Last week a Blaine high school student was suspended from school for 10 days for having a box-cutter, in his car, in the parking lot, while he was inside the school. A couple of weeks ago my nephew — a high-school junior who had been private-schooled or home-schooled throughout his academic career — was also suspended on his second day of public school for having a pocketknife in his pocket (upon his return the administration also confiscated his wallet-chain).
I won’t go for the easy comment about “zero-tolerance” policies in institutions that otherwise chant “tolerance” and “diversity” as sacraments (if you can even bring a sacrament into a school parking lot, that is). Lileks, in fact, has already done this to a turn.
No, what I’m concerned about is another headline I just saw:
Man accused of passing gas is charged with battery
If farting is now considered assault, the schools will have no choice but to enforce their “expulsion” policies!
As someone who went to a school in Miami that had barbed wire around it, I’m just grateful we didn’t have to go through metal detectors. (Though they did randomly do metal detector sweeps throughout the year.)