Posted
An 11-year-old girl's claim on a student feedback form that her school was guilty of committing a war crime, as defined under the 1949 Geneva Convention, has sent social media into meltdown.
The girl's father, Glasgow author Mason Cross posted a screenshot to Twitter of the offending feedback form, joking that he was not sure if he should "ground her or buy her ice cream".
Under a question on the feedback form asking what things her "teacher(s) can do better", Ava Bell suggested that they refrain from using "collective punishment" because "under the 1949 Genva Conventions [sic] it is a war crime".
Mr Cross's post has so far been liked more than 500,000 times, and shared more than 150,000 times.
After Ms Bell's accusation started gaining traction her father posted a clarification, saying that she "thinks her teacher is awesome" and that "it's just this aspect of the educational justice system she has an issue with".
"She has a Google habit. Usually it's along the lines of science and technology," Mr Cross told the BBC.
"According to Ava, her teacher thought it was quite amusing."
After a number of people responded that she should definitely get the ice cream and possibly run for prime minister, Mr Cross posted a picture of Ms Bell holding two ice cream cones, but said that she had already considered the prime ministership and concluded it was "too much hassle".
Although most of the feedback was supportive of Ms Bell, some were sceptical, accusing Mr Cross of fabricating the feedback for attention.
"Meh, no way this actually happened. Shame on you, using your kids for [retweets]," one using wrote.
"Dude, if I'd made it up I would have got her to fix the spelling of 'Geneva'", Mr Cross responded.
Topics: social-media, unrest-conflict-and-war, united-kingdom