Is this what it's like to be 13 in todays society??

Agreed to that.
Unfortunately, though no one seems to want to get involved anymore, (or simply are unable to).

I used to car pool a brood. And carpooled for various outings and field trips. I enjoyed it alot.

Carpooling is great but not always dependable. My girls like taking the bus, plus it stops right at our driveway and across the street at home time. I imagine my oldest will begin to like it less as she gets older with more crude behavior(swearing).

I hate to break your view of schools being helpful, but I never found them to be. I was 13 about 13 years ago. I was harassed in middle school and the teachers/administrators did nothing to stop it. I was actually forced to sit next to the person who was harassing me for an entire year because the teacher would not change my seat. And he verbally harassed me during class. All I got as a response was "boys being boys".

When I was a senior in high school I was sexually assaulted by what I assume to be another student (the person was never identified). I reported it to a teacher and then to the school administration (which made me come back twice for the meeting). As I could not deal with the emotional support my parents would have needed if I had told them did not share with them for a couple of years. But back to the school. The school did nothing to help me. They told me to just go back to class and walk between classes with friends (not possible because of my schedule and would have required me to tell my friends.) So even after I reported the attack, there was no help for me. Maybe there would have been more support if my parents had been involved, but that wasn't a possibility.

So I guess what I am saying is that even if you want schools to be helpful in areas of sexuality it doesn't mean that they will be. Good luck with getting them to help. It is up to you to protect your kids even when they are somewhere they should be safe.

((Googley)) - I'm sorry this happened to and yes I believe schools aren't always effective in dealing with problems. In your case I think the police should have been called and the school would have been quicker to act. Luckily my girls are assertive but when they've had problems, I'm there behind them ready to step in, if they need me - I'm very effective at getting positive results.

I hope my daughters school takes this seriously, just in case another boy decides to try this on a girl who doesn't want to be touched. Years ago discipline was much tougher(to the extreme) and everyone was afraid of getting in trouble. Now things are too lax and the school system sometimes doesn't care or kids fall between the cracks

I'm sorry this has happened to you.

This is the almost the same scenario that my daughter experienced in 7th grade. Some serious teasing & bullying. The administration and teachers did little to nothing for her. I had confronted them about this issue three different times, yet there was no improvement.
So I took action myself and pulled her out of that school and we began homeschooling. Needless to say, all of her grades immediately improved and she hasn't been happier....

Shangrala

Someone once said "the only thing necessary for evil to thrive, is for good men to do nothing". And when I hear someone say "children our our future" I become afraid, very afraid. As far as my State and sex education, the textbooks teach abstinance in the hopes that our kids will wait until marriage. Our underage stats on pregnancy and STDs strongly dispute that theory and yet we do not look for another solution. That is really sad.

Googley, I experienced similar. "Just ignore them, honey, and they'll stop." Oh, no they won't!

I agree just teaching abstinence doesn't work. You can teach it, but you also have to educate them about sex - the emotional and physical implications. The fact is, teenagers have sexual feelings, so abstinence can easily be brushed aside in the heat of the moment. Look what happened to Sarah Palins daughter - I'm sure she was taught abstinence. On Oprah one sex expert recommended mid teens should be told about self pleasure, in order to calm those urges instead of stifling them.

so many times i was told to ignore the pack of boys circling around me grabbing at me and calling me obscene names. When I fought back I was punished for it, when I hid from the boys I was punished for it, but the boys that tortured me for three years straight never were.

I still don't understand why the teachers who saw it never did anything. My parents just discounted it and never did anything. (literally telling me i was exaggerating) It totally ruined my self esteem and taught me the only thing I was good for was academic work...that its okay to treat me like garbage and ignore me. (I literally had nobody speak to me at school unless it was abuse for three years straight).

Of course this school district likes to pretend that drugs don't exist, sex never happens before you are 30, and that those wonderful popular kids couldn't possibly be getting stone cold drunk every night.... suffers from a case of head in the sand disease! (my cousins in this district 15 years after me agree with me totally)

((Amazonmom)) - I'm sorry you were treated so badly and you were right sticking up for yourself. I wish your parents did more to help you. I guess this is why they have the touching rule that got out of hand. I agree the schools don't do enough with cases of bullying. This is one of the reasons my daughter takes Karate and she will use it when absolutely necessary and I'll support her if they question her about getting physical.

The schools use to have a lot more freedom when it came to teaching morals and behaviors. If you google "being a teen in the 50's" and other decades, you will get a pretty good idea of the decline in the morals and values. That coupled with tv and internet and you have a desaster in the making. Teens no longer go steady, they hook up. There are forums out there that say America is the worst when it comes to having morals/values. This is one messy situation.

Didn't mean to dump on you guys;(

I think if sex education focused on things like how to handle feelings of sexuality, what is okay and not okay to act upon, etc maybe there wouldn't be so much grabbing and harassing. And early sexual behavior.

I don't think you're dumping at all - you made a very intelligent statement. I think parents are naturally afraid to admit their young teenagers have these feelings. We teach abstinence, teach them about sex but not how to deal with their urges and desires.

I wanted to give an update - Monday was a holiday here, so I couldn't call the school until Tuesday. Surprisingly the Vice Principle was very open with giving me information. I asked if he spoke to the girl and boy - he said "yes" and I jumped in saying "I suppose he denied it". He said "no they both admitted it and confirmed that other boys have also participated before" I forgot to mention in my 1st post, when they line up waiting for the home bus after school, some boys will play 'boob basketball'. This is when you role up a piece of paper/gum wrapper etc and throw it, so the girl can catch it in her cleavage.

The Vice Principle and the whole staff are taking all this very seriously and are very concerned, this is creating a very bad mentality/atmosphere on the bus. He also said he along with the staff are going to come up with a plan - to discuss inappropriate touching in general, to the grade 7&8 classes. He said every kid involved in touching her breasts will have their parents called as well as hers. I did end up mentioning the Facebook photos, because I think it's relevant to this girls problems, due to inadequate supervision at home. He thanked me several times. I believe this could have eventually got out of hand - this girl was teaching boys it's fine to 'objectify' a womans body and it okay to go around and grabbing private parts. Next time they might touch a girl who doesn't want to be touched and then the school would have to deal with a traumatized child and parents could involve the police.

I don't feel I acted over zealous in this situation. Someone needs to stand up when wrong things are done especially when it comes to children. This wasn't a one time incident. I'm not the kind of person who looks the other way.

It’s nice to know that they’re at least making an effort Lynn. Frankly I wonder what they can really do about it. This lesson must have the support of the child’s parents. I don’t think you over reacted either.

[quote=AAAAA;1382768]It’s nice to know that they’re at least making an effort Lynn. Frankly I wonder what they can really do about it. This lesson must have the support of the child’s parents. I don’t think you over reacted either. [/quote

I agree with you on that AAAAA. I wouldn't be surprised if some parents might just smirk and say "that my boy" -proud their son is interested in girls. Usually by 13, many teenagers have that "I don't care attitude" -- goes in one ear and out the other. I pray the schools action have some affect, because I worry someone might try this on an unwilling child who won't stick up for herself. They better come up with plan otherwise some parent may call the police next time.

When my daughter turned 14 she had six of her girlfriends spend the weekend with us. Friday night they went to a faith based teen center. They called for me to come pick them up at 9, this was unusual since the teen center closed at 10. When I arrived in the parking lot I found my daughter, her six friends, her best friend’s younger brother and four other boys. The adults that supervised the teen center were locked inside watching the events of the parking lot.

When I pulled up Samantha came running up to the van and said “those boys are causing trouble, we’ve got to go.” I said “I’m an adult, they’re not going to mess with me.” Now Samantha is one tough cookie. That poor young girl has gone through more in her young life than anyone ever should have to and it’s made her aggressive and appear fearless. Her mother was in the military and moved from place to place. Her second husband molested Samantha for years. This all came out when Samantha started acting out. The mother (and it chokes me to call her thus) choose the husband and Sam came to live with her “father”. (A whole different story).

The four boys had Mary’s younger brother, Lance, cornered. I went over there and one in particular started getting mouthy. I ordered Lance to get into the van with the girls. The mouthy boy, who I later learned was named Vinny, approached me in a very aggressive manner. I said “I’m not afraid of you, you little punk, you’re a scared little boy picking on someone younger and smaller than you. You’re a coward, you need the group to make you feel strong, and if you look around you’ll see that you’re little group is leaving you here behind. It’s you and me now, who do you think has the advantage here?” He looked around and indeed saw that the boys were leaving, he made a comment to them and one replied “dude, that’s Ricky’s mom, I’m not going to piss him off.” (Ricky was their age, 16, and 6 foot 4, 225lbs. A gentle giant to be sure but his lack of social skills gave him the appearance of being ornery.)

Vinny was not about to just walk away, so he decided to drop his pants and grab his penis and shake it at me.

When we got home, I overheard the girls talking. Sam said “your mother is amazing, but Monday is going to be hell.” I asked them what was going on. It turned out that this boy had been grabbing them on the butt and breast for a long time. Teachers actually witnessed this and just did that thing where boys will be boys. Now I was LIVID.

By this time it was 11:30, I found the boy’s number and called. His father answered the phone. I explained to him what happened that night and what the girls had been experiencing in school. His father actually LAUGHED. I said “you have two choices here, either you make it clear that your son is NEVER to have any contact, verbal or physical, with my daughter or any of her friends again or I am hanging up this phone and calling the police. Your son exposed himself to me, 7 fourteen year old girls, and the staff at the teen center. I don’t know if you ever listen to the radio, but at least once an hour there is a public service announcement about this very thing.”

On Monday I went into the Principal’s office and put them on notice that I have instructed my daughter and all of her friends that if he, or anyone else, EVER touches them in that way they are to immediately call the police because the school apparently is not handling the situation appropriately.

High Five (((AAAAA))) - you're one brave woman and good for you for standing up to that bully. That's shocking he would pull his pants down like that - he must have serious issues. I wonder how he ended up years later. You handled the situation fearlessly and professionally.

Sometimes when kids are in groups they do things, they wouldn't normally do and this is why I wanted the school to realize this is a problem. If the boys have one success with touching they'll naturally want more. I told the Vice Principle if this happens to a girl who doesn't want to be touched, her parents could call the police. If it happens to my daughter the boy will get a broken arm and nose because she knows Karate. Thank you for sharing your story AAAAA.

That was almost 7 years ago now. He never again bothered my daughter or her friends. Shortly after that the school implemented the no contact policy. He did end up getting expelled for fighting and eventually just quit school. He’s been in and out of jail for a variety of offenses, although no sexually related offenses to my knowledge. I later also found out that his father was in a wheel chair, and that he drank and beat Vinny on a regular basis. I do feel bad for Vinny and his mother (if the information I had was accurate) but that does not excuse his behavior.

Bullies don’t frighten me. My father was a professional yeller. Even when we were having a light-hearted friendly debate the more loud you were, the more right you were. So I’m a bit… immune to those traditional intimidating tools, I was raised by a drill sergeant.

It is my experience that people that truly mean to do violence have a certain look in their eyes that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

Wow! Brave women! The school will try and keep this out of the news.

Thanks for sharing, AAAAA.

I know a lot of people have already commented and you might not even read this, but I just wanted to add my two cents. I remember growing up(not too long ago, as I'm 27) there would be girls who liked the extra attention, and others who didn't. It rteally depends on the kid/girl, etc. If they are neglected at home and/or not taught good values at a young age by their parents, then yes, they will act like this,. The important thing is to not let the actions of this one girl influence the way you parent, and to expecially, now more than ever be there for your daughter, set a good example, and to let your daughter know that this is not an ok thing that's going on. Let her know that it's her body, and if she is not ok with something, she has the right to say know, and to report those who may not respect her wishes.

I completely agree LabLover and thank you for posting. I think the way this girl is acting, stems from the way she was raised or lack of raising. My daughters and I talk a lot and they both have strong self esteem and know this kind of behavior is unacceptable at their age. When the time comes and they're all grown, this kind of thing shouldn't happen in front of people. It would be a big mistake for any young man to touch my oldest because she knows how to defend herself.

Kids worry so much about not fitting in. I know when I was an adolescent I put up with things I didn’t like because I didn’t want to appear “square”. Because of this, I made sure that my kids knew that their feelings are justified, if something feels bad, it is.

If there are rules against this, a child such as myself has something to cling to. “I can’t do that, my dad would kill me.” It takes the “choice” out of their hands in a way.

It’s so hard being a teen. I think the ones that are doing “it” need validation, so when some aren’t, they feel the need to ridicule them. I overheard on girl make a comment to my 17 year old son about not being sexually active. I don’t know if she realized at the time I was his mother or what. But when did it become unacceptable to abstain?

You brought up a great point AAAAA - peer pressure. So far my girls have very good self esteem and leader type of personalities. It good to talk about possible scenarios like being offered drugs, alcohol and even when a group is bullying someone. You're right it's good for children to have excuses ready, when they're in an awkward position. I think it's sad too, that girl tried to make your son uncomfortable because he chose abstinence - she was probably ticked off he wasn't interested in her. Really it's no ones business. High five to your son for making his own choices.

To be honest I wish someone would have told me to wait, even till my mid 20's. Even though I was 18, I still think my mind wasn't prepared for all the emotions of a relationship. It made me so unfocused on school.

Yesterday my 8 yr old was saying how one boy who likes a girl, pushes her down on purpose(making it look accidental) and then lays on top of her. So I said "what would you do, if that happened to you"? She said "I would push him off and say never touch me like that again". Ever since my girls started school, we discuss how their day went and I look for teachable moments to open discussions.