8 year old arrested for battery for punching a teacher

[SatoSere]

You do not need to use any type of physical assertion on any child, including slapping on hangcuffs.

You're simply incorrect.

What kind of children did you deal with?

[The Emerald Legion]

If the problem maker is physically removed from the other children he can no longer bother them.

That can also be accomplished by sending the problematic child out in the hallway or to the principal's office for the time being.

Can it now? How do you do that without making them leave if they don't want to?

You're simply incorrect.

What kind of children did you deal with?

My mother had me barely into adulthood and I had two younger sisters. I've also worked AROUND children most of my life. A teacher gently grabbing a child by the shoulders and steering them to where they should be isn't abuse. The idea it is is why our schools are so fucked up right now.

[SatoSere]

That can also be accomplished by sending the problematic child out in the hallway or to the principal's office for the time being.

Can it now? How do you do that without making them leave if they don't want to?

What kind of children did you deal with?

My mother had me barely into adulthood and I had two younger sisters. I've also worked AROUND children most of my life. A teacher gently grabbing a child by the shoulders and steering them to where they should be isn't abuse. The idea it is is why our schools are so fucked up right now.

Keyword: Gently. This is definitely not gentle, lol.

[The Emerald Legion]

Can it now? How do you do that without making them leave if they don't want to?



My mother had me barely into adulthood and I had two younger sisters. I've also worked AROUND children most of my life. A teacher gently grabbing a child by the shoulders and steering them to where they should be isn't abuse. The idea it is is why our schools are so fucked up right now.

Keyword: Gently. This is definitely not gentle, lol.

Oh of course. I don't think this particular incident was justified at all. But at the same time, it's just more fuel for the psychos ruining shit with their hyperbolic 'any physical contact is abuse and you can discipline just with words.' thing.

[SatoSere]

Keyword: Gently. This is definitely not gentle, lol.

Oh of course. I don't think this particular incident was justified at all. But at the same time, it's just more fuel for the psychos ruining shit with their hyperbolic 'any physical contact is abuse and you can discipline just with words.' thing.

Does smacking a troublemaking child's back with a Pikachu plushie that you bought back in elementary school count as gentle?

[Katganistan]

I am not sure what world you live in where teachers have any sort of authority. They are at best laughed at behind their back. At best.
You have to give people the tools they need to do their job with the skills they do have, not the ones most humans don't.

I’m a teacher. I’ve been teaching for 14 years. I was a volunteer teachers aide, student teacher and volunteer youth worker prior to that. I have never once, in the course of any of those roles, needed to use physical force to maintain control and discipline with the children I’ve been working with.
You’re literally calling for us to have a tool that we don’t want or need, claiming that it will help us do our job, despite evidence that it will have the opposite effect. I’m not the first teacher in this thread to tell you that. This is a good example of the major problem in education today - teachers are ignored in favour of armchair experts.

And bullies.

[Katganistan]

If the problem maker is physically removed from the other children he can no longer bother them.

That can also be accomplished by sending the problematic child out in the hallway or to the principal's office for the time being.

Collective punishment works because it makes all the others in the collective collectively pissed at the guy that's guilty to the point where they than bully him into line.

That is literally vigilante-justice-style bullying, and that's another reason AGAINST collective punishment. Do you want kids to be, as you even admit, "bullying" each other for any reason?

It doesn't work that way.
Teacher tried it on my class when I was in middle school.
We tortured the teacher until she went out on leave.

[The Free Joy State]

I live in a world where the authority of my teachers was respected enough to when they threatened to call the office and our parents if we kept acting like shitheads, we knew they weren’t fucking around. What world do you live in where teachers are so incompetent and undisciplined that they can’t handle a special needs kid without grabbing them?

A poor area where kids don't give a shit what the office or their parents think?

I've worked in disadvantaged areas. Children weren't grabbed. Physical punishment is illegal in schools in this country.

Discipline was managed just fine.

As others have said, any teacher who "needs" to hit or grab a child to make them listen is ineffectual of enforcing discipline and, IMO, such people shouldn't work with children.

That can also be accomplished by sending the problematic child out in the hallway or to the principal's office for the time being.


That is literally vigilante-justice-style bullying, and that's another reason AGAINST collective punishment. Do you want kids to be, as you even admit, "bullying" each other for any reason?

It doesn't work that way.
Teacher tried it on my class when I was in middle school.
We tortured the teacher until she went out on leave.

Yeah, I remember an instance of collective punishment at my high school.

It united the whole class against the teacher, not the people that caused the whole class to be detained. In the end, the teacher gave in, and allowed anyone who promised they were innocent go home; the whole class left.

[Purpelia]

Where is the evidence that the child in this incident was bothering other students? As has been pointed out, this was during lunch and the substitute was fussing over how he was sitting.

Those are all nice to have. But barring them simple obedience is a good enough substitute. Our societies are full of high functioning sociopaths, individuals who are literally physically incapable of empathy and yet function just fine because they have learned that societies rules are to be obeyed even if you don't and can't understand why.

In my experience, it only caused ill will towards the one who decided that everyone should be punished for what one person did, because that's not fair.
And I can already see the argument that "LiFe'S nOt FaIr" coming, to which I say: So what? Doesn't mean we can't do our best to make things fair.

Exactly. It either causes everyone to gang up on the "offender" and bully them strait or everyone to gang up on the one meeting out the punishment and side with the "offender". Either way you get a very undesirable outcome.

And what you are advocating for is fear. Not authority derived from respect and good reasoning, but punishing people with no regard for circumstances or their own well-being. Plain and simple classic fear tactics. Disgusting.

Not fear, just practicality. There is no reason to permit one individual to ruin the education of others simply because you are too empathetic and frankly squeamish to let some kids fall through the cracks and have their lives ruined. Everyone deserves a chance at successes. Those that reject that chance should be thrown aside and left to rot.

By raw force of personality and applying rules consistently, mostly. There are other methods, but that one works pretty well.

A teacher with a strong personality as well. Yea... I am not sure where you find these people. In my experience teachers are individuals that couldn't get a real job in their chosen field so they end up teaching in school.

This is simply untrue. Kindly stop talking about things that you clearly know nothing about.

I went to school. If you think teachers have authority, or hell that teachers are for the most part not the weak and pointless underbelly of the professional world than you are wrong. I mean sure, you get the occasional snowflake that is there voluntarily. But for the most part he who does not know teaches is very much true. And teaching jobs are where dreams of professional success come to die.

[Geneviev]

Where is the evidence that the child in this incident was bothering other students? As has been pointed out, this was during lunch and the substitute was fussing over how he was sitting.

I went to school. If you think teachers have authority, or hell that teachers are for the most part not the weak and pointless underbelly of the professional world than you are wrong. I mean sure, you get the occasional snowflake that is there voluntarily. But for the most part he who does not know teaches is very much true. And teaching jobs are where dreams of professional success come to die.

I still go to school, and that's not true. Every one of my teachers are excellent, they are there voluntarily, they know their subjects, and they are anything but weak. So teachers definitely have authority. I don't know where they don't.

[Page]

The age of majority will always be arbitrary whether it's 21, 18, or younger and there will always be the inherent absurdity in that one's rights and responsibilities can change overnight when they're x years and 364 days old. We have to draw these arbitrary lines somewhere though, but we could at least be consistent.

It seems obvious to me that rights and responsibilities should increase proportionally, which is absolutely not the case in America. We never decide that a particular 8 year old is mature enough to drive as if they were an adult, or vote as if they were an adult, or drink, or work. Why then should a child be treated like an adult when it comes to crime? It's not proportional. It's not fair to have responsibilities without rights, and it doesn't make sense. We have abundant knowledge about developmental psychology, we know that the brain takes many years for things like empathy and impulse control to develop.

And how low do you want to go? Should we handcuff and arrest a 4 year old who hits someone? Should they stand trial? If you say yes, you're out of your mind, but 8 is not much better than 4.

[Ghost Land]

That can also be accomplished by sending the problematic child out in the hallway or to the principal's office for the time being.


That is literally vigilante-justice-style bullying, and that's another reason AGAINST collective punishment. Do you want kids to be, as you even admit, "bullying" each other for any reason?

It doesn't work that way.
Teacher tried it on my class when I was in middle school.
We tortured the teacher until she went out on leave.

Right; I was just going along with Purpelia's line of reasoning. Either way, collective punishment backfires against someone.

[Nobel Hobos 2]

The age of majority will always be arbitrary whether it's 21, 18, or younger and there will always be the inherent absurdity in that one's rights and responsibilities can change overnight when they're x years and 364 days old. We have to draw these arbitrary lines somewhere though, but we could at least be consistent.

It seems obvious to me that rights and responsibilities should increase proportionally, which is absolutely not the case in America. We never decide that a particular 8 year old is mature enough to drive as if they were an adult, or vote as if they were an adult, or drink, or work. Why then should a child be treated like an adult when it comes to crime? It's not proportional. It's not fair to have responsibilities without rights, and it doesn't make sense. We have abundant knowledge about developmental psychology, we know that the brain takes many years for things like empathy and impulse control to develop.

And how low do you want to go? Should we handcuff and arrest a 4 year old who hits someone? Should they stand trial? If you say yes, you're out of your mind, but 8 is not much better than 4.

Privileges and responsibilities do not come in pairs. Even if the draft applied to boys and girls equally, it would not be a "fair trade" for getting the vote, for instance. Even so, there is something to your "increasing proportionally" idea and I think it could work if more of the rights commonly denied to children were formalized, and granted one by one over a decade or so. Responsibilities too, though I know there will be a popular sentiment to tie each new right to a new responsibility in a way that usually won't make sense.

Parents having full control over the initiation of rights is hard to do away with. It's inescapably necessary early on (who else is going to grab the child before they run into traffic?) but it goes wrong in many ways. Some parents lose authority, some are too permissive too early, some are too controlling too late. Perhaps what is needed is a kind of arbitrator: parents wanting to grant a freedom early would have to apply, while teenagers wanting a freedom which hasn't been granted by the standard age, could apply for a "court order". And not the full legal process, the arbitrators would be child psychologists rather than lawyers.

[Purpelia]

The age of majority will always be arbitrary whether it's 21, 18, or younger and there will always be the inherent absurdity in that one's rights and responsibilities can change overnight when they're x years and 364 days old. We have to draw these arbitrary lines somewhere though, but we could at least be consistent.

It seems obvious to me that rights and responsibilities should increase proportionally, which is absolutely not the case in America. We never decide that a particular 8 year old is mature enough to drive as if they were an adult, or vote as if they were an adult, or drink, or work. Why then should a child be treated like an adult when it comes to crime? It's not proportional. It's not fair to have responsibilities without rights, and it doesn't make sense. We have abundant knowledge about developmental psychology, we know that the brain takes many years for things like empathy and impulse control to develop.

And how low do you want to go? Should we handcuff and arrest a 4 year old who hits someone? Should they stand trial? If you say yes, you're out of your mind, but 8 is not much better than 4.

Privileges and responsibilities do not come in pairs. Even if the draft applied to boys and girls equally, it would not be a "fair trade" for getting the vote, for instance. Even so, there is something to your "increasing proportionally" idea and I think it could work if more of the rights commonly denied to children were formalized, and granted one by one over a decade or so. Responsibilities too, though I know there will be a popular sentiment to tie each new right to a new responsibility in a way that usually won't make sense.

Parents having full control over the initiation of rights is hard to do away with. It's inescapably necessary early on (who else is going to grab the child before they run into traffic?) but it goes wrong in many ways. Some parents lose authority, some are too permissive too early, some are too controlling too late. Perhaps what is needed is a kind of arbitrator: parents wanting to grant a freedom early would have to apply, while teenagers wanting a freedom which hasn't been granted by the standard age, could apply for a "court order". And not the full legal process, the arbitrators would be child psychologists rather than lawyers.

That sounds horrible. The state has already penetrated far too deeply into family relations. The last thing we need is even more of that.

[Nobel Hobos 2]

Children getting equal rights to their developmental peers is "horrible" apparently.

Some people just hate children. It's mostly jealousy imo. They should stay the hell away from children and in particular, don't produce children of their own.

[SatoSere]

Children getting equal rights to their developmental peers is "horrible" apparently.

Some people just hate children. It's mostly jealousy imo. They should stay the hell away from children and in particular, don't produce children of their own.

This right here. I have a burning passionate eternal hatred towards child abusers because childhood is when a person is the most fragile. And the thing is, there's a disgusting amount of advocates of child abuse in this site. Not gonna mention their names because trollnaming is against the rules.

But yeah, I believe we should strengthen the power of CPS but not to KGB levels. I also think that instead of using an arbitrary number for legal consequences, how about an arbitrary formula instead?

[The Free Joy State]

The age of majority will always be arbitrary whether it's 21, 18, or younger and there will always be the inherent absurdity in that one's rights and responsibilities can change overnight when they're x years and 364 days old. We have to draw these arbitrary lines somewhere though, but we could at least be consistent.

It seems obvious to me that rights and responsibilities should increase proportionally, which is absolutely not the case in America. We never decide that a particular 8 year old is mature enough to drive as if they were an adult, or vote as if they were an adult, or drink, or work. Why then should a child be treated like an adult when it comes to crime? It's not proportional. It's not fair to have responsibilities without rights, and it doesn't make sense. We have abundant knowledge about developmental psychology, we know that the brain takes many years for things like empathy and impulse control to develop.

And how low do you want to go? Should we handcuff and arrest a 4 year old who hits someone? Should they stand trial? If you say yes, you're out of your mind, but 8 is not much better than 4.

Privileges and responsibilities do not come in pairs. Even if the draft applied to boys and girls equally, it would not be a "fair trade" for getting the vote, for instance. Even so, there is something to your "increasing proportionally" idea and I think it could work if more of the rights commonly denied to children were formalized, and granted one by one over a decade or so. Responsibilities too, though I know there will be a popular sentiment to tie each new right to a new responsibility in a way that usually won't make sense.

Parents having full control over the initiation of rights is hard to do away with. It's inescapably necessary early on (who else is going to grab the child before they run into traffic?) but it goes wrong in many ways. Some parents lose authority, some are too permissive too early, some are too controlling too late. Perhaps what is needed is a kind of arbitrator: parents wanting to grant a freedom early would have to apply, while teenagers wanting a freedom which hasn't been granted by the standard age, could apply for a "court order". And not the full legal process, the arbitrators would be child psychologists rather than lawyers.

Unfortunately, the children that kind of arbitration would be most useful for -- those raised in highly authoritarian families and families in closed groups -- are the children least likely to ever hear it existed, and so be least likely to be able to avail themselves of the resource.

That's not to say children should not have human rights to bodily integrity, choice over medical treatment (when they are old enough to be competent to understand; and that they should be protected from harmful ramifications of parental choices when they are not), choice of religion, and so on. They should.

On the subject of increasing proportionality, that's how it could work criminally, too. No potentially scarring actions should be brought against any minor (even one of the technical age of criminal responsibility) before an expert panel (with experience in child development, biology, child and clinical psychology and criminology) can show that they have the level mental and emotional development to intentionally commit a crime, possess the full knowledge of right and wrong, are capable of understanding of what the effects of their actions are likely to be.

In the UK, there's an assessment that takes in a young offender's home circumstances, any previous police background, and information from children's services before deciding whether to prosecute or go to other measures (including school disciplinary measures and restorative measures).

This kind of assessment period would be a good time to add an assessment period to work out if the child is developmentally capable of committing a crime at all (if they're not, measures such as counselling, or familial intervention or treatment for an underlying medical cause -- depending on the cause identified -- might be appropriate, on a case-by-case basis).

[Purpelia]

Children getting equal rights to their developmental peers is "horrible" apparently.

Some people just hate children. It's mostly jealousy imo. They should stay the hell away from children and in particular, don't produce children of their own.

Listen. Parenting is something that should be done by parents. Not by the state. Yes the state needs to step in to ensure children aren't maimed, raped, murdered or otherwise abused. But that's it. If anything the state should provide means to educate and enable parents to do their job instead of replacing them.

[The Emerald Legion]

I've worked in disadvantaged areas. Children weren't grabbed. Physical punishment is illegal in schools in this country.

Discipline was managed just fine.

As others have said, any teacher who "needs" to hit or grab a child to make them listen is ineffectual of enforcing discipline and, IMO, such people shouldn't work with children.

I never said Children were grabbed. No, instead they just get, at worst, shouted at. Which even that is frowned on.

And so you get children literally walking out of class to go do whatever they feel like. Or destroying entire classrooms. Or any number of other stupid things that could be avoided if you just physically stop them.

[Borderlands of Rojava]

You're simply incorrect.

What kind of children did you deal with?

Jotaro Kujo probably, and every other 17 year old anime protagonist.

[The Free Joy State]

I've worked in disadvantaged areas. Children weren't grabbed. Physical punishment is illegal in schools in this country.

Discipline was managed just fine.

As others have said, any teacher who "needs" to hit or grab a child to make them listen is ineffectual of enforcing discipline and, IMO, such people shouldn't work with children.

I never said Children were grabbed. No, instead they just get, at worst, shouted at. Which even that is frowned on.

And so you get children literally walking out of class to go do whatever they feel like. Or destroying entire classrooms. Or any number of other stupid things that could be avoided if you just physically stop them.

Not in any classroom I've ever worked in.

All competent teachers and classroom workers of my experience can gain the respect of a class and they don't need to hit, or grab a child, and they rarely need to raise their voice.

Oddly enough, I did observe the behaviour you describe once -- only once -- back when I was at school; in the classroom of one of these incredibly strict teachers who shouted as a form of communication. Her classroom control was atrocious. I never saw it when I was working.

[Lanoraie II]

In most states and countries there's an age of.....the word is failing me, but basically the minimum age requirement that someone can be arrested. Some places, like Florida (figures), have none.

Personally as someone involved in LEO work, there is no excuse for arresting an 8 year old, much less charging one. In my opinion, no child under, say, 13 should be able to be arrested, and none under 20 should be forced to carry out sentences longer than however many years away they are from 20.

I never said Children were grabbed. No, instead they just get, at worst, shouted at. Which even that is frowned on.

And so you get children literally walking out of class to go do whatever they feel like. Or destroying entire classrooms. Or any number of other stupid things that could be avoided if you just physically stop them.

Not in any classroom I've ever worked in.

All competent teachers and classroom workers of my experience can gain the respect of a class and they don't need to hit, or grab a child, and they rarely need to raise their voice.

Oddly enough, I did observe the behaviour you describe once -- only once -- back when I was at school; in the classroom of one of these incredibly strict teachers who shouted as a form of communication. Her classroom control was atrocious. I never saw it when I was working.

Physical "discipline" (read as: abuse) is always a failure on the authority's part. When I was growing up, the kids who acted out the most (and the ones who acted like traumatized, obedient drones) were the ones who were beaten on the regular. This is more than anecdotal however, this is historically the result one can expect from children in dysfunctional, abusive households; either acting like little hellspawn or desperately trying to avoid getting beaten so they act like angels. Rarely ever any middle ground. Some of the obedient angels are raised in loving households, but their mode of operation is noticeably different. They act appropriately because they were taught to do so, not out of fear of punishment or pain.

[Lanoraie II]

Children getting equal rights to their developmental peers is "horrible" apparently.

Some people just hate children. It's mostly jealousy imo. They should stay the hell away from children and in particular, don't produce children of their own.

Listen. Parenting is something that should be done by parents. Not by the state. Yes the state needs to step in to ensure children aren't maimed, raped, murdered or otherwise abused. But that's it. If anything the state should provide means to educate and enable parents to do their job instead of replacing them.

Wrong. You don't have the right to reproduce or take care of someone else if you are not fit for the job. You don't own your children and aren't owed the presence of a child. If you can't meet required standards, well that's just too damn bad, isn't it? So many children's lives would be saved if parental licenses were a thing.

[Geneviev]

I've worked in disadvantaged areas. Children weren't grabbed. Physical punishment is illegal in schools in this country.

Discipline was managed just fine.

As others have said, any teacher who "needs" to hit or grab a child to make them listen is ineffectual of enforcing discipline and, IMO, such people shouldn't work with children.

I never said Children were grabbed. No, instead they just get, at worst, shouted at. Which even that is frowned on.

And so you get children literally walking out of class to go do whatever they feel like. Or destroying entire classrooms. Or any number of other stupid things that could be avoided if you just physically stop them.

I've never seen anyone do anything like that, other than the destroying classrooms, although that is a completely different case. None of those things happen because children aren't physically restrained. If they do happen, there's always a different reason for it.

[The Free Joy State]

Not in any classroom I've ever worked in.

All competent teachers and classroom workers of my experience can gain the respect of a class and they don't need to hit, or grab a child, and they rarely need to raise their voice.

Oddly enough, I did observe the behaviour you describe once -- only once -- back when I was at school; in the classroom of one of these incredibly strict teachers who shouted as a form of communication. Her classroom control was atrocious. I never saw it when I was working.

Physical "discipline" (read as: abuse) is always a failure on the authority's part.

It is. It demonstrates a loss of control, not regaining it. It teaches nothing but that an act of violence is acceptable, as long as you're bigger than the other party and want to get your way.

When I was growing up, the kids who acted out the most (and the ones who acted like traumatized, obedient drones) were the ones who were beaten on the regular. This is more than anecdotal however, this is historically the result one can expect from children in dysfunctional, abusive households; either acting like little hellspawn or desperately trying to avoid getting beaten so they act like angels. Rarely ever any middle ground. Some of the obedient angels are raised in loving households, but their mode of operation is noticeably different. They act appropriately because they were taught to do so, not out of fear of punishment or pain.

Yes, back when I thought this was a child lashing out in a moment (rather than a child with known SEND who was treated unprofessionally by a teacher who then accelerated the situation), abuse was one of the possible causes the research pointed to, that may lead to aggressive behaviour in young children.

It's the root causes that need correct management and (where possible and appropriate) ameliorating to help manage aggressive childhood behaviour.