The Tiger

garret holt [Click to enlarge]

On Thursday, Oct 3, in the schoolyard of Lowndes High School in Valdosta, Ga., the student body of 2,750 was shocked to find one of the cruelest and most senseless, tasteless and immature pranks ever to make national headlines. Three white students had taken a doll, painted it black, and hanged it from a tree outside of the school. That day, students also found the letters "KKK" written on the wall in a restroom, which had to be repainted as a result.

The students responsible for the disgusting stunt were caught swiftly and punished with the maximum penalty of a five-day suspension. The two second-year freshmen and junior are also being forced to transfer to an alternative school for at least the remainder of the semester rather than return to Lowndes.

It is evident then that school officials have taken this incident very seriously, choosing to punish the responsible students (none of whom have a history of disciplinary problems) fully in order to convey the important message that such "pranks" are intolerable.

Lee Touchton, president of the local NAACP, commented on School Superintendent Steve Smith's reaction to the incident, stating: "We feel he has taken the correct steps to deal with the problem." Although she imparted a message of confidence in the manner in which the affair has been handled, she went on to say: "We are currently pressing for the Federal Bureau of Investigation to treat it as a hate crime, the same as they would do for adults." There are two major problems with this statement and the sequence of events that it advocates.

First, there is no reason to treat this incident as a hate crime because it is not one. Yes, what the students did was absolutely wrong and horrible, but the fact is that it was not criminal. Instead, it is an example of is foolish and inhumane stupidity drawn from a combination of anger and ignorance. The students who performed this stunt were not out to hurt anyone and given the chance, they probably would not do so. Their intentions were half-boiled and short sighted, not criminal.

Secondly, the case should not be treated as if it involved adults because it does not. The people responsible for this episode are not fully formed adults, they are hormonal, angst-riddled teenagers rebelling against the status quo. Unfortunately for them, they just happened to react against the wrong thing in the wrong way. In all likelihood, they have not even espoused the beliefs their actions uphold. Rather, they were probably just reflecting or revolting against what they have seen and heard from the time they were children. That is what teenagers do: they test the waters of what is acceptable to find out just how far they can go. Principal Ann Rodgers hit the nail on the head when she said, "I think it was done out of stupidity."

In the case of this "mock lynching," it is important to keep in mind that this is an isolated incident and not representative of the views of a generation. The boys who are responsible for this stunt are children, not felons. They belong in detention, not federal prison.

Article Tools