AIBU: Teenage friend put on the sex offenders list for 'pantsing' someone at school

[Neonata]

Last week one of my 15YO DS's closest friends pulled a classmate's gym shorts down in the changing rooms as a prank and unfortunately his pants also came down and he was momentarily exposed. The boy then escalated this and the friend has now been isolated for a day, then excluded for a day and also put on the sex offenders list!!

AIBU to think this is a massive over reaction by the school?? He is a lovely boy who is usually really well behaved and generally high achieving academically.

I'm wondering that this will demonise him so much that he will start thinking he is actually a bad person and it will be enough to send him down the wrong path.

Bullying isn't an acceptable part of growing up. Read the statistics of depression, anxiety and suicide attributed to bullying.

I have the utmost sympathy for the victim don't get me wrong. But this is NOT the same as a so or the same thing being done in an office. Teenagers don't always think through the consequences of their actions.*

No, they don’t - and they won’t learn to unless they’re taught to do so. Seeing the perpetrator as the victim (as the OP appears to be doing) because his punishment was ‘harsh’ is teaching him that he’ll be forgiven if he turns on the puppy dog eyes.

A childhood without teasing sounds frankly miserable.

only if you are the arsehole bully person doing the teasing.

Dear Lord are some of you on glue

Bullies ARE nice charming people to everyone except the victim. That's how they get away with it for so long.

As for it being all done and dusted in a week does your local police force have 0 other crimes that this went through so quickly?

I think that the boy who pulled down the shorts is OP son. She is over invested in this ‘friend’ of her son. She is too over protective of him, for him to be anything other than her own son.

He is a nasty, vindictive , vile, evil bully.

My heart goes out to his poor victim. I bet what really happened in the changing room is far worse than she says.

Exactly the point I made earlier Bluelonerose

Excuse my language but some of you on here are fucking twats! Sorry! Minimising this is appalling! I bet you would be the first to shout the loudest if it happened to your son/daughter!

OP you say your son’s friend is a lovely boy and the other boy ‘overreacted’ etc. You have absolutely no idea of what the other boys life experiences have been.

Would you have more empathy if this was the latest incident of prolonged bullying? If he may have already experienced abuse of some kind? Have difficulties of his own? Etc etc

Good natured teasing between friends is a million miles away from what happened here

Although as a result of this thread and subsequent googling, I have learnt that teenagers who accept a caution for a sexual offence can be placed on the SOR, when I thought that it was only for those who have been convicted. So I have learnt something useful other than there are still too many people who minimise bullying in schools

People think it's for rapists and paedophiles but I know several young men who were sexting with their girlfriends of the same age, and someone who was done for mooning

No, you don’t. At best you know several young men who behaved inappropriately with sexual imagery of (most likely) minors, against whom complaints were made by someone, and a guy done for flashing.

Worst case, you know several men who’ve either minimised or fabricated more sympathetic reasons for sexual offence convictions

Have you seen evidence of what their convictions are for? How do you know that they’re on it?

I know plenty of guys who messed around as teenagers and young adults - got caught peeing in the street by police, mooning etc, and yet none of them are on the sex offenders register. Funny that. The only man I know who’s on the SOR is a man who raped two friends of mine.

But hey, I do know six guys who have ASBOs for sneezing in public without covering their mouths... see how easy it is to make unsubstantiated and unlikely claims?

I can’t believe someone here said it’s nowhere near as bad as if it happened in an office! Why not? Because they’re kids and kids have to tolerate bullies and humiliation? Just because teenagers may be less aware of consequences doesn’t mean the experience of the victim is any less damaging.

But hey, I do know six guys who have ASBOs for sneezing in public without covering their mouths... see how easy it is to make unsubstantiated and unlikely claims

According to my DS they also got fined £1000 each and have been tagged too. Must be true because he heard it from someone at school.

Lets embelish the story too....

OP, I think you might be surprised how the "lovely boy" behaves when there are no adults around for him to present a pleasant facade to.

And as to this being some kind of harmless prank that was blown out of proportion: if the subject of the "prank" was OK with it, he wouldn't have escalated the incident, would he?

Sounds like some pretty grim bullying to me. I'd like to think the "lovely boy" will learn a lesson from it, but I imagine he'll just make sure future incidents like this happen somewhere with fewer witnesses. That kind of consideration is probably why the school putting him on an internal discipline list.

I honestly thought that, in 2019, we were past the days when bullying was minimised, and labelled as a harmless prank, and where there is more sympathy from some for the perpetrator than the victim.

It is encouraging that the majority of posters aren’t minimising it and calling it a harmless prank - it is just sad that there are some people who are. I wonder if they would feel the same if their child was the victim? Though clearly any child of @budgetneeded would be on their own, if they were bullied. They would be told it was a fun part of growing up, and if they were upset - even depressed - as a result, they would be told they were just being too fragile.

I know what it feels like to have a parent who gives precisely zero fucks about you being bullied, and it has left me with a life long history of clinical depression. On good days (and there are more of those at the moment) I don’t think about suicide - I just think that the world and I would all be better off if I died. On bad days, I can’t see anything to live for.

But hey, I am clearly just too fucking fragile.

Look, to go on the SOR they have to prove that there is a sexual element.

Whilst the act of pulling someone else’s pants down is horrible, I doubt it was sexually motivated and instead was done to humiliate the poor victim.

@onemorego2019
I have the utmost sympathy for the victim don't get me wrong. But this is NOT the same as a so or the same thing being done in an office.

Actually it is worse.

If this happened to me at work I could get signed off sick and still be paid whilst looking for another job, or I could negotiate a payment from my employer which would mean I could quit immediately. The person responsible would be fired and I would not have to re-live the humiliation.

The victim in this situation has no choice but to return to school and face the bully and all the witnesses to his humiliation.

Why is it different happening in an office?

Because in an office people would take it seriously and not try to minimise the behaviour.

You say you know this boy but actually you don't know that you do. You know how he is around you, around his parents and friends parents. Very different to how he may act in a group of boys when showing off and egged on.

My friend's boyfriend was a lovely shy and friendly boy to her, his and friends parents. In truth he was rude, abusive to her and his little sister. I was shocked to see how different he was as our families were friends.

Given the school's response and the pantsed teen, it looks like they may have a closer view to his behaviour when away from family and adult friends.