Help Needed! Zero Tolerance Gets Third Grader & His Cool Knife Expelled

Awful. Seriously seriously terrible. That the school has no way to mitigate such a ridiculous policy despite staff’s relationship to the boy is HORRIFYING. Another (incredibly sad) reason to do my very best to keep my kids out of CA public schools — many of which are EXCELLENT but stuck in a ridiculous, unwieldy, and short-sighted larger system. This poor kid. Jeesh.

If the officer seriously stated he would shoot the boy if he ever saw him holding a knife again, I would start by addressing the Federal Felony committed by that officer. Both abuse of power and threatening the life of a minor child. It is one thing if an officer is going after an armed assailant and yells, “Stop or I’ll shoot.” But to threaten an, at the time, unarmed minor child with deadly force is quite another matter, and any officer on the force who can not unarm an 8yo with a 3 inch pocket knife, needs to turn in his badge and put away his gun.

I also agree with Difster, in this day and age, my children will never go to a public school, with all of the “safety” BS, they would be much safer schooled in a garbage dump, and until schools improve, mine will be home schooled.

I would take the younger boy out of the school. If he’s not enrolled at the school, then they won’t get as much money. And, there isn’t anything that they learn in kindergarten that they can learn at home.

Any cop who threatens a child, telling him he could be shot, is clearly lacking the judgement necessary for anyone in a position of authority. That officer should be bounced off the public payroll immediately.

No. No no no no no no.

No.

KNIVES DO NOT BELONG IN SCHOOLS. Any knife that is sharp enough to properly stab or slash a person – and pocket knives most often fall into this category – absolutely does not belong in the hands of children at school. Ever. It should be considered a lethal weapon, and punishment should be carried out in accordance with this. What he should have done was turned it in to a teacher/whoever as soon as he noticed he had it and explained that he’d made a mistake. Instead, he was playing with the knife and showing it off to his friends after school. Not safe and not mature. In a he-said-she-said case like this, maybe he did brandish it at the girl, or threaten her or something (even if he did such a thing in jest, it’s thoroughly wrong when doing it with an actual weapon). Perhaps full-on expulsion is a bit strong, but serious punishment is in order. He brought a functional weapon to school. He played with it. He showed it to his friends.

It’s completely reasonable for appropriate children to own and use sharp knives, but not to bring them to school. It’s completely reasonable for children to bring knives that aren’t slashy or stabby to school to use on their lunch (I had a serrated knife – great for cutting things that are somewhat firm and stationary, but would be a completely useless weapon against a living creature). Toy guns and what-have-you are harmless and therefore fine. Actual, functional weapons are not fine. Ever. While your individual child may be very much sensible, mature and restrained enough to handle their knife properly – as a tool – they will be bringing the knife into the vicinity of literally hundreds of other children, many of whom may NOT be sensible and mature enough to handle a knife, and may steal, take, or borrow it from them, then use it as a weapon – either on people or as a vandalism tool.

No weapons in schools, thank you.

christi and sera.. if the boy,as you both suggested, relized he had the knife with him by mistake and handed it to the teacher the result would have beeen the same. zero tolerance means no thought just reaction[actually over reaction]. even if he was showing that “maturity of mind” it would have changed nothing. the district like many think nothing of ruining childrens lives to teach the remaining to fear them. yes fear. if they don’t fear the teachers and the police and the other authorities[elected or not] they might start questioning all the rules and regulations. they might even start thinking and figuring things out on their own and [gasp ] trying to change the stupider ones. we can’t have that can we[sarcasm on high]. move along with the rest of the flock, you are all the same and interchangable,if we loss one or two or more we can just replace them.

Can David Pimentel try to find a lawyer who could help?

Ultimately, these things sometimes have to be changed through carefully orchestrated court action. At that point, perhaps unfortunately, the individuals involved become symbolic of a larger issue. Think “Brown v Board” or “Roe v Wade.” But behind such a campaign is never a random case that just happened to plop down in front of the Supreme Court; it’s a lawyer who set up a case and then waited for the right example. David Pimentel might be the guy, or be able to bring others in.

Good grief. A pocket knife is not a weapon. A pocket knife is a TOOL. Sure, it can be used as a weapon; just about anything can. But making children afraid of tools, as if they were weapons, is as counterproductive as making children fear all strangers as if they were pedophiles. There was a time — and in other cultures that time is still now — when an eight-year-old without a knife in his pocket would be the oddball. Of course back then they had much more experience with knives as tools and no TV to tell them otherwise.

“Like I’ve always said — policies of zero tolerance, lead to actions of zero intelligence.” I love this!

yes christi i know it is reactionary but no it is not ignorant, it has come from decades of experiance watching the school district’s handling of not only my children but entire classes. unquestioning obediance must be maintained at all costs as far as they are concerned and heaven forbid you have the intelligence of nerve to complain or question. you’re feeling seems to be that they have the best intrests of every child uppermost in the minds but that’s not true. any one you rocks the boat must be put in their place[unless your child is the teachers favorite,then you’re golden and can do no wrong]. i stand by my pervious statement. if they feel destroying one child’s hopes for the future[in the name of safety and zero tolerance], and that is what this expulsion will do, will scare the others into line they will do it. even if this punishment is overturned it will follow him for the rest of his acedemic career and possible his life. and you think this is an appropriote reaction? who here is the ignorantone? not me!

There was an incident at my son’s school a few years back where a kid brought a pocket knife to school. They were 3rd or 4th graders at the time. In that case, it did appear to be deliberate and there was at least the semblance of a threat towards another kid. And though I don’t think there was ever any real possibility of violence – it was just a dumb kid showing off – he got suspended.

So basically a worse crime than in this article, and a lesser punishment. A sane punishment.

Overreaction, indeed.

Zero tolerance should be called “zero thought” because that’s what it is. A monkey could be principal under zero tolerance. I could go into any school, any classroom and find something that could be used as a weapon. That pen you’re writing with? Perfect weapon. That textbook? Could cause a nice head injury. This just shows me how stupid zero tolerance is and I’m so glad I don’t live in CA any more.

I think what I find the most disturbing about this story is the fact that a person who carries a gun for a living, and is charged with protecting the public, and who should be someone a child can trust and respect, thought it was appropriate to threaten the life of a third-grade boy under these circumstances. Beyond anything else that happened here, I find that inexcusable, and would think it entirely appropriate for that officer to lose his badge over this incident.

I was in high school when Zero Tolerance laws were taking over California. It was a rural school, and like a previous poster commented, hunting was a means many families used to put food on the table. One of my class hours every day was spent in the attendance office doing clerical work. One day, a class mate came into the office to explain that he had just realized he had left his rifle in the gun rack of his truck which was parked in the school parking lot.

The vice principal was new to our town and called the principal in to confer. Finally, they told the student to put the gun behind the truck seat where it could not be seen, not mention it to anyone else and go back to class.

Another time, a new student from an urban area came into the office with a knife disguised as a tube of lipstick. Apparently it was something she had carried at her old school “for protection.” She had shown it to some other kids and they had told her to take it to the office. The vice principal explained Zero Tolerance to her, told her she had entered a different culture where she did not need “protection,” took the knife saying he would give it back at the end of the day but if she ever brought another to school she would be expelled, and sent her back to class.

I will give those posters who cannot tell the difference between a mistake and intent, a tool and a weapon the benefit of the doubt and assume that they have been in a situation such as the new girl’s former school where “protection” was part of the culture. My classmates and I continued to bring pocket knives to school, even after Zero Tolerance was implemented, because they were tools. I would guess most of the students were thus equipped. We also carried things like aspirin, which were also verboten under Zero Tolerance, because we realized just how ridiculous those rules were.

A kid should be expelled for accidentally bringing in a pocket knife, which could be used to stab someone? But at his disposal every day he still has scissors, sharp pencils, forks from the cafeteria, sticks and rocks from the playground, staplers, or 50 other things that could harm his classmates? Maybe the school district should perform routine psychological profiling on all the students, to find out which ones are least likely to control their impulses, and make those kids learn in a padded classroom with fingerpaints.

Kids should not bring guns or knives to school. But not every sharp object should be classified a weapon. I think it’s fine to say you can’t bring pocket knives to school, but I don’t think it’s fine to act as if the poor kid was going to go on a murderous rampage with his Swiss Army multi-tool.

I teach my kids to follow the rules. But I don’t want them to follow all rules blindly, either. I want them to evaluate the purpose of the rule, the behaviors it is trying to promote, and understand the tradeoffs (loss of freedom in exchange for protecting the masses). That way, when they are older, they can figure out for themselves which rules need changing.

Ut, I’m so glad I don’t send my kids to public school here anymore. We had a similar incident in our private school last month. Child got a talking to and the parents were told not to allow him to do so again. That’s it. No other action taken. Some of the other parents freaked out and said that’s grounds for expulsion! It had to be pointed out to them that this is a private school and we don’t work like that.

So if he does get expelled, I’ll point out there’s a private school not too far from Sunnyvale that at least has some sense about these things.

OK….mother calls school….school tells district…..disctrict calls cops.

In my opinion, because this was a child, who is not normally a troublemaker, who made an innocent (at least) and thoughtless (at most) mistake, this should have stopped at “Mother calls school.” At that point, the parents of the kids with the knife are called and there’s a meeting with ALL parties, a discussion, consequences if necessary, and….that’s it. It would have been done. What is with all this dramatic escalation to the law?? A little perspective, people, please!!!!

way too many people gear knives mixed with children. Knives that children have are tools. That is all. Now that boy knows his knife to be a weapon by adults freaking out over it. ALso, I would like to point out that it is a POCKET knife. it’s not as if he brought (or that his family gave him), a 10 inch kitchen knife. The school should have done a better job with this particular situation. Shame on the them, they just let that boy down.

One more reason to be thankful my kids don’t go to school. Nanny-statism at its very worst.

Also, the cop who threatened the little boy is a sicko who needs to be in a different line of work — one that doesn’t involve carrying a weapon or dealing with children.

Also, the entire public school system needs to be privatized, with all possible haste. Privatization will not solve all of the problems, but I guarandamntee you that things will never improve, and will almost certainly get worse, as long as the government is in charge of running the schools.

And don’t even get me started on the cop who has now likely scared a child into never trusting a police officer.

There is no perspective anymore. And no account for individualism. In our attempt to never single any one out negatively, we end up negating all individual personality. Every incident is treated as Columbine. Every kid, record or not, is treated as an immediate threat. Everything is a potential lawsuit.

It sucks.

I am willing to bet that the boy in question figured that because school was over, it was ok to show the knife to his friends. As others in the past have pointed out, telling the school early in the day would have resulted in the same set of circumstances for this boy.

As to the comment about not wearing clean clothes – goodness gracious! Little judgmental there? Boys, in particular, do that. Shoot, even my husband wears his pants to work more than once. I do the same, and no, none of us stink! As a kid, we had school clothes and play clothes. School clothes got hung up to be worn at least twice. Play clothes the same thing. Not washing clothing that is not dirty makes the clothing last longer (lint= lost cloth) and is wasteful of water, energy and time. Besides that, have you seen boy’s pants lately? My sons’ pants have all sorts of pockets with Velcro and zippers and stuff regularly goes through the wash and stays in the pockets. The fact that the boy had on clothing that he wore over the weekend, clean or not, really has no bearing on this discussion other than the commenter making it sound like the child had neglectful parents, which has not been brought up in the original post.

I hope that the officer involved in this is not a assigned to school duty. I would be fearful of an officer who admits that he would draw a gun on an 8 year old who was showing his friends a knife. (Teens yelling “Fight, fight” and kids circling each other with knives is a totally different situation and does call for different circumstances but I would hope that a tazer would be first resort, not a gun.)

If he had turned it in, I suspect that he would have been treated exactly the same way. Remember the incident with the boy who found somebody else’s k nife by the toilets, turned it in, and got slammed?

Sera and Christi – if you read the article, you would know that the boy only showed it (as many kids would) an HOUR AFTER the school was dismissed. NOT during lunch. Keyword SHOWED, not waived, not “brandished” with the intent of stabbing, SHOWED. By law, a pocket knife is not considered a deadly weapon, so long as the blade is no longer than width of your palm (relative to the person holding it). And yes, this is what I’ve been told by police officers. At 8-9 years old, a “deadly weapon” sized pocket knife would have been pretty big, and would have been noticeable in the boy’s pocket. But considering, he didn’t even know it was in there till later in the day, one can easily speculate that the pocket knife was pretty small. Back when I was in elementary school, there were a number of kids who carried pocket knives. I still have mine. And it’s really small (blade is a little under 2 inches long). And back then EVERYONE used common sense. I showed mine in class one day. Teacher saw, told me I shouldn’t be taking it out in school. Confiscated it for the day, and returned to me after school. Told me to leave in my backpack when I’m in school. Done. No expulsion, no suspension, no detention, no principle and no parents got involved. And guess what, that talking to was all I needed. And never brought it back it school. I was a kid, and didn’t know any better. We as parents and teachers are suppose to TEACH students. If they make a mistake, we TEACH them how to NOT make it again. We can’t do this when we punish the right off the bat, when they don’t even understand WHY. Let’s put it this way, what if ZERO tolerance applied to adults workplace, stores, community centers. They pull out a pocket knife, and get hauled off to jail. You think that would ever fly in the adult world? I don’t think so. It’s a freaking POCKET KNIFE. People just don’t think anymore, and are to engross in their holier than thou attitude.

As Mike Watts said…”policies of zero tolerance, lead to actions of zero intelligence.” So true.

I question the validity of this statement

“One of them was a girl and because the blade was pointing her direction, she decided he was “brandishing it” and went to tell her mom, who told the office, who told the district, who told the cops, one of whom said if he saw him with a knife again, he could shoot him.

Sound too much like “Friend of a Friend….” stories where the words get so twisted because of 6 degrees of separation.

At any rate… punishment yes absolutely. Expulsion.. a bit too extreme

Christi,

The position of schoolteacher has always attracted, in addition to genuine teachers with a calling, small minded petty tyrants who like to bully children … because they are at least dimly aware that if they tried it on adults somebody would shoot them. As the “Education System” has calcified and rotted these vermin have gravitated to the administrative positions they crave. The shift in authority from local school-boards to State and federal bureaucracies has been a godsend to them; before they couldn’t go too far before getting brought up short by parents, and possibly horsewhipped.

There are good people in the education system, but the system is run by and for swine.

Zero tolerance means that no judgment is allowed.

Zero tolerance also suggests that NO level of risk is appropriate. Ever.

Heaven forbid when these little angels get off on their own and have to handle screwdrivers, drills, kitchen knives, pots and pans, hammers and other potentially deadly weapons. They might get cut, bruised, or injured. Just so no one gets hurt… as they age, let’s just grandfather out of use all items that could be potentially dangerous. Because, really, at any age, with no experience, someone is likely to get hurt.

I sure learned the hard way how not to close my pocketknife. I can promise you that in the nearly forty years since, I’ve never tried to close the knife by pushing on the sharp side of the blade. I was about 8 years old and at Girl Scout Camp. We were expected to have them with us at all times.

In my experience, these rules are enforced only depending on who the kid is. I was in high school during Columbine, and my school had the zero tolerance + cameras freak out afterwards. A friend of mine got suspended (though not expelled) for having a pocket knife in his car. However, I worked in the theatre, and like many of my friends carried the master key to the school and 2 multitools on me at all times. My theatre supervisors, both English teachers, were well aware of this, and I’m 90% certain the principal knew we had knives, she certainly knew we had the master key. It was no big deal for us.

When zero-tolerance policies began taking hold, they had nothing to do with child safety, and everything to do with schools not wanting to get sued for discrimination. It was the way that schools could make sure that majority and minority students were always treated equally, by taking thought, rationality, common sense, and the human factor out of the equation.

All schools have good kids who generally follow the rules (or try to) and who an administration will often let slide if they make a mistake or a slip-up. Schools also have problem kids who don’t care much about the rules, and naturally administrations are much less likely to let even minor infraction slide by with these kids. The problem is, if racism is at work, you’re going to find more black kids in the latter category and more whites in the former. By saying that all infractions, no matter how minor, are always dealt with strongly and in the same way, it protects school systems from both actual racism, and the appearance of it.

So zero-tolerance started as lawsuit protection, not child protection.

All you anti-public-school ranters really need to settle down. Yes, the public schools have problems. No, they are not the spawn of Satan. I live in the Sunnyvale School District and my children went to an elementary school very close to the one mentioned in the post. These are basically good schools. The solution is not to pull our kids out of them or shut down the public education system; the solution is to work together to solve the problem of ridiculous zero-tolerance laws. Who’s with me?

–Virginia, who carried a pocket knife in her purse from age 12 until it became too inconvenient to have to remember to take it out before going anywhere that might have a metal detector.

How sad that it is easier to get a kid expelled from school for questionable behavior than it is to fire teachers accused of criminal behavior.

Does anyone have any links to other zero tolerance policies getting changed after media reports?

10 years ago when I was in Bozeman Montana, kids regularly brought guns to school after a morning of hunting and left them in their trucks. The school administration did have something to say about it, as I recall.

“Lock your truck doors. Guns have been stolen out of trucks while students are in class.”

The guns were in the trucks in the typical hunter fashion, on a rack in the back window so that that there was no question that there was a concealed weapon if the driver was stopped by the police for a traffic violation. (All of this was pre and post Columbine.)

Now, while this was an unheard of level of sanity, I do recall that about the time of Columbine there were some bomb threats, with bombs supposedly in back-packs. So the high school banned back packs and made the kids use school issued straps to hold their books. Girls, boys in sports (cups,) complained about the lack of privacy for necessary items, and after a couple of weeks sanity returned and kids were allowed backpacks again.

So yes, school administrations CAN change their minds over what is considered “safe.” I hope they do so with this boy too.

How on earth did we get to the point where people think a child shouldn’t have a pocketknife in school? Why are we such a safe yet panicked society? What are we so afraid of? Seriously.

Moreover, let’s think of what happens when this generation grows up. We’ll have a bunch of adults running around who are used to being watched, judged, and punished at all times. They’ll be even more panicky than our current crop of adults.

The question is, what should we actually do about this! Should be all be contacting the Sunnyvale School District? Let’s get some action going here. Commenting to this self selected group doesn’t achieve much.

And don’t worry, I’m not some kind of self-deluded pseudo-guru who never has a judgemental thought in her head. I feel just as desperate as any of you when I first hear about anything that triggers outrage around well-being for kids, and I usually want to just march right in and raise holy hell. It might intimidate someone into caving in, but it doesn’t bring the lasting change that can only come from true connection and understanding, agreements brought about by a collaborative effort to create a world that works for everyone.

Sometimes I just follow my rage and go with the “raise holy hell” stuff. Only rarely these days. But any time I do, I see how inefficient it really is. It feels good for a moment, maybe, but there’s a price to pay.

And empathy does NOT mean being a doormat, or ignoring your own values. Quite the opposite, really. But intimidation means ignoring others’ values and needs, a sure-fire recipe for long-term conflict, even if there’s a short-term “victory.” This goes both ways, as the authorities who have imposed “zero-tolerance” laws throughout history always find out…

Can we set up an ‘alternative public school system’ please? Give the government-run school systems some competition? I’m not talking about ‘private schools’ that let you into a better school if you can pay enough green. I’m talking about a network of schools that anyone can attend, run on free-range principles (and run by free-range principals!) at which kids are taught to be capable, independent, sensible, confident, non-afraid citizens of a normally-functioning society.

Not all public schools are bad, and not all home-schooling is heavenly (or possible for many of us). We need some alternative that shows how it should be done, and prompts the existing schools to shift their thinking and improve. Competition would be good for them, like in the business world, no?

I think the only way to get educators to understand the stupidity of zero tolerance is to impose it on them.

Lose it and holler at one kid? Fired, no mercy.

Make a mistake on one grade? Gone.

Look at the crap we put up with from teachers because everything has to be loosey-goosey when it comes to the teachers’ union. They can have mass cheating sessions on important tests and not only do they keep their jobs, but people make excuses for them. They can berate a child to the point of sending him to a shrink, and nothing is done about it. They can fall asleep in class and still collect their salary, health insurance and pension. Tolerance is lovely, isn’t it? Yet a little boy who forgets, has a little accident, or acts on impulse is expected to be more accountable than any adult who has done anything similar. No more double standards. Zero tolerance all the way, baby.

Meggie,

When I was in 7th grade the principal did ban a Textbook. The textbook was useless as a textbook. It was more like a coffee table book with lots of pretty pictures and very little text. It was great for slapping people upside the head. Because it was oversized you could get a good swing going. We were ordered to leave it in our lockers. We used the out of adoption previous textbook in the classroom.

About the clean clothes thing: once upon a time I was Supermom. My kids had a bath every day and wore jammies to bed and fresh clothes every morning. Yippie ki yay!

As my kids have gotten older, there are so many more meaningful things to do in the little bit of time we get in the evenings. There have been times when my kids put on clean clothes after swimmng Thursday night and wore them until bathtime Saturday. Oh well! I promise we’ll get back to daily bathing/changing by the time the kids start getting BO.

@SKL – I actually think we’re holding our kids to a bizarre level of immaturity. We’re saying “you are incapable of handling any object that may be misused.” Question – at what age do we roll back such blanket policies? High schools have the same rules. So, basically, you are incapable until graduation day, at which point you can use whatever you want, without any experience, opportunity to fail, or ways to learn from adults around you.

@Mollie – I’m totally with you. But not all parents are like you. And I do think, regardless of what the parents do, 6 hour a day exposure to this kind of thing tends to seep in. Heck, it’s not 6 hours a day anymore. Kids are being expelled for what they write on facebook or, in this case, what they do in public places after school. There was a school I remember that issued laptops, then suspended a kid after seeing something he did at home with the built-in camera! I don’t want a population that, during their formative years, got used to a total police state.

I agree that the child should have had the knife at school. But is having a knife at school that stayed nicely in your pocket only to be shown to someone an hour after school and not reported until sometime later – when I assume the knife was no longer at school – something we want children punished by the school for at all? At some point the school needs to step out of its students’ lives and let parents handle discipline matters.

This is a borderline case as the alleged brandishing was on school grounds and there does not appear to have been a break between school and home. But where do we draw the line because I have little doubt that the same thing would have occurred had the knife brandishing happened on Sunday afternoon and the school was notified? In the area where I worked in the States, kids were suspended and forced into alternative school for a month if they spent a night in juvenile detention regardless of the reason. Stealing lipstick from a store on Saturday night should not result in a school penalty. Nor should the school have any say over how you get to and fro school or what you do after school.

Ahh Pentamom, you have now discovered the major failing of the police, prosecutors and apparently anyone enforcing rules – the reporter of the crime is always believed to be telling the truth regardless of how absurd the story. Crime is extremely incestuous. Today’s criminals are just tomorrows victims. It makes sense – criminals tend to live around, near and with other criminals and, as such, frequently end up victims of crime too. It is amazing to me how, in the eyes of the police and prosecutors, the exact same person can be a saint who wouldn’t dream of lying to the police when a victim and a lying piece of crap when suspected of a crime. You’d be amazed at the number of times I’ve had the following conversation with a DA:

Me: Your victim claims to have been beaten with a stick in the head 60 times but didn’t lose consciousness, refused to go to the hospital though pregnant (because high as a kite) and had only a bruise on her shin and one on her face. You believe this story?

DA: Yes, why would she lie?

Me. Because her husband said that he was going to call DFACS (CPS) to report that she was smoking crack while pregnant, she’s already had one child taken away by CPS in Texas and she doesn’t want to lose this one too. The rumor also is that it isn’t her husband’s bun in the oven (a fact later proved to be true) and she wanted to run to Cali before the bun is fully cooked.

DA: Where’d she get the bruises then?

Me: My client claims that she got the one on her face when the stick popped back into her face when he blocked a strike from her and he has no idea about the one on the leg but from the pictures it appears to come from where she broke the stick in 2.

DA: Well your client is clearly lying.

Me: Why?

DA: blank stare that translates into “he’s the defendant.”

Me: What evidence do you have that your victim is telling the truth? Because it’s not the physical evidence. It’s not the witness you can’t find. It’s not my client’s alibi for much of the time he was allegedly holding her against her will in the house.

DA: Another blank stare that translates into “she’s the victim.”

Me: Last year you didn’t believe her when she told the police that she didn’t steal her neighbor’s jewelry that she pawned for crack but instead her neighbor gave it to her (I didn’t believe her either but that’s not the point). Why is she suddenly so trustworthy?

DA: Another blank stare that translates into “she’s the victim.”

Me: Looks around for a gun to blow my brains out.

SKL- It already exists–

Is this the kind of accountability you guys are suggesting for teachers? Or does your sense of injustice at least swing both ways?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/17/lincoln-brown-chicago-tea_n_1285750.html?ref=education

Actually, Christi, this is completely different. That teacher was suspended after a full hearing into the matter in which the teacher was allowed to present evidence that he was using the word to educate his students. You may or may not agree with the results of the hearing (I wouldn’t know as I don’t know what was said), but the teacher was not automatically fired (or fired at all) for simply saying the “n” word. He was allowed to justify it’s use before punishment was handed down. There is no rule that “n” word equals 5 day suspension regardless of situation.

Children, on the other hand, are expelled instantly for having a knife. It doesn’t matter why they had it. The rules allows for no arguments as to whether the presence of the knife is valid or whether it was an accident. Knife simply equals expulsion.

That said, a white teacher who has been teaching in majority black inner city schools for 21 years should know better than to ever use the “n” word. It is going to offend someone regardless of how you use it. My coworker was upset when I used the full “n” in quoting a report. I thought it was idiotic but some are very sensitive to the term.

Sigh.

“I don’t want to bother having to deal with lilly-livered hoplophobic nincompoops who can’t tell the difference between a weapon and a tool.”

“A pocket knife is not a weapon. A pocket knife is a TOOL.”

Yes. It is a tool. It is a tool that can be used as a lethal weapon.

Y’know something? Pretty much every time I’ve wished I had a tool on me, and didn’t have that tool, it’s been a screwdriver. The times it wasn’t a screwdriver, it was pliers. I’ve never, to my recollection, been out and about and thought “gee, I really wish I was carrying a knife”. (If I’m going to need a knife, I take one especially for the purpose).

If you really think that children need to be carrying around tools, why not a pair of needlenose pliers? Why not a set of allen keys? A shifting spanner? A set of screwdrivers, or, even better, one ‘o them screwdrivers with interchangeable heads, so s/he can unscrew ALL the screws. No, you want them to be carrying around the tool designed to cut and pierce things, including meat. The most dangerous one. The one most widely regarded as a weapon. No. Children having knives in their pockets at school is not necessary.

“Sera,
Which is more dangerous a 3 inch blade? Or a 6 inch (or longer) flat head screw driver?”

A flat head screwdriver tapers to a point, but is not sharp. You cannot pierce yourself with one the same way you can with a knife. You need to use considerably more strength to stab someone with a screwdriver (or with scissors, or something similar) than you do to stab someone with a knife. Screwdrivers don’t have bladed edges at all, so you can’t slash someone with a screwdriver. You can do so with a knife.

“For those who complain that knives do not belong in school, I have to ask, “Why not?” Okay, yes, kids can poke each other with them, but in my time kids poked each other with pencils”

Again, pencils and pens taper to a point, but are not sharp. Pencils and pens will also generally break if you try to stab someone with them – a cloth shirt will mitigate most or all of the piercing power of a pencil or pen. You can do far more than “poke” someone with a knife. You can stab someone through a shirt or even a leather jacket with a knife. The knife won’t give or break, because metal is stronger than flesh. Also, again, you cannot slash someone with a pencil or pen.

“If you think about it, most household [objects] can turn into weapons.”

Yes. However, it becomes ridiculously impractical very fast to ban all common household objects that may be used as weapons. Much like how driving is more dangerous to people’s children than children going places alone is, yet people do drive places with their kids but won’t let them go to places alone – driving is a necessity to our lives, so we accept or ignore the risk. Similarly, schools cannot, to any degree of practicality, ban all objects that can possibly be used as weapons, but children do NOT need knives at school. Dangerous AND unnecessary? Yeah, no thanks.

Also, the vast majority of your household objects are things that are large and heavy, yes? Bludgeoning weapons? A blunt, bludgeoning weapon is far less dangerous than a knife because:

– The deadliness of a blunt object is directly proportional to the strength of the person wielding it. Slashing or stabbing someone with a sharp knife is very little dependent on the strength of the assailant.

– Concealability. Any blunt object large and heavy enough to seriously hurt someone is too large and heavy to carry around all the time without somebody noticing. A baseball bat etc. does not fit in someone’s pocket. A knife is far smaller and lighter and CAN be hidden in a pocket.

“Funny thing, but it used to be that almost every boy carried a pocket knife everywhere, including to school, and most amazingly there were not rivers of blood in the halls”

Funny thing, but times have changed since then. It is no longer common, or assumed, that a child always has a knife in his or her pocket. Children now are far less often in situations where a knife may be required. Children are far more infantised now – a child at 8 back then was far more responsible and mature than a child at 8 now. Also, I believe that schools are now far more high-stress than they were back then.

“Keyword SHOWED, not waived, not “brandished” with the intent of stabbing,”

No. The boy’s side of the story is that he did not wave, brandish, or threaten with the knife. The girl’s side of the story is that he did. Whether or not the girl is telling the truth, there IS an accusation that he DID use the knife as a weapon – there is no clear-cut case that he did NOT at any point use it as a weapon.

“Lets also use this as a lesson in why you should not escalate your complaints about other students. When these things stay with a teacher and maybe principal they are not a problem.”

Yes. Sure. You shouldn’t escalate your complaint that your ~8-year-old daughter was threatened with a knife after school on school property. Yes, she may be lying, or have freaked out over nothing, but the accusation still stands. I’d damn well hope that there is a thorough and serious investigation into ANY child’s claims that they were threatened with a weapon. And yes, threatening someone with a lethal weapon IS a criminal matter. Again, the boy may have done nothing wrong at all, but that needs to be investigated and found out for sure, NOT assumed that he didn’t do it because he says he didn’t.

“Not even grounds for suspension as far as I’m concerned, unless it was actually being USED AS A WEAPON.”

Right. Because you need to wait until the dangerous, unnecessary item that the child is carrying around hidden in his pockets is actually used to hurt or threaten someone, then take action. Y’know, rather than banning them from bringing it to school in the first place.

I’d just like to ask the pro-knife-at-school people the following things:

– Why is it necessary, or even desirable, for your child to have a knife at school? I’m certainly not saying that children should never be allowed to use, own, or carry sharp knives, just that they should never be taken to school.

– How would you feel if your child or his classmates were habitually carrying around at school, say, one of those foot-long monkey wrenches (read: a foot of heavy steel club) to school? You know, to wrestle with those tough large-size nuts and bolts, as every child does from time to time. Obviously.

Well, I was going to just repost Sera’s original comment and replace every instance of “knife” with “scissors”, to show how ridiculous this all is, but I see that Sera has already not only beaten me to the punch, but has decisively clinched the All-Internet “Missing the Point”, “Dramatic Overreaction” and “Can’t Tell If Serious Or Sarcastic” and “abandon Common Sense in favor of Complete Inability to Understand Cost-Benefit Based Risk Analysis” titles *simultaneously.*
Well done!

PS Can you possibly be serious?

ps sera as for the point where you stated there is no evidence he did not use the knife as a weapon,have we now gotten rid of innocent until proven guilty if favor of if you can be proven innocent immediantly you’re guilty?

@ Jon

… uh, yeah? I’m completely serious? Are you trying to tell me that knives are not dangerous weapons?

I grew up in a rural area. At the primary school and both high schools I went to, a COMMON pasttime for many, if not most, boys of my age, was torturing, hurting and/or killing small animals. No, I’m not talking about one or two disturbed little boys. I mean I grew up thinking (with lots of perfectly reasonable and valid evidence at hand) that little boys like to hurt and kill things. I am now 21 and I have yet to be shown strong evidence to the contrary.

At my first high school, the one that I left, an eight-foot, razor wire fence was built around the agriculture plot because local youths were sneaking in at night with their dogs and killing the sheep. I mean the humans and the dogs were physically attacking and murdering the sheep. For fun. Same with the chickens. The cattle, it seems, were too big.

When I was about 15 or 16, one of the girls in my year had (so the story goes) stolen the boyfriend of another girl, also in my year. The girl and her friends caught up with her after school. They ripped out half of her hair, burned her books, and threw her bag into a tree. That’s a more extreme example, but I think you get the general idea.

Now, imagine all that but with knives. Lighters is bad enough. It doesn’t matter if your kid is in a good school or a good area (it wouldn’t be hard to be in a better area than my old school zonings), knives do NOT need to be in that environment.

No, I’m not generally in favour of zero tolerance policies, but we’re talking about dangerous weapons in the hands of children, while around other children. Despite the parent’s judgement on their OWN child’s maturity and behaviour, that knife is going to be accessible to a wide variety of other children who are NOT mature or stable enough to have knives at school. Schoolchildren are stressed. Schoolchildren are bullies or being bullied. Schoolchildren do NOT have an adult’s wisdom, an adult’s understanding of the consequences, or an adult’s control over their temper. Again, we’re talking about weapons that can be used to kill people, in situations where the weapon does not need to be present at all. There is no real positive to children having knives at school, and a hell of a LOT of negative. I would never have felt safe during my school days had I had reason to suspect that any given other child was carrying a knife around in their pockets.

It’s far too easy for a child found carrying a knife to say that they “forgot” it was in their pocket or “accidentally” brought it to school. Or claim that they need it to use as a tool. I’ve never found that I had the need to use a pocket knife as a tool at school. Never. Not once. On the days I brought a cake, I brought a rounded-end, serrated knife to cut it – you can’t stab or slash anyone with a knife like that.

Why is it so hard for you to comprehend that knives truly are dangerous, and knives truly are unnecessary in childrens’ pockets at school? Knives are weapons. No weapons in our schools.

Again, please provide me with an explanation as to why a child SHOULD be carrying a knife to school.

@ Sera: When I was in elementary school, I had girl scouts after school. I did not go home between school and scouts, and….I brought my pocket knife. I kept in in my bag while at school, but I had it. These days, I carry a very small pocket knife and I do use it as a tool. I could probably use scissors for most of the things I use my pocket knife for, but it is more compact. You are right, a kid probably doesn’t need their own knife at school. They do (at least potentially) have access to TOOLS at school that could be used effectively as a weapon. For kids who don’t go straight home on a school bus, maybe they want/need a pocket knife for after school stuff. It would not have dawned on me to use my pocket knife as a weapon because I was taught to use it for other purposes.

I was disappointed last year when my 10 year old daughter was going off to sleep away camp for the first time. The camp had a “no drugs, no alcohol, no weapons” policy, but I didn’t consider my old pocket knife (the very one I was required to bring to camp and had used at scouts) to be a weapon. I asked if she should bring it. I was told, they preferred she not bring it, but if she did, the counselor would have to keep it because, “of course she couldn’t have it in the bunk”….why? why “of course?”….I wanted her to learn to use a pocket knife.

I taught her to use a box cutter and wire-stripper last weekend. At first, she was afraid. She asked if I had ever cut myself with a box cutter. I told her, “sure.” I also told her I was using table saws at 11 in school shop class and teaching other kids to use circular saws and box cutters for set construction (with almost no adult supervision) by the time I was 15.

Cynthia,

I would love to pull my kids out of our local schools based on what we have experienced the last couple of years unfortunately until there is a better system in place we are stuck. My homeschooling would fail based on my responsibility to my disabled husband who needs constant care. I barely get through the homework hours as it is. And our private schools are also just as bad :(. I have been racking my brain for other ideas for schooling without any success so far.

I did send a letter back to the school letting them know that one, what happens in my home and with my children in regards to social media and activities is up to me and my husband. And two, I do volunteer work by phone and email for CASA and know the law regarding what is abuse or neglect in and out. Any questioning of my children would be greeted with serious legal consequences….I still haven’t figured out what to do about the 4th grade teacher who has made it her mission to violate our home policies in regards to censorship and religion. My favorite so far as been her accusation that me allowing my daughter to explore her fascination with movie monsters (think vampires) is going to violate her “Christian Heart” and that me allowing the same daughter to wear boys clothing id going to turn her into a lesbian…..yep, public school at its finest and in a very liberal area???? I think there is something in the chocolate milk…

‘It’s far too easy for a child found carrying a knife to say that they “forgot” it was in their pocket or “accidentally” brought it to school.”

Yes, and heaven forbid that credible grounds for actual intent should need to be established before punishing someone for something that “we don’t know whether they might have wanted to do and they could be lying about not having wanted to do it.” If they forgot it was in their pocket, then clearly they weren’t threatening anyone with it. If they were threatening anyone with it, then there’s *evidence* that they didn’t just “forget” — and there’s something to actually punish them for besides having a wrongly shaped piece of metal in their pockets. I’ll buy the argument that “by then, it might be too late” if you can establish some kind of prevalent problem of eight year olds in that area doing real harm to other kids, such that treating kids who forget to put their tools away like actually violent people is justified.

When there becomes a widespread problem with little boys hurting or threatening other children with tool-type sharp objects in a local area, I’ll consider whether your ideas have merit. Unless that’s a case in a specific place, treating this child like the equivalent of a kid in some place where kids are regularly brandishing weapons to hurt people and other creatures is nothing but COWARDICE on the part of the school officials that would rather screw up a family’s lives than deal with problems as they actually do, or do not, present themselves.

Sera,

I hate to say it but I think this is one instance where you may need a little life experience behind you other than 21 years, no parenting and what appears to be a rural upbringing.

8 year olds forget all sorts of things in their pockets. It is par for the course. If a child has a pocket knife, there is a likelihood that he will eventually accidentally carry it somewhere it’s not supposed to be. My office has represented dozens of cases in which nobody believes the bringing of the object to school was anything other than a pure accident. Such is life with children. Accidentally carrying a knife to school and then doing nothing with it should not be treated the same as bringing a knife to school and threatening others with it. Something this boy did not do under any reading of the facts during school hours.

The kid didn’t bring a machete to school nor do I expect that an 8 year old’s pocket knife is in pristine condition and razor sharp. A 3 inch pocket knife in the hands of an 8 year old is not going to kill anyone. I suppose a Navy Seal could strike in a major artery dead on with it but an 8 year old boy would need to be damn lucky to do such a thing. Kids don’t get 5 seconds of peace without an adult in school anymore and this is a young child. This kid would have to be MacGyver (80s US tv show) to even cause stitches before he was disarmed.

And, yes, a harsh penalty deserves a showing of intent. Quietly keeping a pocket knife in your pocket all school day doesn’t match the punishment of refusing to educate the child for a whole year. There is no indication that this boy was a troublemaker, was picked on or had any desire to threaten other students, and he did not do so with the knife during school hours. Nobody even knew the knife was on school property until an hour after school. There is also no indication that this boy had issues with this girl such that brandishing a knife at her makes sense. In fact, “brandishing” is a big word for an 8 year old so I imagine it came from Mom who was not even present during the alleged “brandishing.” And he showed it to a GROUP of friends, only one of which claims a “brandishing.” There is ample evidence to believe the word of the boy as to what happened.

Further, nobody is arguing that a child needs a pocket knife at school! I don’t think anyone has said that a rule against pocket knives is stupid, wrong, invalid or overprotective. I don’t want kids at my child’s school having knives, not because they are weapons, but because kids are prone to doing stupid things when in groups of other kids (and kids around here DO carry machetes). But that doesn’t mean that a child who does nothing with a pocket knife should be expelled from school, just like a kid who brings a gun and points it at his teacher. It does not mean that a parent should be forced to quit a job to homeschool the child for a year or end up in jail themselves – because the child is REQUIRED to still be educated in some fashion although not allowed in school. It does not mean that the child should be a year behind and be required to redo 3rd grade if his parents, who don’t want to homeschool, didn’t adequate educate him. People are outraged by the PUNISHMENT not the RULE.

oh sera..so you brought a round ended serrated knife to school becaise you can’t stab or slash with it? wanna bet? and if the boy say had brought a cake to school[the next item to be banned ] with such a knife the same crap would have fallen on him. i grew up in the 70’s on long island ,there were race riots at the high school the jh had a razor wire fence around it and still “tools” were not banned,of course there was always the danger but teachers and aides monitered instead of just standing there. any cofrontation[or attempted mugging]would immediatly been stopped. and yes we had moniters in the bathrooms.sorry you grew up in such a school,but i have to ask why the parents and teachers didn’t do more to prevent the psycho behavior of a minority. since it apparently has left you so scarred you can not think rationally i will try to take this into consideration.

Julie, I quite agree with your brandishing comment, and had posted earlier about it. Note that it may come down to a “he said/she said” issue, if the little girl did feel threatened by it (which she may have done, after all).

I’m not so sure about the school’s responsibility or authority to take action for kids playing after school.

I think they do have the *authority* to take action for kids playing on the school ground, after school, and would urge caution if you’re trying to argue that.

Basically: what is the burden of proof should they wish to expel an 8 year old for “brandishing” a knife? It’s not whether or not he’s caught with you – acknowledge and apologize for him bringing the knife. It’s whether or not he was threatening some one with it.

The way we treat our kids is a miniature of the type of society we envision. I am horrified at the Sera-like reaction of “ooh, that’s dangerous – ban it!” That is not how a free people behaves – and can we teach our kids about freedom in schools that are run more like totalitarian countries?

Furthermore, not allowing knives in school just means that when they graduate, they are unprepared for yet another real-world situation.

” Prime example of the obscene panic that is clouding our judgment today. Funny thing, but it used to be that almost every boy carried a pocket knife everywhere, including to school, and most amazingly there were not rivers of blood in the halls. ”

Only time I got hurt in school by a blade was when I accidentally cut myself with a pencil sharpener I’d disassembled to remove a blockage (disassembled with the tip of my Swiss Army knife I always carried with me from the age of about 7 to this day except where legally barred (like airliners)).

Pretty much everyone had one, noone ever thought to use it for something more serious than cleaning his fingernails or cutting a piece of cardboard.

If a school (district) has such serious problems with kids assaulting each other and staff they have to institute such blanket bans and file criminal charges against any kids who as as much as a fruit knife with him, they should reconsider their existence and install metal detectors with armed guards at every door and in every classroom, ban kids from having pencils and pens (which can be used to poke at people, causing horrific wounds).
Any school like that I’d also automatically disqualify as a suitable location to get my kids an education.

Oh – and Sera – YES a flathead screwdriver WILL break skin. Along with pens, pencils and anything that remotely comes to anything close to a point. I know this from life.

I’m not sure why you all have ganged up on Sera about the reality of the day.
In my father’s hometown, kids carried their BB guns to school and checked them into the office. That was true until the ’70s. Now they can’t carry them into town BECAUSE SOME IDIOTS SHOT AT CHURCH WINDOWS AND CARS on their way to school.

Yes, I’m all-capping.

In the ’80s and ’90s, my hometown school still had open campus because students walked to other buildings for automotive, botany, and work-training at nearby businesses. It went closed-campus after the increase in skipping, lunchtime vandalism and parents freaking out that the “school wasn’t watching my kids” when the kids were caught shoplifting and/or reckless driving during school hours.

I think if the vast majority of the students are responsible, you get schools like mine: Our principal used to say that the students enforced their own discipline and came up with great ideas for assemblies, “spirit” events, and field trips. But it reaches a tipping point after the first or second incident of bad behavior, particularly when the responsibility gets pushed back on the teacher or the principal. For example, just off the top of my head:

– My youngest nephews never had a class trip to Disney World because the school could no longer sanction it after incidents in which 1) students went off on their own and got involved in illegal activities and 2) chaperoning PARENTS supplied teens with alcohol.

– My old high school biology teacher stopped keeping animals for observation after 1) a “disturbed” student used a pencil to blind a turtle and 2) a couple “good” kids tortured chicks to death while he was helping a sick student get to the office.

As for Sue’s comment about racerioting in the ’70s: If a student stabbed a teacher back then in the ’70s, would he/she have been allowed to return to that school? That’s what’s really messed up about today’s society, and school along with it. Despite there being zero-tolerance of weapons and such, there’s a high tolerance for unrepentant thugs who are underaged. There’s also a whole other set of rules for special ed students, making them very hard to expell despite threats and violence. The kid who jumped my neighbor’s son (who suffered brain damage) is still attending the same middle school and there’s no chance of compensation for medical bills, since the kid’s family (such as it is) is one of those multi-generation screw-up sorts.

miss jean..if a student had stabbed a teacher ,no they would not be back in school. are you suggesting that the boy stabbed the girl or that showing the knife is the same as stabbing? both are equally ridiculous. punishment needs to fit the crime,not be one size fits all. in your nephew’s case one size fits all was applied,instead of punishing the guilty parties[because everyone in guilty til proven innocent?]. in the animal cruelty case what happened to the students? were they punished[ suspension, expulsion, criminal prosecution, mental health help] be cause that is not by any definition normal behavior. again all are denied interation with those animals because of the assumption that they all will act that way[one size fits all, etc]. if society had as a whole such zero tolerance rules any infringement would be probably death or a life sentence[ great for population control but a perfect way to end a society within a generation].

Any knife that is sharp enough to properly stab or slash a person — and pocket knives most often fall into this category — absolutely does not belong in the hands of children at school.

Why not? I have carried a pocket knife as long as I can remember – probably starting out in the cub scouts. A pocket knife is a tool, not a weapon. It’s no more a weapon than a hammer, a screwdriver, an eating knife, or for that matter a rock.

This sort of ridiculous paranoia is destroying our society.

The key question here is this: did the kid truly threaten or attack the girl? If so, his behavior deserved a reprimand or punishment. If not, there is no problem. Whether he had a pocket knife, a rock, or only a fist is irrelevant – the behavior is decisive.

i lead to death sentance or life imprisonment as a point to show how stupid zero tolerance is and where it leads little by little. slowly rights are being taken away
” for the common good”
since apparently non government people are too stupid to live their own lives[sarcasm on high]
years agao there was a show on tv,i think it was called max headroom or soimething. the thing was it showed survalence cameras in every room of every home and buisness. we all laughed at how impossible such a thing was. but now i’m very afraid that is where we are heading.

You know, clearly, there isn’t enough security in this situation. You see, the school and its district should be doing much, much more, and the district leaders should set the example:
Every district board member needs to go through a TSA style security checkpoint, governed by whatever rules the TSA actually enforces at nearby San Jose Airport when they enter the district buildings for their meetings. After all, we’re talking about our children! That’s much more important than mere aviation safety, or heaven forbid that boring automotive safety stuff.
That’s right, district board members must remove their coats and shoes, walk through at least a metal detector or full body scanner, and for the love of Pete must not have any weapons (or anything the TSA deems a threat). And yes, Mr/Mrs Board Member, that includes your Starbucks tall skinny tall latte. Have you tasted that stuff? Into the trash that goes, it’s for your own good. And your hand sanitizer too. Never can be too careful, highly educated board members might know how to turn that into a high explosive in the sink when combined with the liquid soap. You remember “Fight Club”, right? Anyone who talks back or complains also gets to experience the Constitution-free zone nature of the TSA checkpoint. But that’s ok, giving the screening agent lip could send you on an all expenses trip to any number of undisclosed locations around the world, where one can witness firsthand the fine work of our best intelligence agents using their best enhanced conversation techniques.
I think a few bake sales should be able fund this valuable security initiative, since, you can never be too careful!

Yeah. Expelling a kid over a he-said/she-said thing and the cop threatening to shoot him? I’d say good luck fighting these institutions, because that’s a big fight to pick, even with the help of the media. It’s probably time for this mom to consider some sort of homeschooling for her children, because if she starts something with this district, they’ll mark her and her kids as troublemakers and they’ll never get a fair shake.

I just read the story. Where did this happen? Does CA stand for Communist Affiliates? Americans do not go that way.

Sorry, I still don’t see a big issue with carrying pocket knives around. Whittling, among other things, is great fun, and they are marvellous tools. We were always taught not to try to use them as weapons anyway, because it is easy to misjudge the strength of your opponent and have them turned against you.

I can see the point of banning them if you have a major violence issue at your high school, or of banning them for certain pupils at primary school, but really as I’ve said before, anything can be made into a weapon. At the school my son now goes to, a bunch of boys terrorised the junior high for about a month at the end of one year, and among other things they took a cheese grater to one boy’s legs.(This particular school got nationwide bad press, and over a number of years has implemented a bunch of policies that now make it a relatively bully-free environment….). No knives involved.

Donna I was interested to hear the Samoan kids still carry around machetes. Is that for bushwhacking? My husband carried one around in Malaysia on a semi-regular basis as a kid – it made it easier to get through the jungle to visit his mates.

Hineata – Kids in Samoa don’t usually carry machetes around the streets but you definitely see kids with them. Machetes and bush knives are extremely common tools here. Every Samoan household will have at least one. They are used for yard upkeep (the whole island is a rain forest) and harvesting taro, pineapples, bananas and mangos and probably a million other things that I have no idea about. Since kids here do ample chores, kids learn to use the machete. I’m sure kids from plantation families learn how to wield them from birth. In many ways this island is very americanized (and not all good ways) and in others it’s a totally different culture. I can’t imagine parents in the states sending their kids out to do yard work with a machete.

@concerned_citizen,

It’s always a risk to rely on what kids say. This group of kids was scared once the mom sounded the alarm. Some of them have already admitted to lying. I am horrified that a child would be expelled and prosecuted on the basis of he-said/she-said heresay. That wouldn’t stand up in a regular court, but our district is willing to trust it. That should bother all of us.

i am one of the boy’s best freind, he is a kind hearted fellow!

How many more of these stories do we need before schools finally stop with the zero-tolerance idiocy? Innocent kids who would otherwise never hae gotten in serious trouble in their lives keep having their lives derailed over idiocy.

Welcome to the nanny state.

“The elite think they can manage your life better than you can… What we find that when the government tells you they’re going to give you rights, they’re going to tell you how to exercise those rights.”

Keep voting Democrat, you deserve what you get!

Ridiculous, ignorant, liberal pundits and conservative demigods; these elitist groups believe that the average American lacks common sense and thus needs someone a group or organization to make decisions for our own good.They have an agenda! My daughter wore a shirt with an image of a revolver the school made her turn it inside out, a SHIRT! However, turn on the TV or any other media device and look at the violence that completely in gulfs every sense of our beings. Freedom only comes from ethical leaders using common sense to make desisions.

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