Did Town Really Turn the Tables on School 'Prank'?

I emphatically disagree (scroll down) that this is the Cinderella story that the writer paints. What do you think?

Read the rest of the story: From The Detroit News: Town turns tables on school prank | The Detroit News | detroitnews.com


The monsters who did this to this high school sophomore are the children and grandchildren of the people who are supporting her! The 'overboard-ness' isn't as much about empathy (check back w/Whitney next year and see how many people still care) as it is about assuaging their own feelings of guilt (whether they have culpability or not). That kid needs out of that town the minute she can. Instead of homecoming everything--how 'bout a college fund?

 

Ah, high school.

I've been to West Branch, it isn't a bad city if you have enough money to own a house on the lake. But, it is the parents of the kids who are the problem here.

 

Wait, wait, wait Fangirl. I see parent and grandparents teaching their kids an actual lesson here. I think that it's pretty safe to assume that the parents and grandparents didn't know what the kids were up to - honestly, I doubt that any parent had any idea (nor should they, since the kids should have lives outside of their parents at that age). So it was done. And the adults did their best with what they could. At the same time, they managed to do something nice.

We ALL had horrible high school experiences. Anyone who didn't either doesn't remember, is lying or is one of those 0.0002% of kids that didn't suffer at the hands of anyone else. This seems like a normal high school prank, albeit a cruel one. It would not have been outside the character of the kids I went to high school with and this kind of thing was why there were no popularity contests at my high school - the founder saw this sort of thing coming years before. So let's realize that kids were simply being kids (and saying that it's any more than that is pretty much just ignorance of what goes on in ANY high school) and the adults made something good out of something that could have been awful.

 

I respectfully disagree with you the_jazz about the lesson being taught, that this was a 'normal' high school prank, and that the adults made something good out of what 'could have been awful'.

1. The number of kids involved 'pranking' a single girl make it an a-typical 'prank.' This type of prank has driven less-cheerful types than Ms. Kropp to suicide.
2. Buying Ms. Kropp a fancy dress and feting her on Homecoming Day is not IMO, 'a good thing' in response to what the assholes who singled out this girl did. This to me is a whitewashing, an attempt to say Hey everyone! We're not so bad. Look at all the nice things we are doing (for this kid our kids pilloried).' It is, I feel more about them than it is Ms. Kropp and the offenders.
3. It WAS awful, not could have been.

Please, tell me about how awful high school is. I was a fat, foreign, smart girl in a dumb-ass town not much bigger than this, which is partially why I call bullshit on them.

I did NOT say the act itself was the parent's fault--but decent kids don't do shit like this. I'm judging every single kid who wrote Ms. Kropp's name down as someone worthy of disdain. In general I think, if you're an asshole at age 15 or 16, you are not growing out of it, you'll simply find more 'mature' ways of being an asshole.

Further, the offending students need to understand that buying stuff for someone after you've shat upon them is not the way to make amends.

 

I like the outrage expressed by everyone as if less is to be expected from kids.

Kids are fucking monsters.

 

We know that some of those kids will learn something from this, but like you said Fangirl some will never learn the lessons of cruelty unless they experience it themselves. This hits close to home, with a tragic ending.

 

Not if you raise them right.

It is very hard for me to defend the 'free' public school system over the private one, religious ones, or charter schools when stuff like this goes on. Some of it is the parents, some is the teachers, some is that the other kids push others to be evil. There needs to be expectations and consequences.

 

Hi ASU2003,

I very much agree with your final thought here. I'm seeing no consequences for the group of kids that did this to their classmate. I was pondering: what would be a part of an appropriate consequence? Since this is a school matter, I thought certainly a written letter of apology to Ms. Kropp from each one, to be graded so it's not a 'joke' would be a start.

I also agree with you about raising your kids right. These kids should have learned long ago the difference between right and wrong, cruelty and kindness and yet they acted as if they'd not ever been acquainted with the wherefores of how to be a decent human being.

I don't believe that the parents are completely to blame, any more than I think that when a kid does something outstanding, it is due solely to 'good parenting.' There are a lot of influences, as we all know, that go into the making of an adult.

Speaking personally, having been the butt of a decade of merciless haranguing, I made it a huge big deal that my two sons learned to be kind--and they both are.
Other areas still need work, but I can say the same for myself--far from perfect--still trying to get some things right.
--- merged: Sep 25, 2012 at 2:49 AM ---

Hi Freetofly,

This I only realized after posting hit directly 'home.'
I'm not recounting this as a 'poor me' story but as a context for part of why this struck me.

When I was in grade 6, I was in homeroom when the teacher left for several minutes. For whatever reason a 'mean girl' walked up to the front of the classroom and announced she was looking for a show of hands for everyone who hates Cindy M. (me). The entire class except two girls who were outcasts but not picked on--just ignored--raised their hands. The entire effing class! At first I was stunned and then I burst into tears and fled the class.
The kids got a lecture as their consequence. I got another scar on my psyche because I was not the resilient type. But I don't think kids in general are evil. I think environment plays a good part in how they behave. I was in a crappy town, in a crappy school--sort of not surprising.
--- merged: Sep 25, 2012 at 2:54 AM ---

Hi Xerxes,

I agree that some kids can be fucking monsters. Am I understanding that you've not known any children who were not 'fucking monsters?'
Were you yourself that way?

 

I agree. The show of support from the community is nice, but largely meaningless in light of the fact that the kids got away scott free with their "prank". And I speak as one of kids who never really suffered and bullying (other than one particularly insensitive action in first year). The kids who did this need to see some sort of consequence of their action before anything really meaningful can come of this.

 

Unfortunately I don't think what the town is doing is going to affect the people that perpetrated it one bit. They will operate under the assumption that its only happening because "they feel sorry for her" and in their minds they will rationalize that if it makes this girl "feel better" about herself, then in the long run they did a good thing.

I was bullied horribly..horribly. To the point of being cornered in the bathroom by girls with weapons who would drill into my head how the world would be better off if I was dead. The neighborhood kids would sing "how much is that doggie in the window" when I got on the school bus in the mornings. I would get invited to parties and be circled and ridiculed the whole time I was there. Why? who knows, they made fun of the fact I was in girl scouts, they made fun of the fact that I read books, they made fun of the fact that I was gifted, they made fun of the fact that my parents didnt believe in buying me designer clothes, and that I had braces, and that I wasnt attractive, or that I chose to hang out with the special needs kids. It was bad....I actually contemplated suicide for a few hours one night. I had self esteem...but only among a few friends that I was in girl scouts with. The school actually called my mother in to tell them they were worried (this was in 1982) but didn't really do anything and my mother didnt understand how anyone could really be all that mean to her precious older child. I managed to get thru it by choosing to go to a high school where those particular people wouldnt be (our neighborhood was the dividing line between two high schools, so we had a choice) I spent my high school years with only a handful of people that had known me. It made all the difference, I was "popular" but not with the "popular" kids lol I found my nest of geeky guys who appreciated my smarts and my quirkiness (and looking back since I was the only girl that hung with them...that probably got me points too) Those girls that bullied me so badly, and the boys that made fun of me turned out to be pretty much nothing. Most of the girls got knocked up and didnt finish high school. I've had a few of the boys actually seek me out in the last two years to apologize to me....Their kids are now the age we were when that was going on and I guess somewhere the light bulb clicked on. It actually meant a lot to me that they did that, it made me realize that I hadn't "gotten over it" I had just pushed it back to the corners of my mind

sigh...didnt mean to go off on the rant...Im a totally well adjusted person, in fact I think some of it made me the kind of person I am today. The kind that doesnt take shit off anyone, any time, for any reason. I just really don't think these kids are going to realize what they did was wrong until much later in their lives, if ever.

 

The whole reaction is puzzling to me. I would have thought the first step would be to cancel the homecoming stuff altogether, find the ringleaders and punish them.

After that, if people want to make it up to her, great - but I doubt that this fuss is doing much to make her feel better.

I don't buy the "kids are monsters" stuff. Firstly, at 16/17 I don't see these as kids, but as young adults. I left home at 16 and certainly wouldn't have joined in on this childish bullying - nor would anyone I knew.

We don't have all this stuff like "homecoming", proms, banquets and "graduations" in school. They strike me as opportunities to cause social anxiety while increasing the feeling of "specialness" in some young people who already think far too highly of themselves and are far too pampered.

 

Maybe they should let the 'Queen' decide who can come to the dance. Just have a few bouncers and a list...

 

Looks more like the joke is on some of her classmates. She comes across as a nice person and they come across as spiteful little bastards

 

I wonder if the whole class voted for this? I remember most of my class not voting at all for these stupid things. Only the popular people gave a crap. And ferk them anyway. ( some of them were pretty nice though, so just kidding ) Actually thinking about my own class, I don't understand being able to get enough people to agree on something to do this kind of thing. Maybe it's a town of jerks...

Would cancelling the festivities actually have helped? I could see some extra bullying backlash from that. I think the parents/community stepped up and said that what happened wasn't right, and tried to make it right. It does make the perps look like complete assholes.

 

Yes, I think so. The "festivities" look like bull to me, anyway - why would anyone WANT to attend (unless it is about social positioning)? If the little bastards continue the bullying, punish them harder. Ban them from everything they enjoy and that gives them "status".

 

Hi Alistair:

I never understood 'all the pomp and circumstance surrounding homecoming, proms, banquets and graduations in school' either. Part of it is the social anxiety aspect of it, absolutely. I see no point in voting for most popular and best looking and kings and queens. As the_jazz noted, some schools have stopped encouraging such things or banned them altogether. I feel it is an error to reward students for doing absolutely nothing of note as the rewards and ceremony have nothing to do with becoming an educated individual.

Hi Cayvmann:

You make a good point. If the festivities were cancelled altogether (this year), the young lady may well have suffered all the more for it for it.

 

Indefensible behavior is as likely to occur in a public school as a private one. I don't think public schools are in need of defense anyway or at least not in terms of behavior such as this. Mitt Romney, private schooler, in league with other students, shaved off another student's hair because he suspected the boy was a homosexual. Bullying happens and I'm not sure how private schools handle it these days but public schools are becoming less and less tolerant of it.

Which makes me wonder where the punishment of these students is. Surely the school administration is contemplating the appropriate disciplinary action, no?

I think the parents of these students and the town as a whole, though possibly looking to assuage some of their own guilt, had their hearts in the right place. I don't agree that the best response to the humiliation of an unpopular girl is to make her feel popular and special for a night but as soon as I read that Facebook was involved, I immediately understood how one person's great idea was grabbed onto like the side of a lifeboat drifting away from the Titanic.

What needs to happen as a follow-up to the event (as it looks certain to happen) is disciplinary action against the students who voted for this girl with the intent to humiliate her (if I can be determined who they were, that is - there were certainly those who concocted the idea and made known to her their intent for doing so, but there also may have been some who voted for her simply to ensure that the "popular" candidate didn't get to ascend to her rightful throne - I'm not sure these would fall into the same category)

I would also revisit the entire idea of staging a yearly popularity contest. Tradition be damned. I think the whole ritual does more harm than good (failing to see the good at all really).

Have a football game. Call it homecoming (alumni night) and sponsor a dance afterward. No need to single anyone out as deserving of honors based on something as frivolous as popularity, which from my perspective is too often based on less than admirable character traits and a lack of educational excellence exhibited by those deemed most popular.

 

Errrrr ... fuck.

OK, I would prolly be one of those idiots that jumped on the band wagon and raised my hand when the girl in @shanifaye's class announced "WHO HATES SHANI".

Going back to the whole "I am weird theme". I was a weirdo that read a lot and in a desperate bid to fit in I did lots of shit that I probably shouldn't have. This included hitting this one girl in my class when I was 8. That was actually the event that cemented my future. Because I hit her I will never hit another woman again if I can help it. I know I was only 8 but that is hardly an excuse to get in a fight at all let alone with a girl thats much smaller than you.

I remember finding her later and apologizing to which she laughed in my face and said I just then reminded her of the day. She had long since forgotten it. I'm glad she never had any long lasting effects from it though.

I don't think I trust myself to raise kids.

 

Xerxes
I give people who chose to be child-free a lot of credit. It's extremely hard to be a good parent, never mind a great one. I think I'm in the barely good category but I have made some major fuck ups, mostly going too soft when I should have stood my ground and picking not-good choices for baby daddies (I'm twice married). I tell ya, I wouldn't have picked me for a mom.