After thinking about it for a while and talking with the school principal to get his take on what the core of the issue might be, I decided that my son has not ever reconciled himself to the concept of necessary evils.  And that this was not a problem that started with or was limited to being at school.  So, I talked with the boy about it. When I asked him how he thought we should respond to necessary evils he said, “fight them?”  Ding!  Ding!  Ding!  We’ve found the problem!

Here’s the dilemma I am wrestling with: these are all normal parts of middle school, but are they acceptable?  Is my son who is having a hissy fit saying, “I don’t care if this is normal for these people.  It’s stupid and idiotic and I don’t want anything to do with it” actually speaking out of wisdom?  He gets accused all the time of not being willing to just suck it up and deal with it.  Which isn’t entirely fair; he sucks it up and deals with it and keeps putting one foot