over-reaction or over-cautious...

A Chicago area high school student wrote an essay during a "free writing" exercise in his creative writing class that has people in an uproar. The essay is disturbing because of the graphic nature of violence and sex it contains. You can read the essay in its entirety here: Allen Lee's essay. The opening lines:

Blood sex and Booze. Drugs Drugs Drugs are fun. Stab, Stab, Stab, S…t…a…b…, poke. "So I had this dream last night where I went into a building, pulled out two P90s and started shooting everyone…, then had sex with the dead bodies. Well, not really, but it would be funny if I did." Umm, yeah, what to wright about…… I'm leaving to join the Marines and I really don't give a F... about my academics, so why does the only class that's complete Bull Shit, happen to be the only required class…enough said.

The result of his writing: 'Disturbing' essay gets student arrested

Allen W. Lee, 18, has been charged with disorderly conduct stemming from an essay that was part of a "free writing'' assignment in a creative writing class.

and though he had already been accepted by the Marines for an October start to his basic training the Marines drop essay writer.

He was "crestfallen" when his recruiter called him with the sad news Friday that Marine regulations say the criminal charge makes him ineligible, said his attorney, Dane Liozzo.

Two very important things to keep in mind about this case: 1) the recent Virginia Tech shootings and 2) Lee is Asian-American. Are the two related to this situation? You bet.

His essay mirrors, in a lot of ways, the things reportedly said and written by the VT shooter and the guilt by ethnic-association is sadly a great possibility.

Should they be related to this case? Yes, to the writings; no, to the ethnic similarities. People have been doing the ethnic comparison on Arab-Americans since 9-11-2001 to great harm. It's not only not fair; it's discriminatory. However, back to the over-reaction vs. over-cautious question -

Arresting the young man, in my estimation, for writing what was clearly following the directions of the assignment is a gross over-reaction. The only peace he disturbed is the teacher's and the school's administration. I don't see that he actually broke any existing laws in Illinois. The police in the community took this action on their own. The teacher and the school did the two things that they should have: 1) reporting the essay to administration & 2) immediately referring the kid for intervention/counseling to determine if he posed any kind of threat to himself or others.

The over-cautiousness, given all recent incidents of school shootings, was correct on the part of the teacher. The school administration acted properly, according to law, in its actions, including reporting it to the police. As a former Illinois public school administrator, I know that this is what is required by the School Code of Illinois. The police arresting the student was more than an over-cautious over-reaction. What they did is expose the student to unnecessary notice, that will soon be national I assume, and placed themselves in a very litigious situation regarding 1st Amendment issues.

And what about young Mr. Lee? Though he followed the requirements of the assignment, he seems bright enough to have realized that possibly the content he wrote just might have been inappropriate, especially in light of the VT shootings. With the national and international coverage of the incident he certainly could not have been totally ignorant of it. Also, there is one statement in his essay that points to culpability and what could be construed as poor judgment:

I'm leaving to join the Marines and I really don't give a F... about my academics, so why does the only class that's complete Bull Shit, happen to be the only required class…enough said.

He should have cared. He has been removed from the school, is being tutored offsite, may not participate in graduation ceremonies and has been dropped by the Marines. Such are the lessons we all learn in moving towards adulthood.

Free-writing or not, it not only was poor choice of content but also a poor choice of words. The Marines had to drop him by code because of the arrest. I am sure they may be also questioning his attitude and language towards authority as well.

Whatever... It's a mess all the way around, AND now that lawyers are involved, it's going to go to even deeper and higher levels. I hope the young man comes out of this not only learning a valuable lesson about adulthood but also as unscathed as possible, because at the bottom of it all his future and well-being should be tantamount.