NYC Teen Arrested

    While on Facebook last Wednesday evening, I read a post by a friend from school that read: “I went to school with this kid… crazy” followed by a link to an article in the New York Times.  

    As I read the article, I was disturbed to find that a local teen had thrown a homemade bomb into a, luckily empty, Starbucks over Memorial Day weekend just to make a statement against corporate America–an idea developed in the movie Fight Club. Various news articles have reported that he was planning his own “project Mayhem”to sabotage corporations by destroying property. I was even more disturbed when I read the name of the boy and realized he was someone I knew.   

    Kyle Shaw, just 17, was arrested last Tuesday night and charged with first-degree arson and first-degree criminal possession of a weapon. He had just graduated from City-As-School high school, but before he transferred he went to School of the Future, where I attend school, and was just in the grade above me.  

    When I thought back to the Kyle I knew from school–a socially outgoing guy who had a lot of friends and no former criminal record–I was flabbergasted that he would risk his reputation and future like he did. I remember hearing rumors of him and a bunch of other boys planning a series of fights which they proceeded to tape and put on Youtube. I never liked it and thought it was the start of a dangerous trend that would result in someone getting badly hurt, but never did I expect it to go this far. 

    When I finished the article, I immediately looked at his Facebook profile, noticing that people had already written sympathy comments on his wall just a day after his arrest. My mother peered over my shoulder –a pet peeve of mine that she never seems to remember–and asked who that boy was. When I told her his story, which she had already heard about, her response was: “That’s the bomber? But he’s so CUTE!” 

    She was as taken back as I was, but I was more concerned with what Kyle’s followers would do. The fight club theme had been a recurring issue in my school throughout the previous school year, and now that a member has been arrested I was alarmed to think what could have followed. Had he not been arrested when he was, would there have been more attacks?  This made me wonder if he was really protesting corporate America, or were these acts of rebellion just for attention?  

    Over the years there has always been some history of violence in public schools, but what irritates me the most is that this group of Fight Club extremists would mimic the movie without the thought of consequences.  These days, boys are so obsessed with proving their manliness that they would go as far as hurting each other on a regular basis. What do they really get out of breaking one anothers nose and arms? It seems to me that it only causes tension for the loser who could then ask for a rematch, leading to a never-ending line of hatred.  

    Popularity is isn’t worth destroying your future over. What we do in high school doesn’t define who we are, so why put everything on the line for it? The world is filled with real tragedies and danger, and being that we are the next generation  to enter into it, must we really cause such hardship for ourselves at such a young age?