Friday, September 20, 2002

Muskogee Educators Crack Down on Finger Pointing and Saying "Kapow!"

As reported by the Tulsa World and Channel 6 News, a 12-year-old Creek Elementary School student was first expelled and then placed in school detention for 5 days for pointing his finger at other students and saying "kapow!" The child's mother complained to the school principal that her son's punishment was out of proportion with the crime. Muskogee school authorities defended their actions by explaining that they will not tolerate such indiscriminate "finger-play" in their schools. "You can't be too careful these days," said Bernice Hopley, a teacher at the school." "First they start pointing fingers and going "pow, pow" and the next thing you know they are mass murderers."

Idiotorial: The radioshow shockjocks are roasting the Muskogee authorities over the fire for overreacting to what some call innocent horseplay. What these "journalists" scoff at is America's serious need to secure the homeland. What the liberal media types aren't telling the public is that research has shown that what they consider mild horseplay often leads to bigger problems. Here are the facts:

Fact #1 Over 70 million people have tried pointing their fingers and saying "kapow!". Most finger pointers soon escalate to jabbing and use of the "evil eye". Indeed, for the vast majority of people, finger pointing is the first threatening act they try, a "gateway" to other threatening acts.

Fact #2 Finger pointing is the most popular threatening act in the United States today. Therefore, people who have used less popular forms of violence such as actually shooting people with real guns or stabbing people with real live knives, are likely to have first tried finger pointing.

Fact #3: Finger pointers have lower achievement, more acceptance of deviant behavior, more aggression and poorer relationships with their parents. Finger pointing and saying "kapow!" correlates with higher rates of delinquency, arrests and failure in school. Dr. Gabriel Nemo of Columbia University states that throughout history, finger pointing has been associated with mental disturbances ranging from distorted perception to schizophrenia. According to Dr. Akira Watanabe, a specialist in violent behavior, "I have never found any other gesture, including the "OK" sign, which came close to the psychic damage caused by pointing and saying kapow". Babies born to mothers who used finger pointing during pregnancy developed health problems similar to drug users.

We at OkiePundit believe the Muskogee school authorities did the right thing by severely punishing the deviant elementary school thug and snipping the finger pointing in the bud before something even more serious happened.

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