Originally published on January 26, 2015
Whatever happened to the good old days when throwing food in school was predicated by somebody shouting FOOD FIGHT to the dismay of harried hairnet-clad cafeteria ladies?
Sadly those days are gone and apparently so are the days when you could bank on school principals having more than two brain cells to rub together.
Photo Credit: maxresdefault.jpg
Nowadays food fight means something entirely different. At least it does for students at W.F. Burns Middle School in Chambers County, Alabama anyway. Teachers there are stockpiling arsenals of canned food because… ARMED SCHOOL INTRUDERS, y’all… and everyone knows middle-schoolers with cans of food vs. bad guys with guns makes for a fair fight.
Don’t worry, though. Hurling creamed corn and lentil soup is not as heinously stupid as it sounds. Students will only resort to throwing food after all other lines of defense… like the old dump-a-bag-of-marbles-on-the-floor-and-watch-the-bad-guy-slip-and-fall-then-knock-him-out-with-the-anvil trick… are exhausted. Phew. I was worried it was super stupid.
You might think this is a hoax. I know I did. But think again because it’s not. School administrators, as in the principal and vice-principal, actually think this is a good idea. They even sent a letter home to parents explaining the plan for enhancing school defense procedures and soliciting donations of canned food. If you don’t believe me, here’s a screen shot of the actual letter.
“We realize this may seem odd…”
Odd? How about idiotic. And if canned goods as weapons isn’t idiotic enough for you, let’s revisit Ms. Holley’s and Ms. Bell’s attempt at defending their genius plan…
“The canned food item will give the students a sense of empowerment to protect themselves and will make them feel secure in case an intruder enters their classroom.”
Seriously. Only a moron could classify arming kids with canned goods as empowering. What’s next? Gigantic ACME mousetraps? Invisibility cloaks? Or perhaps teachers could encourage bad guys to talk about their feeeeeeelings while students hold hands and quietly hum I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing in perfect harmony.
If I was a school official in Chambers County I would be embarrassed. I would issue a retraction, an apology, claim temporary insanity on behalf of the principal and vice-principal and possibly even ask for their resignations, but one thing is certain. If I truly believed the potential for school intruders posed a real and serious threat to the safety of students, I would not concoct a strategy in which throwing food was a defense tactic, even as a last resort. I would explore and implement REAL measures that ACTUALLY protect students, like… dare I say… providing weapons and training to teachers because you know, teachers with guns vs. bad guys with guns makes for a fair fight. Seriously.
Here’s the deal, I’d like to see the world for once all standing hand in hand and hear them echo through the hills for peace throughout the land as much as anybody, but bad guys with guns make it impossible. For the record, canned foods don’t stop armed and violent school intruders from killing children. Good people with guns do. It’s the real thing.