Tuesday, October 02, 2007



America in a nutshell

What happens if a high school student drops cake on the floor in the cafetaria? In New Zealand, they get told to clean it up, and if they refuse or do a crappy job, put on detention. In America, OTOH, it's a different story:

School security guards in Palmdale, CA have been caught on camera assaulting a 16-year-old girl and breaking her arm after she spilled some cake during lunch and left some crumbs on the floor after cleaning it up.

The incident occurred last week at Knight High School in Palmdale and was caught on a cell phone camera by another pupil who was then also assaulted by the security guards.

[...]

In an even more shocking development the security guards later had the mother of the girl arrested after she sought out an attorney and demanded that the guard be arrested, telling her that if she wanted the guard detained then she herself would also be charged with battery after she allegedly pushed the guard and an assistant principal of the school. She has also been suspended from her job at another school in the county.

The school expelled [the student] for five days before then having her arrested for battery and for littering (the dropping of the cake). Then they had the pupil who captured the video arrested along with his sister who was merely present at the scene.

It goes without saying that she was black.

What lesson must America's high school students be learning from this sort of incident? That authority is vicious, arbitrary, racist, brutal, and will stop at nothing to protect itself and avoid being held accountable for its actions. Which kindof sums up America in a nutshell.

(Hat tip: Capitalism Bad, Tree Pretty)