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Comment by u2328 | Hacker News Reader

This is disgusting. Is this really how Florida treats its own? I grew up in Southern California and I blew out the circuits on my junior high's science building once. I got a firm talking to, a two-day suspension, and a uncool nickname out of it, but that was it.

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It is worse than you think, here is a small excerpt about Florida students: In Florida, students have been arrested for bringing a plastic butter knife to school, throwing an eraser, and drawing a picture of a gun. The eleven-year-old who allegedly brought a plastic butter knife to school was handcuffed, taken to jail, and charged with a third-degree felony. Legislation recently passed unanimously by the Florida Senate could change all that by prohibiting schools from calling the police for nonviolent misdemeanors. "Throw an eraser and they want to call it throwing a deadly missile, which is a felony," said state Sen. Stephen Wise (R-Jacksonville), the senate sponsor of the legislation, which has yet to clear the state house. "When you get into the juvenile justice system everybody thinks your sins are forgiven when you turn 18, and I will assure you that doesn't happen. It's a blemish on your record." http://www.eagleforum.org/educate/2009/june09/zero-tolerance...

I am personally aware of two FL elementary cases one where a student was charged for throwing a deadly missle, which was a paper ball, and the other a boy kissed a girl on the school playground and was charged with sexual harassment. I wish I could say I am joking...

Good thing the sea levels are rising..

> I got a firm talking to, a two-day suspension, and a uncool nickname out of it, but that was it.

Was this before, or after, the Columbine school shootings in 1999 and the terrorist attacks of Sep. 11, 2001?

I realise you haven't directly stated that you support these actions, I would like to make the following comment since it seams to me that you think school shootings and terrorist attacks are valid reasons for this behaviour.

I believe while you are under the impression your government and law enforcement agencies are just doing more to protect you, you are actually relinquishing your freedom in exchange for false hope and allowing your government to nerf the world, and allowing the terrorists to win.

Arresting 11 year olds for bringing a plastic knife to school is ridiculous behaviour and should not be allowed (or encounraged) under the guise of "protecting us from school attacks and terrorists".

(I say 'your' because I am actually a UK citizen. While the ridiculous behaviour of the Americans is not really a concern of mine, I worry that other countries and governments will follow suit. That said, we're not dumb enough to allow rampant legal gun ownership. Sorry.)

Nor did it indirectly state it. It's certainly true that those events resulted in increased sensitivity towards school violence and explosions, so it's worth asking what context the GP's actions happened in-- doesn't imply the sensitivity is a good idea. I don't believe you can read any value judgement out of csense's comment at all. Don't put words in other people's mouths and then lecture them about it.

Edit: clarity

You read so much of your own bias into parent's comment it is not funny. Nowhere is it stated, explicitly or implicitly, that poster believes those events to be valid justifications. His point is that in current American society, those events are used as justifications for restrictive laws, which is undeniably true.

> we're not dumb enough to allow rampant legal gun ownership

I respectfully submit that much of Europe's "enlightenment" in this area (including the UK) is not due to the wisdom and foresight of its leaders, but due to the historical accident that it was already densely populated when firearms were invented.

Widespread gun ownership was a reasonable decision in the US at the colonies' inception, and once it's implemented, the switching costs of changing to restricted ownership permanently become high. I'll elaborate on this:

When the US colonies first started, they had a tiny population trying to hold their own, spread out in a vast wilderness. A gun can be used to defend against criminals, hostile natives, or can be used for hunting. Remember, homes were often miles apart, there were no telephones to dial 911, and the nearest police force might be in one of relatively few cities or forts, tens or hundreds of miles away. Not letting people own weapons would have made the colonists' lives much harder.

Once enough guns are out there, it gets harder and harder to argue that they should be outlawed, because:

(1) A culture of gun ownership develops, which will be upset if you try to take them away

(2) A sizable number of guns will presumably escape the confiscation program and enter the hands of criminals

Add to this, the country's experiences during the war of independence convinced its founders of the benefits of empowering the citizens to rise up against foreign invaders or an oppressive government.

As for why there's not more support for "common-sense regulation," no less a hacker than Eric S. Raymond has recently given a cogent explanation [1] [2].

[1] http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=4912

[2] http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=4939

To parrot your sentiment, arresting random girls for wearing fancy dresses around the time of the royal wedding is ridiculous behaviour and should not be allowed (or encouraged) under the guise of "imminent breach of the peace".

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jul/19/arrest-w...

My point is, please drop your anti-American superiority complex. You Brits do plenty of ridiculous things too.

I will say in predominantly minority schools in Florida it has always been like this. If you were a certain race, class, or acamdemic level you were treated differently. A friend of mine (white and ESL, or gifted) threw some acid in my face one time by accident and we had a class discussion on lab safety. Another friend (poor, black, and academically behind) was suspended from school for using the face washer. No class discussion on lab safety in that case.

Columbine wasn't the first school shooting[0], and 9/11 wasn't the first terrorist attack.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_attacks_related_to_sec... (The list begins with an incident in 1853)

Columbine had a major effect on the way US schools deal with violence, threats or even just weird kids.

9/11 had a profound effect on how the US deals with terrorism, threats of terrorism or even just brown people.

Certainly not the first, but probably the events with the most lasting effects.

it changed everything dont you see

(why do you hate america)

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