Boy disciplined for pointing a pizza gun

An elementary school is punishing a 10-year-old boy who’s accused of threatening students at his lunch table with a pizza gun.

Nicholas Taylor took some bites out of his slice of pizza and noticed it looked like a gun. You can imagine that, but here’s my Photoshopped version of what it could look like.

A friend noticed it looked cool. So, Nicholas waved it around and started pretending to shoot it into the air.

Now he’s going to have some lonely lunches. He has to eat at a table by himself for the rest of the semester.

Administrators at David Youree Elementary School in Tennessee say the boy was threatening other kids, and even though it was only pizza, it was shaped like a weapon. The district says some students were concerned about his behavior because he was making “threatening hand gestures.”

Once reported to the teachers, the district says the boy didn’t tell them the truth about pointing a pizza gun at other students.

A school district spokesperson says, “I realize some might say we are going overboard but the principal is just trying to use an abundance of caution and send the message that we don’t play about guns and it’s not something we joke around about.”

The boy’s mother is upset. She talked with a Nashville TV station saying the punishment was “absolutely ridiculous.” They don’t even own a gun and she says her son is a big Star Wars fan, so the closest he is to a weapon is playing with a light saber.

In addition to lunch at the silent table, Nicholas has spent time with the school resource officer learning about gun safety.

Has zero tolerance gone too far?