# How dangerous was your high school? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 17, 2016, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511 "2016-04-17T22:51:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![spamforbrains](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@spamforbrains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spamforbrains)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/21 "2016-04-18T02:24:47Z")
There was a lot of bullying that the adults totally ignored. Once I had to kick a nasty bully in a bad place in order to get him to leave a slow to mature boy alone. The watching teachers did nothing before and afterwards. Otherwise, the occasional food fights were the worst hazard. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/22 "2016-04-18T02:30:18Z")
Absurdly safe. The school was on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, not exactly a rough neighborhood. And the student body was five hundred intellectual boys at a Jesuit school where we were all on scholarship and all had Ivy League aspirations. Most of us were determined never to get in trouble because we all had a lot to lose. So, no bullies, no gangs, no fistfights (maybe a shoving match or some swear words once in a blue moon), a very peaceful spot for me and my fellow nerds. ---
**Author:** ![kopek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kopek/32/337_2.png) [@kopek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kopek)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/23 "2016-04-18T02:32:34Z")
Most of High School was McKeesport and not dangerous at all. Some of us carried pocket knives but I can’t remember anyone using one on a person or even threatening someone. We had fistfights and some of those got bloody but nothing a few days or weeks wouldn’t cure. Early/mid 1970s. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/24 "2016-04-18T02:34:35Z")
Eastern Long Island – perfectly safe. ---
**Author:** ![chizzuk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e36b37/32.png) [@chizzuk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chizzuk)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/25 "2016-04-18T02:35:54Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > Rockville, MD, 1981-85 > > No trouble at all. 60 students in a state-funded school. My graduating class was six. > > Why no trouble? It was a segregation school for kids with legal, drug and other issues that had been ‘removed’ from the public school system. About half of us lived there. The ones that could handle it got to live at home. > > Once there? Locked doors, large - unarmed - men for security in every hall, county police maintained a two-officer presence in the lobby and the truly hardcore were medicated by on-site nurses each morning. Class size was about 4-6 in each class. Gym was held in what was non-euphemistically called ‘the cage’. > > So yeah, no trouble. It was simply not allowed to occur. At the slightest hint the offender would be placed in isolation for several hours. This sounds like RICA, except smaller. I went to HS in Rockville also, although it was a comprehensive HS and about two decades later. There were some fights–the school housed a program for emotionally disturbed students, some of whom were then sent to RICA if their behavior became too extreme–and I recall somebody being thrown through a plate glass window in the courtyard, but it was a big school and I never felt unsafe. No metal detectors, no gangs, no visible drug use though I’m sure it was there. Once I stumbled into the middle of a fist fight walking through an area during lunch that I normally didn’t go to, and the guys paused to let nervous little me scurry through, then resumed hitting each other. It was funny after the fact. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/26 "2016-04-18T02:47:09Z")
> [@chizzuk](#): > > This sounds like RICA, except smaller. Color me surprised. Yeah, not RICA but nearby. We could see the RICA complex from the cage. RICA was for the ones the courts thought were incorrigible. My school was for those of us they thought were salvageable. I don’t even know if it’s still there. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/27 "2016-04-18T02:49:10Z")
Ours was the only school newspaper to have a regular obituary section. ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/28 "2016-04-18T03:18:47Z")
Catholic all-boys school in St. Louis 87-91. A few fist fights here and there, but that’s about it. There was one teacher who routinely smacked students around for misbehaving. He was probably the scariest guy there. I was shunned and mocked by other students, but I never felt in much physical danger. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/29 "2016-04-18T04:32:36Z")
Catholic all-boys high school in the Bronx, 1965-1969. I can’t recall any student on student violence ever, except for maybe some horseplay. (In grammar school I was involved in a fist fight or two and some smacking by bullies.) The Christian Brothers, though, would smack us around on occasion. ---
**Author:** ![movingfinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@movingfinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/movingfinger)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/30 "2016-04-18T05:29:12Z")
West side of Los Angeles, (Alexander Hamilton High). It was a a big school, 3000 or so students, almost all white, 97% Jewish. It was what could be called “upper middle class”, just south of Beverly Hills. You should have seen what a ghost town it was on Jewish holidays! This was 1957-1960. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/31 "2016-04-18T05:35:55Z")
Small town Wisconsin, 1976-1980. Absolutely safe. I hear there was a fight once, but I didn’t see it. Could have been a rumor. Bullies, yes, but it seemed merely the intimidation was sufficient. They never actually hurt [del]me[/del] their victims. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/32 "2016-04-18T07:32:33Z")
Student violence? Welllll… the trades HS was next door, we shared the yard, and sometimes we’d give each other nasty Looks, specially when mixed-school couples happened. Sometimes a new xyzfriend and the new zyxfriend’s relatives would be pointed out to each other and hop over to introduce themselves and ask about any family rules (many families had certain bars where they didn’t want their kids, such as the bar known as an adult hookup place or those marked by radical politics). And sometimes people got angry over insults to a player during a school match but their friends acted to cool things down before anything bad happened. I can’t recall a single actual fight in or around school grounds. There were some fights between trades HS kids from rival families but they took place away from school grounds and from what I recall the grownups put a stop to it as soon as they heard of it (those old rivalries are supposed to be a matter of business and occasional snarling nowadays, not of fistfights and much less of knives in the light of dawn). Regarding bullying it was actually better than the lower grades school. The lower school had several teachers who were bullies, the HS did not. 1982-6, small town in Spain. About 1000 students in our school, some 1200 in the trades school. ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 9:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/33 "2016-04-18T09:24:15Z")
Small rural high school in Western New York, mid-1980s, 400 or 500 students. No security guards, no metal detectors. There was a lot of low-grade bullying and fistfights but no knife fights that I was ever aware of. Lots of kids carried pocket knives (and doing so wasn’t against the rules as far as I know) but they didn’t use them against each other. No gangs I was aware of. I was a lot more concerned about verbal bullying than violence. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/34 "2016-04-18T09:34:01Z")
My experience is a bit weird as I spent most of my high-school time at one of the worst-performing schools in the country (England), and a few weeks at one of the _best_ performing schools before my scholarship fell through. So at my regular school there were plenty of punch ups bloody enough to put people in hospital and at least a couple of inter-school fights where gangs of guys from a rival shitty school would come round en masse and police would have to be called. And yeah I got bullied, a lot, but it was not really violent bullying as I was one of the biggest guys (I got bullied because I didn’t stand up for myself, not because people thought they could take me in a fight). Then at the other school the students were very disciplined. If bullying happened, I didn’t see it. Let alone bloody fights. This was 20 years ago…totally over it, not bitter… 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/35 "2016-04-18T09:45:27Z")
Cape Town, late 80s. Perfectly safe other than the police raids, but that’s because my school was a Coloured school set, for historic reasons, in a White neighbourhood. Coloured schools in actual coloured suburbs were generally not as safe, with gangs and much more frequent police incursions ---
**Author:** ![Tabby\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tabby\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tabby_Cat)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/36 "2016-04-18T09:46:12Z")
Singapore, in the 90s. Perfectly safe. No weapons of any sort, at all. I doubt there were any fist fights, certainly none that I was aware of. After I left, there was a fight at a rugby match, and it managed to make the national paper. [http://news.asiaone.com/News/Education/Story/A1Story20100413-209958.html](http://news.asiaone.com/News/Education/Story/A1Story20100413-209958.html) A grand total of no noteworthy injuries. ---
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 11:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/37 "2016-04-18T11:13:52Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > High school in suburban Los Angeles, 1969-1972. Race riots between white students and black students were an annual event. They usually resulted in school closures, and generally came in the week preceding the Christmas or spring vacations. I don’t recall any gangs, just rage between black and white students. This simmered all year, in isolated fights. There were restrooms on campus I never entered for my entire time in high school, because of the risk for black on white violence. Once or twice a year, it would explode into a riot involving 40-50 people, resulting in some serious injuries, but no fatalities. 1964 to 1867, I suspect we went to the same school. A couple of black on white gang fights would break out each year. Suburb south of Los Angeles. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 11:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/38 "2016-04-18T11:25:58Z")
Not dangerous at all, but I didn’t live in America. Rural New Zealand is a nice quiet place to grow up. A lot of teachers died of old age and illness, though. And quite a few kids had fatal traffic accidents. If you were superstitious you might think twice before going to our school. That’s about all, though. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 11:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/39 "2016-04-18T11:28:35Z")
> [@HoneyBadgerDC](#): > > 1964 to 1867, I suspect we went to the same school. A couple of black on white gang fights would break out each year. Suburb south of Los Angeles. Shit HB, that’s some serious time traveling there! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2016, 11:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511/40 "2016-04-18T11:29:29Z")
> [@HoneyBadgerDC](#): > > 1964 to 1867, I suspect we went to the same school. A couple of black on white gang fights would break out each year. Suburb south of Los Angeles. I was about 30 miles east of LA in a mostly white community, surrounding a black neighborhood that was form by “redlining”, the practice by real estate agents for steering minorities into segregated neighborhoods. There was one or two black kids in my elementary and junior high schools; in high school, it was about 80% white and 20% black. We did not play well together. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-dangerous-was-your-high-school/752511.md?page=3)