Rack School II - spanking the monkey
School orders mom to spank son--or else
Once again I find myself beset on all sides by knee-jerk reactions. Maybe it's me. Maybe I'm supposed to slam the other guy every chance I get, regardless of rational thought or common sense.
It's all because of the mom who wouldn't spank her 6-year-old at the request of the administrators at his private school, resulting in his suspension.
From the right, it's "spare the rod, spoil the child" and "panty-waist liberals are ruining society by coddling the criminal element".
From the left, it's "what's with fundamentalists and spanking?" and "projecting repression onto your kids".
But I see a deeper issue here. What I see is a mother who professes to believe in raising her child in the way she sees fit, yet she enrolls him in a private school and signs a legally binding document saying that she will conform to their way of controlling the child.
This is the result of society's paradigm that in order for your child to succeed in life, you have to get them into the best Kindergarten so that they can get into Harvard or Yale. After all, an ivy league grad, regardless of his intellegence or academic proficiency, will get far in life. Case in point: our current President.
But what makes me think that this mom is so shallow as to subscribe to this dogma? Well, not to stereotype or anything, but she hyphenates her last name, and named her son Chandler. Any other questions?
And sure, the school's assistant administrator is small-minded, but you have that in public schools as well. I don't think anyone can say they've gone throught their entire academic career without crossing paths with many of these kind of people. Academia is not immune to idiots,and sometimes it seems like it attracts them.
As to Chandler's behavior - he's performing above his grade level (which typically results in boredom in class) and his Mom just went through a divorce. And his many transgressions can all be described as drawing attention to himself. Suprise, suprise!
So, yes, we can blame this one on overindulgence. But not on the kid. Overindulgence of the culture that produced these symptoms in the kid and the school. Until we change the culture, we'll continue to see this kind of injustice done to those who are supposed to be our future leaders. And we'll continue to see our future leaders reflect this injustice through self-overindulgence and injustice of their own. Case in point: our current President.
Once again I find myself beset on all sides by knee-jerk reactions. Maybe it's me. Maybe I'm supposed to slam the other guy every chance I get, regardless of rational thought or common sense.
It's all because of the mom who wouldn't spank her 6-year-old at the request of the administrators at his private school, resulting in his suspension.
From the right, it's "spare the rod, spoil the child" and "panty-waist liberals are ruining society by coddling the criminal element".
From the left, it's "what's with fundamentalists and spanking?" and "projecting repression onto your kids".
But I see a deeper issue here. What I see is a mother who professes to believe in raising her child in the way she sees fit, yet she enrolls him in a private school and signs a legally binding document saying that she will conform to their way of controlling the child.
This is the result of society's paradigm that in order for your child to succeed in life, you have to get them into the best Kindergarten so that they can get into Harvard or Yale. After all, an ivy league grad, regardless of his intellegence or academic proficiency, will get far in life. Case in point: our current President.
But what makes me think that this mom is so shallow as to subscribe to this dogma? Well, not to stereotype or anything, but she hyphenates her last name, and named her son Chandler. Any other questions?
And sure, the school's assistant administrator is small-minded, but you have that in public schools as well. I don't think anyone can say they've gone throught their entire academic career without crossing paths with many of these kind of people. Academia is not immune to idiots,and sometimes it seems like it attracts them.
As to Chandler's behavior - he's performing above his grade level (which typically results in boredom in class) and his Mom just went through a divorce. And his many transgressions can all be described as drawing attention to himself. Suprise, suprise!
So, yes, we can blame this one on overindulgence. But not on the kid. Overindulgence of the culture that produced these symptoms in the kid and the school. Until we change the culture, we'll continue to see this kind of injustice done to those who are supposed to be our future leaders. And we'll continue to see our future leaders reflect this injustice through self-overindulgence and injustice of their own. Case in point: our current President.
posted by Wyld Card at
12:40 AM
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