Much ado is being made over this video.

A 14-year-old Australian punk decided to pick on a reportedly pacifist 16-year-old kid simply because the latter was different and not thoroughly popular. The Czar maintains that pacifists simply are people who have not been pushed far enough.

Casey Heynes was pushed far enough, picks up the bully, and splatters him into the concrete. At first, perhaps, it is shocking. But the Czar has seen enough splatterings to know that the bully was not seriously hurt, but was stunned. His nervous system was so overwhelmed by the shock of hitting concrete that he staggers around, at one point laughing embarassedly into the camera because he cannot control his legs, and he clearly has the wind knocked out of him. To confirm the story, the antagonist admitted he had a skinned knee and nothing more.

Both students were suspended (Casey because strictly speaking, this was not a self-defence situation—he could have walked away), but there are two more pieces of the story worth commenting on. First, great job to the girl who stands up to the punk’s friend who was going to pursue Casey. That’s a sheila for ya. And excellent work by whomever had enough sense to capture this on video (even if the videographer was encouraging a fight). The unnamed punk did not wake up in algebra class and decide to intimidate Casey: this kid has been doing this many, many times to many, many kids. No doubt school officials knew all about it, but like their American counterparts, never seemed to look up from their desks to catch him doing it. Now they have to do something. Casey may be suspended, but he definitely took one for the team, and moreover he has become an Australian folk hero—which admittedly can be done by falling drunk out of a third floor window and surviving.

Since Obama is focusing like a laser on school bullying to the exclusion of all else, he must of course endorse this video as a good example of what to do, right?

Back when the Czar was in grade school, in the 1270s, this is exactly how you dealt with bullies. Not with posters or after-school videos (unless they were like the one above). By third grade, you need to assert yourself or bullies find you. Thus, by eighth grade, we did not have a problem with bullying in our school any longer. And the nuns of Санкт Горвиц, who taught us at Наша Дама Вечера, expected us to unleash the same lack of mercy of the sort they inflicted on us. (The Czar remembers well making fun of Sr. Barsuk’s wooden eye patch, and she forced the Czar to kneel in hot urine for three hours. Of course, the urine cooled after a few minutes, but she had plenty more to freshen it up on the spot.) Casey followed the Czar’s advice. Now he has gone from chronically unpopular to national freaking hero. Good on ya. Guarantee he has a couple of dates to the next school dance.

The Czar of Muscovy

Божію Поспѣшествующею Милостію Мы, Дима Грозный Императоръ и Самодержецъ Всероссiйскiй, цѣсарь Московскiй. The Czar was born in the steppes of Russia in 1267, and was cheated out of total control of all Russia upon the death of Boris Mikhailovich, who replaced Alexander Yaroslav Nevsky in 1263. However, in 1283, our Czar was passed over due to a clerical error and the rule of all Russia went to his second cousin Daniil (Даниил Александрович), whom Czar still resents. As a half-hearted apology, the Czar was awarded control over Muscovy, inconveniently located 5,000 miles away just outside Chicago. He now spends his time seething about this and writing about other stuff that bothers him.