We Are Just Trying to Protect Our Own
At least three times in the past week, I’ve heard some variant of this statement:
I’ve noticed that those who are community-spirited and positive about life have become even more so, reaching out to organize helping systems and cheer people up—and those who are naturally whiny, critical and self-involved have now gone into overdrive.
I’ve noticed that those who are community-spirited and positive about life have become even more so, reaching out to organize helping systems and cheer people up—and those who are naturally whiny, critical and self-involved have now gone into overdrive.
It’s mostly true. Crisis brings out not just true strength of character, but leadership. Crisis also alerts you to who you wouldn’t want to be stuck with in, say, a bomb shelter.
Crisis has also laid bare the vast and growing distance between those whose primary goals center around more for me and mine—and those who mind the community.
If you’re an educator, you’re familiar with that gap. Maybe you work in a stressed school where lack of qualified staff, supplies and leadership is an ongoing predicament, while well-outfitted schools 25 miles down the road are passing out Chromebooks like peppermints to kids already connected at home. Or maybe your work life is a series of conversations with parents who want special treatment—for their child only.
One education professor I know calls this belief—that some kids are inherently more worthy of educational perks than others— ‘deservingness.’ There are other words: Privilege. Entitlement.
Since the founding of the nation, we have wrestled with the tension between mythic CONTINUE READING: We Are Just Trying to Protect Our Own | Teacher in a strange land