What’s The Matter With Kids These Days?

I get such glee about reading about idiocy, usually while thinking “You must be f#cking kidding me!!”

And today we have a two-fer:

First up we’ve got a school district in Atlantic City, NJ that has suspended a seven year-old due to “the school’s zero-tolerance policy for guns.”

Now, guns in school are generally considered a bad thing, and I won’t argue with that. Even toy guns can send the wrong message, so I get the idea behind a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to guns.

And I mean, a seven-year-old, right? That’s just scary. Except, the seven year-old didn’t have a gun, or a toy gun, or pretend to have a gun, or even an have an imaginary gun. He drew a picture of a gun.

Now I get the reasoning here. The picture was of him shooting another student. There is some reason to be alarmed (I guess), but when questioned about it (by his mother since the school just straight out suspended him ), he said he was shooting his friend with a water-gun.

The ACLU is starting to get involved here as well. I’d love more details to talk about this, but unfortunately the Press of Atlantic City, where the article comes from, is not exactly ripe with important details, though it does have some unimportant ones. In the article we learned that the kid also “drew several other pictures, including a skateboarder, King Tut, a ghost, a tree and a Cyclops - all in red and black ink.” And that he is asking Santa for a new skateboard, a flat-screen TV, a Nintendo Wii and a box of candy canes, all of which clearly provides insight into the mind-set of this kid. And yes, they felt it was necessary in the article to provide a link to King Tut for anyone looking for more information on Egyptian Pharaohs.

Moving right along in our examination of troubled youth in America, I refer you to a story from another source of hard hitting news, the Brooklyn Paper: A six year-old was issued a warning from the city of New York “about the chalk ‘graffiti’ on her front stoop.”

The wee vandal was reported by a neighbor for making chalk drawings on her own building and on her stoop. According to the letter she received, the family “still has a week to respond to the city warning letter, which explains that she must remove the graffiti or ask the city to do so. A Sanitation spokeswoman said last week that if [the family] does not respond to the letter, the city could issue a $300 ticket if the graffiti is still there.”

Although the original work was washed away by rain last week, she was out tagging again shortly after the sun came back out, probably with her parents permission as they fully support her. According to the law (one I am familiar with for various reasons) “which criminalizes the use of chalk on a building only when the scrawler lacks the building owner’s permission” the six year-old technically is not in violation since she was drawing on her own building.

Now, okay, I can’t really blame the City or Sanitation for issuing the warning as I am sure they were just following protocol (although maybe they should have gone out and checked the “scene of the crime” before issuing a summons or, I don’t know, gotten some facts or something), but who the hell is the neighbor who called 311 to complain about a six year-old making chalk drawings?

The article goes on to say: “But if Dawkins is right, than the city has just criminalized…drawing arrows to point neighbors towards a stoop sale down the block — as long as a neighbor calls 311 to complain.” Um, yeah, hmm, that sounds familiar.

Oh and to add fuel to this fire, a New York chalk “graffiti” artist was just arrested. As the NY State Penal code defines graffiti in section 145.60:

1. For purposes of this section, the term “graffiti” shall mean the etching, painting, covering, drawing upon or otherwise placing of a mark upon public or private property with intent to damage such property.

I am not quite sure how chalk “damages” property since not only does it wash off, but you can also dust it off, so unless the property being “tagged” with chalk is water soluble and can not be touched or dusted, no damage is actually done.

Anyway, I think it is time we passed some laws preventing any child under the age of 8 from possessing a writing implement. You know, for our own safety and to improve our quality of life.