Although most parents want school officials to enforce rules for a drug-free school environment, they often feel differently when their own children are the objects of student searches. This paper argues that as long as searches are directed at "others,"--those who are known or assumed to be guilty of school rule violations or criminal activity--people tend to believe that searches by school officials are justified. The paper describes how and why the concept of the "other" or enemy is created. School administrators, with the help of the judicial system, have applied that process to certain types of students to justify increasingly intrusive searches by school officials for a wide range of infractions. James Aho's model explaining how enemies are created (1994) is used to compare two strip-search cases decided by the Seventh Circuit Court and similar cases in other jurisdictions. The discussion illustrates changes in courts' handling of school search cases over the last 15 years. The conclusion challenges educators to acknowledge their role in creating and perpetuating an enemy whose only place in society is outside the social norm. Two figures are included. (Contains 23 references.) (LMI)