Category Archives: bullying

The Bullying Society

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Diane Ravitch has this up.

As I said in my comment there, bullying from children is just a reflection of the adults and culture around them.  We have shows like “Survivor” that encourage groups to pick apart others and zero in on a target.  My Boomer generation didn’t have violent video games which desensitizes one to violence.

I think these all feed into the bullying mentality. Pick on those that are different or weaker. Keep at it until they disappear–either through suicide or crushing their soul until their light goes out…the effect is still the same.

It has even broader implications than “just” bullying–creativity comes from thinking differently.  Bullying will crush the ones that think differently, limiting the greater impact they might have had on the world.

I don’t think the solutions are campaigns telling kids to stop bullying.  It’s too complicated a problem.  And it’s not the kids fault as much as it is society’s.

A post script

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A post script to this blog…what I meant when I referred to Katrina is that I told them I thought the George W. Bush administrations’ slow response to the emergency was racist.  It was September, 2005, so it was only a month after the storm hit, but it was apparent to me.  What really shocked me was how only the one black woman agreed with me, again, subtly, but she saw it, too.    This why I probably began to think that Daniels was dismantling or weakening the Civil Rights Commission and blurted that out.

When I think about that interview and how I missed such a fabulous opportunity–a  life changer- because it would have been a career I would have enjoyed with its daily change, using the creative along with the analytical, and fighting for the underdog—and all the misery that mercury has caused me, I want to cry in despair.   This poison has taken so much more than can be neasured…

I give myself 24 hours to feel sorry for myself, and then move on…

Bill Gates hasn’t destroyed public education yet….

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…but damn,he sure is trying with everything he’s got.

<sigh>  I was all ready to rip into Gates once again… but I’m halfway through the article of Chronicles of Higher Education….and this one sentence that Gates “just wants to get more people through the system with college degrees so that it will lift them out of poverty…”

bwahahahaha.  That’s rich.

Then, further down, they disclose that Gates Foundation is supporting the Chronicles of Higher Education financially.  I think I’ve already read that somewhere, but alas, the brain didn’t bring it up…the article is clearly a promo by Gates…so yeah….

So…I’ll have to refer to previous blogs on Gates…

Here.

Here. Silencing teachers.

Here. Supporting Brookings Institute that dismissed Diane Ravitch

Here. Not content with just controlling education, but the food supply, as well.

Here.

Israel launched Air Strike Against Syria

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You know, I have been wondering about all the important news out there that has been happening while they’ve been broadcasting the Zimmerman trial nonstop….

It’s not that I don’t think it is important–it is….but it does not need 16 hour coverage five days a week!

And I think the minute Zimmerman grabbed his gun and uttered the words “I’m sick of these punks getting away…” he met the legal standard of manslaughter, perhaps even murder.  I hedge on that because murder is premeditation–you decided you were going to kill your spouse when you found out they were cheating on  you.  This, on the other hand, sounds more like manslaughter–you weren’t intending on killing someone, but nevertheless, you did.

Self-defense is the only reason for someone to be set free.  I don’t believe in my heart that Zimmerman feared for his life.  Again, the words “I’m sick of these punks getting away” is an aggressive stance, not one of fear.

So…what’s been happening?  This, for one.  Happened a week ago!

More on the abortion debate in Texas.  I agree with limiting it to 20 weeks, even twelve weeks, but the rest is draconian and meant to interfere with a woman’s right to an abortion in that time frame.

Good for you, Suri

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Suri Cruise gave the stalkerazzi a piece of her mind.  Good for you, Suri.  And good for your mother raising you to believe in yourself and your right to privacy.

…and don’t mind the “bitch” word–you’ll hear that word when you stand up for yourself, as you have now experienced.  Embrace the word–it becomes a word of power once you realize it means you aren’t a doormat and you have set your boundaries.  Bravo.

And the Kardashians? Meh.  You can’t have a TV show exposing your every move and then claim you want privacy.  It messes with the  mind.

 

Obama and the Education Fiasco?

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One of the commenters on Diane Ravitch’s site has this link up .  An excellent timeline on what has been going on behind the scenes with *cough* education reform.

I really, really, hope that Barack Obama has changed his mind regarding this–as Diane Ravitch did when she came to realize that education reform was actually turning schools into for-profit centers.

From the link:

“When teachers are given powerful opportunities for career advancement, ongoing professional growth and recognition for outstanding achievement, we see increased student achievement in TAP schools,” Lowell Milken said in a December 2008 press release. “Chicago TAP schools are off to a strong start in continuing efforts to achieve these goals.”

Milken, unmentioned in most accounts, has a vested financial interest in school reform efforts and “fixing failing schools.”

That’s because Milken is a major investor in K12 Inc., a corporation traded on Wall Street that sells online schooling and curriculum to state and local governments. Milken invested $10 million in K12 Inc. in 2000, a stake that is now worth over $125 million, according to a July 2008 article in Forbes.

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Milken is full of it, to put it bluntly.  Nobody who knows anything about teachers and education would ever make such an idiotic statement.  Most teachers are in the profession because they want to see children learn, NOT because they want “career advancement”.  Their professional growth comes with experience….there is no substitute for that and no amount of money can magically *poof* experience.

Truly, to say that a student’s achievement is the teacher’s achievement is, in my view, taking away from the student’s hard work.  A good teacher is only part of the student-parent-teacher equation.  ALL of them play an important role in how well the student does.

When I first went to college, I wanted to be a teacher.  When I discussed this with my college advisor, she discouraged me from going that route–she said the jobs wouldn’t be there.  I wonder what she knew and when she knew it??  Anyway, I decided to go into Communications so that I could make documentaries and still somewhat “teach”.

However, when I was on what was supposed to be a progressive jobs website, there was Teach for America.  I applied, writing in my application how I had helped my daughter overcome dyslexia and learn to read.  I wanted to teach in inner city schools, I told them, so I could help the little ones with such learning hurdles.

I was turned down flat.  Not even an interview.

Knowing what I know now, it is obvious they were never interested in educating kids.  They didn’t want folks who were passionate and truly wanted to help kids learn.

When you couple this with the military in schools, it’s truly scary, indeed, on what is happening to our schools.  God help us.

Rep. Brown: Shame On You

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Like I posted previously, I’m pretty upset and words fail me, but Rep. Brown speaks for me. 

I think we need to stop spending money on these….useless eaters. (Hillary Clinton and Rush Limbaugh have both reportedly stated such)  ….so I’m trying to find information confirming that Hillary or Bill made the statement, and it’s interesting all the stuff that I came across….one of which is a statement that Cecil Rhodes of the Rhodes scholarship fame, was a racist who called Africans “useless eaters”.  (Interesting that Bill Clinton is a Rhodes Scholar.)

This, for instance.  Well, now.

And then there’s this (2010).  Isn’t it interesting that wherever Clintons go, there is disaster….and they’re always “my bad”   “oops”   “sorry bout that, folks”….and they’re still praised out the wazoo….for doing what, exactly…?  Somebody please tell me.

More on food from Raj Patel here.

Here’s a link Patel mentions in his blog on the hunger summit.

Wow:

So it’s hardly surprising that almost 200 African farmers’ and campaigners’ groups have rejected the G8’s New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition, calling it a “new wave of colonialism” in a statement sent to G8 leaders earlier this week. Their analysis is clear: “Private ownership of knowledge and material resources (for example, seed and genetic materials) means the flow of royalties out of Africa into the hands of multinational corporations.”

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The real causes of hunger are inequality of wealth and power, not a lack of big business.

 

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Word.

We don’t want your GMO’s.  We don’t want your money.  We want decent, livable wages to pay our own way.

 

 

Walmart: Always low wages…Always

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…was on a sign protesting their continued more-for-us-less-for-you campaign.  Thankfully, they were unsuccessful in their bullying tactics.

From the first link:

“From day one, we have said this legislation is arbitrary, discriminatory, and discourages investment in D.C.,” Alex Barron, a general manager for Wal-Mart whose region includes D.C., writes in a company statement. “It means most shopping dollars will stay in the suburbs, unemployment will remain in the double-digits in some neighborhoods and underserved communities will continue to have disproportionate access to affordable groceries.”

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I followed the last link to this:

The company’s hardball tactics come out of a well-worn playbook that involves successfully using Wal-Mart’s leverage in the form of jobs and low-priced goods to fend off legislation and regulation that could cut into its profits and set precedent in other potential markets. In the Wilson Building, elected officials have found their reliable liberal, pro-union political sentiments in conflict with their desire to bring amenities to underserved neighborhoods.

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I just can’t understand the thinking that losing Wal-Mart is a bad thing?  Good Riddance to a big box store that pays poor wages, encourages employees to apply for food stamps, guts entire towns that were once full of independent small business owners, and imports cheap plastic crap from China, where again, people are paid low wages (which I know are beginning to rise, but still…).

 

No More State Secrets

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Judge Jeffrey White  is allowing the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) to move forward.   Don’t fly in any small air craft, judge.  Or drive a car...

From the EFF website:

“The court rightly found that the traditional legal system can determine the legality of the mass, dragnet surveillance of innocent Americans and rejected the government’s invocation of the state secrets privilege to have the case dismissed,” said Cindy Cohn, EFF’s Legal Director. “Over the last month, we came face-to-face with new details of mass, untargeted collection of phone and Internet records, substantially confirmed by the Director of National Intelligence. Today’s decision sets the stage for finally getting a ruling that can stop the dragnet surveillance and restore Americans’ constitutional rights.”