And again...*FACEPLANT*
26 Jan 2005 23:31![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xaq_the_aereon "I hope schools will realize it's less an exercise in tolerance than a platform for liberal groups to promote their pan-sexual agenda," said Robert Knight, director of Concerned Women for America's Culture and Family Institute
...I can't even think of anything demeaning to say about this. It pretty well speaks for itself. But that quote makes me want to go up to this guy with the following quote:
"Yes, the left-wing liberal radicals DID have a hidden agenda here, Mr. Knight...their agenda was to lure out all the idiots in the world so that we could make fun of them. AND YOU FELL FOR IT!"
I swear, if I ever hear -anyone- use the words "agenda" or "conspiracy" again from her to the day I die, I'm going to stop whatever it is I'm doing and vomit on them. X_X ..Unless they're a close friend, in which case they'll simply get the Abenobashi War Fan. >:D
...I can't even think of anything demeaning to say about this. It pretty well speaks for itself. But that quote makes me want to go up to this guy with the following quote:
"Yes, the left-wing liberal radicals DID have a hidden agenda here, Mr. Knight...their agenda was to lure out all the idiots in the world so that we could make fun of them. AND YOU FELL FOR IT!"
I swear, if I ever hear -anyone- use the words "agenda" or "conspiracy" again from her to the day I die, I'm going to stop whatever it is I'm doing and vomit on them. X_X ..Unless they're a close friend, in which case they'll simply get the Abenobashi War Fan. >:D
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no subject
Date: 1/27/05 06:49 (UTC)I'm a clergyperson: orthodox, theologically; an idealist, philosophically; a child of the Enlightenment, politically; a bleeding heart conservative. I can't tell you how many times I've gone to gatherings of clergy or other overly religious types and had a liturgy stuffed in my throat that reminds me of this program. Many and many are the times that I have been asked, not merely to listen to things I am skeptical of, but to RECITE prayers and confessions and whatnot that would require me to say things to God that I don't agree with.
F'rinstance -- I support our govt's policy in Iraq. I'm not a fire-eater, but I'm backing the effort. If you don't support the policy, that doesn't mean you're an expletive to be deleted; we should be able to get along. But to lure me into a meeting where I am asked to confess our "national arrogance," or to ask God to bless things I think are evil, or to pray for wisdom in election time where the prayer is a thinly-veiled campaign ad for the opposition is fundamentally dishonest, manipulative, and just plain wrong -- even if you agree with the sentiments expressed. (It would be, of course, just as wrong to write a jingoistic prayer that did this in reverse.)
Now, this kind of talking to the pray-ers under the guise of talking to God has been going on for ever -- I've put up with it my whole career. But I'm a big boy. I know when I'm being had, and I can resist going along to get along. But kids are different. Offering manipulative, ideological fare to kids who have less ability to critique or resist it is nothing less than dastardly. And the fact that we don't mention God doesn't mean it isn't laden with all kinds of ideological subtexts.
Me, I put the blame for the bullying in school squarely on teachers and administrators. They have elected to create schools where the inmates run the asylum. Civility (which includes not calling each other names) is best taught in face-to-face relationships which include the presence of proper authority and adult role models. The answer is insanely simple. Just reduce the size of schools. If every teacher knew every student (at least by name), then nowhere in the entire school can a kid be anonymous. Nowhere is that kid out of sight of those who can bring restraint to bear. The omnipresence of adults also means that restraint can be less heavy-handed. Correction of bad behavior can be more prompt, more direct, have more influence, and be handled with fewer layers of bureaucracy. (Quite a change from the factory farm model upon which most American schools are based, huh?)
In a more intimate environment, name-calling -- including the use of pejorative sexual terms -- can be suppressed without getting into whether homosexuality is good or bad. A simple, "we don't talk like that around here," accompanied by situation-appropriate discipline, ENDS the issue (at least in that situation). But those who view the school as a giant values-farm where all the little piggies are to be inoculated according to the values of the farmer means we keep trying to make them oink the way we think they ought to. So we get "no name-calling" programs that involve teaching kids that homosexuality is good, AND we get sex education programs that drone on and on about abstinence while avoiding cold, hard facts about contraception.
The point of this is that, yes, the conservatives are hyper-sensitive to gay rights propaganda. But that doesn't mean that gay rights aren't being propagated by folks who are determined to shoehorn them in by any means possible. The schools are an ideological battleground because all the power-players in the education establishment WANT them to be (read Plato's Republic: nothings' changed). This will go on ad infinitum, ad nauseam et ad absurdum, until we fix the way we do school.
-- AWC
no subject
Date: 1/27/05 10:00 (UTC)I'm not sure there really is one definitive reason for why this happens, or "cure," anymore than there is one "type of child." I do agree that a common factor is the reliance on schools and school faculty to teach children morals--with the varied moral codes of households out there, shouldn't that be the job of the home? The problem comes in when teachers use their position to preach what isn't appropriate, and when guardians aren't willing to put forth the time, energy, and love (awkwardness, research/knowledge, frustration) to do the job themselves.
On the other hand, a child has his or her own will. There comes a point where one benefits from being introduced to different viewpoints, and not just flipflop over to whichever sounds most sensible at the time. Keeping in mind, too, that as children age, many are going to start bringing up discussions themselves--trying to make an environment completely devoid of moral discussions is going to be a very difficult, if not impossible, task.
As for school faculty choosing to create schools where the kids go crazy-go-nuts... ;P Think about that for a bit. Any of the teachers I've had, with the possible exception of those in the private schools, would have done many things to teach in a smaller school. The problem? New public schools cost some...oh, 8 millon US$ was the last elementary school built around here, 10 years ago, if I recal correctly. A new elementary school in Lafayette, Indiana is looking around $19 million, and a middle school $34 million. Then there's the year to year upkeep, faculty wages, buses (there'd have to be whole new bussing routes), so on, and so forth. People complain about school taxes as they are, especially those without school-aged children.
no subject
Date: 1/27/05 17:31 (UTC)Schools cost so much because we want them big. We want huge plants with diverse facilities (including sports arenas) and huge cafeterias and so on.
If you did away with all the crap that we think is essential but isn't, you could build a 500-student school (anything larger is just organized child abuse -- too many rats in the maze), up to code and all, for about what you'd spend on a 500-seat church -- maybe $2-3 million in today's money. That's assuming you want fancy.
If you build 'em small, you can match 'em to neighborhoods and localities, and reduce busing drastically. If you make it so teachers and teaching are properly centered in the life of the (smaller) school, you can eliminate a whole bunch of parasitical school employees: guidance counselors, psychometrists, secretaries, curriculum specialists, assistant principals, yada yada.
What costs is all the frills and extracurriculars, not teaching kids stuff.
But my point was . . .
In the social universe of the small school matched with the defined neighborhood/locality, not only does every teacher know every student, but teachers and parents know each other outside the school environment. You build a real community, where discipline (= punishment) is less needed, because discipline (= accountability) is increased. Sure, there will be fights and bullying and name-calling. But dealing with them wouldn't be a formal process of write-ups and how-many-trips-down-the-hall-before-we-suspend-you, etc.
Teacher says "Stop that." Kid doesn't stop. Teacher 1) sends kid to principal, AND 2) tells parent -- whom teacher knows socially. Parent and teacher will, in most cases, be able to get on the same side of the issue, thus preventing misbehaving kid from playing off one against the other.
Many other things would need to happen to truly re-make public schools. Smaller size isn't a panacea. But it's an aggravating factor in EVERYTHING.
When the assault on Columbine HS happened a few years ago, all my daughter's friends felt put upon by nervous school administrators, who thought the answer was to crack down on everybody for everything. But the problem was, primarily, that the two boys were crazy; secondarily, that nobody (including their parents!) thought their craziness worth telling anybody else about; and tertiarily, THAT THEY WERE INVISIBLE BECAUSE OF THE SIZE OF THEIR SCHOOL SOCIAL UNIVERSE.
If 5% of the kids in any group are likely to be a problem, and you have 100 kids in school, you have 5 problem kids. But if you have 1000 kids in school, you don't just have 50 problem kids (5 x 10), you have (let's say) 100+ problem kids -- the original nasties, but also their hangers-on -- who aren't as bad as the bad kids, but who adopt their poses, and thus screen them from view. You have created, not just a larger concentration of bad kids, but a hostile subculture, impenetrable to adults. In a large school, the adults DO NOT KNOW what is going on. Nor do many of them wish to, being intimidated by the true nasties. So nobody's responsible.
And our solution is to get them together and do "No Name Calling Week" crap. This is, depending upon your ideological predilictions, either a secular revival meeting or a communist self-criticism indoctrination session. Either way, it stinks.
-- AWC
no subject
Date: 1/27/05 07:32 (UTC)Why is it that we not only let the secular right-wing nutballs hijack concepts like patriotism and the American flag, but now the religious right-wing nutballs have family values?
Actually, you know what? Let's take every group like this (Focus on the Family, Concerned Women for Group Names that are Entirely Too Long, etc.) and force them to stick the word "Nuclear" in front of every occurence of the word "Family." Then the names will make significantly more sense! :D
...Hey, wait a minute. Why is the Concerned Women for etc. etc. led by a guy named Robert?
no subject
Date: 1/27/05 10:01 (UTC)Or I could make a joke about how the wominz are baking pies.
Or I could link a LOLZ WITTY IMG.
Or I could crawl back to my hole. :H!
no subject
Date: 1/28/05 03:00 (UTC)I dunno. They may not be all-consuming conspiracies, but this and NARTH {North American institute for Research and Treatment of Homosexuality}, among others, do give off the stench of (not-so-)hidden agendas.