07 September 2008

Teachers can use force to protect other kids

According to the Dominion Post, Police Inspector Chris Graveson says teachers are too cautious about using force to protect children in classrooms even though they are entitled to do so.

Apparently the issue is adolescents, some of whom are being sexually aggressive and violent towards other kids. Teachers, understandably terrified of being accused of being abusers themselves, fear touching kids even to defend others. It's dead wrong.

Inspector Graveson has made it clear that teachers should intervene, which is common sense of course. He points out that if some children are restrained, there is a risk they may bruise, particularly if they remain violent. The choice is simple though - a teacher is morally obliged to protect children from their peers if violence is witnessed.

Of course with a headline "Teachers can use force on kids", the "journalist" Lane Nichols is being deliberately provocative. It is not initiating force, it is using force to defend one child from another.

Teachers, particularly male ones, have been inflicted with a feminist led hysteria against any physical contect between themselves and their pupils, on the implication that it "could" be sexual and abusive. Few deny the seriousness of teachers sexually abusing their pupils, but teachers are well aware of the risks of any such allegations. Children are long taught to report "bad touching". However it has paralysed teachers providing comfort to upset children. I recall being hugged and held by a teacher when I was 10 because I was upset as my grandfather had died. I am grateful for that, I was crying and needed that comfort - it is natural, and this is what has been lost, to a feminist hysteria that has literally thrown out the baby with the bathwater.

Teachers must do the same to protect other pupils.

Of course the reaction of the eminently useless Office of the Children's Commissioner was to say "would be very surprised if it was official police policy to encourage teachers to use a level of force that would leave bruises on primary school children".

That is NOT what it was said. It is NOT encouraged, but accepted that it may be necessary if a child is resisting restraint and it is to protect other adults and children.

You see children are not always innocent.

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