I never had to deal with these kinds of issues, as a parent. And when I was in school we never had this kind of stuff going on, at least not at this age. I got terrorized a bit when we moved to ND, but I pretty much dealt with it, and by then I was in 8th grade.
A little different than 8 and 10 year olds.
Should they have been arrested... I don't know. Felony seems a bit overkill... but I know everyone is on edge because of Columbine. I would defaintely not be happy if I was one of the "victims" parents and was told later, "Yeah, there were drawings, but you know kids, we didn't take them seriously." The real issue, imo, isn't whether they should have been arrested or not, the real issue is how we got here, and how we instill in teens (and now pre-teens) that violence isn't the way, that this kind of thing isn't cool, acceptable, funny, etc.
But, getting on my 46 year old soap box for a minute, it isn't like this kind of thing happens over-night. Its a steady "decline". When I was a kid (yeah I know, here goes), you were held responsible for your actions. Not that we never did anything wrong, we did. Yeah, boys will be boys. But you have some "fear of God" in you, when you know that if you are caught you will get in big trouble by your parents, or hassleing old kids gets you beat up, etc. Any more, many adults and parents act like kids are bain dead. "Well you can't hold it against little Johnny that he is: destroying property, acting like and idiot, bring a gun to school", he doesn't know better. I think he does... he just knows he'll get a free ride.
I remember once when we were cursing the drag. We were probably 16 and 17. Some 13 year olds starting throwing rocks at our car. We chased them, and their parents were really ticked. "How dare you frighten my kids!" "They were throwing rocks at our '57 Chevy!" - "So, kids will be kids. Didn't you ever do anything like that?" - "Not really, 'cuz we know if we got caught we'd get beat up, or our parents would ground us." Not that we wanted to actually hurt the kids, but at least put some "fear of God" into them so they didn't do it again. But since their parents basically thought it was just cute, every time we drove by the park and they were around, their they would be, flipping us off and yelling and laughing, because their parents had protected them from any consequences.
No... I don't think a 9 and 10 year old kid should fry or anything, and I don't have answers... but sometime kids have to be taught what is acceptable. And I'm sorry, sometimes explaining it in philosopical and quite terms just doesn't get the point across.
Explain to Mo its wrong, maybe no reaction. Have his older brothers bomp him in the head, and he quites messing with their stuff. ;)
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
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