YE GAY OL’E VALLEY: Let the Kids Do What They Want?

By: Dani Langevin – March,  2022

Last month someone wrote an editorial about public schools interfering in the socialization of students.

I’m having a hard time understanding what this person is talking about and the point of their whining. The writer asked the question, “Why can’t our school leaders just back off and let kids do what they want to do?” (On Valentine’s Day)

Am I the only one saying, “Because they WILL do whatever they want to do,”? Is the writer that deficient of common sense that they really don’t see what would happen if we let kids do what they want? Remember Kyle Rittenhouse? He did what he wanted.
(Editor’s Note: Kyle Rittenhouse defended himself against a criminal mob and was found not guilty on all charges in a court of law).

DONATE TO THE VALLEY PATRIOT’S
SCHOLARSHIP DRIVE

Another statement made was, “Inclusion and other highly political views have no place in public schools.” Yup, that’s right. So, all of you parents who have a child with medical, emotional, learning, or any other disorders, your children are not welcome.

Why should we force anyone’s child to deal with another child’s learning issues? What about when they are from another culture? Apparently, we should not tolerate or accept their experiences or traditions. Should they be excluded because they don’t think, dream or worship like YOU think they should?

The term “highly subjective political views” is highly subjective. What does that mean? Does it mean we can teach about slavery only from the side of the slave owner and not the enslaved? That’s what it sounds like to me. Do you still want to teach that the enslaved were happy to be where they were and without their white owners they wouldn’t survive? Is that not highly subjective? Or better yet, that the enslaved “immigrated” here as some textbooks states completely ignoring the human trafficking the US participated in for three centuries.

That beautifully ugly term “Indoctrinate” was thrown in for good measure. This is the vocabulary flavor of the month. This is what people use to scare parents into thinking we, as educators, have some nefarious reason to do what we do, and we have some sort of superhuman power to change the thought process of your children. If teachers could indoctrinate, as I believe you understand the word, we’d control the world. Teachers didn’t write the history, science, literature, or math equations. We teach them. Stop shooting the messenger.

The fact that this editorial is about Valentine’s Day makes it laughable. Valentine’s Day is not even a holiday. But it’s “a day for ROMANCE,” says the author of the editorial. Romance in elementary school? How would you feel if the teacher brought up the subject of romance in their elementary school classroom? I’m sure parents would not be happy. Yet here it is being offered by an adult to children. And if you want to go with the romance theme, what if a little girl gave a little girl a card or a little boy gave another little boy a card? Is that type of romance prohibited or accepted?

And what about the abuse thrown at educators: “Public school teachers and administrators can barely educate kids in the subjects they need…” Isn’t that nice. Let’s give licenses to more people to bash teachers. I particularly loved the commentary from a Methuen mother who obviously hates the system and yet put all of her children through it.

What does that make her? What colorful language do you use for a mother who sent all of her children to an institution for 12 years that she truly believes was damaging them? What mother would do that? If she really hated it that much, why would she send them? I question her as a parent.

Did the Methuen school committee actually say, “…public educators just can’t help but involve themselves in the way children socially interact,”? If not, shame on you for saying that.

You say out of one side of your mouth that we shouldn’t be interacting with their socialization and out of the other side you are doing that exact same thing: getting involved in what kids can and can’t participate in in school. Do you not see that?

VALENTINES DAY! This is what you are screaming about. A day created by card companies to take your money. A day to remind you that you don’t treat your loved one the way you should every day.

Yeah, that’s worth space in a newspaper and it’s certainly worth connecting it to the education of our youth. The ignorance of the general public when it comes to education is limitless. Perhaps the writer was right, we haven’t been teaching them in the subjects they need: respect and humility. ◊