by Gene Howington
Aiden Steward is a nine year old boy with an active imagination. He attends the Kermit Elementary School in Kermit, Texas. He was suspended for making a threat against another student. He said he could “make him disappear”. Aiden’s weapon of choice: the One Ring from J.R.R. Tolkien‘s “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings“. Admittedly, the gold band forged in the heart of Mount Doom by the dark sorcerer Sauron is a powerful weapon.
Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
“They did what?” – J.R.R. Tolkien, spinning in his grave.
It can make you invisible, allow you to walk in the shadow realm, and control all the other rings of power including the Nine worn by the Nazgûl – the fearsome undead elite guard of Sauron some of whom are powerful sorcerers in their own right. It is also completely and utterly fictional which damps down its inherent danger as a threat quite a bit. Reduced to zero as any reasonable intelligent person might observe.
According to NYDailyNews.com, his father was as amazed at the school’s reaction as if they had performed real magic of their own.
“It sounded unbelievable,” the boy’s father, Jason Steward, told the Daily News. He insists his son “didn’t mean anything by it.”
The Stewards had just watched “The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies” days earlier, inspiring Aiden’s imagination and leading him to proclaim that he had in his possession the one ring to rule them all.
“Kids act out movies that they see. When I watched Superman as a kid, I went outside and tried to fly,” Steward said.
Clearly Mr. Steward doesn’t appreciate the clear and present danger and threat of imminent lawless action that accompanies a Ring of Power. But this isn’t our lil’ neer-do-well’s first run in with “the authorities”. Since moving to the Kermit Independent School District six months ago, Aiden has been suspended three times. While the cause for one of the suspensions is not mentioned, his other “crimes” include:
One charge of referring to a classmate as black. – (Dastardly. Unless, of course, the other child wasn’t actually black and then it would be “mistaken”.)
One charge of bringing his favorite book to school: “The Big Book of Knowledge”. – (This is elementary school, damn it! You can’t have kids learning, especially on their own!)
Both of which got him in-school suspensions. Clearly Aiden is a miscreant of the most foul sort and should never be allowed to use an imaginary magic ring. Or . . . he could be a smart eager to learn kid with an active imagination.
Well that could be your problem right there.
No one in the school administration seems particularly smart or eager to learn and I suspect you couldn’t find their imagination with a spy satellite and a pack of bloodhounds.
Just punishment or ridiculous behavior by alleged adults?
What do you think?
Source: nydailynews.com
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I was that kid and my heart breaks for him.
I think this kid should be tried as an adult
Crazy place…… guess the ring is not based in scripture. When one of my sisters lived in Texas, her son brought a toy tasmanian devil to pre-school. This upset some mothers who referred to the toy as satanic. Aiden’s parents need to move him to another school except there probably are not many options in that part of west Texas. It is probably the most conservative and stultifying area in the state.
What is it with so many schools suspending elementary-age students these days? Pretty soon, they’ll probably be instituting “stop and frisk” policies lest the kids bring books of knowledge and magic rings into their schools. I can’t remember a time during my more than thirty years working as an elementary classroom teacher when a young child was suspended in my school system.
Clearly an expedition needs to be mounted to destroy this ring—which will presumably result in the kid collapsing under the weight of his own imagination. Can someone call Gandalf and have him start putting together another team?
“I can’t remember a time during my more than thirty years working as an elementary classroom teacher when a young child was suspended in my school system.”
When I was in school, I don’t recall anyone in elementary ever being suspended. That was strictly a punishment for junior high and high school kids acting up. Even then it was reserved for serious breaches like fighting or vandalism, not wielding imaginary weapons. If that had been a criteria, our entire G&T class would have gotten suspended for playing Dungeons & Dragons.
That child must feel like he’s living in hell
blouise,
He is!
Does he have a license for that “Ring?”
Next thing you know, he will graduate from rings to voodoo dolls and pins.
Word of advice to the school administrators: Be afraid; be very afraid.
Sounds like a kid who would really appreciate a learning environment where imagination and the pursuit of knowledge are appreciated.
Chuck,
Considering how nasty the Ring Wraiths are, I think they should start their fear early and often. Fighting off the Wizard King is easily as bad as getting rid of Papa Legba should that loa decide to ride your spirit like a horse albeit the later is probably a more existential dilemma than an undead sorcerer riding a dragon and bent on physically crushing you like a bug.
Look, that little girl over there is waving a magic wand. What’s that you say? “It’s only a pencil with sparkles and stars”. You lie!!! Double suspension, silly second grader.
Gene,
A Circuit Judge in Mississippi had a guy charged after the guy consulted some sort of psychic to put a curse on the judge by witchcraft or voodoo. IIRC, the charge was either attempted murder, or attempting to hire a hit man.
I can’t recall the outcome, but do remember there was a great deal of hilarity in letters to the editor at the expense of the judge. That was before the internet, or it would have been much worse.
“This is the excellent foppery of the world that when we are sick in fortune—often the surfeit of our own behavior—we make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars, as if we were villains by necessity, fools by heavenly compulsion, knaves, thieves, and treachers by spherical predominance, drunkards, liars, and adulterers by an enforced obedience of planetary influence, and all that we are evil in by a divine thrusting-on.” King Lear, Shakespeare