Posted on 05/09/2013 4:11:53 AM PDT by rhema
What the young learners have in store for them in the future is anybody's guess. Legislators wish to create something called a "school climate center," which sounds meteorological, but would be, instead, a command center to fight bullying.
Fight bullying? It sounds like no fighting in the war room, from "Dr. Strangelove."
Bullying is a bad thing, and I imagine teachers and administrators and even the kids know it when they see it. But that isn't enough. It is apparently painful to DFLers -- all of whom passed the new anti-bullying measure in the House -- that Minnesota's anti-bullying law is only 37 words. Such restrained lawmaking can never do when there is so much new air that can be blown into the thing. The new law would include additional reporting of bullying, training and other requirements administered through the new school climate center.
I don't know what that means and neither do the proponents, chief among them Rep. Jim Davnie, DFL-Minneapolis. The Senate took up the measure Tuesday, May 7. Maybe it will become law and maybe it won't. It is unfunded, but that means only for now. Money would have to be found to create and staff the school climate center. Money would have to be found to train teachers and administrators. To investigate all formal complaints of bullying couldn't come cheap. Whole new divisions of bureaucrats would have to be hired.
The bill calls for $1 million to set up the school climate center run by the state Education Department. And an analysis by the Minnesota Management and Budget office estimates that it will cost school districts $20 million a year to implement the new policies, which have yet to be invented.
OK. Some kid bangs another kid up against a locker and punches him in the stomach for wearing a purple shirt to school. That's bullying. You don't need a new policy for that. Or, every day some little guy, just for being little, gets conked over the head with an algebra book by a lineman on the football team. Don't need a new policy for that.
I would imagine that much of the concern compelling the proposed new law is manufactured on behalf of kids struggling with sexual identity issues. They should not be bullied, and five will get you 10 that teachers are already alert to that dynamic. Proponents of the new measure say that not enough is being done, thus the need for new programs, administered by a central office, created out of whole cloth.
Which can only mean that new programs are intended to be put in place to monitor the kids like hothouse orchids. What they say, think and feel, much less what they might express physically, will have to pass the muster of the school climate center. I don't think I am exaggerating. The ramifications are problematic, at best. Is it bullying if a guy cancels out on a prom date at the last minute? Is it bullying if a student pipes up in class that he or she is in favor of conventional marriage? That could hurt somebody's feelings. Would hurt feelings constitute bullying?
And if hurt feelings constitute bullying, then it stands to reason that the school climate center -- I'm seeing a NASA space launch-type room with computers and television monitors -- would have to send out an agent for perhaps some bureaucratically approved indoctrination.
It all comes under the rubric of being careful what you wish for. This kind of proposal seems to suggest that the kids will be taught by bureaucrats what they can think, feel and even say in order for those thoughts, feelings and speech to fall within the guidelines established by the state.
The time frame for this was about 4 months before we pulled them from school.
“For guys it is part of figuring out the pecking order.” HELLO?! Do you think this is something only guys go through? Girls can be more cruel and bitchy than anyone. It’s not easy for anyone — but yes, you have to learn to deal. The problem these days is if some kid fights back there is the politically correct “punish everyone equally” dictum. Used to be if a bully hit first, and the victim attacked back, the victim wouldn’t be punished. Now they want to say that both kids are horrible and deserve official punishment for fighting. A man used to be able to tell his son “if you are hit, hit back.” Now they want to jail the dad for “encouraging” the son. Political correctness gone mad.
We were deathly afraid of her doing something. She was so sad and cried all the time. See used to say, “why do they hate me I don’t even know or talk to them”. It was emasculating as an old fashioned style father (former Corps and LEO) who had to see this and could do nothing for fear or being a bully myself to teen-aged girls. I really was minutes way from beating another parents’ or school administrators’ ass or worse. My wife worked hard to keep me away from the school.
Now she is back to a happy place and all is well. She is an angel. Still has a nightmare occasionally.
My dad grew up in Washington Heights in NYC in the forties. A pretty rough neighborhood and he always gave me good advice.
"If you're being bullied by a group of kids, strike out at the biggest one. The rest will all stay out of it and you'll be down to one. Even if you lose, the others will respect you and stop."
I think I was bullied once in second grade and was never targeted again after that. Girls just don't have those routes to resolution.
Even boys now days are different. With the influx of mexicans and further deterioration of the backs and white teen age culture you are at risk to get stabbed, shot, or beat down either at school or afterwards. There is no more of the old honor thing where you fight one and the rest leave you alone. Now they are vermin and attack in hordes. Just watch some of the school bus videos of late.
A better question: SHOULD we try to prevent bullying? EVERYONE gets bullied. Little kids pick on you for being too: short/tall, dumb/smart, ugly/cute, rich/poor, fast/slow, hairy/bald, dark/light, or whatever they can think of. The point is that they are looking for what your "buttons" are, and then to see what happens when they push them Then, they want to see how long that button works. Like any toddler with a new toy that actually moves or makes a sound, they are enjoying manipulating their environs. At some point, EVERY person wants some button-pushing to cease. Figuring out how to make it stop is a rite of passage for the growth of every being. Counter-attack in-kind, use physical force, deflect the criticism with humor, ignore it, etc etc etc... There are as many solutions to this problem as there are ways to bully someone.
Watch any litter of puppies, kittens, piglets, dolphins, or whatever. It isn't human nature, it is NATURE, that compels this behavior.
It is also a crucially important lesson to learn: how to get an annoyance / threat / thief to stop taking advantage of you, hurting you, or otherwise making you miserable. If you are prevented from ever learning any of these methods, then you'll be at the mercy of anyone who wants to make you miserable or poorer, for the rest of your life. Those who seek to stop bullying are simply getting into the business of changing human nature (which NEVER goes well), and can do nothing but prevent important life lessons from occurring.
(Yes, SOME bullying goes waaaay too far... usually because the victim never engages or figures out a way to confront it... and those who do so should be punished appropriately. However, the vast, vast, majority of what is being addressed by these idiotic schemes should never come under government scrutiny or control. If we take away this life lesson, then our future generations will simply be far MORE susceptible to those who do not receive Dear Leader's Wise and Just Non-Bullying Education.)
***The other 10% is a coalition of fat kids, gingers, and stutterers. ****
Back in my day being in the popular and accepted class meant you would not be bullied. Those who were bullied were
too rich
too poor
new kids
no kin in the class
weak kids
religious kids
sissies
mama’s boys
non athletes
normal kids not allowed to fight back.
Fathers a public drunk. (Bullies’ parents hid their drinking)
I’ve been to some schools in which the most of the entire class was kin to everyone else in the class, and the outsider kids caught hell from everyone.
The bullies were usually kids who were big, athletes or not athletes, who just loved to beat up on others because they could get away with it. You didn’t tell because you would then be considered by all to be a “snitch”.
Another kind of bullying was when everyone just shunned you because you were too poor or an outsider.
Even teachers could be a bully. When a teacher left the room she would call on the most unpopular kid to take names of people talking while she was gone. The kid was unpopular so if everyone hated him for taking names it was OK.
Now, most anti-bullying laws are aimed to protect homo kids. We never had that as back then most kids had no idea what a homo was. They were just “sissies”.
I know some people who have said they will never attend a school reunion because of bullying by the entire class even though they live just a few miles from the school.
“I know some people who have said they will never attend a school reunion because of bullying by the entire class even though they live just a few miles from the school.”
I felt that way too for many years. A few years ago, after listening to a few classmates who (much to my surprise) reached out to me on FB, I went to my 20th anniversary reunion.
Listening to how a few of my former tormentors had crashed and burned, gone through personal hell, or just been non-starters in life was actually very satisfying. I feel a lot better now for it.
That these kids are so pampered is probably exactly WHY the are going “gay.”
I agree. I'd go so far as to ditch the teaching of modern foreign languages and teach the little beggars Greek and Latin so they could read that literature in its original form.
Much more valuable than learning how to ask where the bathroom is for that trip to Paris that never materializes.
Documented evidence.
Not. I documented everything (3.5MB) and went all the way up to the corporate VP for HR. He told me I was a "whining malcontent" and to get back to work.
>It is also a crucially important lesson to learn: how to get an annoyance / threat / thief to stop taking advantage of you, hurting you, or otherwise making you miserable. If you are prevented from ever learning any of these methods, then you’ll be at the mercy of anyone who wants to make you miserable or poorer, for the rest of your life. Those who seek to stop bullying are simply getting into the business of changing human nature (which NEVER goes well), and can do nothing but prevent important life lessons from occurring.<
Consider that ignoring the predators teaches them to go through life repeating what works. Perhaps this hands off reaction by adults in power is what perpetuates anti-social activity in the workplace and in society? Intervention will not stop a budding sociopath, but it will make some youngsters sit up and take notice. If anti-social behavior is pre-determined, how does at least a segment of the human race ever learn civil behavior? God gave us brains and the ability to fight against the worst of human nature.
Perhaps one direction in which to turn, is looking for youngsters who are not able to develop coping skills on their own. These are the kids who eventually escape through suicide. Society won’t be able to save all of them, but just perhaps some sort of intervention could save at least a percentage.
Had a similar thing happen.
On my five year class reunion, I had a guy come up to me in tears, drunk. He apologized for be an ass, and said there wasn’t a week that went by without him regretting it.
I hadn’t thought of him in years before that.
You stopped at VP?
And THEN turn it around so the PERP now feels the pain!
Having experience in both, my opinion is shaped also by my experience living in foreign countries.
Any foreign language is good, and very early exposure (at toddler age when they are learning language) is important.
Then learning any language later on is easier.
Reading in native language is interesting.
We use Fitzgerald’s and also Fagles. With Fagles you can get the audio of The Iliad and The Odyssey and listen and read. It’s actually great. Ian McClellon (sp?) and that wonderful Derek Jacobi, respectively, no opposite.
It’s so great for knowing good behavior v bad, regarding the discussion, here.
Yes. Don't misunderstand.
I just think it's unrealistic [if not downright impossible] to teach a child to converse competently in a foreign language all the while immersed in American culture. Much better, perhaps, to teach the grammar, syntax, and spelling such that the child could read the literature [and then make him read the literature].
There, he might learn something of value.
This is one of my favorite passages from Albert Jay Nock's "The Theory of Education in the United States".
"I was lately shown a dormitory in an undergraduate college, and was told that people spoke only French in that house, no other language being permitted. This did not interest me. I asked what they said when they spoke french, this being the only thing that counts, for one may chatter nonsense and inanities in French as weall as in any other language, I suppose."
Teaching children to read Greek and Latin with no pretense of spoken fluency would be good mental discipline and open them to the foundation of Western Civilization. The Social Studies approach to teaching foreign languages holds no value to me.
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