Maryland lawmaker introduces bill after pastry 'gun' suspension
A Maryland lawmaker has introduced legislation after a 7-year-old boy in his district was suspended for shaping a pastry into what his teacher thought looked like a gun.
The Star Democrat reports that Republican Sen. J.B. Jennings introduced a bill that would prohibit schools from suspending students for seemingly harmless childish acts, such as playing games with fingers pointed like guns or chewing food into the shape of a firearm.I understand the sentiment that leads to this sort of thing, I really do. These types of stories are getting more and more common - Pop-Tarts, fingers, cowboys-and-indians, pieces of paper - it seems like things that should warrant at most an admonition to settle down are being blown way out of proportion. With today's "zero tolerance" idiocy, kids are being hauled out of classrooms and hit with suspensions over the shape of their breakfast pastry - proving once again that common sense is far from common.
But filing a bill isn't the way to handle this. First of all, who's going to define "seemingly harmless childish acts"? I don't want the screaming milquetoasts who blanche at the sight of a vaguely gun-shaped breakfast treat deciding what is or isn't harmless. I suspect my definition and theirs are worlds apart. Secondly, it still doesn't get to the root of the problem, which is school administrators with little common sense and even less accountability who think it is perfectly reasonable to suspend a seven-year old over the shape of his breakfast.
That's not the sort of thing that's going to be changed by passing another bill. That's the sort of thing that, in a perfect world, would be served by stocks in the town square and rotten fruit for the school adminstrator who punishes a second grader with suspension over a gun-shaped morning treat. Since we are far too "civilized" for that, perhaps a round of firings will shake things up? Preferably from a cannon, mind you...
This is a story where the backstory is vital. Is this a case of a teacher who is hypersensitive to school violence in the wake of the Newtown shootings? Perhaps this teacher should be offered counseling to help overcome their fears. Is it a problem student being punished through acceptable channels? They couldn't punish a hyperactive child diagnosed with ADHD who fidgets and disrupts the class, so when this child makes a gun shape they sieze the opportunity? It's certainly plausible; at least as plausible as a teacher being so threatened by a three foot tall second grader with a "gun"-shaped pastry.
In any case, making more laws isn't going to solve this, because it's simply not a legal issue...
That is all.
11 comments:
I see this as more of a "Warning Shot across the Bow" to all those Idiot School Staffers.
But I do like the idea that THEY would have to go through Counseling and Disciplinary Procedures if THEY violate the law.
It's got that "Sauce for the Goose" Flavor to it.
At least the cafeteria isn't serving Pilgrim Puffs. (Does anyone else even remember that cereal?)
I see this two ways.
Teachers/administrators intent on demonizing guns (brainwashing).
Teachers and administrators in serious need of mental heath counseling for their phobias.
Both are bad.
Eck!
Not that I want to be accused of Raising Jay's BP .....
but here's another story along the same lines.
http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2013/03/08/cupcakes-with-army-soldiers-get-kid-in-hot-water-at-school/
I particulary like the " No disrepect was intended to members of the military" ... Yet, it seems to me, that's exactly what they accomplished.
notDilbert.
Anybody left in that town, who retains some common sense, should
go to the school and have a "bite in" in the parking lot.
This full-bore stupidity has got to
stop.
It is not Zero Tolerance;
It is ZERO INTELLIGENCE.
The Smarter Half maintains seat-belt and helmet laws have allowed the stupid to live to breading age. Thus we have new and better idiots every generation.
OMG! Those apples are shaped like hand grenades! Those kids are holding bananas just like they would a penis! The list goes on and on. It demonstrates that the observer has a problem, not the actor. Teachers and school administrators that cannot tolerate children acting like children instead of small adults really need to find another way to make an income. Boys act differently and have different interests than girls, and that is OK. The same advice applies to paranoid law enforcement personnel who truly believe that everyone they encounter may physically harm them and politicians that really do not understand the U.S. Constitution and the limitations that it places on government power. There are enough people out there that can do your job better that we do not need you and your own problems. Get help or get gone.
I'll be repetitive.
It's partly stupidity of all or none rules but the subject of guns is the antis work to make them like smoking.
To be specific make them socially unacceptable and in the same realm of porn or worse.
Look in what do you see...
Eck!
+1 on Eck... Sigh...
I'd (re) legalize the bastinado.
That'd learn em.
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