Girl Violence: YouTube Fad?

Another a href=”http://www.themonitor.com/news/school_11132___article.html/garcia_girl.html”display of girl-on-girl /a violence has surfaced on YouTube (thanks to the reader who emailed the story):br /br /blockquoteAdministrators of the Raymondville school system said they will review the district’s cell phone policy after a report of an assault on a middle school student that was recorded with a cell phone and then displayed on YouTube.br /br /It was at least the second time this year students from the school district uploaded violent videos to YouTube, said school board president John Solis. Early this year, a Raymondville High School student used a video to solicit someone to beat another student.br /br /The father of a 13-year-old girl whose recent video-recorded beating was uploaded to the video-sharing Web site said he may press assault charges against the other students he blames for injuring his daughter.br /br /Regino Garcia said Friday he is dissatisfied with the response of school administrators who he believes did not adequately punish those involved in the beating.br /br /Garcia said one Myra Green Middle School student beat his daughter Sara on March 11 while another girl used a cell phone to record the incident, which left Sara with a slight concussion.br /br /A third girl urged the girl striking Sara to “hit her face” during the attack, he said./blockquotebr /br /So these girls beat up another girl in a middle school hallway and here is the typical response from an administrator:br /br /blockquoteSolis, the school board president, said officials will have a workshop to discuss policy on student cell phone use.br /br /”We’re going to see if we need a stricter cell phone policy or not allow them anymore,” he said. “That’s what they’re doing -videotaping on cell phones.br /br /”It’s a new wave. It’s happening in other school districts here in the (Rio Grande) Valley. Our school district is not immune.”/blockquotebr /br /How many kids are being beaten up in the hallway that never reach YouTube? Wouldn’t a better idea be to have a workshop on how to keep an eye out for bullying kids in the hallway? Or perhaps have the groups of girls who are bullies go to a group to learn anger management and be taught to understand why they are hitting other girls in the face? (Hint, girls love to disfigure other girls out of jealousy for being good looking–address emthat/em and you might get somewhere).br /br /I have worked with a number of schools in the course of my career and I can tell you one thing I learned. They often punish victims and allow bullies to flourish and insist they have few problems. While I can understand wanting to review cellphone policy, blaming YouTube and cellphones for allowing violence to go unchecked in your school is externalizing the problem so you can stick your head in the sand. It is no solution to violence.br /br /If you would like to read more about school related violence and the differences in girl and boy motivations for anger etc. take a a href=”http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3804/is_200410/ai_n9484280″look at my article (with Sandra Thomas) here /a entitled “School Connectedness, Anger Behaviors, and Relationships of Violent and Nonviolent American Youth” or if you want a good book on the topic, try a href=”http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0013L2DZ0?ie=UTF8tag=wwwviolentkicomlinkCode=as2camp=1789creative=9325creativeASIN=B0013L2DZ0″emOdd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls./em/aimg src=”http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=wwwviolentkicoml=as2o=1a=B0013L2DZ0″ width=”1″ height=”1″ border=”0″ alt=”” style=”border:none !important; margin:0px !important;” /