Things That US School Children Are Being Arrested For

[Jimmie Higgins]

Ironically this original list was from a Alex Jones-type libertarian blog. The comments at the end were like: "This is why everyone needs to be home-schooled". Still the information is valuable and the liberal blog that re-posted it at least got the racial repression aspect of this trend in the US:
http://stfuconservatives.net/post/16895192354

19 Things That School Children Are Being Arrested For In America:

19 Things That School Children Are Being Arrested For In America (http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/19-crazy-things-that-school-children-are-being-arrested-for-in-america)
#1 At one public school down in Texas, a 12-year-old girl named Sarah Bustamantes was recently arrested for spraying herself with perfume (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/09/texas-police-schools).
#2 A 13-year-old student at a school in Albuquerque (http://stfuconservatives.net/post/16895192354#), New Mexico was recently arrested by police for burping in class (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57334925/student-arrested-for-burping-lawsuit-claims/).
#3 Another student down in Albuquerque was forced to strip down to his underwear while five adults watched because he had $200 in his pocket (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57334925/student-arrested-for-burping-lawsuit-claims/). The student was never formally charged with doing anything wrong.
#4 A security guard at one school in California broke the arm of a 16-year-old girl because she left some crumbs on the floor (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk2b_twCCdw) after cleaning up some cake that she had spilled.
#5 One teenage couple down in Houston poured milk on each other during a squabble while they were breaking up. Instead of being sent to see the principal,they were arrested (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/09/texas-police-schools) and sent to court.
#6 In early 2010, a 12-year-old girl at a school in Forest Hills, New York was arrested by police and marched out of her school in handcuffs just because she doodled on her desk (http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/02/18/new.york.doodle.arrest/index.html?hpt=C1). “I love my friends Abby and Faith” was what she reportedly scribbled on her desk.
#7 A 6-year-old girl down in Florida was handcuffed and sent to a mental facility (http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2010/feb/11/port-st-lucie-schools-confines-6-year-old-with/) after throwing temper tantrums at her elementary school.
#8 One student down in Texas was reportedly arrested by police for throwing paper airplanes (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/09/texas-police-schools) in class.
#9 A 17-year-old honor student in North Carolina named Ashley Smithwick accidentally took her father’s lunch with her to school. It contained a small paring knife which he would use to slice up apples. So what happened to this standout student when the school discovered this? The school suspended her for the rest of the year (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/12/29/nc-high-school-senior-suspended-charged-possesion-small-knife-lunchbox/#) and the police charged her with a misdemeanor.
#10 In Allentown, Pennsylvania a 14-year-old girl was tasered in the groin area (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaPjJG8NVsY&feature=player_embedded) by a school security officer (http://stfuconservatives.net/post/16895192354#) even though she had put up her hands in the air to surrender.
#11 Down in Florida, an 11-year-old student was arrested, thrown in jail and charged with a third-degree felony for bringing a plastic butter knife (http://www.eagleforum.org/educate/2009/june09/zero-tolerance-states.html) to school.
#12 Back in 2009, an 8-year-old boy in Massachusetts was sent home from school and was forced to undergo a psychological evaluation (http://www.tauntongazette.com/news/x1903566059/Taunton-second-grader-suspended-over-drawing-of-Jesus) because he drew a picture of Jesus on the cross.
#13 A police officer in San Mateo, California blasted a 7-year-old special education student in the face with pepper spray (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/12/08/MNH91M90CN.DTL) because he would not quit climbing on the furniture.
#14 In America today, even 5-year-old children are treated brutally by police. The following is from a recent article (http://www.kcra.com/r/29847063/detail.html) that described what happened to one very young student in Stockton, California a while back….
“Earlier this year, a Stockton student was handcuffed with zip ties on his hands and feet, forced to go to the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation and was charged with battery on a police officer. That student was 5 years old.”
#15 At one school in Connecticut (http://stfuconservatives.net/post/16895192354#), a 17-year-old boy was thrown to the floor andtasered five times (http://www.middletownpress.com/articles/2011/06/14/news/doc4df7b12331ec9768149316.txt?viewmode=fullstory) because he was yelling at a cafeteria worker.
#16 A teenager in suburban Dallas was forced to take on a part-time job (http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/weird/Teen-Fined-637-for-Foul-Language-in-Classroom-114879844.html) after being ticketed for using foul language in one high school classroom. The original ticket was for $340, but additional fees have raised the total bill to $637.
#17 A few months ago, police were called out when a little girl kissed a little boy (http://www.thesmokinggun.com/buster/cops-called-for-school-kiss-657831) during a physical education class at an elementary school down in Florida.
#18 A 6-year-old boy was recently charged with sexual battery (http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2012/01/27/hercules-family-battles-playground-sex-assault-claim-against-6-year-old/) for some “inappropriate touching” during a game of tag at one elementary school in the San Francisco area.
#19 In Massachusetts, police were recently sent out to collect an overdue library book from a 5-year-old girl (http://boston.cbslocal.com/2012/01/02/charlton-library-sends-police-to-collect-overdue-books-from-5-year-old/).
anyone wanna count how many of these kids are white? don’t worry, it won’t take long at all.
I think on the large-level, public school policing is part of a effort to destroy public education because the ruling class sees no need for it in a world where they are trying to lower working class expectations and don't need highly skilled workers. On the local level, schools have been cut-back and stretched thin, creating crowded classes that "teach to the test" where teachers can't actually spend time with kids and so administrators probably see policing as "the only help the state is offering" and a short-cut for dealing with student populations - also in many cases, schools admins and certainty teachers have no choice about the police being on campus because these decisions are made by other bodies either state or district. There's also the "drug-war" aspect to this as policing began in High Schools to "protect good students" from "gangs and drug dealers" and schools allowed cops to do drug sweeps.

Anyway, fucking outrageous stuff.

[Dennis the 'Bloody Peasant']

...cannot believe it..these are the actions you'd expect to read about in an overtly fascist country's school system, not the supposed 'free world' (I'm sure the 'USA woop!' apologists would point out that these are a minority of extreme cases..even if that was true; the number is nowhere near as important as the acts themselves...these are children being brutalised and criminalised for absurd reasons).

Sickening and disheartening in the extreme, those poor kids.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I think on the large-level, public school policing is part of a effort to destroy public education because the ruling class sees no need for it in a world where they are trying to lower working class expectations and don't need highly skilled workers.

I can't help but think that one way or another it will end up blowing up in their faces. Didn't they try this sort of thing before? So what makes them think it will work this time round?

Also, they do need highly skilled workers. Global capitalism exists partly thanks to advancing science, engineering and technology. Without a good pool of people from which skilled professionals can be drawn, such foundations would shrivel. I don't think the ruling class even have the numbers to take their place. The developing world seems to keep getting richer so it's not like they'll always have the option of outsourcing.

Arse backwards.

[Blackscare]

Clicked through some links and found this gem out of AB.

http://www.abqjournal.com/main/2011/10/18/news/valencia-sued-for-violating-due-process.html

Disgusting.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I'm sure the 'USA woop!' apologists would point out that these are a minority of extreme cases..even if that was true; the number is nowhere near as important as the acts themselves...these are children being brutalised and criminalised for absurd reasons.I totally agree, but there's the numbers too. The Guardian did a story about how 300,000 students in Texas had been given misdemeanor tickets. So like anything with the US "justice system" the extreme cases are just the inevitable outcome of a whole system of profiling and control that goes on daily. For every outrageous case of a 2nd grader being handcuffed is a story of a probably just as harmless student who's a sophomore in High School and get's his/her life fucked by a drug-war scarlet letter on their record because he/she was providing their friends with some drugs and the school let the cops systematically search through their locker. These cases don't get any attention because the victim of the cops is "guilty". Yet when the cops go through student lockers, they are probably going after "profiled" students, probably doing this more in "bad" schools and, of course if you are rich enough to pay for primary education in a private school, there are no cops on campus everyday and they probably wouldn't even think of searching lockers in a general sweep.


I can't help but think that one way or another it will end up blowing up in their faces. Didn't they try this sort of thing before? So what makes them think it will work this time round?Hubris? Lack of working class fightback and movements? The logic of the drug-war and de-funding public education taken to inevitable extremes? I don't know, but it's messed-up.


Also, they do need highly skilled workers. Global capitalism exists partly thanks to advancing science, engineering and technology. Without a good pool of people from which skilled professionals can be drawn, such foundations would shrivel. I don't think the ruling class even have the numbers to take their place. The developing world seems to keep getting richer so it's not like they'll always have the option of outsourcing.They do, but I think they just don't need everyone to have access to these skills and so they are, in effect, creating a kind of tiered education system. Remember Newt Gingrich saying that "not all kids need to know about everything - and it's 'elitist' to think they should all learn the same skills" - his answer was that poor kids should just learn how to be janitors by cleaning their own schools! This was extreme even for Republicans and probably helped put the nail in the coffin of his "electability" potential, but across the US school districts and states have been kind of doing this already, but just not as crude and blatantly. So while suburban kids learn basic physics, many rural and urban kids, for whom college isn't really on the radar, are encouraged to go to trade schools and programs that teach "discipline" and "practical skills".

It reminds me of the part in the Autobiography of Malcolm X when he talks about his teacher telling him that being a lawyer was "unrealistic" and he should find a "negro-job," a trade where he can use his hands.

[Robocommie]

For several years now my friends who work in education have been really concerned about this, it's a trend that's been going on for a while and shows no sign of changing. Basically, schools are being segregated into two varieties; the good schools for the rich kids, and the bad schools, which are essentially being converted into cheap juvenile detention facilities - literally.

[Agent Ducky]

It's not that bad where I am, but my school recently installed cops.
My friend came to school with a plastic sickle (It's not even a weapon in the first place) and they took it away from her. They said it was "potentially dangerous." You know what else is potentially dangerous? Fucking textbooks, but you can't take those away.

[The Jay]

Wow, if I was one of the parents I would not be happy at all. In fact I wouldn't feel right leaving my children in the care of people who are being paid to harass children.

[MrCool]

The kiss apparently occurred after two girls debated over whom the boy liked more. That’s when one of the girls “went over and kissed” the boy.

So what is this, felony rape?