Things the kids say in class
An interesting thing about coming into random classes around the community is hearing how young people think and feel. For reasons that are hard to understand, many kids are unaware that their voices carry beyond the ear of the person to whom they are speaking. Time and again I will hear someone who has been speaking in a raised voice say, “I wasn’t even talking to you.” when I correct inappropriate language, or comment on the topic of conversation. Some of them are in their own little world, which is OK by me, and while most of it has no interest to me what so ever, the other day I over heard something that I find disturbing.
In an advanced English class, at the high school level, a young fellow was engaged in idol conversation rather than bother himself with a rather simple writing assignment. Even though there was no real attempt to keep their voices down and I was sitting on a stool hardly three feet from him and his friends, I had not been following the complete context of what they were saying. But one statement he made caught my ear. He allowed as how he didn’t need most of the rights he had been “given” in this country. A statement like that is chilling coming from anyone, but add the fact that he was sitting in class in his R.O.T.C. military uniform, I felt a mixture of shock and sadness.
Wouldn’t an R.O.T.C. program be expected to teach that the reason the military exists is to protect the rights of the citizens? Why was this boy in the upper levels of this program and still under the dangerous delusion that someone had “given” the citizens rights? How could he not have been taught that our rights as citizens are things we posses that the governmental and military powers are forbidden to take away? Other questions came to mind as well, like how did kids who would blow off a simple writing assignment, and sit visiting all period get into an advanced level class in the first place? But that one falls into the general category of the average students rule that a sub teacher day is a free period, and even if some of the more arcane civil rights are unnecessary, the sub teacher rule is inalienable.
Earlier today I read this article in the New York Times about a fellow who was working in Iraq for a private security firm who was arrested and abused by the US military. The one thing that jumped off the page for me was how dangerous it is to have individuals in our society who so willingly participated in detaining and abusing a their fellow citizen. Each one of these military guys, from the lowest ranking guards in the detention center to the top level of command in the unit, all the way to leadership in the Pentagon are members of communities in our country. Clearly they have no regard for constitutional rights or their responsibilities as representatives of the people of our country to uphold certain ideals. Arguably these people represent a very real danger to us, and our kids as long as they live and have the potential to influence public life. This extends far beyond active military careers too. Remember, just like the felon who will be released into the community when the sentence has been served, these members of the military will spend most of their lives as civilians in the community, still with the fundamental belief that our cherished civil rights do not necessarily apply.
So then of course, ones mind swings back to that classroom, on a dark morning deep in December of this year, when a young fellow bedecked in his military uniform declares that he has no need for his civil rights, and by simple extrapolation, he certainly would have no qualms participating in trampling the rights of others. Scary. But then he wasn’t actually talking to me, so how could I have overheard?
Raising ones hands in despair over an incident like this, condemning the R.O.T.C. program, or other aspects of the educational system is an over reaction of course. This young man seemed to be a nice guy, obviously bright despite my frustration that he would not settle into writing a few paragraphs on the assigned topic of the morning. From a couple other things he said, again in private conversation, it was clear that he came to school with a certain world view, and the problem with civil rights was a part of that package, against which thoughtful education has a tough time competing. For the rest of us it is a call to vigilance. There are dangerous elements among us, and they are not all gang-banger with switch blade knives in their back pockets. Many nice folks, with otherwise high moral values, do not understand some of the fundamental values of the American experiment, and it is the duty of our educational system to at least work toward stemming a dangerous trend toward limiting our rights as citizens.
In an advanced English class, at the high school level, a young fellow was engaged in idol conversation rather than bother himself with a rather simple writing assignment. Even though there was no real attempt to keep their voices down and I was sitting on a stool hardly three feet from him and his friends, I had not been following the complete context of what they were saying. But one statement he made caught my ear. He allowed as how he didn’t need most of the rights he had been “given” in this country. A statement like that is chilling coming from anyone, but add the fact that he was sitting in class in his R.O.T.C. military uniform, I felt a mixture of shock and sadness.
Wouldn’t an R.O.T.C. program be expected to teach that the reason the military exists is to protect the rights of the citizens? Why was this boy in the upper levels of this program and still under the dangerous delusion that someone had “given” the citizens rights? How could he not have been taught that our rights as citizens are things we posses that the governmental and military powers are forbidden to take away? Other questions came to mind as well, like how did kids who would blow off a simple writing assignment, and sit visiting all period get into an advanced level class in the first place? But that one falls into the general category of the average students rule that a sub teacher day is a free period, and even if some of the more arcane civil rights are unnecessary, the sub teacher rule is inalienable.
Earlier today I read this article in the New York Times about a fellow who was working in Iraq for a private security firm who was arrested and abused by the US military. The one thing that jumped off the page for me was how dangerous it is to have individuals in our society who so willingly participated in detaining and abusing a their fellow citizen. Each one of these military guys, from the lowest ranking guards in the detention center to the top level of command in the unit, all the way to leadership in the Pentagon are members of communities in our country. Clearly they have no regard for constitutional rights or their responsibilities as representatives of the people of our country to uphold certain ideals. Arguably these people represent a very real danger to us, and our kids as long as they live and have the potential to influence public life. This extends far beyond active military careers too. Remember, just like the felon who will be released into the community when the sentence has been served, these members of the military will spend most of their lives as civilians in the community, still with the fundamental belief that our cherished civil rights do not necessarily apply.
So then of course, ones mind swings back to that classroom, on a dark morning deep in December of this year, when a young fellow bedecked in his military uniform declares that he has no need for his civil rights, and by simple extrapolation, he certainly would have no qualms participating in trampling the rights of others. Scary. But then he wasn’t actually talking to me, so how could I have overheard?
Raising ones hands in despair over an incident like this, condemning the R.O.T.C. program, or other aspects of the educational system is an over reaction of course. This young man seemed to be a nice guy, obviously bright despite my frustration that he would not settle into writing a few paragraphs on the assigned topic of the morning. From a couple other things he said, again in private conversation, it was clear that he came to school with a certain world view, and the problem with civil rights was a part of that package, against which thoughtful education has a tough time competing. For the rest of us it is a call to vigilance. There are dangerous elements among us, and they are not all gang-banger with switch blade knives in their back pockets. Many nice folks, with otherwise high moral values, do not understand some of the fundamental values of the American experiment, and it is the duty of our educational system to at least work toward stemming a dangerous trend toward limiting our rights as citizens.
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