IT SEEMS LIKE EVERY TIME I open the paper I see headlines about students fighting with teachers, disobeying teachers, stabbings between students and fights being plastered all over social media.
Everyone will be quick to say the children are getting out of hand, and though I agree, I hope we don’t forget that our generations had our own problems. I remember students fighting each other and teachers.
The only difference was that we never had smartphones to capture it – not that we would want to because then our parents would kill us.
That being said, I have a solution for the violence amongst schoolchildren. Instead of punishing the student directly, the punishment should go to the parents, once your name is on that birth certificate you will be held responsible for your child’s actions.
Imagine a father at work and in walks the Disciplinary Officer with a bull-pistle.
“Mr Augustine, your child Mercedes Augustine was in an altercation today which resulted in you having to be punished. Please bend over.”
Or you in a party and the DJ calls you to the stage so you could get the licks. And do not even think about running; the law would be such that you can’t run – if not it is more licks in the centre of town. With this new law it would be easy to tell who has hard-ears children ’cause those parents would be walking around looking over their shoulders.
Now I don’t know about you but iffen that was me I woulda tek de licks and then go home and unmek my child backside.
You could imagine a worldwhere parents paid for their children’s mistakes? All children would be saints ’cause there ain’t nuh big hardback man nor woman that want to get licks in this day and age.
Children need to fear their parents’ discipline again. My mother is a woman who could call from St Philip down to St Peter and punish me over the phone. She used to make me stand up like the Bussa statue with a heavy book in eachhand and tell me not to move until she called back.
Once I moved as soon as she put down and in a split second the phone rang back: “Go back down!” was all I heard and then heavy breathing like a dragon. From then on I knew my mother had super powers and I feared my life. If you doubt me, ask me.
Discipline will always begin at home. It may end in the jailhouse if you aren’t careful, but it will always begin at home.
• Toni Johnson is an actress versed in the area of comedy. Email: toniann.johnson@gmail.com