Nothing Mr. Shop Teacher

Finding fault in others seems too easy for a lot of people, no matter what you do someone is critical and has a better idea, they have no problem letting you know how wrong you are and heaven forbid if you attempt to disagree, but we really need to learn that we can disagree, especially when they are the ones who are wrong.

We all have encountered this in the past, and sad to say some are still going through this even today, think back to when you were a kid, there was always a bigger kid bossing you around and or kicking your butt when you didn’t take them seriously, everyone around just watched and you took the punches without any help.

The shop teacher had to leave the room for some unknown reason, most likely to step outside for a smoke, the class was in the middle of taking a written test so everything would most likely remain calm.

Making the decision that someone should be in charge “to keep the class calm” he chose the smallest kid in class, made the announcement then grinned as he walked out the door, this is the moment the hair stands on back of your neck and the goose bumps raise up on your arms.

About five minutes later one of the biggest kids in class walked up and dropped his test onto the young mans desk, fill this out for me he said, looking up the young man refused, the bigger kid leaned into his face and screamed, Fill it out, Now, Damn it!!

With the bigger kids spit splattered across the young mans face, he looked up and said “You need to go sit down and finish your test” the bigger kid smiled and snapped his fingers, two other boys with want to be gang nicknames stood behind the young man.

This boy don’t know who he is messing with, let’s show him, this is when the blade of a knife was pressed into the young mans throat, he sat there shaking and tried to not move, his eyes darted back and forth to see if anyone was going to help, he was held there while he completed the three bigger kids tests for them, along with being forced to add their names to the top of the page with the heading of Mr.

While they were laughing at him the shop teacher walked in and asked what was going on, “Nothing Mr. Shop teacher we were just getting the man in charge to make sure we were doing our papers right”, the rest of the class backed up their story and sitting there with a red mark across my throat, I disagreed with what had happened but the teacher had no interest in what I had to say.

What did I get for my trouble, a swat with a wooden paddle for not completing my own test, laughter from three want to be hoodlums, and the loss of respect for a teacher who was supposed to be in charge of a class of boys, rather than putting his responsibility onto me.

I looked up the names of these men a few years back and found they were incarcerated in a state facility, which is exactly where I figured they would end up.

I was lying in bed thinking last night about situations like this, I wonder how many times our children go through something like this and we never hear of it? I wonder how many of these people would simply back down if just one person in class would stand up and side with the victims?

This happened a little over forty years ago, and there was no excuse then and sad to say things seem to be only worse today, I respect our teachers for what they have to put up with, they seem to have their hands tied and are forced to allow students with this mentality to take over their classes and intimidate the whole system.

Could we stem a lot of these problems if only we were allowed to stand up and make the bullies responsible for their own actions, and is it fair that we have to be overrun by this mentality for fear of offending them?