April 26, 2008
National Day of Silence
Yesterday, students across the U.S. and in Rhode Island participated in National Day of Silence, taking an oath of silence for a day or part of a day to bring attention to the harassment of gays and lesbians.
From the Providence Journal:
... at least 29 public and private high schools participated in Rhode Island. This year’s event honored Lawrence King, a 15-year-old California student who was shot and killed in February by a classmate because of King’s sexual orientation.At Feinstein, students and a smattering of teachers wore gray T-shirts that said, “Silence is the most powerful scream” and “58,000 — the number of homophobic slurs you’ll hear by the time you graduate from high school.”
The Day of Silence challenged students to think about their own behavior. When a classmate uses an anti-gay slur, do you speak out and run the risk of being ridiculed or harassed or do you remain silent?
While expressing indifference to orientation and "what people do in the bedroom", WPRO's Matt Allen in his show today questioned whether schools should not be more focused on the three r's. In response, a teacher called in to defend the exercise and point out that participation by students was voluntary.
Let us now separate out the matter of orientation. The issue is not whether gays of all ages should live free of harassment; of course they should. Questions raised pertain rather to the mechanism or authority by which such a day in our secondary public schools was arranged: who decided that, phrasing this as positively as possible, students would be availed of the opportunity to participate in such a day of recognition and also ensured that the student population was made aware of the details of this opportunity? What was the criteria by which the cause to be championed was selected?
These details are important as questions in their own right. But answers to them are requisite also to a compilation of a list of proposed Days of Silence. (Additions to the list are welcome.)
- In tolerance of religion.
- For promotion of the qualities of hard work and responsibility.
- Encouraging respect and recognition of the hard work and sacrifice of men and women in our military.
- For awareness and prevention of teen pregnancy.
- And the corollary to that last: in recognition of the importance of the father in a child's life.
Participation would be voluntary, of course. To whom do we submit our list?
I can think of another: the prevention of school bullying.
But that's considered in some quarters even more dangerously liberal than preventing harassment of gay and lesbian students.
Why is sexual orientation a school subject below the level of high school?This is a symptom of why primary education has regressed.
Posted by: joe bernstein at April 27, 2008 5:38 PMI'm very conservative and I read the site frequently, but you're badly wrong here. At least where I go to school, Day of Silence was a completely student-organized event. The school's Gay Straight Alliance - a group with its share of problems - organized a permission to reduce the disruption to teachers and learning. I can't speak for everyone in every school, but this was an extremely positive experience for me.
In addition, the point of Day of Silence is the number of LGBT individuals who are forced, for various reasons, to keep silent about their sexual preferences. The other ideas are good ones, given that.
Things like this tend to be typical liberal BS. In this case, the normal conservative assumptions are a bit hasty.
Posted by: Michael at April 28, 2008 7:34 PMThank you for the first hand report, Michael.
You stated that this was a student organized event. It would nevertheless have needed the cooperation of the administration and teachers. Going back further, suppose a student had brought this idea forward to a teacher/guidance counselor/principal and, instead of encouragement, the reaction had been silence or a slight frown or a negative reaction, however muted? Would the student have insisted? Would s/he have continued to advocate for the event in the face of continued non-encouraging reaction as s/he worked through the "chain of command" trying to get the event off the ground?
In reality, no event can be completely student driven. I would not term this "typical liberal BS"; certainly this is a worthy cause, as is school bullying, suggested by Rhody. In fact, there are many worthy causes that pertain specifically to student. The point is that only certain ones get acted upon. And the narrowing of that list is not the students' doing.
Posted by: Monique at April 29, 2008 8:26 PMMonique, thanks for replying.
I grant you that this had the cooperation of teachers and administrators, and I agree with you that no event is totally student-driven; I also understand the points made by the questions you raise.
My point in commenting was only to note that, at least where I'm from, this was not some PC-driven, compulsory event attempting to jam left-wing views down the minds of students. It was a voluntary, positive attempt to raise awareness. Like I said, there was no pressure from administration or teachers to participate - or not to be participate. While my teachers accommodated my choice as best they could, there were no disciplinary/grade consequences based on my decision - positive or negative.
Also, the "typical liberal BS" was meant to indicate my usual skepticism at events like this; as you pointed out, there are usually few in support of traditional or identifiably "conservative" values, and these events tend to be rather pointless.
Posted by: Michael at April 29, 2008 9:25 PM