Bullying/attack advice

Tpcl20

As a child and an adult I have to say that I hit people who attempted to harm me. Children who are predisposed to violent outbursts are often not rational or reasonable. When they attack another child, the only language they will understand is retaliation. It's likely that they are seeing violence at home or exposed to violence in video games. From their peers, they are seeking feedback and if the feedback comes in the form of physical pain, in any cases I've come across, they won't do it again. It's like getting an electric shock - you're not going to touch the fence again after that. If you do, you're not functioning on the same level as most people. If they're not deterred by being humiliated and hurt instead of feeling the pride of having "won a fight" that they thought they'd get, there's something different going on there and they probably need help.

That said, as a former teacher, if I were to witness students fighting I would intervene and try and find out what happened. If it seemed like somebody obviously started the fight, I would speak with their parents and try and suss out if there was anything going on in their life that might be affecting them and causing to lash out. I would also contact the parent of the child who they were fighting with and do the same thing, and indicate that I had dealt with the other side of the situation. Any school should have a behaviour policy which would involve a warning for a first time, some form of disciplinary action for a second time (extra homework, detention etc).

The school may be at least a bit suspicious that your son was an equal party in the fighting. Are you sure it was two other boys ganging up on him and not three lads in a disagreement? Also no offence but the "asthma attack" excuse for spitting at somebody strikes me as a really terrible cover-up attempt for him spitting at somebody. Spitting at another child during a pandemic is a pretty lousy thing to do. Obviously they're not going to make an allegation like that unless they have direct proof, but the fact that they seemingly haven't done anything about the situation is odd.

Edit; just to clarify I have never, nor would I ever hit a child as an adult. Exposure to violence is now universally understood to cause severe emotional distress which can permanently psychologically damage and destabilise a child. Unfortunately many parents who were themselves physically abused perpetuate violence against their own children and these are the children who will act out. The school likely knows that these students would be battered at home if those students parents were alerted to every single incident. I'm not saying that it's right or fair, but it does sound to me like they're from a difficult background, whereas your child should "know better" than to react disproportionately (and especially, to get caught). If you could curtail your righteous indignation and use it as an opportunity to explain to your son the importance of watching your back, avoiding bullies, getting to a place where there's an adult nearby when he's threatened and only fighting back when it is absolutely 100% necessary (and definitely not spitting at people because that will get you in big trouble), then it could be a big learning experience for him. To let him know you have his corner but he needs to keep himself safe too. If the anxiety is too much around this, it might be an option to move school because if the issues have gone too far, sometimes scorched earth policy and a fresh start could be the better option.

You will probably know yourself what the right course of action is. But ultimately, fighting tooth and nail for justice probably won't get you anywhere here because your child spat at those boys - what you perceive to be an obvious consequence here is probably being stymied by a relatively complicated background situation.