Schools’ zero gun tolerance get more ridiculous

Education, Keep and Bear Arms

A student’s mom in Mobile, AL is a little upset these days. You see, her daughter’s school got upset because the daughter drew a picture of a gun, then reportedly pointed a crayon at another student and said, “Pew pew!” (The school has not commented on whether or not the crayon was loaded, however)

In reaction, the school reportedly had the daughter evaluated by a psychologist and had the daughter sign a contract stating that she would reach out to someone should she want to hurt herself or another. Such contracts are fairly standard for people with mental health issues involving suicidal or homicidal intentions.

Why is the mother upset? Probably because her daughter is just five years old.

MOBILE, Ala. (WPMI) A Mobile mother is not happy about a controversial Mobile County School contract her daughter signed without her consent. The contract promises that her daughter will not kill or injure herself and others.

Rebecca is angry.

“This isn’t right. She’s 5-years-old,” said Rebecca.

[…]

Rebecca said, “Most of these words on here, she’s never heard in her life.”

School officials told Rebecca they had to send Elizabeth home after an incident in class.

“They told me she drew something that resembled a gun,” said Rebecca. “According to them she pointed a crayon at another student and said, ‘pew pew,” said Rebecca.

She said her child was given a questionnaire to evaluate her for suicidal thoughts.

“[They] Asked her if she was depressed now,” said Rebecca.

Without her permission, Rebecca said her child was given the Mobile County Public School Safety Contract to sign stating she wouldn’t kill herself or others.

“While I was in the lobby waiting they had my 5-year-old sign a contract about suicide and homicide,” said Rebecca.

Now, obviously this isn’t a binding contract anyways. It’s just an agreement that happens to be in writing, but has no force of law behind it. That said, this is yet another in a troubling trend of school administrators taking zero tolerance rules to insane levels.

I don’t think anyone believes that students should bring weapons into schools. I don’t think anyone really believes a permissive policy regarding weapons is a good thing. However, what we’re seeing now are students being treated like they may become derranged killers simply because of a drawing, a pop tart, or in some cases even a t-shirts that depict firearms when no one is even remotely at risk.

Rather than protecting students, these policies are creating an environment where students are terrified of teachers and school administrators censoring their right to free expression when no one is at risk and class is not significantly disrupted.  For example, while the girl in question in this even may have disturbed class with her “pew pew”, was class any more disrupted than if she had asked a friend what she thought of a television show? Of course not.

While “zero tolerance” laws may sound good, they force schools and school administrators to devote limited funds toward combating a scourge that has no risk to anyone, rather than focusing on the far more important job of educating our children.

Tom Knighton
First, I’d like to take a moment to mention how great it is to be posting something to The Liberty Papers. In 2009, I joined with a friend in a project he had started where we blogged about area politics. I’d blogged a little bit here and there before about whatever random things, but my libertarian streak had never really gotten a chance to fly.

Suddenly, I had a platform. To say it changed my life was…well, a significant understatement. It lead to me getting to know some pretty cool people, many of whom are here at The Liberty Papers. It gave me the opportunity to first write for a local newspaper, and then eventually buy it. While that didn’t necessarily work out, it was yet another example of me being able to write a lot of words in a fairly short amount of time. So, I did like a lot of people and decided to write a book. Bloody Eden came out in August and is available at Amazon (or your favorite book website for that matter).

Now that we’ve gotten the history out of the way, a bit about the politics. First, I’m probably best described as a classical liberal. At least, that’s what every “What kind of libertarian are you?” quiz has told me, and they’re probably right. I’m a constitutional libertarian, for the most part. If the Constitution says they can do it, it doesn’t mean they should, but if the Constitution says they can’t, then they can’t. It just doesn’t get any simpler than that.

I look forward to contributing here at The Liberty Papers.

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