There is a high school principal in Nashville that no longer has a job because the kids there constantly fight. Gang fighting, random jumpings, bus beatings. This has been happening all year long, but two weeks ago students were arrested every single day for fighting on school property. MANY students. One day it was like 18.

I am well-informed about the situation because one of the women I like at work has two teenaged daughters who attend school there, so I’ve been paying close attention to the story, which led me to think about the fighting that occured at my own high school.

The situation was very different for me. The public high school my friend’s kids go to is urban and is very racially diverse. My public high school was very rural, yet only a 30 minute drive away fom the school in Nashville. I’d say that less than 2% of the student body at my high school belonged to a minority race. White, rebel flag-waving, tobacco chewing people they were. Well, a lot of them, anyway. Despite the nearly all-Caucasian population, we had serious racial tensions in our school. The few black students at my school felt so threatened by the institutional, as well as intentional and direct racism they experiences that there were a few skirmishes. That involved guns. After that any racially “motivated” clothing or paraphanelia of any kind was not permitted on school grounds. Believe it or not, after that ,things died down.

No, most of the fighting at my school was about other things. It was about boys and girls and bad deals and break-ups. About getting cheated. The fights I happened to witness were passionate, and everyone knew the participants history with one another. For instance, I was not surprised to see Marcia Sloan* and Brooke Binkley* straight up BOXING each other in the hallway during 4th period from my seat in AP English. Brooke fucked Marcia’s boyfriend in the theatre light loft, the one with the winding staircase, and most of the days when Marica was working. I watched them land punch after punch on purpling cheeks and ears, but didn’t say anything to anyone. I didn’t feel motivated to interfere, and I couldn’t interrupt class I was 14 at the time, I was probably afraid of what people would think if I spoke up. That fight was broken up within 2-3 minutes by the petite, 50-something sophomore English teacher who got herself punched in the face in the process. The punch was on purpose. Marcia got expelled for that one.

But the most legendary fights were the ones that were planned in advance. Knowing a fight on school grounds would lead to expulsion or be broken up within seconds, those with a taste for blood would challenge the person they intended to fight to do so at a later date. And always at the Sycamore Rec.
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