What Cuts Deeper Than a Bullet?

What Cuts Deeper Than a Bullet?

What could? What could ever tear through flesh more mercilessly than a chunk of cold lead propelled by exploding gunpowder?

Cowardice.

I recently spoke with maestromason in a thread on the recent Ohio shool shooting, and he mentioned cowardice. I had not considered that as a possible cause for the recent phenomenon of children taking the lives of children in such a way as we see far too often. But it makes sense.

I remember back to a time before Columbine, a day when things were simpler and tougher, yet safer. A day when guns were prolific and everyone carried a pocketknife, yet a day when using a pocketknife was rare and the entire concept of going on a shooting spree amid a school full of students was incomprehensible. Back in those days, I was a victim of bullies on many occasions... until the day I had had enough and stood up to them. I got my butt kicked, but I kept fighting; enough was enough. And the bullying stopped.

I learned something that day: bullies are cowards. They act out their fear by trying to continually prove to themselves that they are tough and strong. They choose the weak, the ones who don;t want to fight, and use them to stroke their own bruised egos. Back then, I hated bullies; today, I pity them.

But if bullying and cowardice existed back in those days, what has changed? Why is there so much violence in schools today as compared to the days of yore? Authority. In my day, the teachers controlled the schools. You did not fight back against the teachers, because you would be expelled after you had your attitude well adjusted. There was no abuse, but there was discipline. Paddles were hung in offices and classrooms as a reminder that the students would stay within rules of conduct.

Today, paddlings are forbidden and relatively vile actions are treated with something called "A-School" (alternative school) here. A-School is nothing more than a daily study hall with increased supervision; a watered down form of a jail. Students who go to it typically come back exhibiting even worse behavior than they did when they went in, simply due to the fact that they spend all day every day associating with the worst violators available. And A-School is not just for the worst of the worst; it is used for minor offenses as well... minor skirmishes, possession of contraband (not just knives, but things like cell phones and cameras), etc. This places kids who are simply being kids in direct intimate contact with those who are likely to one day be a serious problem.

Without discipline, the school hallways have turned more dangerous. Those with a propensity for violence toward others have become bolder and less concerned about the possibility of getting caught. The punishment is not punishment, but a vacation for them. The normal pecking order has been disrupted in the name of progress and children are no longer able to seek either refuge from the tyranny nor retaliate without the same consequences as the troublemakers. Thus, the other kids are faced with a dilemma: how do they combat such when there is no authority to go to for effective aid?

They fight back. They have no other choice.

But not all kids are physically able to fight back effectively. Some are smaller of stature, and some have more intellectual interests than physical. Some just do not have enough self-confidence. In the face of more and more aggressive challenges, is it any wonder kids become scared?

Cowardice can be defined as habitual fear.

Cowardice makes one afraid of direct confrontation. Cowardice makes one angry, both with the source of their fear and with themselves. Anger leads to hate, and hate... leads to violence. One group of cowards who has come to believe they are above the rules and can do as they please, and another group of cowards who is living in continual fear with nowhere to turn... can anyone give me a more direct recipe for violence?

In the name of polical correctness, for "the good of the children", to ensure that "No Child is Left Behind"... today, February 27, 2012, a child was left behind... in a cold grave, to join the many more who have been left behind before. Another child has been left behind in a jail cell, his life ruined, hie future gone.

This is MADNESS!

This is INSANITY!

The solution is simple: bring back discipline in the schools. Bring back the paddles, and demand the right to either discipline problem students or expell them outright. Get rid of the study hall schools that coddle problems into disasters. Bring back expulsion, possibly with automatic enlistment in the military (boot camps tend to fix those discipline problems) or enrollment in the "boot camp style" schools springing up around the country. Tear down those "gun-free zone" signs and allow responsible faculty members to defend both themselves and their charges with like ability. Disband the NEA and allow schools to hire the best teachers instead of the ones who manage to keep their jobs long enough. Drum the pundits that want to use schools as social experimentation stations out of the system. And get back to teaching the children that want to learn. It's called a "school" and not a "hazardous zone" for a reason.

The social experimentation has gone on long enough. We have a result. It doesn't work. Can we please get back to our base now, before more children die at the hand of a coward? For the sake of the children, can we return to sanity and reality?

Or are we too afraid... are we cowards as well?

TheRedneck

reply to post by TheRedneck

I remember back to a time before Columbine, a day when things were simpler and tougher, yet safer. A day when guns were prolific and everyone carried a pocketknife, yet a day when using a pocketknife was rare and the entire concept of going on a shooting spree amid a school full of students was incomprehensible. Back in those days, I was a victim of bullies on many occasions... until the day I had had enough and stood up to them. I got my butt kicked, but I kept fighting; enough was enough. And the bullying stopped.

This part jumped out at me.
I think alot of political correctness is whats causing things to be so different today.

I was bullied as well at one point,I fought back and they went away.
Kids aren't really allowed to act like kids today unless they are acting politically correct.

How dare little Jimmy have to punch someone??
Violence isn't the answer they say?
My answer to that is,whats the question again,you can't tell me the answer without asking me the question?
Well it worked for me just fine in my day yet for some reason a kid dealing with a bully by beating his butt is wrong??

Its the political correctness of society and sometimes how the parents raise them to be like that,that turn them into cowards in my opinion.

Great thread!!

Well said and Bravo.

I have been saying the same thing for years.

I know many will take this the wrong way, but I have always thought the two worst thing in a boys life are mothers and the lack of uncles.

I am not against a mother loving their sons. It is simply the tendancies of women to care too much for the son's welfare. Mothers let your sons fall down and get hurt. It really is good for their development.

Also, who better to show a young man how to get into and out of trouble than that crazy @ssed uncle we all have. This is also a vital part of a boy's develpoment in a man.

I know I could have given a much better explaination, but often times brevity helps the reader draw a far better picture for themselves.

You seem to have figured out the solution to the problem but once you understand the CAUSE of the problem then you'll understand that NO ONE wants the solution.

This whole thing is happening by design my friend.
There are no 'accidents'.
It was designed to happen this way.
It is all part of the grand design to corrupt not just our country, or world but, Humanity itself.
It has worked beautifully I must say.

Just go along for the ride and be an observer because you ARE NOT going to stop the grand design from unfolding. One day ALL OF THIS will change. All of the madness WILL come to an end BUT...... ONLY AFTER the grand design has been completed and realized and then completely unfolded.

We WILL regain out humanity......but, not just yet.

Even if "paddlins" were allowed in school and at home still, it wouldn't solve this. The level of bullying now goes beyond school, it infects every aspect of the childs life. Not even home is safe because of online bullying.

reply to post by Kali74

With the exception of the online aspect (which I still don't understand, really... I didn't know one could email a punch in the face? ) bullying has always been going on in every area of a child's life. That lack of a true 'safe haven' is one of the reasons a child would eventually rise above their fear and stand tall. There was the authority aspect, where adults would referee any abuse away, but that was tempered by a realization that sometimes it takes putting both participants in boxing gloves and letting them go at it; it did not carry with it the prospect of punishment for standing up for oneself.

It's more than just the wooden paddle hanging on the wall: it was the knowledge that it would be administered fairly and with understanding. Today it is A-School (translation: being placed in amongst those who started the problem) administered without any thought to fairness and without any attempt to understand the problem.

Don't let the aspect of paddling blind you to the concept of fair and equitable punishment and discipline.

TheRedneck

I too was bullied. I too stood up to my tormentors. Funny how back then, all they did was say "**** you!" and then proceeded to describe profanities. No guns, no knives..heck, they didn't even threaten my dog. Our society claims to be "better" and "improved and evolved"..yet kids are gunning each other over STUPID-ass reasons. My prayers till go out to the families of all concerned, and indeed for the ones who did this. I think they need the prayer most of all - because, we can revile them and shake our heads, but in the end, something is horribly, horribly wrong. With them..and us. We can't shirk blame either, no matter how uncomfortable this makes us. Our apathy, our selfishness..like all the other factors, we had a hand in all these tragedies, too. May God have mercy on us all.

Sorry for the rant.

Things are not any worse now just because you hear it on the news.

People love to glorify the wild west or the mafia, when they were nothing but terrorists, and your town being riddled with holes was just every bit as scarey then as it is now.

Billy the Kid was wanted for killing at least 12 men. He was 18/19 years old.

Kids in the inner cities where a quarter of the high school kids belong to gangs, live with this kind of fear every day. You just don't hear about it because it is not a surburban white neighborhood.

reply to post by TheRedneck


I like your thread, and the ideas you propose, but I feel that what you asking for will never happen.

I agree with everything you’ve written, but I just want to say that parents or family need to be the enforcer.
IMO, it all goes back to the parenting. Schools are afraid to discipline the children because of the parents, and parents are afraid to discipline their children for a plethora of reasons.

I remember asking to be paddled, rather than have the school call my parents whenever I acted up. That’s what I feared, my parents.

A parent disciplines their kid (in anyway, spanking, taking away privileges, whatever) and the school finds out, people get righteous. Even if the kid deserved it.

Whereas;

A school disciplines their student (in anyway, spanking, taking away privileges, whatever) and the parents finds out, people get righteous. Even if the kid deserved it.

It’s all broken.

And it’s unfortunate.

A laser beam, I reckon a laser beam could cut deeper than a bullet.

Gangs dont have them now do they???

America is a bully. It has been a bully riddled with greed for a very long time. I don't know if the ideals we are taught in school, or should I say used to be taught in school, are true, or ever were true in this country. I think it is something put out there to justify what we do later as being somehow morally superior. Manifest destiny, now there is a phrase for you, justified the extermination and eradication of an entire group of people living here. Greed and bulling our Nations true agenda, at home and abroad.

Sorry if I am way off topic, but it is no surprise to me that our children are reflecting the society they live in.

Edited to add, I am really really angry and heartbroken over this. I deplore it.

reply to post by nixie_nox

The Wild West was not all that wild really... those are just stories. The gunfights were few and far between (and rarely at high noon on a deserted street face-to-face).

The Mafia was pretty bad, I'll grant you that.

But the news is not the change. I have watched my son and daughter go through school and seen the changes from when I went through school. No media needs be involved for me to see the stark contrasts. Sure, we hear it immediately rather than through the grapevine, and sure, we get live video instead of pre-taped segments, but that is only our perception of the events, not the quantity of the events. In the time period I spoke of, any murder would have been news, at a school would have been a major story!

TheRedneck

reply to post by TheRedneck


words can hurt just as bad if not worse than
a punch or a kick

and in my eyes is the worst form of bullying

Originally posted by TheRedneck
reply to post by nixie_nox

The Wild West was not all that wild really... those are just stories. The gunfights were few and far between (and rarely at high noon on a deserted street face-to-face).

The Mafia was pretty bad, I'll grant you that.

But the news is not the change. I have watched my son and daughter go through school and seen the changes from when I went through school. No media needs be involved for me to see the stark contrasts. Sure, we hear it immediately rather than through the grapevine, and sure, we get live video instead of pre-taped segments, but that is only our perception of the events, not the quantity of the events. In the time period I spoke of, any murder would have been news, at a school would have been a major story!

TheRedneck

Actually the wild west was very violent, with a homicidal rate SEVEN Times of the murder rate today.

But you are rigth in that the duels you see on the movies are atypical.

But Hardin started killing at 14, Fisher started killing at 16.

These events are nothing new.

The world is not any worse today, and if you looked at newspapers from 100 years ago, you will still see all the same stories that you see now.

Crime is at its lowest point since 1960.

There are 350 million people in the US. This is the third or fourth event in 12 years.

Just like plane crashes, they don't happen often so it makes news when they do.

Is it sad? Hell yea.

But it certainly doesn't mean we bring back corpreal punishment. As if it made people better.

Remember, all those kids that were paddles are now your lawyers, politicians, and bankers. So obviously corpreal punishment doesn't work.

Helicopter parenting doesn't work either. Those are two extreme sides of the same coin.

Children reflect the upbringing they receive.

I do everything I can to connect with my child, have fun with him, earn his trust. If I do say I am going to do something, I follow through with it.
I do not treat him like a second class citizen. It is not about instilling fear, or making them feel inferior. Just the oppsite. I can give him plenty of respect while still holding authority. I never even used baby talk on him, I talk to him like I talk to any adult, always have. I now have the most behaved, empathetic, but curious child in the class.

Since I show him respect, he now knows how to show it right back. Because I discuss things with him until he understands, he is curious but also receives instruction very well.

I have never had to lay a hand on him.

So what happens if you use fear to control a child? Then they learn to use fear to control people.

reply to post by maryhinge

It is also the easiest to ignore.

In a society where freedom of speech is valued at all, there is no possible way to remove the aspect of hurting words. The best way to handle a situation one cannot avoid is for one to prepare for the situation. We do it all the time: if it is cold outside, we wear heavy clothing. Extreme cold can be deadly, but we survive it every day by preparing for it. If we drive, we buy insurance; we don't make it illegal to have an accident! Since accidents are unavoidable, we prepare for them.

Where hurting words are concerned, they will happen. The way to handle this is to prepare for it: explain to a child that words alone are not a big deal. What's the old saying? "Sticks and Stones may Break my Bones..."?

That's another thing that hasn't changed: words. And yet, I never got bruised because of words, I never had to go get sewed back together over words, and I never got into trouble over someone else's words.

I just ignored them.

TheRedneck

reply to post by nixie_nox

Remember, all those kids that were paddles are now your lawyers, politicians, and bankers. So obviously corpreal punishment doesn't work.

And they're still alive.

I'll take a kid getting a deserved paddling over kids dying as a chunk of lead rips through their scared body any day. If you wish to disagree with me on that, well, we'll just have to disagree.

And rare? These are children. One is two too many.

TheRedneck

That crazy uncle I spoke of earlier, thold me how to handle a bully.

I was, and still am, a little smaller than average in size. When I was in the sixth grade a couple of guys thought they could make me do things I really didn't want to do. (enough explaination)

I remembered my uncle had told me "if some body wants to fight, hit the first right between the yes."

I did just that to the one closest to me, and grabbed at the other, trying to get a good swing at him.

To my amazement, it worked. The first one went down, crying. The second ran away.

I am not saying this is the best thing to do for anyine else. I just know noone ever tried anything with me again.

I was also careful not to become the type of person I saw in them.

Oh! The teacher didn't seem to see the situation in the same way I did. But, that paddling I took with pride.

It is so sad but true that COWARDICE is starting to become the accepted norm amongst young people today. I just got back from driving to the store and I saw a prime example of it.

A young man in his upper teens walking down the street attempting to intimidate PEOPLE on a street HE DOES NOT BELONG ON by gesturing like he was holding a gun straight armed and pulling the trigger. I could not resist myself pulling up on him very fast in my car while he was gesturing shooting a gun, pulled up in front of him and got out of my car and said, "Hey Young man? Who are you making that gesture to? Me?" and he replied very intimidated, "Ohh, Ohhh Sir Uhhh NO Sir!" Then I told him, "Young man, you are going to find yourself in an early grave walking the streets making gestures like that." Then I asked him, "Do you want to be known as a COWARDLY ASS young man who walks the streets attempting to intimidate people by gesturing that you have a gun and will shoot people?...because that is EXACTLY what you look like!"" and he replied, "Whatever man!...if it keeps these (expletives) off my back then hell yea!"

Now this just happened about 30 minutes ago!

smh

reply to post by TheRedneck


BRAVO! The Redneck for such a thought compelling thread such as this is!

I believe this issue needs to be addressed and not only addressed but some effort put forth to eradicate this problem with today's youth.

These children are raising themselves instead of being properly raised then they grow up to become the neighborhood terror/pain in the @$$!

The type of education that morally & ethically prepares one for the world begins in the HOME and is TAUGHT BY THE PARENTS not the academic school house!

PEOPLE!

PLEASE TEACH YOUR CHILDREN THAT THE VALUE OF HUMAN LIFE IS PRICELESS AND NOT CHEAP!

Originally posted by TheRedneck
reply to post by nixie_nox

The Wild West was not all that wild really... those are just stories. The gunfights were few and far between (and rarely at high noon on a deserted street face-to-face).

The Mafia was pretty bad, I'll grant you that.

But the news is not the change. I have watched my son and daughter go through school and seen the changes from when I went through school. No media needs be involved for me to see the stark contrasts. Sure, we hear it immediately rather than through the grapevine, and sure, we get live video instead of pre-taped segments, but that is only our perception of the events, not the quantity of the events. In the time period I spoke of, any murder would have been news, at a school would have been a major story!

TheRedneck

So true! The Wild West was tame by comparison of today's streets due to having CODE, and HONOR that you cannot find in the streets of today.

People back in the early U.S. pioneer days were RAISED from the HOME with as strict code that they abide by...

To help those in distress.

To help your neighbor.

To abide by the RULES AND REGULATIONS OF THE LAND!

Before Black's Law was established in the U.S. people held values and principles of conduct first.

Today, there is a universal urban code of conduct called "street code" but it is watered down and has none of the TRUE GRIT that the Wild West had back in the days.