Steel Cage Discipline: It Makes Sense In Texas
This is a very common story about school sanctioned gladiatorial combat among high school boys. The Guardian reports:
Some schools have counsellors to settle disputes between students. But South Oak Cliff high school in Dallas preferred another, more direct method: bare-knuckle fighting inside a steel cage.According to a 2008 report obtained by the Dallas Morning News, staff at the school sanctioned the use of “the cage” - a section of the boys’ changing room barricaded by wire mesh and steel lockers - to settle disputes and bring unruly students under control.
I fondly remember the day I bludgeoned Vespin the Trapper Master to death with my graphing calculator. Nobody makes weapons of woe like Texas Instruments. Unfortunately, I went to high school on Long Island, so our Colosseum was in the basement of a Genovese drug store. Would that I was born a citizen of Texas. There I could have received the full adulation of the mob:
Frank Hammond, a counsellor at the school who was dismissed and has since filed a whistle-blower lawsuit, said: “It was gladiator-style entertainment for the staff. They were taking these boys downstairs to fight. And it was sanctioned by the principal and security.”
The (ex) principal weighs in after the jump.
Sadly, Donald “Proximo” Moten, the principal of South Oak Cliff High, denied the charges:
Moten, who resigned last year following a separate investigation, denied that any cage fights took place during his tenure.“That’s barbaric,” he told the paper. “You can’t do that at a high school. You can’t do that anywhere. Ain’t nothing to comment on. It never did happen. I never put a stop to anything because it never happened.”
Are you not entertained? I am shocked, shocked, to find violent pugilism going on in this establishment.
At least the school district superintendent seems to understand that no Texas education is complete without spending at least some time in a cage of death:
However the school district superintendent, Michael Hinojosa, agreed that “some things that happened inside of a cage” were “unacceptable”, and said that the school had been turned around under a new principal.No criminal charges were filed, he said, although disciplinary action was taken.
Yeah, “some things” were unacceptable. Other things? Well, how else is Texas supposed to train the next generation of mavericks?
Texas high school used cage fighting to settle disputes [The Guardian]
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Comments
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FIRST to complain...
"Would that I was born a citizen of Texas."
?
I'm never first
McCain's from Arizona.
And it seems really odd that there isn't any factual clarity over whether there was or was not a cage at the school.
3500 sq ft house, bride, and a Lexis.
DO NOT MESS WIHT TEXAS!!!
this post is begging for frat stud
I'll step into a cage match with Latham any day.
Two firms enter, only QUINN REMAINS
This is garbage. This story has nothing to do with Law, Law firms, Law tabloids or anything. Just another example of ATL's jealousy or bias against Texas. Still irrelevant though.
I would not want to wrestle a 3500 sq ft Texas wife even if the prize was a new Lexis.
South Oak Cliff High School really fell apart after Dennis Rodman left, just like the Chicago Bulls...
I may not agree with the tough decisions the principal made, but I agree that the principal was not afraid to make the tough decisions....
This doesn't surprise me one bit... I recall sanctioned PE events that were not that dissimilar to this except you fought on mats, had to stay on your knees, and you didn't have a choice of who you would fight or whether you would participate. Seems logical that some backwards podunk school would take it a step further in the interest of conflict resolution.
Now this is what I call Dallas Prestige.
Dallas Prestige
3500 sq ft and a wife, bitches!
Hail Mr. Principal, those who are about to die salute you!
I knew something was missing from my high school days. Toga day takes on a whole new kind of fun.
12 - Dallas prestige is a 3,500 sq ft cage in which to beat up the wife and kids...
Texas to 190!!
Elie - nice Casablanca reference, by the way.
Guys in my high school used to get their content from the Drudge Report all the time. It was no big deal.
What does this have to do with anything?
you really do suck as a writer, elie
i dont know if im any better, but i dont torture the readers of a once great site like you do.
you really do suck as a writer, elie
i dont know if im any better, but i dont torture the readers of a once great site like you do.
"I fondly remember the day I bludgeoned Vespin the Trapper Master to death with my graphing calculator. Nobody makes weapons of woe like Texas Instruments. Unfortunately, I went to high school on Long Island, so our Colosseum was in the basement of a Genovese drug store. Would that I was born a citizen of Texas. There I could have received the full adulation of the mob:"
Elie: What the fu*k are you talking about?
Did you check out the rates Lat is charging for ads? Kudos to you if this really catches on. It's a great idea, but I wonder how many organizations are going to pay these rates? I'm sure you did your marketing homework. Good luck . . .
19 - you just did.
Please remove the picture of my husband from this post. I am positive he would not appreciate being featured in this post.
What do you guys have against us? 3500 sq ft is okay when it is in the right place.
...and I like my Lexus.
25 - If you really were a 3500 sq ft Texas wife you would know that it is spelled Lexis, not Lexus.
Mitchel Cumstein, the new King of SkaddenDC.
3500 sq. ft., Laura, the twins, the dog, and a Lexis. Don't mess with Texis.
Guys in my high school used to stage cage-matches all the time. It was no big deal.
Elie-- have you been nipping at the martini trough a little early? I know its Friday but WTF? This is grounds for the old axe - and performance related to boot!
dont you bottom 50% T14-ers have something better to do with your fridays?
They should do this for law review at Cooley....
1,
Read a book once in awhile.
20,
Get a sense of humor, whydon'tcha?
(What the F- "whydon'tcha" isn't even a word)
Elie,
Funny post.
non sequitur post
texas for the motherfucking win
Two sweaty dudes rolling around with each other in the locker room equipment cage is gay...totally gay.
Gentlemen at the legal preparatory academy with which I was once affiliated devised means and methodologies for conflict solution that did not involve mediation, negotiation, or any other of the varied forms of alternative dispute resolution in which instructors at the legal preparatory academy opined from time to time, and furthermore not involve the aforementioned gentlemen girding themselves with statutes, regulations, the common law, and the other tools and weaponry of the litigator, but rather involved physical combat. These gladatorial tussles were viewed with opprobium by the administrators of the legal preparatory academy, and much amusement was procured by the same at the expense of those gentlemen with conflicts to be resolved, who were left bloodied by the experience. The entire course of conduct, while sordid, was not considered to be "a big deal", or even of particular relevance to the legal world at large.
OMG this is fantastic!
Why don't law schools do this shit?
The Management Committee likes this idea and will be implementing cage match fights between sub-par associates to determine which one is laid off. Then, get this, we'll lay them both off. Ha!
Anyone who knows Dallas knows this is the scariest, most ghetto school in the city... nobody drives a Lexus at this school, I assure you, unless they do "business" on the side.
"Ain't nothing to comment on." -- great quote by the (ex-)principal.
"I fondly remember the day I bludgeoned Vespin the Trapper Master to death with my graphing calculator. Nobody makes weapons of woe like Texas Instruments."
TI for life, yo...screw RPN.
This would never happen in Alexis Texas.
But, it might happen in Lex Steel!
READ THIS I'M SOOOO SORRY EVRY1!!! If you do not copy and paste this onto 10 videos your mom will die in 4 hours
I grew up in Dallas. S. Oakcliff was considered one of the best high schools. But I am not surprised this happens in Texas. Living in NYC, I realize how backward some places are.
43-Your comment indicates that you are not from Dallas, and don't sully our great president's number.
"3500 sq ft house, bride, and a Lexis."
Listen you diddle-headed law school morons, LEXUS is the brand of nice cars you're too stupid to drive! LEXIS is a research service you never bothered to learn.
You spent six figures on a legal education at a good school, and you can't even keep that straight? Thank God you're all going to be permanently unemployed.
Good flame, 45.
just texans being texans. please secede from the union, again.
i love the texas hate...people are just jealous
Hottie
4, 12, 14 – I know these boards are full of inside jokes that are supposed to be funny (but which aren’t at all), but you’ve really got to let go of the whole 3,500 sq. ft/Lexis thing. No one knows what the hell you’re talking about, and if they do, they (like you) probably have the mental capacity of a gnat. Also, going along with 48’s comment, suffice it to say that whenever mindless vitriol is spewed against an entity, much like the vitriol that is spewed against Texas by commenters on this site, it tends to show that there is something else going on with the spewers. This is particularly likely where, as here, the vitriol obviously has no basis in fact. And do you really want to sound like a 5 year old anyway? Because that’s what your comments amount to. Seriously –Lexis and 3,500 square foot houses/wives/whatever-the-hell-you’re-talking-about? It doesn’t even make any sense.
43 – I’m not sure what century you grew up in Dallas, but Oak Cliff has always been a complete dump. HP has always been the best public school in the city, state, and arguably the country. In fact, I bet a kid with a diploma from HP has gotten a better education than the education provided by the toilet colleges attended by 4, 12, and 14.
God I love TX. Best. State. EVER!!!!
Dubya is prouder than texas toast!