Losing my Tolerance for "Zero Tolerance"

this is true ^ | ? | Randy Cassingham

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

There's stories out there of high school kids getting suspended for having keychain emblems that are shaped like guns. When the schools' administrators get asked why they suspend kids for this, since the keychain "gun" is about the size of a charm on a bracelet and could never be misidentified as a real gun, they always answer that the kids' keychains are "inciting violence".

It's pure hogwash and it's just further evidence that the liberals have turned the public schools into political re-education camps.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Oops, I mis-typed in #21. I should have said, "There's plenty more stories out there of high school kids getting suspended for having keychain emblems..."

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

No problem, I caught what you were talking about. I'm not about to tell you I'm the world's greatest typist.

[Maximum Leader]

You're right. On balance, zero tolerance is not a bad thing. Ditto with airport searches.

In an ideal world, school administrators (or TSA security officers) could use their discretion about guns or drugs they find. In the real world, alas, we have trial lawyers.

If administrators used discretion, does anyone doubt that a disproportionate number of minorities would be getting in trouble?

Every time, a prinicipal kicked out a gang member with a gun, he'd be facing a civil rights lawsuit. Even if the culprits were white (like the Columbine duo), their parents would still be calling their lawyer to get their poor babies off the hook.

It's unfortunate that so many kids get in trouble for keychains and aspirin, but with our present legal system, zero tolerance is the only way to keep the genuine threats out of the schools.

[CGTRWK]

My theory is that the zero tolerance nonsense is largely an attempt by schools to protect themselves from the Jesse Jacksons and Al Sharptons.

If you leave any room in the rules for the administrators' discretion, obviously when a known good kid brings is giving a friend what looks like an aspirin or brings in a pocketknife or whatever it is, you don't punish them. But when a known troublemaker does the same thing, he's up to no good and you crack down on it.

The problem is that a disproportionate number of known troublemakers are members of oppressed minorities. If you can expel a poor black kid for bringing a knife to school (to threaten other kids) and don't expel a middle class white kid for bringing a knife (to cut up her lunch), Jesse Jackson will be in town stirring up a race riot faster than you can say poke chops.

As a result, the only way a school can go after the dangerous kids is with inflexible rules which are purposefully blind to intentions and everything else which seperates good kids from bad. When the rabble rousers come out, the school can point at a clearly written rule and there is no oppurtunity to attack an administrator's judgement.

Needless to say, this is an absolutely insane way of doing things, but what more can you expect from liberals? To go off on a bit of a tangent, if you could expect anyone to crack and shoot up their school, it'd be the good kids who do everything right for 10 years and then get railroaded by this kind of thing. I'm surprised that hasn't happened yet.

[headsonpikes]

"That said, the real problem is the 'atmosphere' of fear and oppression this communicates."

Au contraire.

AFAIAC, this is the only redeeming feature of the maniavcal Zero Tolerance policy.

It's a clear demonstration to the kids that the Establishment means them no good; that'll help keep their minds straight When It's Time.

;^)

[supercat]

When the schools' administrators get asked why they suspend kids for this, since the keychain "gun" is about the size of a charm on a bracelet and could never be misidentified as a real gun, they always answer that the kids' keychains are "inciting violence".

I'm wondering when someone will get suspended for possessing a Taxachusetts quarter.

[Old Professer]

Speaking of quarters, I was at the Metro recycling and hazardous waste disposal site on Friday and found 5 quarters, 2 dimes, 2 nickels and a few pennies on the ground. Only the nickels and pennies weren't green - the pennies are mostly zinc now and the quarters and dimes are mostly copper; there's a large lesson in there somewhere.

[Fred Hayek]

It's gone beyond the schoolyard, it's in the workplace. A few years ago there was an incident at one of the Intel plants. Two electricians - one man, one woman, were working on one of the junction boxes during a FAB conversion. The man says to the woman "nice T-shirt". A third party - a woman - was walking by, and filed a complaint. The man had commited an act of sexual harrassment in the workplace against the woman that he had made the comment. He was promptly fired.

The whole story - the T-shirt said "Texas A&M", where one of his children were going to college. The woman to whom this comment was directed to knew that, and did not take offense at the comment.

[Celtman]

marktwain:
"It isn't zero tolerance that keeps the fights from getting bloody. We could bring guns to school (for hunting afterward), and it was the rare individual who didn't have a pocket knife on him. I made a spear gun in shop.

      Exactly!  Pocket knives are tools.  (Switch blades were banned.)  We shot arrows in the school cafeteria (after school.) 

FITZ:
"We have zero-tolerance in the public schools my kids attend and if it weren't for that, I'd have to home-school them.

      Nonsense. 

CGTRWK:
"If you leave any room in the rules for the administrators' discretion, obviously when a known good kid brings is giving a friend what looks like an aspirin or brings in a pocketknife or whatever it is, you don't punish them. But when a known troublemaker does the same thing, he's up to no good and you crack down on it.

      No.  Even a known troublemaker should be able to share his aspirin (or lemon drops) with a friend.  A "known" good kid should be busted for sharing his methamphetamine.

      Let's look at the lessons taught by "Zero Tolerance:"

• Butter knives are in the same category as bayonettes.
• Anything in pill form is in the same category as heroin.
• "Nice T-shirt" is in the same category as "sleep with me or you're fired."
• You are guilty if a government official (school administrator) says so.
• Due process consists of an edict by a government official.

      When pocket knives and aspirin were common in schools, violence was not.  Yes, things are different today.  But the solution is to find the cause, and fix that, not to make the situation worse by trivializing true offences by putting them into the same category as non-offences.

[JudgemAll]

Zero Tolerance is like saying you can kill someone because they threaten you with a paper gun. You simply cannot confine someone under color of law because they are playing hypothetical in accademic or extracurricular ways.

Zero Tolerance is the thing of fascists and mafias.

[freepatriot32]

Zero Tolerance is the thing of fascists and mafias.

and democrats (yes i am aware that thats redundant)

[Mulder]

I hope I'm around to see the Day when there is "zero tolerance" for the facists who enact these policies.