FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Stuff

Cry-Baby of the Week

This week: A school suspended a student for stopping a kid from self-harming, and another school banned a bullied child from bringing his My Little Pony lunch bag to school.

It's time, once again, to marvel at some idiots who don't know how to handle the world:

Cry-Baby #1: Bayview Middle School

Screencaps via WAVY News

The incident: A girl took a razor from a kid who was self-harming.

The appropriate response: Congratulate her.

The actual response: She was suspended from school.

Adrionna Harris is a sixth-grade student at Bayside Middle School in Virginia Beach, VA.

While at school last Thursday, Adrionna found one of her friends self-harming with a very small razor blade (like the one pictured above, which I can't figure out the practical application of).

Advertisement

According to her mother, no teachers were around, and Adrionna felt it was "a 911 situation," so she took the blade from the boy and immediately threw it in the trash.

Adrionna then went to school staff and told them what had happened. They responded by giving her a ten-day suspension with recommendation for expulsion. This was as part of the school's zero-tolerance policy on possessing weapons on school property.

Speaking to WAVY News, her mother Rachel said, "I was very shocked that a student would get suspended for saving another child."

Rachel also said that she made several calls to the school to try to discuss the suspension, but her calls were all ignored. The school only contacted her after a local news channel made calls to the members of the school board.

At a due-process conference held yesterday, the school agreed not to expel Adrionna, but would not overturn her suspension.

“Even if I got in trouble, it didn’t matter because I was helping him," said Adrionna. "I would do it again even if I got suspended."

Cry-Baby #2: Candler Elementary School

Screencap via ABC 13

The incident: A boy was getting bullied at school over his My Little Pony lunch bag.

The appropriate response: Disciplining the kids who were bullying him.

The actual response: The school banned him from bringing the My Little Pony bag.

Nine-year-old Grayson Bruce is a student at Candler Elementary School in Upper Hominy, NC. According to Grayson, he has been bullied at the school for some time.

Advertisement

Apparently the bullying intensified when Grayson started bringing his lunch to school in a My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic lunch bag. Speaking to WLOS News, he said, "They're taking it a little too far, with punching me, pushing me down, calling me horrible names, stuff that really shouldn't happen."

Last Thursday, in an attempt to stop the bullying, the school told Grayson that he was no longer allowed to bring the bag to school because it was "a trigger for bullying."

"Saying a lunch bag is a trigger for bullying, you may as well be saying a short skirt is a trigger for rape. It's flawed logic; it doesn't make any sense," Grayson's mom, Noreen Bruce, told WLOS.

Noreen isn't the only one who thinks the school is in the wrong. A Facebook page called Support For Grayson currently has more than 60,000 likes.

After the story attracted international media attention, the school reversed its stance on the bag. In a non-apology released yesterday, they said: "We sincerely regret that the issue of being told to leave the bookbag at home was perceived as blaming Grayson. While that was not the intent, the perception became reality. We support Grayson bringing the bookbag to school."

I guess the lesson that can be learned from these two stories is that schools will reverse disciplinary decisions if they attract enough media attention. So get your local news station on the phone, kids.

Advertisement

Which of these middle schools is the bigger cry-baby? Let us know in this poll just here:

Who is the bigger cry-baby?

Previously: A guy who wasn't invited to hang out with Obama vs. some parents who think an anti-bullying film is anti-Christian

Winner: The parents!!!

Follow Jamie "Lee Curtis" Taete on Twitter.