Just Give Her Candy

Wow, this is a story that would make me lose faith in humanity, if it didn't happen in "How-do-you-work-this-thing" Florida.

So a little hellion down in Florida pitches a hissy-fit, and the teachers and administrators called her mom to come restrain her. The child climbed on desks, tore paper off of a bulletin board, and became violent with the teachers, kicking and punching several of them.

According to the articles I have read, the mother couldn't come to restrain the child, so after many pleas to calm the child down, the powerless school administrators called the cops. The police came and, recognizing the child from a previous incident, handcuffed her (gently).

Now, from an irrational point of view, this is obviously unacceptable! The school should have found a way to calm the girl down! "Talk to her calmly to defuse the situation," says the imbecile lawyer! Nevermind the fact that that had already been done... Maybe we should just give her some cookies, for cryin' out loud!

This irrational point of view is where the mother is coming from, as she is now suing the police department for handcuffing her daughter.

Now let's look at this logically...

The child was having a *violent* temper tantrum. She hit teachers, was destructive, and distracted the other students. The first thing the teachers did was talk to her, trying to get her to calm down. Good move, but unfortunately it didn't work. Next step? Send her to the principal. Well, the principal (or assistant principal) tried talking to the girl, and that didn't work either. She continued being violent. Next, the school did the logical thing and called the girl's mom. The mom, as I understand it, couldn't come to restrain the girl, which put the school in an awkward position.

The school had exhausted all its resources for dealing with this unruly girl. They could not restrain her, and she was being violent, which is quite unacceptable and must be stopped. The only option that the school had left was to call in a higher authority, and that's what they did by calling the cops, who handcuffed the violent child.

John Trevena, the lawyer for the girl's mother, said it is incomprehensible that the police officers would take such action over a youngster's behaviour. Heaven forbid anyone should teach the child a lesson she apparently wouldn't learn otherwise.

The police were perfectly justified in what they did. I don't care if you are 5 or 55, if you are violent, you need to deal with the consequences. Now, I'm not advocating locking the girl up, but she needed to learn where such behavior can lead. If no one can intervene (the girl's mom is obviously opposed to this), then the girl is setting patterns that will be very harmful for herself and others in the future.

The behavior that this girl exhibited was entirely unacceptable, and I'm all for finding other ways to punish the girl besides calling the cops. However, there was no other option available in this situation, as the school is not allowed to punish children adequately. If the parents won't give a child consequences, and the schools can't, then the cops are going to have to do it sooner or later. Should they do it now, while the girl won't be locked up and can't really hurt anyone, or should they wait until she commits a serious crime and spends time in jail?

The impotence of the school administrators is just more proof that the public school system is broken... I pray for my peers who are stuck in it.