Teen charged with making terroristic threat

[Duelist925]

1, having been one myself, I came across tons.

And you never said something stupid while away from supervision?

2, my spouse's family, extended family, and friends all seem to have them.

The actions of children or young ones around family or adults of any kind is a far cry than that when unsupervised online

3, I am a parent myself

I refer you to my previous comment

4, generally unless I lock myself in a cave, one does tend to come across numerous children in public-shopping malls, parks, libraries.
5, I do volunteer work from time to time and a lot of it does involve children's groups(big brothers/big sisters, several smaller local groups)

Actions RL don't necessarily equal those online--I'm far easier to understand, and speak far easier online than I do RL. And that's not even getting into the way anonymity affects our judgement when we say stuff online.

People say and do stupid shit online. Look at any set of youtube comments, especially on any "controversial" issue.

This was the same. Should the kid get punished for the jackassery? Yeah. But the current reaction of over the top.

[Gravekeeper]

The difference between online/offline is something half of grown adults don't farking grasp. Never mind some teenager. -.-

At the very most this merited a scary visit from the cops to search his room and put the fear of God into him, and that's about it really.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

You know, I respect your right to have a strong opinion Blaquekatt.

Still, what I said:

Off hand black comedy isn't really rare among boys but carrying it out or being serious about it is... Not sure how you fix this. As kids, you do this thing in a safe setting until you outgrow it and learn you can't do it. With Facebook though, you go "public" long before you're ever finished working on yourself.

This was said in reference to a quote which, if read in context, easily reads in a sarcastic fashion.

What you paraphrased me to say:

every child makes threats of violence, until they grow out of it

Look, if you're going to paraphrase me, could you do me the basic courtesy of not fundamentally missing my point AND misrepresenting me? Then, feel free to pull back on the mocking tone just a smidgen.

If you'd like to have a discussion on the stages of childhood development or how parenting could have stopped this, feel free. I could tell you that most childhood development studies I've seen suggest that behavior like mouth soap washing don't stop the behavior on average, although it does tend to curtail it in the home. It also on average tends to build resentment or mistrust between caregivers and children. Kids who receive physical punishment are statistically more prone to become estranged from the authority figure in question. That's not all kids, and my family practiced the soap trick with mostly success except for the one cousin that won't talk to her mother, but that's what statisticians say tend to be the results in aggregate.

Here's what I remember from teenage boys...chaos. They did this insane thing where they tried to get away with things... and did. They were also really free with things like sarcasm and playacting when people used an insulting adjective on them. They made mistakes and went over the line occasionally.

That's the point. Boys do this when they're not around authority figures and when people aren't watching. What boys are also not particularly great with in their teens are social boundaries, solid decision making, and being responsible with their speech online (although that may be the vast majority of people honestly.) They still have things to learn and mistakes to make.

[BlaqueKatt]

The actions of children or young ones around family or adults of any kind is a far cry than that when unsupervised online<snip>

This was the same. Should the kid get punished for the jackassery? Yeah. But the current reaction of over the top.

I've never said the reaction was justified, just saddened that this seems to be falling under "boys will be boys"

as far as "unsupervised online", that really shouldn't happen. it's lazy parenting.
San Diego DA

Place your computer in a common area of the house.
This is probably the most important thing you can do. Do not let your children be in their rooms all night on the Internet. The mere presence of parents can have a tremendous effect on a child's online activities.

even microsoft has age guidelines for internet usage

Ages 15 to 18

Create a list of Internet house rules as a family. Include the kinds of sites that are off limits, Internet hours, what information should not be shared online, and guidelines for communicating with others online, including social networking.

Keep Internet-connected computers in an open area and not in a teen's bedroom.

[Ladeeda]

Uh-huh, and how does that work when most phones are mini-computers? Can't exactly hover over a kid every second of every day, especially when there's so much free Wifi around.

It was a cute idea back when every household was likely to have only one computer for the entire family, but technological advances and the low price of computers has made those "guidelines" obsolete.

[violiav]

Right, each of our kids has a tablet (kindle, nook), mostly used for watching minecraft videos and Netflix.
The only issues we've had was with the oldest (13 gong on needs ALL the lotion in the house. Yeah, during the move I found several empty bottles of Ole in his room. I was wondering where it had been disappearing to). We started hiding the power cord when we discovered he was printing off furry anime porn in the wee hours when everyone was fast asleep (PC in living area).

[Ladeeda]

Okay, 1) why did we need to know your 13 year old son's porn preference and wanking habits? And 2) what does that have to do with black humor/potentially threatening remarks on the internet?

[Kheldarson]

Okay, 1) why did we need to know your 13 year old son's porn preference and wanking habits? And 2) what does that have to do with black humor/potentially threatening remarks on the internet?

I think it's referencing the fact that boys will find their way around any restriction put on them?

[Panacea]

Since when has the first amendment covered making threats to shoot up a school?

Never. But it has to actually BE a threat. The problem with the internet, as has been mentioned, is that it does not account for intonation. That's why there are periodic reminders to those who use email and such to use emoticons or italicization to emphasize words that in spoken language would be stressed and convey the true meaning.

Based on the description of the event, I would have taken the comment as a kid being a smart ass. But kids are told to report these kinds of things. So its up to the adults to investigate and figure out what was really meant, rather than employ stupid zero tolerance policies.

Makes me wonder what this DA would have thought of Swift's "Modest Proposal" back in the day.

[violiav]

I didn't say anything about wanking. For all I know he's really concerned about his skin and the effects of aging. Or the lotion gnomes leave empty bottles amongst his things.
And yes, he'll find his way around most rules,"Well you didn't actually say XXX."
And yes, his "humor" tends to be less than mainstream.
He's actually gotten in trouble at school for the threatening remarks. A couple years ago (I think he was 11 or 12?) a group of kids was harassing him in class (taunts, whispers, etc). He asked them to stop, asked the teacher to get them to stop. Nothing got done, so decided to point with his pencil and say something along the lines of, "If you don't stop I'm going to stab you, and you, and you." (a later school told us he had Aspergers, which somewhat explained his lack of a filter for what he says) He's been tested for high IQ, he just says really dumb things (trash talks a lot during video games).
That netted him at home suspension for the rest of the month and was sent to the "satellite" campus for the rest of the semester.
The Intermediate school he'd been suspended from has/had a very big, "suck it up"/"good ol boy" mentality.
Fortunately he's inherited his dad's tall athletic build so within a year or so most other d-bag kids should leave him alone without him having to do anything. He's also much better at dealing with social situations.

[Andara Bledin]

Never. But it has to actually BE a threat. The problem with the internet, as has been mentioned, is that it does not account for intonation.

The guy who did this did include two very well-established indicators that his prior comment was made in jest.

The thing about this case is that there is no case. There isn't a target. He wasn't trying to frighten anyone. He wasn't trying to gain anything. It's demonstrable on it's face that his only goal was to be darkly humorous.

Fortunately he's inherited his dad's tall athletic build so within a year or so most other d-bag kids should leave him alone without him having to do anything. He's also much better at dealing with social situations.

If he's not a fighter, and he's a bigger kid, this might just paint a target on his back. Nekojin was a big guy in school, but awkward, and that made him a target du jour because if a kid could beat him up, they could brag about it as a form of counting coup.

[crashhelmet]

Here's a follow up to the story

Teen Jailed For Facebook Comment Reportedly Beat Up Behind Bars

[Rageaholic]

500000 dollar bail for this? Are you kidding me?

How can anyone afford that?

[violiav]

Yeah, that's BS. Checking the guy out (19 years of age is a little beyond parental monitoring) to see if anything could happen is one thing, but once they found a lack of evidence that he would actually commit a crime it should have resolved fairly quickly.

[Fire_on_High]

So does anyone think this punk will ever, EVER run off at the mouth again? I'm guessing he's going to be scared into being an absolute paragon of restraint and virtue from now on.