Dunno… people fighting… so whadda do you want to do?
Let 'em fight ? Pepper spray ? Throw a fist to the face ? Blackjack ? Choke hold ?
Take your pick I guess.
Police are trained how to restrain a violent person. Most of them are trained well, some are trained badly. Unfortunately, there is no one weird trick that always stops violence and never hurts anybody. Assistant principals are probably not trained on this at all.
Back in the day, I learned martial arts. We learned the triangle hold, but were forbidden to use it in competition. When the adrenaline is flowing, it is too easy to go too far, and the line between a tapout and brain damage is fine indeed.
Oh, bullshit. It is not at all “easy to go too far.” It takes malice of forethought, and you would have to be a sociopath or psychopath to cause brain damage or death.
I have a black belt in jujitsu. I’ve been choked thousands of times, and I’m fine. I’ve choked others a thousand times without incident. It’s easy to keep it safe in the dojo. You respect the tap-out rule. If the person being choked is too dumb to tap, when they go out, you relax your hold and they’re fine. Then you resuscitate them. It is so obvious if a person you are choking is unconscious. One would have to keep the hold on for a minute+ to cause brain damage. The Hollywood scene where the person is dead in 15 seconds is pure fiction.
In a real situation, if a choke hold is being applied to an unruly, combative person, you would relax the constriction when they pass out. They’re still breathing and they’ll be fine. Brain damage my ass.
Um, no.
Administrators (and, indeed, all teachers) are required by law to have undergone physical restraint training. That comes in a few flavors:
- The short version, which is what teachers usually get, which is mostly about not touching students (except under very rare circumstances) and,
- The longer version, which is usually a multi-day training with plenty of hands-on practice. The focus is on safety for everyone involved, and much of the time is devoted to de-escalating a situation. Typically a small team at a school is trained at this level- often (but not always) that’s admin.
Either this man never had any training, or he ignored it completely.
Unacceptable.
I’m not a fan of police in schools. I question authority, and believe in the Chomskism “authority, unless justified, is inherently illegitimate and that the burden of proof is on those in authority." That said - the girl that got choked out was really attacking the other girl, and was still striking the other girl even as she was being choked out. I’ve also practiced martial arts, and have been choked a few times. As far as fights go it’s one of the better endings, especially if the person doing it is calm and controlled as appears to be the case here. It’s a shame that the teachers have to deal with this type of stuff, they are teachers after all, not bouncers.
As well they should, isn’t dealing with this sort of thing the raison d’etre of assistant principals?
I have no idea what Mr. Burgess’ training is. My comment applies to the safety of a choke hold. It’s safer than striking, IMHO. Strikes can break bones and even kill. If you’re choked out and regain consciousness shortly thereafter, you might have a slight headache, and no permanent damage. My comment in no way was meant to justify the behavior of Burgess. However, he does have my sympathy. Dealing with unruly, violent teens is no fun.
I had no problem with your post, I thought it had good information.
ETA: “interesting” information, rather. I am not in a position to say how accurate it is.
I believe whether or not you crush their windpipe may also be a relevant factor, as well as the health of the person in the chokehold.
Depending on the chokehold, that is flat out wrong. Actually, that idea is dangerously wrong and could be the reason why cops periodically kill people with chokeholds, they don’t know the difference between blocking the airway and the arterie.
if the airway rather than the carotid arteries is blocked, the subject cannot breathe, but his brain is still perfused with blood and he will remain conscious and may continue to struggle for a minute or more; he will lose consciousness only when the oxygen in the circulating blood is consumed and he collapses from hypoxia. Even if the hold is released at this point, the blood circulating through the brain contains no oxygen, and consequently the subject may not regain consciousness or resume spontaneous breathing.
The problem is that your own experience invalidates your response.
It is very easy to learn to choke someone out, this means people without any time on a mat or any actual personal combat experience can do like this person and over extend the hold either through ignorance or panic. If I’m riding some big scary dude’s back and I sink the hold I’d probably hold the shit out of it because I’m not trying to fight anyone and having spent time with people this vice principal’s age (69) I suspect that they are genuinely afraid on a normal basis. My own dad, who is a 66 y/0 gym rat, now carries a gun all the time despite the fact that he lives in a quiet suburb and never goes anywhere but work, the gym, and the grocery store and to coach littler girls sports.
I’m not approving of this dude’s choices, but I’m not quick to ascribe malice when incompetence and cowardice are much more likely.
Dude, they don’t let trans people use the right toilet there. Who knows what kind of clown college they have for training school administrators?
So revolting I puked up my dinner, really.
I’m not sure I understand you correctly. I was a credentialed teacher in California up until last semester and I wasn’t required by law to undergo physical restraint training. Maybe you mean those who volunteer for this must undergo restraint training? I’ve still never heard of this training for California teachers, although administators may need to be trained. But teachers are told to never, ever restrain a student.
Exactly!!! I also would point out a very obvious double standard, a white police officer in a school picks up an African American student and body slams her and no charges are filed. An African American school administrator accidentally or through negligence and lack of training uses a bad hold and causes a student to black out with a chokehold while trying to prevent a very physical fight… a serious investigation begins into the administrator’s actions instead of the lack of training he received or school policy and lack of training on de-escalation!
I honestly think that they are going with the higher charges in the hopes that a jury will not be able to convict. This is allowing them to let this person go while appearing to have “clean hands.”
I can see going with the cynical route but from what I’m reading, the police are trying. They went for the higher charge because it allows them to change to a court that will agree to hear the case.
Yeah, I noticed this rather inconsistent enforcement of the law. It doesn’t help that the Sheriffs name is freaking Robert E. Lee. o_0
“Let this be a lesson: only cops can body slam students without repercussion.”
I can’t remember… How did they break up fights on “Springer”?
