Student Suspended for Slicing Apple During Healthy Snacks Presentation

Reason ^ | November 3, 2014 | Lenore Skenazy

[Mrs. Don-o]

Hey E-Pluribus:

Da'Von Shaw is a black student.

[AppyPappy]

Some chile may have been very badly killed by that knife.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

So were Trayvon and Michael and Jamal and Marquis and Darnell and Tyrone and...

[Mrs. Don-o]

You will have noticed, however, that this disproves your idea at #4 that this was an instance of "trumping things up on white students."

The school authorities in this instance were stupid. Unfair. Irrational. But not, in this instance, racist.

[Rusty0604]

I bought a switchblade in Mexico when I was twelve and carried that around for years.

[Rusty0604]

But it would be difficult to slice and apple with them.

[Rusty0604]

you could use it to strangle someone couldn’t you? For that matter, you could use your hands.

[smokingfrog]

Good thing you never got caught.

[USFRIENDINVICTORIA]

I taught H.S. shop for a few years. The woodworking shop in particular was loaded with "weapons". Fortunately, the students learned how to keep all the cutting tools very sharp -- so that they weren't dangerous.

Seriously, it never occurred to anyone that these tools would be used as weapons.

[goldstategop]

You have stupid principals who think anything sharp is a weapon.

I wonder if he has ever seen a kitchen knife.

[TexasRepublic]

“In high school we had shootguns in the trunks of our cars to go straight for a grain field for dove hunting.”

Half of the pickup trucks in my high school’s parking lot had shotguns displayed in the window racks. This was in Houston, 1970. It sure was a different world not so long ago.

[Rusty0604]

Never did. I bought it because I didn’t want to break my nails trying to open a regular knife. Made the boys respect me too, LOL.

[Duckdog]

oops, shotgun

[JimRed]

I honestly don’t know how someone can survive without a pocket knife.

I keep a Leatherman tool in my car. Just a matter of time, I suppose before I am arrested for carrying THAT deadly weapon!

[E. Pluribus Unum]

The purpose of zero-tolerance is to manufacture infractions against non-Eric Holder’s people. Period.

[SampleMan]

to my 8th grade `show and tell’. My Dad picked it up on one of his Indochina vacations.

Ha! Love it.

[Mrs. Don-o]

But in this case they got a black kid. Doesn't that screw up the plan?

No, I think there's plenty of just-plain-educratic taboo- response and stupidity involved.

[CARDINALRULES]

This zero tolerance crap is stupid.

There was that kid in Texas that got suspended a few years ago because he had been helping his grandma move and a butter knife fell out of a box in the back of his truck. He didn’t even know it was there.

—

Good thing we didn’t have that when I was in school. I carried all kinds of things in my purse that I could use as weapons, including pocket knives. Not to mention the bottles of Advil and Tylenol I carried. Hell I had my teachers bumming them from me all the time.

This was in the 90’s and they still allowed the kids to have their hunting rifles in their vehicles. And in 9th grade we had archery as part of PE.

[Birdsbane]

I know from a few people that our Parole & Probation office allows felons to carry a Leatherman or related type “Tool”. Felons can own and use any single edged solid shank knife in their food preparation. The school was over the top on this and the teacher and all staff involved should be re-educated and reprimanded...a frontal lobotomy followed by waterboarding w/electrical shock to the genitals. Re-education complete.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Teachers unions are evil. Even FDR was against public sector unions.

But the purpose of zero-tolerance is STILL to address "disparate impact."