Six-year-old Boy Holds Class Hostage, Uses Finger For Gun (This isn't satire)

[shadowrider]

The scene was tense Wednesday, 3 March, when Mason Jammer, a student at Jefferson Elementary in Ionia, Michigan held his kindergarten class hostage by fashioning his finger into the shape of a gun. Ionia is far distant suburb east of the thriving metropolis of Grand Rapids.

During the siege, panicked teachers gathered outside the classroom expressed concerns that the finger might go off. “This just wasn’t funny,” said the Jefferson principal. “ made other students uncomfortable.”

http://wmbriggs.com/blog/?p=2086

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Ionia kindergartner suspended for making gun with hand

IONIA -- To the little boy's mother, it was just a 6-year-old boy playing around.

But when Mason Jammer, a kindergarten student at Jefferson Elementary in Ionia, curled his fist into the shape of a gun Wednesday and pointed it at another student, school officials said it was no laughing matter.

They suspended Mason until Friday, saying the behavior made other students uncomfortable, said Erin Jammer, Mason's mother.

http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2010/03/ionia_kindergartener_suspended.html

QUICK, put that finger away before it hurts someone

[crim son]

1. I'm glad he was suspended.

In what way is pretending to aim a deadly weapon at another student considered amusing or entertaining? Obviously nobody thought the finger would hurt anybody, but a kid who thinks that behavior is funny would freak me out, definitely.

[ret5hd]

5. .

:rofl: oh stop! please stop! you're killing me!

[SteveM]

54. This has to be out of the Onion. When I was in school we had cast metal chairs...

and after a lunch of beanie-weanies, the fun began. Today, I'd be expelled for expelling.

[pnwmom]

6. He was a KINDERGARTNER. And in my generation, 95% of boys would have

freaked you out, apparently.

Pow!

[crim son]

16. It isn't your generation any more, or mine.

And I'd be a piss-poor anti-gun person if I thought it was cool to run around and pretend to kill people. Times change, people change; I'm just changing faster than you are.

I have three kids and have never allowed anything resembling a weapon in the house. No toy guns as kids, not even water guns. I can imagine you find that quite incomprehensible.

[cowman]

19. I suppose

you think the parents should be investigated and punished for not properly teaching their child tho respect the fears of other people.

We really have become a nation of wuuses

[cowman]

26. Oh my Gawd

I guess I'm going to go criminal any day now because I used to play with toy guns and pretend to play war and I guess my police officer daughter is going to go bad because she learned to handle and shoot guns by the time she was 5

How ridiculous is that?

[earthside]

29. You're not any kind of 'change'.

This is the old, 'be afraid of everything' mind-set that brought ridicule and mockery on certain 'liberals' for generations.

[Jackson1999]

31. and I can guarentee you that......

...when they are with their friends, they pick up sticks and pretend they are guns-playing soldier, cowboys and indians and all the other things little boys do.

[shadowrider]

34. Let me respectfully ask you a question I've asked of others

As an anti-gun person, and you're certainly welcome to your point of view, if you and your family, including children, were walking to a restaurant (or big box store, or the mall etc.) and out of the blue came a bad guy with the intent to harm you or your loved ones in some way, would you want me, as a concealed carry person, to ATTEMPT (there are no guarantees) to stop this crime against you or your loved ones and prevent harm to you or them? Or, as an anti-gun person, would you prefer I keep walking and let happen what will?

Just curious

[Callisto32]

35. No baseball bats? Crowbars? Nail Pullers?

Screwdrivers? Books? Butter knives? Ball bearings? Thumbtacks? Pencils, pens, rulers? Cyanoacrylates? Epoxy? Chlorine bleach and ammonia in the same general place? Drain Opener? Tent spikes?

I'm not even trying.

Trying to weapon-proof your household is utterly futile.

[shadowrider]

36. As long as there are no evil guns

They're perfectly safe dontchaknow.

[RaleighNCDUer]

40. so are you now going to ban fingers, too? nt

[cognoscere]

52. Hey, they could put an eye out with that thing. n/t

[SteveM]

55. You don't know where those fingers have been! nt

[pnwmom]

46. I see no evidence that my generation was more violent than younger ones

even though we all used squirt guns.

[gorfle]

48. My parents tried that.

My parents tried the "no toy guns" thing when I was a kid. I can remember - I was about 3 or 4 years old - I started making toy guns out of sticks to play with.

Kids, boys in particular, have looked to great warriors as role models since the dawn of human history, and they pretend-play to be like them, dress like them, and act like them. Whether it is kids playing with pretend swords, cowboys and Indians, or Axis and Allies, kids pretend to be the great warriors of their day and days gone by.

It's the way of things.

[PavePusher]

51. Try to use logical thought.

Try real hard.

[earthside]

7. You've got to be kidding, right?

Six years old?

What kind of perverse, weenie, totally 'petrified of your own shadow' world do you and the principal of Jefferson Elementary in Ionia live in?

My gosh, you must be afraid to walk into your own bathroom.

Suspended a six year old? No wonder the country is falling apart.

[Name removed]

17. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

20. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[shadowrider]

24. .

:fistbump:

[Callisto32]

37. And you think that a kid should be suspended for thought crime.

Thinking this kind of behavior is dangerous is absurd on its face.

[shadowrider]

8. When I was growing up

We could go to the store and buy a "war kit" which included a helmet, grenade, machine gun and other sundry items. We'd then go out and play "war" all day, taking a break for a sammich and a Mountain Dew at lunch.

None of us grew up to wreak havoc on the community. We were just boys being boys, nothing more, nothing less.

[crim son]

18. We are not living at the time you were growing up.

I'm sure you must have noticed the fact.

[shadowrider]

21. So boys can't be boys?

If finger guns are that dangerous today, it follows that they've been that dangerous forever. My point is, no one I grew up with, played "war" with, or used their finger as a gun has committed any type of crime.

[cowman]

23. For christsakes

IT WAS A KID, GET OVER IT

[shadowrider]

25. You and I agree

Did you respond the the incorrect post?

[shadowrider]

27. OOPS, sorry

I need to clean my bifocals. I thought you were responding to me. My bad.

[cowman]

28. sorry about

that I meant to reply to Post 18

Gotta go pull a 24 hr shift in Vegas, Y'all have a hell of a good day, see y'all tomorrow

Peace Out:hi:

[Jackson1999]

33. You are right that times are not the same....

It is in fact a lot safer today than it was when I was growing up in the 1970s.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States

[Callisto32]

38. Right,

It's a "post 9/11 world" you know.

[Glassunion]

39. I might suggest you read up on why boys act like boys before making such statements.

Boys will act like boys. There are reasons for it. Perhaps you should find out why boys act the way they do, instead of demanding he be expelled.

Ignorance spreads quickly.

[slackmaster]

44. I see you have no experience dealing with actual children

Please borrow one for a while before you have any of your own.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

49. Really? It would freak you out. Kids playing cop and robbers would likely cause a stroke I guess.

[Deep13]

2. .

:banghead:

[Pab Sungenis]

3. Every single teacher who waited outside that room should be fired

either that or go teach in the Neighborhood of Make-Believe if they think a finger can actually "go off."

[opihimoimoi]

4. In other societies...the finger would be removed and classes resumed...

no problema

[shadowrider]

9. And in other societies

At 6 years old, he'd already be trained in the use of suicide vests and AK-47's.

[opihimoimoi]

50. Yep, we are a confused Species....we keep testing which modes to use.. we hire hero leaders too some

times...

We should learn to do better

[pnwmom]

10. It IS satire. The real story is still stupid,

but most of the facts (the teachers in the hall, the principal with a shovel, the FBI getting involved, etc.) in the first piece you cite were made up.

http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2010/03/ionia_kindergartener_suspended.html

[shadowrider]

12. The first piece

Goes a little overboard illustrating the absurdity of the response, but the situation was accurately described. It's why I linked to the paper.

[pnwmom]

13. No, the writer of the first piece made up a bunch of facts that did NOT happen.

Anyone who reads the whole piece can tell it belongs in the Onion.

No adult was actually afraid of the finger, teachers were not congregating in the hall, the principal did not come in armed with a shovel, and the FBI didn't get involved.

[jeepnstein]

11. Those who can't do...

can't teach either. Seriously, what kind of fools do they have running the classrooms in that school?

"Siege?" Give me a break.

[pnwmom]

14. There was no seige, or even a perception of a siege. This piece is a satire,

despite the claims of the OP.

[The_Commonist]

15. I still have my kindergarten finger-gun.

Actually, I have a matched pair of five-shooters.
Been keeping them attached to my hands for the past 40 or so years.
Haven't used them in quite a while, but I keep them handy, just in case...

[shadowrider]

22. The HORROR

Why haven't you been profiled on Americas Most Wanted yet?

[ret5hd]

30. can you do that staccato r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r sound that turns them into full-auto?

If so, do you have a license?

[shadowrider]

32. Unfortunately I can't roll my R's

But I can say "bang, bang, bang, bang" real fast. Does that count?

[RaleighNCDUer]

42. Aw, that's just semi-auto. Might as well have a muzzle loader. nt

[cognoscere]

53. Hmmm....

If you have your hands in your pockets, do you need a Concealed Carry Permit?

[RaleighNCDUer]

41. what ever happened to

"Mason, take your seat and stop that playing around or you will spend recess facing the corner!"

[shadowrider]

43. I went to Catholic school

I'd have gotten a whack on the back-end with "Dr. Brown", THEN would have been sent to the corner AND missed recess.

[GreenStormCloud]

45. Agent Fred Bellaire, of New York is wrong.

The F-15E Strike Eagle carries bombs, lots of them.

[Newest Reality]

47. I am surprised

to see any anti-gun reaction to this at all. Symbolic gestures should not be mistaken for deadly objects, but that should go without saying.

That school, and the teacher represent a problem, not the child. I would question the teacher's mental condition and the school's policies in any situation like that. In the article, it was mentioned that there are more effective ways to deal with behavior. What kind of model is the teacher providing there?

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but a finger gun will never hurt me!" Even a child can understand that.

[Remmah2]

56. Pointed his finger?

Probably a handloader. :)

[sylvi]

57. This was a popular toy when I was a kid

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hmDs2vKASo

Kids would probably go to jail for this nowadays.

[Glassunion]

58. They already do go to jail...

Sad thing, is that it is for far less than that toy...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=118&topic_id=302286&mesg_id=302291