Physical fights within the youth of our nation is something that I have been noticing more and more lately. I cannot scroll through my facebook feed without seeing a video of a fight. I recently saw a video, that was shared by a local, young girl (the video was not of students in the JM school), of two girls fighting on the bus. The girl who initially started the confrontation was punching the other in the head until she was being begged to stop, and this truly disgusted me.

I was so disturbed by this video not only because of the content, but because a friend of the girl was videotaping the whole encounter. In my mind, I cannot understand how someone who supports that kind of behavior would be considered a true friend.

Curious, I decided to look and see how other people were responding to the video, and I was surprised. The comments consisted of things varying from humor to disgust, like myself. The thing that surprised me the most, though, was the response from the young girl who shared the video. She shared her opinion vaguely stating that the behavior seen in the video was necessary and okay.

It is becoming more and more normal for teens to participate in physical violence. I feel that things need to be done to change these behaviors. Recently Missouri put a new law in place that can send students involved with fights to a juvenile detention center for up to four years, regardless of their age or grade.

This new law sparked many opinions from the people of Missouri, some in favor of the law and some not. “Are we really trying to throw these kids’ futures away by giving them a felony charge for something they do in their adolescence, giving them an adult charge when we can do something else to get in front of the situation?” said Erica Ussery, according to Complex.

Fights between children need to be viewed much more seriously. These encounters could end in jail time, or even death for some. This is a true problem that needs to be fixed before it is worsened.