Bullies in Court Reporting – The Personal, Systemic, and Cultural Forces Pushing Stenographers to the Brink

In the StenoImperium article “Deadlines, Deadlines Everywhere: The Court Reporter’s Race Against the Clock,” the author paints a vivid picture of stenographers sprinting to meet back-to-back transcript demands — a race where there’s no finish line, only more hurdles. While the piece focuses on deadlines, it indirectly exposes something deeper: bullying in the court reporting world isn’t limited to personal mistreatment. It’s also baked into the very structure of the industry.

Court reporters are navigating three interconnected forces:

• People who abuse power within the profession.
• Systems that exploit labor through impossible expectations, legal loopholes, and digital disruption.
• A culture that normalizes cruelty and mistakes it for strength.

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The Personal Bullies – Power Plays and Professional Intimidation

On the human level, bullying in court reporting can look like:

• Agency pressure – threatening to blacklist a reporter if they decline an unrealistic turnaround or refuse to work without proper pay.
• Attorney intimidation – yelling, belittling, or demanding a reporter “just delete that from the record” in violation of ethics and law.
• Gatekeeping within associations – industry leaders using their positions to discredit dissenters, retaliate against whistleblowers, or block speaking opportunities.
• Peer hostility – colleagues undermining one another to secure jobs, clients, or status.

These personal interactions create an environment where speaking up feels risky. Reporters often fear losing work or being ostracized — which makes silence an easier, but more damaging, choice.

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The Systemic Bullies – Deadlines, Policy, and Profit Models

The StenoImperium article describes how time itself becomes the adversary — a bully that never sleeps. But behind those deadlines are systemic forces shaping the profession’s stress:

• Unrealistic turnaround expectations – Daily copy, same-day delivery, and expedited transcripts stacked back-to-back without relief.
• Legislative erosion – Bills like AB 711 in California normalize the absence of human reporters, emboldening courts and agencies to devalue the role.
• Digital disruption – The aggressive push by large firms to replace stenographers with digital recording and AI transcription undercuts rates, quality, and due process.
• Client-as-dictator model – In many agencies, “customer service” means bending or breaking labor standards to keep attorneys happy. The reporter bears the cost.
• Pay compression – Even as expectations climb, page rates stagnate or drop, with agencies pocketing the difference.

These systemic pressures don’t just make the job harder — they make it easier for personal bullies to thrive. When the system normalizes overwork and underpayment, individuals can exploit that vulnerability without consequence.

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The Cultural Bully – Normalizing Cruelty as “Power”

Robert Reich, former U.S. secretary of labor, writes about the “collapse of decency” in leadership and the way cruelty becomes normalized. This same dynamic exists in microcosm within court reporting.
Every time a stronger party bullies a weaker one — whether it’s a high-profile agency against a freelance reporter, or a judge allowing intimidation in the courtroom — the social fabric of the profession frays.

An abuse culture thrives on three conditions:

1. Fear – Reporters fear losing work or being blacklisted.
2. Humiliation – Public shaming, whisper campaigns, and online pile-ons.
3. Favouritism – Certain individuals get plum assignments or leniency they haven’t earned, while others are punished for speaking out.

Favourites fawn over the bully for self-preservation, while targets live in constant anxiety. This is not a sign of power — it’s evidence of illness in the system and, in many cases, illness in the individual.

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Bullying Is Not Just Immoral — It’s a Medical Crisis

According to neuroscience research cited in The Bullied Brain, chronic bullying damages both brain and body, leading to anxiety, depression, substance abuse, suicidal ideation, midlife disease, and shortened lifespans.
Bullying is contagious — exposure breeds more bullying, especially when it is rewarded or left unchecked.

Healthy leaders have robust affective empathy circuits; bullies, by contrast, have eroded them. Treating chronic bullies as “powerful” rather than ill feeds the cycle. Just as infectious disease is quarantined, persistent abusers of power should be removed from positions where they can harm others, given psychological evaluation, and placed in rehabilitation programs.

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Why the Two Types of Bullies Feed Each Other

Personal bullies often hide behind systemic ones. An agency owner who threatens to stop sending jobs if you miss a deadline can point to “industry standards” — even if those standards are abusive.
Likewise, systemic bullies — like legislative changes that strip reporters from proceedings — gain power when individuals in leadership refuse to push back, or worse, actively support harmful reforms for personal gain.

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Breaking the Cycle

Combating bullying in court reporting means tackling all three levels at once:

1. Call out unethical behavior — and know this is not bullying
   There’s a crucial difference between bullying and accountability. Bullying is about power, intimidation, and silencing dissent. Calling out unethical conduct is about protecting the profession, clients, and the record. A common tactic of real bullies is to label the whistleblower as the bully to deflect attention from their own misconduct. They rally allies to harass or ostracize the person who spoke up, creating the illusion that the target is the aggressor. But in reality, the bully is the one weaponizing the group against an individual, not the one standing alone and pointing out wrongdoing.
2. Push for structural reform – Advocate for laws, agency policies, and industry norms that protect human reporters, not just corporate margins.
3. Build solidarity – An isolated reporter is a vulnerable reporter. A connected, informed community is harder to bully — whether by a person or a system.
4. Redefine “standards” – The profession must resist normalizing unrealistic delivery times and rates that devalue the skill, accuracy, and judgment only a stenographer brings.
5. Reframe bullying as a medical crisis – Address chronic bullying as a health emergency, not a moral weakness. Illness can be treated; cruelty disguised as “leadership” should be quarantined.

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Sidebar: How Bullies Reverse the Narrative

Bullies in court reporting often don’t just intimidate — they manipulate. One of their most effective tactics is reversing the roles so the person exposing wrongdoing becomes the “problem.” Here’s how it works:

1. You call out unethical behavior
   You point to facts, policies, or conduct that harm the profession, clients, or due process.
2. They frame you as the aggressor
   Instead of addressing the behavior, they accuse you of being “negative,” “toxic,” or a “bully” for speaking up.
3. They rally a group to back them
   Using alliances, industry status, or association platforms, they get others to publicly or privately attack you — often without those people even knowing the full context.
4. You’re left standing alone
   Isolated and outnumbered, you appear to be the one “causing trouble” simply because you refuse to back down from the truth.
5. They hide behind the crowd
   The real bully is not the lone voice demanding accountability — it’s the one orchestrating a group to harass or ostracize that person.

Bottom line:
Calling out unethical conduct is not bullying. The real bully is the one who uses intimidation, reputation attacks, and group pressure to silence you.

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Final Word

The StenoImperium article framed the deadline race as a constant, grueling sprint. In truth, the clock is just one of many bullies in the room. The others are the individuals and systems that exploit fear, normalize cruelty, and reward compliance over integrity.

Until stenographers recognize that personal, systemic, and cultural bullying are all part of the same problem — and treat it as a professional and medical crisis — the profession will remain at the mercy of those who profit from its exhaustion.

The first step is naming it. The next is refusing to run someone else’s race. The final step is building a profession where empathy is a prerequisite for leadership, not a casualty of it.

Disclaimer

The content of this post is intended for informational and discussion purposes only. All opinions expressed herein are those of the author and are based on publicly available information, industry standards, and good-faith concerns about nonprofit governance and professional ethics. No part of this article is intended to defame, accuse, or misrepresent any individual or organization. Readers are encouraged to verify facts independently and to engage constructively in dialogue about leadership, transparency, and accountability in the court reporting profession.

• The content on this blog represents the personal opinions, observations, and commentary of the author. It is intended for editorial and journalistic purposes and is protected under the First Amendment of the United States Constitution.
• Nothing here constitutes legal advice. Readers are encouraged to review the facts and form independent conclusions.

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