(Non)Education in America
May 11, 2010
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Posted by Michael S. Langston
The high school, which erupted over hurt feelings when some wore flag shirts to school on Cinco De Mayo, and then erupted further when an incompetent management structure got involved has apologized.
The statement given ignores any of the real issues. Like all political statements, they even pretend something is true that they know isn’t. Their school & their decisions, are anti-free speech and to pretend otherwise should be seen as the absurdity it is. He then talks about being “proud” of the students for handling the media coverage…
You mean the ones’ who protested, to get media coverage?
…On Thursday, May 6, about 50 students, many carrying the Mexican flag, walked out of classes. The students told reporters that they thought it was disrespectful for the students to wear the American flag on their shirts while others were celebrating Cinco de Mayo….
First, what the hell were they protesting? Maybe it’s just me, but if Joe Friday sticks by the facts it seems it went like this:
- Some students wore American flag t-shirts on a Mexican holiday.
- Some fragile students complained that they were “hurt” by this.
- Incompetent management then forces the students to change or go home.
For all intents and purposes, it seems the idiots protesting won the fight.
But yesterday, according to the statement…. “they (the students) wore purple and white for solidarity”…. so all is well I suppose.
Meanwhile, you still have children who were “taught” in this “teachable” moment that they should never, ever have to be disrespected. I’m unsure where this belief about respect has come, but I believe it’s a dangerous and intolerant belief. I seem to recall when respect was earned, not deserved, but I digress.
It seems logically obvious that true freedom is to allow things you won’t/don’t like. Allowing freedom actually means (please read carefully you spoiled little brats) people are going to do things you don’t really like and there’s absolutely nothing you can or should do about it.
Additionally, on the plethora of things you should be grown up enough to deal with in a free society, speech by way of t-shirts is the least intrusive and offensive thing I can think of. Seriously, I have what some would call a pretty dark sense of humor, and the things I can think to wear if I were to purposefully wanted to disrupt Cinco De Mayo…. well, let’s just say while it make me laugh, my imagination can lead me to t-shirts which might actually be cause for a protest (assuming the school allowed it).
In a free country, not only do we not allow the cops to arrest people simply for demonstrating their beliefs, but we also respect freedom in general. For instance, when some comedian or cartoonist creates something satirical, yet disparaging to the Catholic Church, no one demands protests, no one demands censorship, and no one ever demands death.
Sure, people rightfully offended might debate about it, write about it, might boycott products, but they don’t close schools to protest over being disrespected. They prefer to get their respect through their actions towards helping others, not through mob scenes.
What’s also buried in here, is that no one (especially the “Mexican” students) seems to understand the holiday has nothing to do with Mexican independence and its history is actually a shared American/Mexican holiday for a Mexican victory of one battle over the French. It was a hard fought victory for 4000 barely-trained Mexicans over 8000 well-trained and well-equipped French. So the holiday was never meant to be “celebrated” exactly, as it was meant to be more like a D-Day remembrance. (Mexican Independence day is the 16th of September)
Indeed, to be really offensive students could’ve chosen to have worn French flag t-shirts, not American flag t-shirts.
Back to the history: It was used in early American history, mid-1800s, by Mexicans & Americans in California to tick off the French. Now, I’m all for doing anything that irritates the French, but that obviously died out over time. The holiday, then became almost nonexistent.
However, with money to made…. over the past 30 years or so, corporations & a willing populace have changed everything. The remembrance, which should come from such a bloody, yet surprising victory, was turned into a holiday to sell more Mexican food, beer, and flags; just like St. Patrick’s day might have one time had something to do with St. Patrick, but now serves only as a reason to drink green beer and buy “Kiss me I’m Irish” stuff.
My point: that looking at this from each angle seems to show the American public should be angry at one thing only. How high school kids, in a well-funded school system, in one of the richest states in one of the richest countries in the world are so… frustratingly ignorant of their ancestral history and know nothing about even about the basic idea of freedom itself.
Categories: Critical Thinking, Culture, Education
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Tags: Education, Freedom, History, idiocy, Protests, Public Schools
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