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Diversity/tolerance classes

Travis

Misanthrope of the Mountains
Travis
Joined
Mar 31, 2007
Messages
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At the local high school some of the kids have decided it is "cool" to spray paint swastikas on the pavement. This has unsettled some of the kids and upset some of the parents. So this all goes up before the school board who now want to force the students into more "diversity/tolerance" classes.

Now.......maybe I'm cynical but I'm thinking that if a kid actually holds abjectly racist viewpoints (which might not even be the case here as kids are known to do stupid things like painting swastikas just for kicks) I don't think making them watch a video on a rainbow of people standing on a grassy hill holding hands and singing will do any good.

Well, that was how the videos went back when I was in school. Today they probably have a bitching synth/pop soundtrack.

Is there any hard data on this stuff? I just can't see a kid raised in a house where it is commonly accepted knowledge that the Jews control everything deciding dad is wrong because of a class at school.
 
Sounds to me like those kids have already won. "Yay, we've made people react to our stupidity!"
 
This is an OUTRAGE!!! What's next? FEMA death camps with cattle cars lined up next to them?

</nutter mode>

In all seriousness though I do agree that those classes will do little, if anything, to keep kids from doing dumb stuff like this for attention. It may however give some other kids ideas on how they can get attention. Even back in my day where they showed very graphic films during drivers ed with names like "Blood on the Highway" and 'Jack and Mary plummet off of a cliff while drinking and driving at makeout point" they were mocked at the end of classes. Some things cannot be taught with just a film and a stern lecture/warning of what not to do.
 
It's almost certainly just to placate the parents.

The kids almost certainly did it for attention/outrage, not to try to send any sort of articulate message. As long as the kids are educated as to why the symbol is seen as hateful, the school has done its job.
 
Of course, it will depend on how the class is run, but I learned quite a lot in the diversity class I went to. It wasn't really about reforming skin heads, but more like getting rid of basic ignorance. Lots of sharing experience (and pet peeves).

I guess it would only work with a diverse group. My high school was 95% White, and there were quite a few swastikas and racist comments I heard. But I'm sure there could have been gender talk.

But, of course, for most of us the swastika didn't mean we hated jews :p .
 
AvalonXQ said:
It's almost certainly just to placate the parents.

The kids almost certainly did it for attention/outrage, not to try to send any sort of articulate message. As long as the kids are educated as to why the symbol is seen as hateful, the school has done its job.
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Highly unlikely that these things are done because no one ever told them why it was wrong.

If they didn't already know why it would provoke sufficient outrage, they probably wouldn't have chosen a swastika.
 
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It isn't to teach them a lesson or to placate the parents. It's a full on CYA to make sure the school cannot be held liable for anti semitic acts.

Here's an example. My sons school sent me a note the other day. Turns out the senior class planned a field trip of their own with a bunch of kids sneaking out of town to Atlantic City or something.

Now this has been in the works for months. The only reason the school notified us is so that we could not hold them liable. They made sure they emphasized this in the letter.

They could care less.
 
Wow, what's the ethnic/racial/religious makeup of that school?

I don't think it will do much to change the mind of a young skinhead/neonazi, but it may make other kids take a harder look at their own attitudes.
 
The other thing here is that as long as you keep making a huge deal out of painted swastikas they will keep doing it. They find that button that makes you jump and they just keep hitting it.
 
Travis said:
The other thing here is that as long as you keep making a huge deal out of painted swastikas they will keep doing it. They find that button that makes you jump and they just keep hitting it.
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Agreed. I don't know why we give idiots that kind of power. Kind of reminds me of the Koran burning guy.
 
joesixpack said:
Wow, what's the ethnic/racial/religious makeup of that school?

I don't think it will do much to change the mind of a young skinhead/neonazi, but it may make other kids take a harder look at their own attitudes.
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The probably aren't even skin heads. Some people just want a reaction.
 
Caper said:
The probably aren't even skin heads. Some people just want a reaction.
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Pretty much. Think about when you were a kid and what you and your classmates level of interest/knowledge was regarding politics and such. They don't tend to pick up on nuances but they can pick up on the buzzwords and symbols without understanding what they really mean.

"Swastika = Bad guys who are really disliked by just about everyone. Lets draw one and see what happens... Stuff happens... Hey look, it got some attention!"

Such is the mentality of a lot of teenagers.
 
Diversity/tolerance classes

Waste of time on the people who don't need them, wasted time and effort re: the people who do. Exist mostly to help hippieish feel they are doing something to bring people together and bureaucracies to know they LOOK LIKE they care and are doing something about a problem.
 
fuelair said:
Diversity/tolerance classes

Waste of time on the people who don't need them, wasted time and effort re: the people who do. Exist mostly to help hippieish feel they are doing something to bring people together and bureaucracies to know they LOOK LIKE they care and are doing something about a problem.
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Actually parents have a lot of say in the school, dirty hippies or not, and I have no doubt that most of the administrators there do actually care about this.

It's very likely that most (if not all) of the parents from that school were horrified by this act and have every desire to do something about it (your assumptions about it's effectiveness notwithstanding). The best they can come up with is diversity training. Maybe there's a more effective response but so far no one's floating it. I can't fault them for making an effort.
 
I'm reminded of this comic:
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A bit of explanation here.
 
Diversity classes? People point out the obvious lack of forethought which goes into vandalizing things to get a rise out of others.

No diversity classes? Moral outrage at school's lack of appropriate response to kids with no perspective on racial prejudice.

Seems like a win-win situation. For social trolls at least.
 
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I think the answer is to catch the people in the act. It may not be the students. The school should know when it is happening. Have someone wait for them to do it, then maybe spray them with paint balls.

Or send all parents a note "Do you know where your children are? Something happened between these times. Were your children at home?"
 
truethat said:
It isn't to teach them a lesson or to placate the parents. It's a full on CYA to make sure the school cannot be held liable for anti semitic acts.

Here's an example. My sons school sent me a note the other day. Turns out the senior class planned a field trip of their own with a bunch of kids sneaking out of town to Atlantic City or something.

Now this has been in the works for months. The only reason the school notified us is so that we could not hold them liable. They made sure they emphasized this in the letter.

They could care less.
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I would have to disagree. Their is certainly an element of CYA, but I am willing to bet the administration does care. I have worked with over a dozen school administrators in my career, I have never meet one that would not be truly upset and concerned if such a incident occurred at their school/district.

Besides, do you actually blame the district for covering themselves in this litigious society? I do not.

Without knowing what students actually committed this crime, there is very little the district can reasonably do besides diversity classes. If the students who did it were caught, my guess is they would be expelled. However, I do not know enough of the details to say for sure.
 
Does anyone have any ideas on a more effective reaction?

I mean aside from just ignoring it in case it is just attention seeking behavior.
 
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