High School Student Disarms Gunman…Gets Suspended?
A Florida high school student wrestled a loaded gun away from another teen on the bus ride home this week and was slapped with a suspension in return.
The 16-year-old Cypress Lake High student in Fort Myers, Fla. told WFTX-TV there was “no doubt” he saved a life after grappling for the loaded .22 caliber revolver being aimed point-blank at another student on Tuesday.
Reading that article, yeah, it sure looks like a case of political correctness and zero
However, it's not quite that clear-cut:
Fla. high school student reportedly suspended after disarming gunman
The boy's mother told Fox4Now.com her son was suspended because he refused to cooperate with the investigation, adding that he was scared.
Now, don't get me wrong. It's still BS. But it's a different kind of BS. They're suspending him as a punishment for not cooperating with the investigation, not for possessing the gun. That's quite a bit different. Now, the boy's mother says he's scared, and he may very well be. However, he'd be better served cooperating and helping to get the kid kicked out - because he's already marked. He's already made himself a target by getting involved.
The difference in stories makes me wonder just what exactly is going on. I have a hunch that there's more going on than either story is letting on - the sensationalism of "ZOMG they suspended this kid and he's a hero" is way over the top; I can't imagine any school risking the HORRENDOUS PR of suspending this kid without reason. Now, is it possible that the school is just that tone deaf? Oh hell yes - whether they were trying to intimidate the kid into talking, retaliating for not talking, or simply following procedure blindly, someone along the line had to have said, gee, this is going to look bad.
At least I certainly hope someone did. I mean, this is Florida, where they are decidedly less gun-averse than, say, Massachusetts. You'd hope that a good story involving school kids and a firearm - especially one like this one that could have been so much worse - would be an easy sell. The media gets to put in its standard gun control plug ("Guns are so easy to get they're showing up in school buses") and at the same time they get to praise a quick-thinking (and acting) young man for saving lives. While, of course, admonishing people to not get involved.
This one's worth keeping an eye on to see what happens...
That is all.
2 comments:
I wouldn't want my kid cooperating at that point either. I would want my attorney there to represent my child.
Cooperation is code language for not just rolling over on someone, more specifically even himself.
I immediately overreacted to this story and sent an email to the principal, and she said the press is all wrong with the facts. Seems the kid disarmed him, but apparently gave him the gun back and did not report it, because the police had to go to the offending kid's home and get the gun there, so all is not as it seems with the half-assed reporting.
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