Three Wrongs

You probably saw it.  The video was everywhere.  A senior deputy in a South Carolina public school apparently lifted a student out of her seat and tilted her so violently that she tumbled to the ground.  Then he “threw” her across the room and held her down while he handcuffed her.

The uproar occasioned by this incident was immediate.  It was obviously a case of child abuse.  No adult man, especially a police officer, should ever handle a minor is this manner.  As one television commentator put it, “I would never treat my own children that way.”

The county sheriff quickly intervened.  He promised to investigate the episode and make sure justice was done.  Then the very next day he fired the deputy, opining that two wrongs don’t make a right.  The student’s behavior might have been wrong, but so was the deputy’s.

It strikes me that the sheriff added a third wrong to this unfortunate sequence.  In jumping to a conclusion and punishing the deputy as harshly as he did, he too over-reacted—probably in order to quell the intense political pressure he was under.

Let us take a step back and examine what occurred.  By all accounts the student was disruptive.  She refused to control herself despite the teacher’s many requests that she do.  The student similarly defied the assistant principal.  No matter what was said, she would not move.

Only after this was the deputy called in.  Yet he too was disobeyed.  Eventually, in his impatience, he went to remove the girl from her seat.  Once again she resisted.  What followed is in dispute.  Some say he intentionally dumped her onto the ground.  Others, including me, believe that she accidently fell in the process of being picked up.

In any event, she was then forcibly moved across the room.  Here, some maintain that she was thrown.  It looked to me, however, that she was dragged.  Either way, she continued to protest and at one point struck the officer.

Whatever the case, the critics insist that this was a vicious, and totally unnecessary, intervention.  But I ask, what was the deputy supposed to do?  Was he to spend the next several hours pleading with her?   Was he to beg, “pretty, pretty, please—with sugar on top?”  Should he have walked away?

Had he done the latter, would all learning have been suspended in that classroom?  Might it not also have been discontinued the following day by a student who discovered that no matter what she did, she would not be punished?

And what of the nearby classrooms?  Might not other students have recognized who had the upper hand?  And what of students at other schools?  Might doing nothing have been a prescription for anarchy?  It was in Baltimore and Ferguson.

The commentator who insisted that he would not deal with his children this way almost surely has relatively obedient children.  As a good middle class parent, he undoubtedly taught them right from wrong and how to regulate themselves.

But what of children who do not acquire these internalized controls?  Are they to be allowed to run rampant because utilizing force is ruled out of bounds as uncivilized?  Wouldn’t this undermine the whole notion of civilization?

The fact is that our society functions as smoothly as it does because most of us restrain ourselves most of the time.  We are the beneficiaries of firm, but tolerant, parenting and of reliable policing.

Back in the bad old days, hunter-gatherers dealt with numerous transgressions by killing the offenders.  As a consequence, their death rate was many times higher than it is today.  Are these the conditions to which we wish to return?

Social order is not automatic.  It must be dependably enforced.  If we go down the road of insisting that coercion be totally defanged, the result will be disastrous.  Yes, limits need to be drawn—but they must not be so unreasonable that force is no longer forceful.

Melvyn. L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University