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I'm quite familiar with shotgun shells. And as a Scouter for the last 10 years, I'm also quite familiar with 4th grade boys. I don't know what you guys know about 4th grade boys. But, if you don't think that some bully in this school wasn't fully capable of taking this shell from this kid and then smacking a nail with a rock up against the primer to see what would happen, you don't know much.

I think zero-tolerance policies in schools are ridiculous. But when someone brings live ammo to school, you don't need zero-tolerance to figure that a penalty needs to be applied. Whether the one in this case was appropriate is another matter. I'd fine the parents $50 or $100, personally. It was their stupidity.

I'm no anti-gun activist, either. My son has earned his Rifle Shooting and Shotgun Shooting Merit Badges, and I was very proud when he did. But live ammo doesn't belong in school.

Yes, I brought knives to school when I was a kid. It was O.K. then. But then you didn't have schools with kids in them that get their ideas of how to run interpersonal relationships by watching hip-hop and rap videos, and thinking that fear=respect, and that the way to deal with insults (either real or perceived) is to attack someone with a weapon. In the Boy Scouts, all the kids have knives. I never saw anyone have to have a knife taken away from him because he threatened someone when I was a kid, but I've seen it now. Which is not to say that knives should be taken from Boy Scouts, nor that I think that butter knives in school should result in an expulsion. But the world has changed.

In the past, say, 50 years how many children have died from a shotgun shell absent a firearm? Zero? You believe they are dangerous because?

You can kill someone with a pencil by stabbing them. I would worry more about kids with pencils then kids with shotgun shells. I bet the statistics would confirm this if anyone cared enough to look it up.

First of all, I am fully aware of todays government school conditions and understand your concern. But your answer is exactly what I said it would be, a "what if." What if someone took the shell away from the boy and did something bad with it.

Nevertheless, you provided a long answer, and I believe it deserves a reasoned response.

You said, Yes, I brought knives to school when I was a kid. It was O.K. then.

I frequently had various kinds of ammo in my pockets when I went to school, and on several occastions even brought a rifle to school. No one even raised an eyebrow. The reason that could not be thought of today is because as you said, But then you didn't have schools with kids in them that get their ideas of how to run interpersonal relationships by watching hip-hop and rap videos, and thinking that fear=respect, and that the way to deal with insults (either real or perceived) is to attack someone with a weapon and ...the world has changed.

That is the point I am making. Moral values do not change. People may change, policies may change, but moral values do not. It cannot be morally wrong to have bullets in your pocket.

But, as you pointed out, today we have kids who have no compuction about using weapons or anything else to harm others. Now that is immoral, and that should not be tolerated. I believe the should be zero tolerance, but we have directed the zero tolerance toward the wrong people. If we had exercised zero tolerance to all of uncontrollable kids, if no amount to classroom disruption, foul language, threatening, and worse that goes on today were tolerated, if they threw all these young thugs out of the schools, we would not have to worry about what decent kids brought to school.

We have made a big mistake in this country. Bad people are allowed to be bad, and because they are obviously dangerous, the solution is to eliminate the freedoms of the decent. This is backwards, and immoral.

If you really think someone should be fined, it should be all the parents of the young thugs who have made it impossible for decent kids to be treated with respect.

Hank