When I first heard of this earlier today I thought I would side with the officer. I have seen how insolent some kids can be these days to teachers and other authority figures as well as at home. In too many households these kids call the shots. Some of the parents are too busy, others don't care, and some are actually in fear of how their kids will react if they (the parents) dare to set boundaries.
Back in my high school days it was almost unheard of to be defiant to a teacher or school admininstrator. Yeah, you occasionally had a classmate push the limits but that was so rare that the rest of us would just sit with our mouths hanging open dreading what would come next, all while knowing the kid deserved it. But that is not how it is today. Today kids get away with a lot and they know they can get away with a lot.
Then I saw the video in its entirety, the one with audio where you can hear a student try to get the officer to ease up on the female student and he snaps back with, "I'll put you in jail too!"
I do think the student involved in the subject of this thread shoulders some of the blame for administrators feeling they had no choice but to call this officer in to do his job. She was insolent, clearly, and she should not get a pass on that. The problem that I saw in the video in this case is that I do not see the officer doing his job as much as I see him reacting to an individual student who pissed him off. IOW, this officer did not use physical force because it was necessary, he used force because he was mad.
Student insolence is of course unacceptable but this officer's action was wrong on every level.
