Is it time to be scared of seven year olds now?

April 13, 2000 10:08 AM

Is it time to be scared of seven year olds now? Muderous plot? From children? Sounds like a reporter using strong words for some playground craziness, and everyone overreacting. Reminds me of a certain show I saw last night...
posted by mathowie (7 comments total)

That is weird!!!

Not for nothing, but back in the 80's, with all of the violence you saw in Transformers, GiJoe, the Robocop Films, Aliens, and what have you, none of the kids were all that crazy (or perhaps that's merely my own view of things.)

Now, we've toned down the violence in movies and television; The cartoons are as clean cut as you can find, and kids are doing this? Weird.
posted by Cavatica at 10:53 AM on April 13, 2000

I don't think this is anything new for kids to be talking about and playing about. But certainly school administrators pay much much more attention to the problems now. Sounds like this group of girls decided for whatever reason that they didn't like some other girl. This is how they could express it. I don't know how far it would have gone, but instead of treating the girls like criminals for plotting to do something they didn't really understand, maybe officials should take this whole plot as a sign that the girls need to learn more respect for other people, even if they don't like them.

Of course, we can't possibly know all the details from this article, and it's silly to make any assumptions about the girls, their environment, their behavior, or their intent just based on what CNN chose to write about it.
posted by daveadams at 11:08 AM on April 13, 2000

I feel the same way (and yes, Matt, it does remind me of last night's ep... without the disturbing Disneyland imagery) - one of the concerns that I have is that the media overreactions can be harmful too. The school must not be completely over the edge, since the girls got a 3 day suspension and have to have a stamp on their little foreheads that says "sane" - but the fact that it got onto CNN means it's going to affect these girls for a long time... We don't know all the details of this situation, but when I was a kid, I remember little "we hate Joe" clubs and "hey, lets lure Joe out into the woods and stab him in the head" fantasies, and "hey, let's not let that weirdo Joe play in any reindeer games" and ... and ... I SAY THROW THE BOOK AT THEM!
posted by CrazyUncleJoe at 12:02 PM on April 13, 2000

Let's see: "hate club", amateurish drawings, no weapons. But it actually looks like the school reacted appropriately, particularly since one of the parents brought it to their attention.

It's just the darned media that needs to take a deep breath.
posted by dhartung at 1:30 PM on April 13, 2000

Nothing new, here.
posted by jason at 7:26 PM on April 13, 2000

The article quotes some one as saything, "Ten years ago, stuff like this didn't happen."

Doesn't anybody remember grade school? Remember how shitting little kids can be to each other? Remember bullies and exclusionary clubs and horrible rumors that were spread around about that one kid that everybody hated? And I find it hard to believe that this is the first time a couple bitchy little first grade girls decided to "plot" the murder of whatever sap bore the brunt of their ire.

Yes, they should be punished, but this isn't sympomatic of our era, just symptomatic of first grade.
posted by jennyb at 10:47 AM on April 14, 2000