He's the man!!

OkayI gotta vent about this. I've mentioned a student before, but I didn't have a nickname for him--he will now be referred to as The Man. You'll see why. In the past, I just thought of him as a pretty typical middle school boy who's a little rowdy, a little gross, a little obnoxious and at times a little rude. But recently we've had a lot of problems with him. Especially when there's no male counselor around. I have come to the conclusion that he has absolutely no respect for women and I blame it on whatever's going at home. I don't know for sure, but I would bet money that mom is being treated like chopped liver at home by dad or a boyfriend. And whoever is his primary male influence is showing him that women are inferior and that you have to be A MAN at all times, which means no crying or showing weakness.

First case in point: The Man is playing basketball with some other boys. Another boy playfully pushes him to keep him from the ball, and The Man falls down, hands first onto the asphalt. And what is his first reaction? As he's fighting back tears of pain, he shouts the "F" word at the other kid 3 times and lunges at him. He then picks up the basketball and attempts to throw it at the other kid's head. So his hand is bleeding (in huge droplets) and he wants to just beat the other kid. The other counselor (also female) asks him to go get his hand cleaned up and he says, "I'm fine" and shrugs it off. He wants to just continue playing and handling the basketball, with a bloody gash on his hand. He eventually allows the other counselor to put a bandaid on it, but heavens no, he won't let anyone wash it off. Later, we told his mom that he had used the "F" word, and her reaction? "Oh, you know better. You need to get with the program, The Man. School's starting soon, and you know you can't talk like that," in a very passive aggressive voice. That's it? And I like how apparently it's all right that he says that word around us, but not when school starts. AGGHH!!

Second case in point: On Monday, about 5 minutes before lunchtime, The Man realizes he forgot his lunch. So, we have him call his mom. And instead of saying, "Hey Mom, will you please bring me by my lunch?" he actually says, "You need to bring me lunch" in a very controlling voice. He didn't even say thank you. I am sorry, but if my 11 year old boy said that to me, do you know what my response would be? "I don't need to do anything for you right now. I guess you'll be hungry then, huh?" But no. She zooms over with McDonald's. And we asked him why he didn't ask nicer, and he replies, "I don't owe her anything. I do everything for her. She doesn't do anything for me." ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? I just wanted to slap him. I asked God to bite my tongue so I didn't get fired. He just makes me so sick, to know that his mother allows him to talk to her that way, and that she isn't phased when we tell her that he talks to us like that.

The first time we talked to her about his behavior should have been our first sign of what's to come. I was telling her that he was being very disrespectful and disobedient to us and asked her if she would talk to him about it, and she said, "I'll try, but it's not gonna help." Great. So you've given up, then? If that's the case, you have at least 6 more years of this!! That's a long haul, if he's in charge!!

Oh yeah, and the other day we tried to talk to her about him being rowdy and rude, and she cuts us off saying that he's bored and that she pays for activities that we're not even doing. I ask her what activities he's not doing, and she says that he told her "we don't do anything. we just sit around all day." Now, what intelligent parent would believe that crap? I straightened her out on that. No, we don't ever sit around all day. Even when field trips are cancelled because of bad weather, we are in the gym playing basketball, or various other ball games. During every week, we swim 3 times, go to the climbing wall twice, play tons of teambuilding activities, we play kickball, dodgeball, sprout ball, fastest tag in the West, games with a parachute, water games, board games inside, card games, crafts, and the list goes on. Whatever lady, you just believe anything your sweet little liar tells you.

And I'm not going to get into the amount of times he's straight out lied to us, or argued over every little thing or complained that what he has to choose from for activities "sucks".

I am just saddened, sickened and angered by the whole thing. He's a disrespectful little twerp, and it's not entirely his fault. I just wish some mothers would realize the monsters they're creating.