and frankly, neither did the principal or the teacher in the classroom.
At this point, most of us have seen the video. As I watched it, and spoke about it to friends, I realized many people were ignoring or misunderstanding the emotions in the room. Especially people who think the student should simply have followed the officer's instructions.
Below the orange desk for more...
The problem is that Officer Ben Fields lacks emotional intelligence. If we're being generous, we could say he lacked emotional intelligence yesterday during this encounter.
Here's the NY Times decribing events leading up to to the video:
He said that the young woman, a sophomore, was on her phone, and that the teacher asked her to put her phone away, getting “close to her face.”
No one's asked why the student was on the phone. Was it an emergency? Was she having a bad day? Was she being just being a teenager and digging in her heels when the teacher got in her face?
Did officer Ben Fields stop to wonder? Did he even stop to think that might be part of his job? I'd say the odds are low.
When an administrator and Officer Fields were brought in, students in the class “barely knew what was going on,” he said. The administrator and Officer Fields each asked her to leave multiple times and requested that she cooperate. The young woman said she did not do anything wrong and refused to leave. She remained quietly in her desk as they continued to ask her to leave.
The student was displaying the classic fear response an introvert would have. She froze. She felt safe in her chair and withdrew into it.
She's got three adults glaring at her, two of them strangers. She knows that classroom is her safe place. She is with peers she knows. There was something unpleasant waiting outside. She didn't have a good answer to the officer's questions so she repeated the same thing over and over. She clammed up.
That is the response of many children when frightened.
There are ways to defuse the situation. Either the officer or the administrator could have used them. They were brought in partly because they weren't involved in the original altercation. By this point, the teacher was already emotionally vested in the outcome and compromised as an arbitrator. The next step was to bring in an outside arbiter (the administrator) who wouldn't have emotions running high.
No one has suggested that the student was a threat to others. She had been disruptive, but not a threat. She was no longer disruptive because the accounts say she answered quietly. Either the administrator or officer Fields could have said something like:
"Well, we need to continue with the class and you can stay in the class for now, as long as you stay off your phone. But we are going to have to deal with this. It's not acceptable to be on the phone and distract everyone else."
But that isn't what happened. Instead:
Then Officer Fields grabbed the girl, flipped her desk and dragged her across the floor. Mr. Scarborough saw the officer put his knee on her as he attempted to arrest her.
This is completely inexcusable.
The girl's head almost hit the desk of the student sitting behind her. She could have suffered a serious injury, concussion or even death. And it is down to the sheer idiocy and emotional unawareness exhibited by officer Fields.
He has no business interacting with students, or even the public as a peace officer given this incident. He has no business having the awesome authority of the state vested in his person. He should be off the beat permanently. He isn't what the police force needs, and definitely not what schools need.
The risk is just too high that officer Fields' lack of emotional intelligence will lead to a greviously wounded, or dead child the next time he has to deal with a situation like this. He should find a different line of work, after he's done facing the music for this incident.