SCHOOL DAZE

“Manasseh was twelve years old when he began to reign...And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord...” (from 2 Kings 21:1-2)

On Tuesday morning, “Mr. Speaker” (Tom Finneran) was talking about the violence (and really the whole “kids gone wild” stuff) that’s happening with American teenagers...in many cases at the middle school level.  I am among the many people who have been shocked by last week’s video of the girls in Florida who pummeled a 16-year-old classmate just for the sake of doing that and then putting it on the internet.  On Monday night of this week, Boston’s Fox channel 25 broke the story (complete with cell phone video) of a group of teenage thugs viciously beating two teenage boys with a pipe.

There were certainly bullies, “incidents” and problems when I was in school, but I can’t remember anything nearly as bad as those events.  Today, the bullies and their “associates” are essentially “running the asylum”, or so it seems.  I will have to conceal a bunch of information for this next story, but I heard of something that happened at a local high school recently in which a male kid was incredibly disrespectful to a male substitute teacher.  The teacher repeatedly attempted to get  control of the situation and to get a semblance of respect from the kid, which did not happen.  The teacher made the mistake of grabbing the kid’s arm for a split second, and a huge “situation” was tripped off.  Fortunately for that teacher, the administration was supportive, teenage witnesses sided with the teacher, the perpetrator admitted to being wrong, and the whole thing ended up being dropped.  But it COULD have been a big problem - for the teacher!  How stupid it is to blame the TEACHER!

I know this will make me sound like I am 85-years-old, but when I was in junior high school in Canton, Massachusetts in the 1960s several male teachers thought nothing of using corporal punishment on boys.  I received some of the corporal punishment, myself, but many of my peers received FAR more than I did.  Mr. “L” our shop teacher used to call us up to the front of the room, have us bend over and touch our toes and then give us a big whack on the rear end with a formidable wooden stick.  Mr. “G”, a social studies teacher, had a spanking stick called “Little Citrus” which he used regularly.  Did we all run home and tell our parents?  No, because we were of the generation from which telling our parents we had gotten spanked at school would have necessitated another spanking at home!  Teachers were respected...even feared somewhat...and that wasn’t a bad thing!

Many of you know that my wife works at Marian High School.  For the past few years, her job has been strictly to work in the office as Administrative Assistant, but before that, she was a substitute teacher.  In late 2003, our church was in the process of taking out a new mortgage with a different financial agency.  Mary Ann is the Treasurer, and she and I had to go over some important paperwork which just could not wait.  She was supervising a study hall at the Marian High School library and I was asking her questions and filling out the paperwork.   A kid in that library was being such a jerk and giving her such lip it was unbelievable.  It was evident this was a rich kid who has always had his own way and virtually never been told “no”.  He had no respect for authority.  I turned to him. and sternly and definitively said, “Look, she told you ‘no’, it’s NO!  Now you’re going to sit at that desk and your going to do your homework and I don’t want to hear one more word out of you!”

The kid backed off.

I thank God he did.

What would have happened if the kid had not backed off?

I will have to let you use your imagination.

What I’ve written here is the biggest reason why I’m NOT a liberal.  Typically, Liberals oppose all violence.  Liberals believe violence begets violence.  Liberals like to be passive and gracious and quiet and sweet.  Liberals get pushed around.  Liberals would say, “If you have corporal punishment in schools it makes kids more violent."  In fact, that was not the case years ago.  Today, teachers hands are tied.  They have no power or authority or “nothin’”.  They are supposed to take whatever is dished out to them by disrespectful kids and their even more disrespectful “hovering parents”.  

We have bullies and punks running wild with no respect for anyone.  We have bullies and punks running wild with no regard for anyone’s safety.   Again, a great case in point is the beating outside of the school in Holden on Monday.  

There is a tremendous lack of respect for authority in our society, and I for one very much do not like the way things have become.

Incidentally, for those of you who wonder how a minister can express the kind of thoughts that I’ve expressed on this posting...keep in mind that Jesus Christ (see John chapter 2 among other places) MADE a whip, overturned the tables of the merchants and moneychangers in the temple and VIOLENTLY AND WITH AUTHORITY drove them out!