Fight culture at HHS reaching new highs

A familiar instinct to the students of HHS when we hear the sound of what may be a fight is to respond with a peek out your classroom, or over the head of a kid in the hall who’s standing in front of the scene. 

Some look at the fight with disappointment, some videotape to show their friends the next block. With “fight week” that happened early Nov., some of us are asking what’s causing so many fights? 

The answer is nothing. 

High school fights seem to be inevitable. According to CNN, 50 percent of high schoolers globally, have experienced in school peer on peer violence. 

What makes the difference between HHS and other schools that experience this peer on peer violence, is our reaction to it. With each fight, there will be a video of it, and usually we’ll know who was involved by the end of the day. 

“The video of me fighting was put in a fight compilation. People from other schools were texting me telling me they saw my fight video. It sucks that the video was taken because I’m not a violent person,” said GiovanielCordero, junior. 

Cordero got in a fight about a year ago. 

“The fight was silly, my reasons for fighting were silly. High school is so short, so I’m not gonna spend it being mad at people,” Cordero said. 

While it needs to be understood that the fighting is not for our entertainment, we should also recognize that more likely than not, there are circumstances to the situation none of us know about. 

“It’s more deep rooted. Some kids have anger built up that they do not know how to release, unless it’s with their fists. We should address that. Right now these fights are self versus self,” said Mozi Punni, senior.

The reasons for violence, and the consequences these kids receive, range more than HHS students are aware of.

“There are different factors we should consider in terms of consequences. It certainly does not work to do the exact same punishment for every kid,” said Kevin Haley, HHS Hall Para.

While it’s essential to remember these fights are not for our entertainment, we should understand how difficult of a situation it can be for the people directly involved in them. 

“The para’s physical health is in danger every time they have to break up a fight. In the moment, kids do not care or think while it is happening,” Punni said. 

The responsibility of breaking up fights mostly falls on the shoulders of our hall paras. While teachers can be involved, this is part of the para’s job. 

During “fight week”, tension was running high within the student body, but also for our staff here at HHS. 

“Within fight week I definitely had to be more conscious of the fights. It felt kind of like being on pins and needles,”  said Greg Riek, HHS Hall Para. 

With that being said, what should HHS be doing a better job of? How can we make fights no longer something we see as a central weakness HHS has? 

We should start with our reaction. More mature reactions, and not amused reactions. The more fuel we add to the fire, the more we take videos, the more likely the fights will continue to be a concern, and topic of discussion. 

The circumstances of these fights may be simple, but they may not be. The whole student body can’t understand what caused that kid to get in a fight, so why should we gossip about something or someone, we don’t understand. 

“We need to be able to let the fight go, and not harbor the hate,”  Riek said.