Why Are Our Schools Such Violent Cesspits?
On the morning of February 3rd this year, Harvey Willgoose, a 15 year-old schoolboy, left home anticipating a normal day at All Saints High School in Sheffield. It wasn’t to be. Instead he was stabbed and killed in the school courtyard by another teenager, Mohammed Umah Khan, also aged 15. The jury at Sheffield Crown Court found Khan guilty of murder and, on October 22nd, sentenced him to life with a minimum of 15 years behind bars.
Harvey is the latest victim of the endemic violence that plagues so many of our schools. Also this year, a teenage girl was found guilty of attempted murder after attacking a pupil and two members of staff with a knife at a school in Carmarthenshire. Back in 2018 I wrote about the murder of Ann Maguire, a 61 year-old languages teacher, who, in April 2014, was stabbed seven times by Will Cornick during a Spanish lesson at Corpus Christi Catholic College in Leeds. I went on to highlight the stabbing of another teacher, Vincent Uzomah, by a pupil at Dixons Academy in Bradford, a year after Mrs Maguire’s death. By the grace of God he survived.
Earlier this year, a Channel 4 News report on violence in our schools revealed that there were 150 stabbings and other injurious knife crime incidents across England and Wales last year. That’s almost four per school week. Furthermore, there were 20,000 violent crimes recorded in schools by police forces in 2024 – and nearly half of forces did not respond to the data request, meaning the true number is likely to be significantly higher. Between 2013 and 2023, moreover, 5,000 violent injuries were inflicted upon teachers by their pupils. 1,011 suffered fractures, 126 lost consciousness, 16 entirely or partially lost their sight, and four suffered amputations. This is worth repeating: four teachers were forced to have limbs surgically removed after being assaulted by one or more of their charges.
According to the most recent Behaviour in Schools survey of 5,800 teachers, conducted by the NASUWT teachers’ union, in the last year 20% of teachers have been hit or punched by their pupils, 38% have been shoved or barged, 25% have experienced pupil violence at least once each term and 81% of teachers say that pupil behaviour has deteriorated. Dr Patrick Roach, the NASUWT General Secretary, lamented:
Recent years have seen an unprecedented surge in levels of violence and abuse in the classroom. Based on our latest data, we estimate as many as 30,000 violent incidents against teachers involving pupils with a weapon in the last 12 months.
It is a national emergency, but no one seems to care, least of all the current Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson, who seems more concerned with closing down private schools and forcing their former pupils into the state sector.
But why is violence so alarmingly commonplace in our schools? Well, it’s because violent pupils are largely allowed to abuse and attack their peers and teachers with impunity. And they are allowed to attack them with impunity because they are seen as blameless victims rather than violent thugs – victims of a cruel and unjust society.
As an example of this pervasive thinking, let’s consider Mohammed Umah Khan’s excuses after he stabbed Harvey Willgoose. “I’m not right in the head,” he told Sean Pender, the Headteacher. “My Mum doesn’t look after me right. I’ve stabbed him.” He used a set of ready excuses no doubt learned from a variety of mental health professionals and teachers to divest himself of responsibility for an unspeakable act of savagery.
Clearly, such excuses had previously worked. According to Assistant Headteacher Morgan Davis, Khan had a history of violent conduct at the school. This raises the question: why was he still there? The brutal truth is that the school leadership viewed such conduct as beyond his control. That’s why, after stabbing Harvey, Khan said to Mr Davis: “You know I can’t control it!” A serial offender was treated as a victim and, consequently, went on to commit murder.
As a teacher of almost 22 years, I’ve worked in schools where such perverse, naïve thinking is widespread. Armed with pre-learned excuses, the children and teenagers mete out threats and violence with impunity, and the innocent struggle to survive. Teachers are abused and the vulnerable are mercilessly bullied. Such schools are jungles. Rules are discarded and, when things go wrong, as in the albeit extreme case of Harvey Willgoose, the school is forced to close ranks and cover up its neglect of the real victims and its appeasement, even encouragement, of the perpetrators.
Back in 2018, Don Maguire – bereaved husband of Ann Maguire who, as mentioned above, was murdered in 2014 by a deranged pupil – was confronted by a wall of silence when he asked the authorities, including the school, questions about the circumstances surrounding her death. He said: “The impression was that there was more attention and care going to the killer’s family.” The killer, according to Don, was not being treated as a cold-blooded murderer but someone to be protected and helped. There was talk of rehabilitation and his best interests, even though he’s never shown a shred of remorse. The school concealed the details surrounding Ann Maguire’s death from her bereaved husband, I suspect because her killer previously displayed a propensity towards violent psychopathy, a propensity that was appeased and ignored at every turn by the school’s leadership. And even now, to add cruel insult to wilful injury, Will Cornick, her frenzied and remorseless attacker, is being treated as a victim to be helped rather than punished. The very approach that led to Mrs Maguire’s tragic death is being repeated, only this time by the criminal justice system.
Indeed, this philosophical orthodoxy pervades wider society as well, including the justice system. Paedophiles and murderers receive paltry sentences, shoplifting goes unpunished, illegal migrants are rewarded with mobile phones, and the mass rape, burning and murder of Jews is excused as a justified act of resistance. These are perverse outcomes brought about by the decline of traditional morality and its replacement by an amoral relativism that refuses to judge people, even murderers.
Our schools reflect this catastrophic orthodoxy. Perpetrators are treated as victims and, consequently, face little to no sanctions for their actions. The result: the degeneration of our schools into violent cesspits.
This piece first appeared on Joe Baron’s Substack, which you can subscribe to here.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
Can’t control it? He says they knew it? Then he must be controlled against his will. Before he commits murder.
Why wasn’t he sectioned several incidents ago. I wonder if cannabis was included in his diet.
Mohammed Umah Khan’s bog-standard excuse of “Mental Health” is the most convenient way of hiding the fact that he is happy, because he killed an infidel to guarantee his entry ticket to the Muslim Paradise Brothel with 72 virgins and “boys like pearls”, as promised by the Koran. No Muslim man, woman or child can be guaranteed entry to their “Paradise” unless they have KILLED AN INFIDEL, or died trying to kill one, ANY WAY THEY CAN. One infidel murder is sufficient, but some Muslims like to overdo it. If a Muslim murder attempt does not succeed in actually killing the Infidel victim, the Muslim is disappointed at his own failure, and must try again & again until he or she succeeds. It is one of the most fundamental tenets of Islam, and so-called “Moderates” must also adhere to it, though it is kept well-hidden from Westerners. That’s why that Evil Bangladeshi Muslim woman stabbed Steven Timms, MP, in his own constituency office, trying to kill an infidel, but he survived, so she must try again, unless she has already managed to kill someone in prison. That’s why no prison guards or infidel prisoners are safe around Muslims in prison.… Read more »
Cannabis is conjecture but administration of aluminium adjuvanted vaccines causing permanent brain inflammation is more likely.
As well as the whole perpetrator-as-victim mindset being responsible for the normalisation of violence in schools, equally responsible is the policy that has been in place for probably at least 30 years (but getting more extreme) that says you can’t punish children however ghoulish their behaviour… you can’t touch or even give away the slightest hint of aggression to a child even if their behaviour is out of control. The only upshot of all this is that deep-seated problems with violent potential go unaddressed in perpetuity.
You let kids get away with anything and guess what… they will try everything!
What would be the consequences of searching a child’s schoolbag to make sure they’re not concealing a knife… or for holding back a violent bully from attacking a vulnerable pupil? Probably something like accusations of abuse by the parents who think their kid is an angel.
Why? Because we imported hundreds of thousands of feral youths and young adults from conflict zones and cultures where aggression and violence – particularly with bladed weapons is the norm to settle disputes.
They then taught the indigenous young by example: slash first, discuss later.
That’s the elephant in the room that the author doesn’t mention
A very important, truth-telling article by Joe Baron. Another example is the little known case of 15-year-old schoolboy Henry Webster, who was challenged to a one-on-one fist fight at school by a Muslim youth who had been harassing him. When Henry arrived at the agreed place on the school tennis courts, 3 cars full of adult Muslim men suddenly came roaring across the schoolgrounds, jumped out and attacked him with the sharp end of CLAW HAMMERS, then kicking and punching him as he lay on the ground. It had all been arranged by the Muslim coward. Henry suffered a fractured skull and permanent brain damage as a result of the attack. Ten jailed for hammer attack | Swindon Advertiser Henry Webster race attack: schools ordered on offensive against racist bullies “The Daily Telegraph has obtained a leaked copy of the review, which examined the events surrounding a hammer attack on Henry Webster, a white schoolboy, by a Muslim gang in Wiltshire. The review says that schools in England and Wales should record the ethnicity of bullies and victims. If a pattern of racism emerges, they should take urgent steps to address the playground culture. Teachers should also liaise more closely… Read more »
For anyone following the treatment of the Nigerian murderer of Lisa in the Netherlands, this article rings very true.
The media and authorities are going out of their way to emphasise his difficult youth and circumstances, forgetting that he offended several times before and could have been stopped.
I recall getting 6 of the leather strap for the crime of not putting brown paper on my Maths Text Book. —-OK some will say that was a bit harsh, others will say it is totally unacceptable. My own opinion is that it was maybe a bit over the top, but after getting the strap my Text Books were always covered.
If Liberals and do gooder’s want to remove the strap they have to replace it with something, but instead they have allowed pupils to run amok. I have spoken to quite a few teachers about discipline in school and they all tell me “We are not even allowed to tell children to SHUT UP”—-The Political Class of Social Engineers destroy everything they touch.