Violence Begets More Violence

While collecting mail from a post office box, I accidentally knocked my elbow into a woman at a box below me. I probably shouldn’t have reached over her, but the toddler at my side was cranky and I was in a hurry. Apologizing for my carelessness, I assumed the encounter was over. I assumed wrong. As I walked away from the post office, the strange woman bent down and ran into me, butting her head into my stomach and shouting that only the child had saved me from worse.

As violence in our city goes, this is an eminently forgettable moment. Yuppie mother has the wind knocked out of her, film at 11. Yet the shock of that impact stayed with me. Ten years later, the wind is taken out of me again as I read about three boys at Markham Middle School in Watts forced at gunpoint to lie on the ground while police shout obscenities and search them for a gun. Two other boys who happened upon the scene soon found themselves prone and handcuffed as well. My guess is that these youngsters won’t soon forget this violent encounter. The thought of students carrying guns is terrifying. Both as someone who spends most of her life in the classroom and also as the mother of a son about to enter public high school, I care very much about safe corridors. But I also know that were my child to be treated as those students at Markham Middle School were, he would be permanently affected by the violence of that day. Joseph Morgan, 13, said he had just completed an errand for a teacher and was returning to class when he encountered two officers with guns drawn and three boys already lying on the ground. Joseph said he tried to explain to the officers that he had permission to be out of class. “They just told me to shut up.”

Treating young people with disdain breeds their contempt. What we--teachers, police officers, parents--gain in momentary power with a show of force, we lose in terms of our power to influence them. Joseph Morgan said that one of the officers “put the gun to my head and he grabbed my neck and he slammed me to the ground.” The pass in Joseph’s hand, that symbol of school order, could not protect him. Why should he put his trust in such symbols the next time around? Better to learn from experience and expect the worst.

Showing teenagers disrespect does them material damage. Full as they are of braggadocio, few are as sure of themselves as they pretend to be. Tough as they appear, inside most are fragile. From a teen’s point of view, adults often send them the message that they are a plague on the landscape, disturbances in the field. The kids respond with more lip. I think we are afraid of teenagers, especially the boys. We fear their recklessness and shaved heads. We counter their bravado with our own, and because we are bigger and stronger, most often we win. But every encounter with violence takes its toll. The casualties on both sides are alarming. Let’s put our heads together and avoid escalating this unnecessary violence.