization and they worked elsewhere.
I have had both my private pension and my government pension cheated out of me. The government pension because I thought I was officially working on the books of the company or business and I wasn't, and my private pension may have been taken because I didn't know it was supposed to be transferred back to my Mums address when I sold my house... (It maybe possible to forward my current address to the pension company but what's the point? Even though I put in a lot over 9 years I have not put in any since so it will likely pay me pennies rather then pounds when I am older, and rhat is if I live that long.
Ooh. I was cheated out of that too. Estate agent was acting in the interests of the buyers and not me, so I was pressurized into selling it for half its market value, and I gave in as I assumed the estate agent was acting in my interest.

So if these were all bullying, then it has happened through life and is why I am not rich despite all those years of hard work.

I can't work now as I get too much stress which brings on the shutdowns. I get loads of anxiety to the point I was going in half an hour to an hour early as I could not walk from the car park to the place of work until I had calmed down.

But... If it is bullying then yes. I have had it as a child and an adult. If it is physical violence, I had it all the way through my childhood and into my late teens. Not daily, but on occasional flare ups. And I was never able to fight back so I just had to take it as part of life.

Now I say all that not to have any sympathy but to show possible examples. Some are just taking adavtage. I could easily write 20 times this amount. But to read all this assumes that things have been bad. No. It is not all bad. Inbetween these events life has been ok and some of it has been good. Kind hearted people have blessed me with miracles. All sorts of positive things have happened too.
So all is not bad. It's just life. Seasons of life with its ups and downs!