Zero Tolerance is Zero Intelligence

A Promise is a Promise

Published on December 2, 2005 By Dr Guy In Current Events

2 students in Orange Co. California are facing expulsion for taking a teacher at her word. The teacher assigned a project where the students were to keep a journal with the understanding that no one would read it (except her for grading). Instead the teacher read somethings and decided to let others read them as well. And the students were suspended and are awaiting an expulsion hearing.

Why? Well, in their journals, they talked about torturing and killing a teacher. From the little snippets that the article revealed, it appears that they were just being stupid adolescents, and trying to one up each other on what they thought was a funny scenario. All with the expectation of the journal not being read per the promise of the teacher. But she broke her promise.

And in the zero tolerance of the post Columbine mentality of schools, these students are being punished not for anything they did (or you could say for doing what hey were told, but I digress), but for believing the word of an adult.

In this stupidity that passes for education today, they ignatzes don't even realize the damage they have done, not only to these 2 students, but to their own reputations. No longer can any student trust the word of a teacher. All teachers are suspect, and should be regarded as only telling the truth, when it suits them, and not when it is the right thing to do. And that is the lesson the teachers are not only teaching these 2 students, but the entire student body. Wow! What Nobel prize winning candidates!

When are these mental midgets going to learn that actions speak louder than words? And when you leave reason at the school door, the only thing you are teaching the students is to never trust people in authority. For they will always let you down? It requires no intelligence to enforce a zero tolerance policy where a spork becomes an expulsion offense. And the trust that the teachers are supposed to be trying to create with their student is gone.

I am glad most of my children are out of school. I pray that the remaining 2 will not be saddled with mental midgets in their last few years. But my grandchildren will have to spend a school career with a bunch of mind numbed robots that cant think for themselves and that my grandchildren can never trust for anything. Not even legitimate school work.

It is a sad day in education, not because of 2 over hormonal jocks who may have to seek a new school, but for the millions of school children that just learned a valuable lesson. Never trust a teacher. Hire a lawyer and get them to sign an unbreakable contract.

The Legal professions stock just doubled, thanks to idiots in education.

Comments (Page 4)

Texas Wahine

on Dec 02, 2005

But would you rather have the teacher come to you and your husband alone, or have your kids smeared and their sanity called into question because of a poor choice of writing material? That's the question you're posing.

Honestly, I would want them to understand the consequences, so yes, I would expect the teacher to report it to the school administration, and the authorities, if they felt it was warranted.

It would suck, and it would hurt, but it's much better for them to learn that lesson when the stakes aren't so high (and I don't consider sitting on the bench at a football game or school suspension high stakes).

The whole "my baby could NEVER do anything like that!" head-in-the-sand kind of parenting may feel good to the kids and the parents, but it teaches the kids that they can get away with anything and mommy and daddy will just sweep it under the rug.

If my kids have to hurt or be embarrassed in order to grow up to be stable, law-abiding men, then I will allow them to be hurt and embarrassed.

Rightwinger

on Dec 02, 2005

English teachers are not trained Psychologists.

--Tex W.

But Psycology DOES come into play every day in their teaching careers and is thusly required as a means to help them deal with their students. They may not be "trained" psychologists per se, but in order to become a teacher in most states, you have to have it.

A) I don't think it would be prudent for the teacher to confront the students who wrote the death threats. Her safety should have been a concern.

---Tex W.

This, then, begs the question "how well does she know her students"?
Let's do a little profiling; how many of the school "shooter-uppers" were jocks?
Most, if not all of them, were the nerdy (yes, I know....poor word choice, but it applies, at least from the jock's perspective) "victims" of the jock clique's bullying or other hazing. Jocks are joiners; social creatures. The "shooter-uppers" were all loners and brooders. And I never even HAD a Psycology class.

It's a shame.....I very well remember a time when students were afraid of the teachers, not the other way around.

A specific and graphic threat against her is not something that should be shrugged off.

I have to give you this one. But then, she shouldn't have nade the promise she made. She did. She should have called in the parents and talked it over with them.

bakerstreet

on Dec 02, 2005

The turn of this discussion is sickening. Writing a scenario in a diary isn't a "threat". They probably just wrote this specifically because they were told no one would read it. I used to embed awful little statements in our daily reports in high school because I knew the teacher didn't read them, then we'd all laugh once I got it back with an 'A' on it.

They were told that no one would read their diary. I'm sick of this pig mind-raping standard, "Wait, they could be dangerous because of what they wrote on a piece of paper" bullshit, frankly. There shouldn't be "consequences" to self-expression. There shouldn't be some f*cking mental health standard that people's material should be compared to to see if they are fit.

People go out an pay cash for Steven King books full of sick violence, they watch courtTV with rapt attention, eating up every blood spatter and arterial spray, and two kids make a silly entry into a diary because they are told someone will read it and suddenly it is a threat. Maybe the threat is all the CSI, forensics bullshit making us a culture fascinated by mental sickness and murder.

If kids artistic expression starts to mirror adult artistic expression, should you be threatened? Lets take the writers of half the shows on TV and call them a "threat".

Rightwinger

on Dec 02, 2005

The whole "my baby could NEVER do anything like that!" head-in-the-sand kind of parenting may feel good to the kids and the parents, but it teaches the kids that they can get away with anything and mommy and daddy will just sweep it under the rug.

Very true.....we could raise kids together! They might grow up to be Moderates.

If my kids have to hurt or be embarrassed in order to grow up to be stable, law-abiding men, then I will allow them to be hurt and embarrassed.

Hurt and embarrassed is one thing....having their records permanently marked for a stupidly-chosen and exectuted prank is quite another.

Rightwinger

on Dec 02, 2005

Writing a scenario in a diary isn't a "threat". They probably just wrote this specifically because they were told no one would read it. I used to embed awful little statements in our daily reports in high school because I knew the teacher didn't read them, then we'd all laugh once I got it back with an 'A' on it.

---Baker

Precisely. We used to do the same thing. Dr. Guy used to sing the song I mentioned. Nothing new under the sun, is there?

They were told that no one would read their diary. I'm sick of this pig mind-raping standard, "Wait, they could be dangerous because of what they wrote on a piece of paper" bullshit, frankly. There shouldn't be "consequences" to self-expression. There shouldn't be some f*cking mental health standard that people's material should be compared to to see if they are fit.

People go out an pay cash for Steven King books full of sick violence, they watch courtTV with rapt attention, eating up every blood spatter and arterial spray, and two kids make a silly entry into a diary because they are told someone will read it and suddenly it is a threat. Maybe the threat is all the CSI, forensics bullshit making us a culture fascinated by mental sickness and murder.

--Baker

Well said.

Texas Wahine

on Dec 02, 2005

RW:

But Psycology DOES come into play every day in their teaching careers and is thusly required as a means to help them deal with their students. They may not be "trained" psychologists per se, but in order to become a teacher in most states, you have to have it.

As someone who has taken the psychology coursework required for a teaching degree (and tons more psychology/sociology) I can tell you now that teachers aren't trained in that capacity.

Sure, having had those kids in her class for half a year, she will have some insight into their personalities, but she's not qualified to "diagnose" anything or make a judgment call about a threat.

The fact that she did indeed report it indicates that her intuition told her to take it seriously.

Let's do a little profiling; how many of the school "shooter-uppers" were jocks?
Most, if not all of them, were the nerdy (yes, I know....poor word choice, but it applies, at least from the jock's perspective) "victims" of the jock clique's bullying or other hazing. Jocks are joiners; social creatures. The "shooter-uppers" were all loners and brooders.

Link

There's one example that comes to mind immediately. I can google for more if you'd like. I think it's dangerous to assume that only the "loner" types of kids have the capacity for violence. Any child who acts aggressively and gives indication that he (or she) intends to hurt or kill someone else should be watched with a careful eye.

Just as we must be vigilant in the fight against terrorism and be on guard for attacks from those who don't fit the "terrorist profile", we cannot assume that because someone is an athletic star that he or she is unwilling to carry out his or her threats.

I have to give you this one. But then, she shouldn't have nade the promise she made. She did. She should have called in the parents and talked it over with them.

I agree that it was a stupid promise to make. I just feel that her lapse in judgment in making that promise is overshadowing a much larger problem.

Bakerstreet:

If kids artistic expression starts to mirror adult artistic expression, should you be threatened? Lets take the writers of half the shows on TV and call them a "threat".

The difference is, this was a specific threat directed at their English teacher. Even barring any issue I might I have with the content of their writing (I don't think it was appropriate for a school assignment), they didn't write about fictional characters. They described, in detail, a plan to for them (not made up characters) to murder their English teacher (also not a fictional character).

That's the difference.

RW:

Very true.....we could raise kids together! They might grow up to be Moderates.

Haha. I will be very pleased if my boys grow up to be reasonable independent thinkers. That's not a bad thing at all.

Hurt and embarrassed is one thing....having their records permanently marked for a stupidly-chosen and exectuted prank is quite another.

I don't think suspension is too harsh. It's a consequence. Life is full of sucky consequences. These two guys need to learn to think before they act.

(PS - I'm a "tough on crime" kinda liberal, can you tell?)

MasonM

on Dec 02, 2005

Sounds like a couple of dumb asses to me. Dishonest teacher? Yep. Dumb asses? Yep.

Was the teacher wrong. I dunno. After reading something like this, I might wanna bring it to someone's attention too.

It's a very weird world.

MarcieMoo

on Dec 02, 2005

Despite their oath to confidentiality, even counselors, psychologists, and chaplains have a responsibility to report if they feel the counselee is a threat to him/herself or others. An imminent threat. If the counselee is threatening suicide, the counselor can legally call in authorities or call the hospital. If the counselee is threatening lighting himself and the family on fire inside his house, the counselor has a responsibility to report it to authorities.

Exactly, singr. If I could take that mandated reporter title off from my job description, I'd do it in a heartbeat. This teacher reported it because she had NO CHOICE. These young men, at 17 and 18, ARE far too old to NOT know that writing like that would have repercussions, like Tex said.

It scares me that you're all so glib about this. I'm not one to jump to conclusions about my students when they know a little more than they should about adult topics at 6. These young men wrote some horrible things...whether its meant to be funny or not. Students who are of that age KNOW that their teachers HAVE to report things like this. They *KNOW*. I guess you can't buy common sense these days.

Academic records...*SCOFF*. First, they're football players, which pretty much erases any "wrongs" they might have committed in high school. Second, have you seen a high school transcript? They don't copy all of the behavioral stuff in your file. They copy your transcript, stamp it, and send it off to whatever college you want it sent to. These boys are in NO danger of having any further academic endeavors smothered because of this "incident". Nothing a good coach can't cover up, anyway.

EXACTLY, Tex. Had they chosen a fictional victim...it might not have been so concerning.

Writing a scenario in a diary isn't a "threat".

It's not? When the subject of a violent crime is a real person? Can you put yourself in this teacher's position? Imagine yourself at say, 23, 24 years old, teaching in a high school, new to the whole thing, the high schoolers bigger than you are. And then you come to find out that two football players who know you have written down a plan for your demise. I don't know about you, but joking or not, I think I'd be a little concerned for my safety. I'm a big girl, but I think I'd still be scared. I'm no match for two football players. I think I'd "break a promise" too if two of my students wrote about cutting off some needed parts of mine.

I think you'd also be in a little different mindset if it were YOUR child that were a victim of a violent crime. If it were your child gunned down in a classroom because a teacher didn't "catch" a troubled child (oh...but we're not supposed to get involved or care, right?). Sure...the chances are few. But if it WERE your child, you'd wish that someone had made some connections with that kid that made the "jokes" about killing other people, about bringing a gun or a bomb to school.

I find it interesting that the article says nothing about these two boys' parents etiher. I wonder where they are in all of this.

One more thing--YOU...yes YOU...Joe Voter, elect your local school board. You also elect the legislators who make laws that the administrators at your school NEED to execute. Your school board hires administrators. You elect those school board members to choose your district's administrators for you. Your school board and those hired administrators hire the teachers, too. You're not completely innocent in all of this red tape crap.

I don't think suspension is too harsh. It's a consequence. Life is full of sucky consequences. These two guys need to learn to think before they act.

Amen. They're not going to have a leg to stand on once they're doing this as adults and they don't have daddy's wallet or their football stardom to rely on. What are they going to do then?

bakerstreet

on Dec 02, 2005

"The difference is, this was a specific threat directed at their English teacher. "

Again, since when is something written that is never going to be read by anyone else a "threat"? Held to that standard, the secret service could be kicking down the doors Liberal doors 24/7... go read the forums at DU. Do you really want the standard of "threat" to be cranked down to diaries and offhand remarks?

singrdave

on Dec 02, 2005

the administration has to start thinking, and stop acting like trained monkeys.

The difference is, this was a specific threat directed at their English teacher.

You mean if you were the administration you would have handled it differently? In this post-Columbine age, can you afford to not take threats seriously?

since when is something written that is never going to be read by anyone else a "threat"?

Remember that Klebold and Harris's stuff was searched with a fine-toothed comb after the fact?

I'm certainly not saying that this would have become Columbine II, or even amounted to anything at all. But in the shoes of the administration, could you have acted any other way?

bakerstreet

on Dec 02, 2005

I would have never given them the idea that a diary I intended to read would ever be private. My bet is they wrote that stuff to see if someone was really going to read it. I think they thought, as most rational people would, that no one would really believe that they intended to glue anyone to the wall and set their head on fire...

Grownups in America can't have it both ways. We fill our entertainment with violence, the average documentary being made right now is probably about some "cold case" wherein someone is brutally murdered, and yet when our kids express anything akin to what we watch on TV constantly we feel weird about them.

If we are going to look so harshly at kids that would write something like this, we'd damn well better start looking harshly at ourselves for filling our entertainment hours with REAL LIFE and simulated horrors of the same calibur. Worse, if we are going to pretend that such things are worthy of action, we'd better watch what we as adults are haphazardly saying and doing.

Face it, if someone in your place of work said something akin to the many nasty posts that pop up at DU about what should be "done" to the President, and they got fired and the police were called, I think a stink would be made. I guess it is easier to tread on the expression of kids.

I wonder where the ACLU is in all of this? If they don't get around to it I guess with Christmas coming up they have their hands full stemming all this unruly yuletide cheer.

KFC Kickin For Christ

on Dec 03, 2005

I would have never given them the idea that a diary I intended to read would ever be private. My bet is they wrote that stuff to see if someone was really going to read it.

I was thinking along these lines. My guess they may have been testing the teacher to see if this teacher would indeed keep this quiet. Or maybe taking advantage of the situation, not willing to put down their most intimate details of their daily life. Besides this was much more fun.

Grownups in America can't have it both ways. We fill our entertainment with violence, the average documentary being made right now is probably about some "cold case" wherein someone is brutally murdered, and yet when our kids express anything akin to what we watch on TV constantly we feel weird about them.

Sooo True.

My son in the 6th grade wrote a story about a bomb blowing up the Titanic after the teacher gave a writing assignment. She asked they put down what they thought could have happened to the Titanic. He drew a picture of the boat with a bomb in it. She called me immediately all concerned thinking maybe I should know this. She also said she was not going to tell the principal even tho she was required to do so because she thought we were good parents and would take care of our son. I laughed. Not to her because she was so serious, but I did say that I felt she was going a bit overboard here...(no pun intended).

so what about the chain of complaint? If we have an issue with a teacher....should we go all the way to the school board and complain about him or her? No we start with the teacher. Then we go to the principal if it doesn't get resolved. If that doesn't work we keep going up the ladder until the situation gets resolved. That's what should have happened here in reverse. First the teacher goes to the boys, then the boys' parents and so forth. Teachers get very angry if you go over their head instead of speaking to them first. Isn't it only fair to give the same curtesy?

Rightwinger

on Dec 03, 2005

Tex:

I understand where you're going with your link, but look at the majority of kids who become school shooters. Most were,it seems, outsiders. They were loners with personal problems who were bullied and abused by cliques of one sort or another.
I admit that I didn't look over the whole site, but it said he was "murdered" during a fight with another guy in a parking lot.
Was he "murdered", as in shot down or stabbed with no warning, out of the blue? Or did he die as a result of the fight? That's two very different things. When I have more time, I'll look over the site in more detail.

Texas Wahine

on Dec 03, 2005

Bakerstreet:

Again, since when is something written that is never going to be read by anyone else a "threat"?

We won't agree on this because we have a completely different idea about what type of content is appropriate for school assignments. I don't think school is the place for a kid to explore the darker side of his writing.

RW:

I understand where you're going with your link, but look at the majority of kids who become school shooters

You're talking about the big national news school shootings. I'm talking about all school violence, not just shootings. There are plenty of instances of violence, even deadly violence, perpetrated by popular kids.

I really don't think it's something that you can completely profile.

I admit that I didn't look over the whole site, but it said he was "murdered" during a fight with another guy in a parking lot.
Was he "murdered", as in shot down or stabbed with no warning, out of the blue? Or did he die as a result of the fight?

It's a long story, and I wrote a blog about it if you'd like a fairly concise re-telling. I'll try to summarize it briefly here:

In Amarillo, TX schools (and in fact in most Texas schools) sports is a form of religion. Amarillo is a very conservative area. There was a small group of kids in Amarillo who liked punk music and wore mohawks and colored hair and other "punk" styles. The jocks didn't like this, and constantly accosted these kids.

Brian Deneke was (from all the accounts I've read/watched) a peaceful kid and not a troublemaker, however he was continually "jumped" by the jocks. Adults in the community turned a blind eye to it because of course the punks are the bad kids and the jocks are the good kids.

The night he died, he and several friends were at the local IHop (their usual weekend night hangout), drinking coffee, talking, and writing music. The jocks knew the "punks" hung out there, so they all showed up (drunk) and came in and threatened the guys.

The management kicked the jocks out, so they waited across the street in a parking lot for the punks to leave. As the punks came out of the IHop, the jocks met them, armed with chains and baseball bats and it turned into a brawl.

Brian allegedly came to the defense of a friend who was being beaten with a chain. The jocks then began beating Brian with bats.

One of the jocks, Dustin Camp, hopped into his Cadillac and sped toward Brian. Brian was hit and his body became lodged under the Cadillac. Dustin backed up and ran over Brian a second time.

There were several eyewitnesses to the murder, and yet Dustin Camp was found NOT guilty of first degree manslaughter and was given 10 years probation. This can be DIRECTLY attributed to the community's attitude about people who are different and the way they view high school sports heroes as saints.

That case really epitomizes, to me, the problem with judging what kids are capable of based on things like sports or appearance.

bakerstreet

on Dec 03, 2005

I don't even think they were exploring anything, Tex. They were probably laughing at the fact they could write anything and the teacher wouldn't see it. Like I said about the reports I used to put stuff in. I don't remember what I put exactly, but I bet there was something in one of them that they could have gotten me in trouble by today's paranoid standars. But then I regularly got caught with knives at school and I just picked them up at the end of the day...

it really doesn't matter why they put it there, I despise the idea that we have cranked the level of "threat" down so far you can mutter something or write it in a diary with no intention of anyone knowing and yet you are making a "threat".

There's a difference in "being" a threat, and "issueing" a threat. This is America. Kids aren't threats until they do something to become a threat. Eventually, after a couple of omre 9/11s and McDonald's shooting sprees, this draconian standard will be used on adults, and these precedents will help it along.

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting on the forums.
Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
It's simple, and FREE!