Posted by Jim from Canada on December 20, 2008:

"Tim, you just described Zero Tolerance exactly! Stupidity; narrow-mindedness; scared of thinking for themselves. That is the ZT mindset!" (italics mine)

As a culture, we re being taught not to think for ourselves - that doing so just gets you into trouble.

Express an opinion? Get shot down via internet, editorials, and media, depending on how important you are and how controversial the opinion.

Do something one way, get sued. Do it the other way, get sued by someone else. It's no wonder that so many of us follow the "Only Following Orders!" way - the ZT mindset. We need to spread the idea that there are no perfect solutions, and that sometimes you have to accept a judgement that you don't agree with. Otherwise, we will not have any judgements - just ZT.

Posted by Mekhong Kurt, Bangkok, Thailand on January 21, 2009:

This ZT stuff really gets me. On the rare occasion I visit the U.S. (my home country), I'm *very* careful to obey all people in authority -- especially in this post-9/11 era. I'm also careful in all my interactions with anyone to try to avoid doing or saying anything that others might find objectionable. Happily, I've had no problems on those visits. But I dislike being on edge every time I'm in public, at a stranger's home, etc.

I suppose had the parole officers (or the regular police, for that matter) had said up front they were holding Washington while the case was investigated, I guess there's something of an argument there. But to hold him for parole violation was ludicrous. At least he was released fairly quickly. And I'm no apologist for ex-criminals, but I do believe in fairness -- including for parolees who are meeting their obligations.

Posted by Susan in Mississippi on September 24, 2009:

Just thought I would add my story. My 17 year old A student son was recently expelled from his senior year for consuming alcohol in route to a Friday night out of town football game. First, let me say he was not driving nor was the alcohol taken onto campus nor were there any problems associated with my son while attending the game. A teacher smelled the alcohol and that was it, expelled! Let me also say that I was in attendance at that game and never had any idea that he had had the alcohol. We are your average middle class family in small town USA and now we find our son in an alternative school.

Posted by Richard, Texas on January 1, 2010:

I had two occurrences with my ten year old son and twelve year old son. My ten year old has ADHD and ODD during a critical medication change prescribed by his Dr. He was subject to four hours of harassment by the behavioral specialist and later forced to sign a citation from the police department for threatening the aide.

My other son twelve is an A & B brilliant student that just wants to do his work and then read on his own. He is harassed as school and in self defense threatened another student that was taunting him about his mother. Today he was booked at the police department for "terrorist threats" and will have to appear in court.

I have tried to file formal complaints with the school board but they will do nothing. They hide behind the zero tolerance law. I am unable to file charges against the students that harassed my children. I am going to pull them and home school them. The school system has lost it directive.

Posted by Robert, Florida, USA on July 16, 2010:

Zero Tolerance scares the crap out of me. It's not a obscure fact that thinking requires effort and somewhat sound judgment... but come on, really? Did everyone who came up with this honestly say "Let's make every ludicrous offense deserving of the harshest punishment! There is no way anything could possibly go wrong!"

Just as diet pills don't instantly give you a six pack, and just as those get-rich-quick house buying schemes don't actually make you super rich, zero tolerance provides neither an easy nor an effective substitute for thinking, nor does it serve to actually stop whatever it's trying to stop. It does an absolutely amazing job, however, at creating an environment of fear, paranoia, and distrust.

All of which, scarily, are used primarily to control...

Posted by Zachary, New York, USA on September 5, 2010:

Once in school a kid was really bothering me so I yelled a threat at him, a student overheard and told the teacher. She sent me to the Assistant Principle's office and she sent me to the In School Suspension room while she debated my case. She said that because I was provoked, and because I didn't have any marks on my record that I would only get one day on In School Suspension. I was so relived that my school was not a Zero Tolerance school. But the sad thing is that there are four Assistant Principle's, and had I been sent to any of the other three then I would have been Suspended out of school for two weeks. I was lucky that I was sent to the nice Assistant Principle, but I know that most Assistant Principle's are mindless Zero Tolerance drones who will punish anyone for anything in the name of Zero Tolerance.

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All I can say is, pay more attention in school. Especially in English class. -rc

Posted by Mark, Austin TX on September 21, 2010:

I'd like address Jay from England:

By his rational, as soon as some one intended to do you harm, _you_ will be punished: Either you or your loved ones will be killed or injured, or if you defend yourself, you will be punished for that defense. He presents you with a lose-lose situation of someone else's making. Like the freshman psychology situation you are presented with the choice of which innocent get punished, rather than focusing on the true evil.

It has always been the tradition of the western civilization that you have the right to defend yourself. I guess Jay (and many of his English countrymen) feel that right is no longer there.

I feel sorry for them.

Posted by Archaya, Indonesia on April 25, 2011:

Being lost, I'd comment REAL late....

Let me speak to Jay: you are an IDIOT! Seriously, everyone above has said what I felt when I read the news.

If you are attacked, you have the RIGHT to defend yourself. If a person threatens the lives of your family members, especially children, you have the DUTY to defend them. Even if it means killing somebody else and you feel sorry for the person afterwards.

I have a rather similar case, or rather, my friend did (similar in the way that his life was threatened, a robber threatened him with a knife on a running, crowded train).

My friend fought the robber and flung him out, and the robber died. He (robber) was desperate, couldn't find a job or loans while his pregnant wife and four kids were starving. Bueno -- he chose his path, got himself killed in the process for doing the wrong thing.

The others have said before me, even you, Jay: it is WRONG to ATTACK. But Washington did NOT attack -- he was DEFENDING. If he stopped to think, HIS FAMILY WOULD HAVE DIED. It is basic human nature, the protective instinct, as simple as that.

It is WRONG to punish a man for wanting to PROTECT HIS FAMILY. One does NOT think when one's family is threatened, one REACTS. If one feels sorry afterwards, like my friend did -- he visited the dead guy's family and contributed something, to relieve his guilt, and he regret killing the man, even though it was in self-defense, and he even wondered if he should have defended himself.... Well that just means that my friend is human, no?

But my country is slightly more realistic than yours: naturally there were interrogations and reports, but my friend, he was not punished. Why? Because it was NOT HIS FAULT. The person at fault is THE ROBBER.

There, I said it, in the same way as the others have spoken. I am glad that we do not have ZT here in Indonesia, and I pray that American politicians will wake up and revoke the kind of stupid law that punishes a man for protecting his family.

Amen.

Posted by claire, England on August 27, 2011:

I have just caught this (very old!) article from this week's TIT (from the abbreviated version, even though I am a premium subscriber - yes, I do read it twice!!!) and know where Jay is coming from. I am NOT saying I agree with him in the slightest (I would kill anyone threatening my family, for example) - but am agreeing with him from the English Law perspective, which is basically that you can only use 'reasonable force'.

There have been several cases in England where a 'baddie' was shot by a 'goodie' and the 'gooodie' was done for it. The most famous one I can think of was a farmer called Tony Martin who shot two burglars, injured one and killed the other. He was found guilty of murder (reduced to manslaughter on appeal) because it was felt he had used excessive violence. I agree he should not have had an illegal shotgun but, at the same time, the two 'baddies' should not have been burgling him! Oh, and the injured burglar tried to sue Martin for loss of earnings because of the injuries caused - he lost because he was not as badly injured as he claimed, not because he was injured while committing a crime (and, as he was a career criminal, I have often wondered what income he claimed he was losing!)

A neighbour of ours had problems with people getting over his 6' wall to get into his garden. He called the police and said he was thinking of putting broken glass along the top of the wall to stop them. He was told that, if he did, HE would be done if anyone climbing over the wall was injured. He said that, instead, he would put broken glass in the flowerbed, so it was obviously on his property and would only affect anyone trespassing. He was told exactly the same would apply because he had done it intentionally to hurt somebody, even though they had to be acting illegally to get hurt.

So Jay was correct from an English legal perspective. However, I think that both examples prove that sometimes the law is an ass! Oh, and I think the example of my neighbour also goes along the Zero Tolerance route!

(ps please keep up the good work - and I was wondering if the old TV series, America's Dumbest Criminals, got its idea from TIT as the theme is very similar!)

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I'm slightly familiar with the Tony Martin case, and my understanding was that he lost the case because the burglars were not threatening him directly, but were in fact attempting to flee. When he shot them, they were outside his home. A similar case in the U.S. would likely be adjudged similarly. In the case reported on this page, it was reasonably clear that had the intruders been able to retrieve their weapon(s), they would have killed the victims. In other words, unlike Martin, they had a reasonable fear for their own lives -- and that was so clear from the outset, the police hailed Washington as a "hero". Yet he was still arrested for a ridiculously thin technical violation of the law. So, I still don't see how Jay could come to the conclusion that Washington was morally unjustified, even in the light of the Martin case. -rc

Posted by Rick, USA on August 27, 2011:

I think it is possible Jay does not know what love is, to risk your own life or take a life when it comes to saving someone you love. He appears to me to be someone who would had ran away from the situation, caring only about his own.