One young woman told the student newspaper that she and other students who witnessed the beating as it spilled out into the corridor from the study room didn't understand what they were seeing. She says they thought it was "just a fight," which is why nobody tried to break it up.

I'm not sure what to think about that, honestly. In my day, breaking up a fight was considered the morally admirable thing to do. I've heard lately, though, that students who try to break up fights in high schools are often punished as severely as the people who were fighting.

That's not the main thrust of my article, but I don't think that's an attitude we should be teaching teenagers.