Boughxb Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
no one at the school
> should ever talk to her about her totally whacky
> lifestyle?

Now I understand your position. You think atheism is a wacky lifestyle.

Thank you to everyone else for your constructive responses to my question on how to handle DS's situation at school.

If I'd had such complaints,I would have explained to the culprit that public school is a place for all kinds of people, not just atheists. And good manners require that we don't discuss our religious biasises with anyone who is not actively interested.

I'd also remind a student that it's rude and unacceptable to call another student's beliefs and religious practices "whacky."

Is atheism a lifestyle? :) I think of it as more an inner-self kinda thing that doesn't pop out unless somebody asks about it.

I think of lifestyles as what I eat, where I go, how many FSM converts I can cajole, and such. :)

School and religion mix about as well as reason and Mormon Doctrine.

Ron

Exactly, Cheryl. If my son were putting kids down for their beliefs you better believe I would speak to him. They only reason they found out he is an atheist is because they pressured him into admitting he does not believe in a deity just before condemning him to hell for it.

I wanted to throw in my two cents but not necessarily on the other thread.

I taught public school for a few years in an area that was 80% mormon. Your situation is very tricky because it involves a couple of "moving pieces."

Yes, the teachers and administration should be supportive of anti-harassment and bullying no matter what level it comes from, but that is tricky from a teacher's perspective. We could only really jump on what we saw; otherwise it turns into a whole he said/she said nightmare.

I saw this behavior, and my only advice to the children involved was to try to teach them all about boundaries. The ones who preached vs. the ones who were preached at.

Unfortunately, the worst moving piece is that even if the children stop preaching at your son, that may not stop the shunning. And shunning can't really be controlled by teachers or administrators. He might always feel like an outsider--or he might find friends as he gets older who won't care about his personal beliefs.

Tricky situation. Best of luck to you. I really do hope he finds a group of friends who accept him for who he is, and not what church he attends.

I completely agree. School isn't the only place he has an opportunity to socialize with his peers. I've recently tried to provide him with another outlet by enrolling him in the city's choir. They emphasize character and mutual respect with this group and he's found a real home there.

I think that this (the choir thing) is great. And to be honest, the reason that I didn't want to jump on the other thread is that it turned out more to be one of those:

"YOU SHOULD DO THIS!!!"

"YOU SHOULD DO THAT!!!"

"WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU!?! SATAN WILL EAT YOUR FACE!!!"

Even though I took your original post as being one where you wanted to vent at something that was clearly just a shitty situation. But it sounds like to me, you've got your shit together.

And religion or not, children can be so horrible to each other. Some kids will simply find a way to be dicks. It is their gift.

No, I did not say atheism is a whacky lifestyle. That is your inference and your insecurity. My point was any lifestyle outside the mainstream in any society is going to be seen by people as "whacky"

The same conversation could be had of a religious child in a school made up of primarily atheist children. They are going to feel isolated, alone, and pressured.

Please don't make inferences about me and my beliefs. You're obviously not very good at it.

Boughxb Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> No, I did not say atheism is a whacky lifestyle.
> That is your inference and your insecurity. My
> point was any lifestyle outside the mainstream in
> any society is going to be seen by people as
> "whacky"

Which is why tolerance should be taught to these children in order to dispel that sort of bigotry.
>
> The same conversation could be had of a religious
> child in a school made up of primarily atheist
> children. They are going to feel isolated, alone,
> and pressured.

Not necessarily, and it doesn't need to be a necessary assumption about any school where a child ends up being the minority. My sister attended a private catholic school for a year, as a Mormon, and not once was she felt bullied, isolated, or pressured over her religious differences. (And we all know what those Catholics and Mormons really think of each other.) They went out of their way to treat her with respect because they viewed her as a fellow human and not as someone with some "wacky lifestyle."

You seem to think tolerance can't or shouldn't be taught. It should absolutely be taught, whether it be over race, sexuality, or religious preference. Sometimes all it takes is showing children how their behaviors can have a direct negative impact on the people around them. These kids aren't BAD kids, and just giving them some perspective on their behavior may be all it takes. Are you advocating such simple steps shouldn't even be attempted?
>
> Please don't make inferences about me and my
> beliefs. You're obviously not very good at it.

You are advocating a position where it is OK to marginalize a group of people just because they happen to be the minority. What am I supposed to infer?

<3 you Ron

One of the differences between a Catholic school and a public school is that the Catholic school is private, t he parents value education and the school is free to kick out or not take troublemakers. Public schools do not have that luxury. There is also a much smaller taeacher pupil ratio. That comparison doesn't cut it and I have taught in both.

I read the entire thread that spawned this one with mixed admiration, amusement, and horror. What shocked me more than anything else, was Boughxb's total inability to see the situation at hand. I grew up in a Southern Baptist household (a horror story in and of itself) and community, and when I converted to paganism I was anathema. I didn't object to people presenting their beliefs to me; what I did object to was the emotional abuse that came along with it, even as a teenager.

To a child still in the formative years, it must be traumatic to hear "You're going to hell", "You're evil", "God will judge you", etc. What disturbs me more is that this other kid is probably not even aware of the damage he's causing. He's a simple tool for his parents and the LDS to brainwash all that they can get their hands on. I applaud Vhainya's willingness to stand beside DS during this particular situation.

And Boughxb. What do I say about you? You, sir, are clearly not one of the sharper knives in the drawer. Rather than consult Wikipedia for the meanings behind Lord of the Flies, may I suggest that you actually read the book? As for the rest of your meaningless comments and babble, what can I say that hasn't already been said? Through the course of history religion has been used to abuse and persecute those who have held "whacky" beliefs (incidentally, when you put that word in and the little red line appears under it, that means it's spelled wrong. Just a FYI). This is just another example of such, and your unwillingness to see or to admit it is only indicative of either a low capacity for understanding or an intentionally ignorant stance. You put words together well, so I'm forced to imagine the latter is more near to the mark.

Finally, let me say that in the public school forum, it is totally inappropriate for children to use a religion that supposedly preaches love and tolerance to cause another child to feel like an outsider. Shame, shame on the parents for indoctrinating their children to this degree!

mmm, how do you spell "whacky"?

I do see it from the ostracised child's point of view. I was that child, except it wasn't about religion, it was about DNA. Good luck getting away from your genes!

I grew up in a very very small community where all the residents had known each other for generations. For generations they had bullied my family. One group of kids tied a string to a brick and the other end to my dad's scrotum and threw it off a balcony. I fought through bullying my whole life to show that I was not someone that would take it. I scratched and clawed for every bit of respect I could get. By the time I reached high school I had a giant chip on my shoulder and felt as excluded from the group as any atheist does in a church. No one reached a hand out to help me and no one tried to pass an ordinance that people shouldn't talk to me about my whacky family because it would make me feel bad. I earned what respect I could of those people whose respect I cared about and watched the others get washed away in their river of life's excuses. I also lashed out and did my fair share of retaliation to the bullies and emulated the bully behaviour to others that were weaker than I was. I have regrets about it to this day.

I don't think having another child talk to your child about them religion comes close to what damage can be done by true bullies. I don't even think we are talking about a bully situation here, we are talking about how to help a group of children who have a lot in common find a way to get over their differences in religious belief. In cases where it turns into hazing or physical abuse I think you are correct, those things need to be fixed ASAP. Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't see in your post that anyone is threatening your son but that they are making him feel bad because he doesn't believe as they do. Isn't that the natural feeling of someone who doesn't share a common belief with the majority of others?


But I don't see how any teacher or system could get rid of this problem and that is why you need to teach your child to be strong and either walk away and find a place that is safe or deal with it. They will have to deal with it the same way that you or I have to deal with it when we see the bishop's wife in the grocery store and they ask us why we weren't in church on Sunday. We deal with it and we let it roll off our backs.

I am truly horrified for what you went through growing up. Obviously what my son is experiencing is not to this degree, but he is only in 4th grade and who is to say it cannot become more vicious as the boys get older, or that this general attitude of intolerance won't bleed over into other areas like a person's sexuality?

You don't think the bullying you suffered could have been stopped to any degree by adults who step in and teach these kids mutual respect for their peers? I find that viewpoint very bleak and sad.

Obviously whatever I do will not stop ALL the intolerance or bullying, but it can START to put a stop to it as awareness of the problem rises.

XCon601 Wrote:
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> And Boughxb. What do I say about you?

I find it amazing that you know anything about me that would warrant you saying anything about me at all. You know nothing about me.


>You, sir,
> are clearly not one of the sharper knives in the
> drawer.

Is this a bullying tactic? You are speaking of how a child can deal with other kids that have different beliefs and you start off by insulting someone you disagree with? Please go look in the mirror and write the word "the problem" around your face.

>Rather than consult Wikipedia for the
> meanings behind Lord of the Flies, may I suggest
> that you actually read the book?

Please cite your evidence to show that I have never read the book? Do you often mischaracterize people based on guesses? Do you do that in school playgrounds about people that look different than you do? How do you think that makes them feel? BULLY!

>As for the rest
> of your meaningless comments and babble, what can
> I say that hasn't already been said? Through the
> course of history religion has been used to abuse
> and persecute those who have held "whacky" beliefs

I think you just made my previous point. You can take the work "religion" out of your post and replace it with anything differences people may have. Race, greed, geography, general whackiness, language.

When people are presented with differences their natural reaction is to reject it, the trick is to train people to think it through.


I could go through the rest of your insulting post but I've got to get back to work.

My recovery from mormonism can definately be a timesuck.

This is facinating! Discovering boughxb suffered at the hands of bullies, and then watching him(?) defend bullying behavior relentlessly through two threads.

As he said, no assistance was given him against his bullies. And he characterized helping the atheist boy as making the child feel weak and afraid.

The mechanism at work here is obvious. When complaining about being bullied as a child to parents/authority figures who could have helped, boughxb was most likely told to "toughen up", and was he "too weak to defend himself?", and "what's the matter, you afraid?".
After all, his parents suffered the same things and they're probably "just fine". Even though they are obviously damaged enough to not even have the heart to keep their own child feeling safe.

I hope you work on your past with a therapist before you continue the cycle, boughxb.
This thread triggers such strong feelings in you. You keep coming back to defend an undefendable position. If this child deserves assistance, so did you. But you did not receive it and now are advocating denying help to this child.
It's projection.

anonirregular Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> This is facinating! Discovering boughxb suffered
> at the hands of bullies, and then watching him(?)
> defend bullying behavior relentlessly through two
> threads.
>

Sorry? I am not defending bullying behavior. I think you need to define what bullying behavior is. Is it a disagreement? At what point does peer pressure for good or bad become a bullying moment in your mind? Is it when you feel like the group isn't accepting you? That they don't like hanging around you because you are different somehow? Is it when they constantly harrass you because of your freckles or your early puberty? What if the team puts icy hot in your jock? Is that bullying? I don't believe that what was described in the orginal thread was bullying but oversensitity to an overwhelmingly homogenous environment that doesn't match our belief system. I may have misunderstood the original quote but handing out material to a friend (perhaps that can be clarified) on the playground or telling a classmate "People that don't go to the Mormon church are going to go to hell" is not what I would see as bullying. I guess we may have gotten to the point that any indication that someone may not like us or that we are weak or that we don't fit in is a bully tactive but I just see that as an indication of how emotionally weak we've all become.

> As he said, no assistance was given him against
> his bullies. And he characterized helping the
> atheist boy as making the child feel weak and
> afraid.
>

Your off base again. I certainly hope you aren't a therapist, because your inferences suck and are pretty quickly inferred. I'm actually coming from the angle of a phrase I heard while listening to "Love and Logic" which mentions that the most powerful communications we send our children are the indirect messages. A child whose parent hovers over them and constantly checks with them to see if they are ok, who steps into their social interactions to declare them unfair, etc are sending a message to the child that they are fragile and need someone to rescue them. I really do believe that the best tactic for this is to work through our children and train them on how to deal with difficult situations like this. Ultimately this will benefit them the most.

My son has a bully in his class and he is very non-confrontational. He came home one night because the kid had been terrible, he had broken all my sons pencils, gotten the whole class in trouble so they couldn't do art (he loves art and the bully hates it) and when they tried to play kickball at recess he threatened my son and shoved my son's friend to the ground. I was pissed at this kid! I wanted to go to the school and let them have it for not supervising the kids and for allowing this one kid to destroy the fun for all the other kids. I mean when did it become a 4th graders responsibility to police the other kids so they can do art? I was also pissed at this kid and thought of confronting him and protecting my son. As I thought through it though I realized that my son is certainly able to defend himself and can grow stronger by learning to deal with this kid than by me dealing with it for him. So I told my son "Above all else you make sure that you are safe, if he threatens you make sure that you are safe, stay away from him. If that doesn't work, make sure that you are safe. MAKE YOURSELF SAFE, don't allow him to make you unsafe. etc etc etc." My son felt empowered and the indirect message from me was "You are a smart capable boy and I have no reason to step in and protect you"

Eventually these kids will grow up to be adults and will have to deal with this stuff anyway. Bully's don't go away because we want them to, they go away because we make them go away.

How do you expect your kids to stand up to the church if you won't let them stand up to a 4th grader at school? You cannot control the other kids perceptions/beliefs/boundaries but you can help you child control their own.

> The mechanism at work here is obvious. When
> complaining about being bullied as a child to
> parents/authority figures who could have helped,
> boughxb was most likely told to "toughen up", and
> was he "too weak to defend himself?", and "what's
> the matter, you afraid?".


Again, bullshit, you just make this stuff up or did you go to school for it? I had to figure out for myself to toughen up, and believe me I played the victim card as much as I could, and for as long as I could. But eventually I got tired of it and realized that I was giving them all the power. No one needs a nanny, bullies prey on people who portray their differences as weaknesses and they will incessently attack the weak.

It's biology at work.

> After all, his parents suffered the same things
> and they're probably "just fine". Even though
> they are obviously damaged enough to not even have
> the heart to keep their own child feeling safe.
>

Bullshit again, my parents were remnants of anything that had any confidence, happiness, or sense of belonging and they preached it to us all day long about how horrible their lives were growing up in this hellhole. They kept on playing the victim card and giving us children all the tools of the victim. They never ever stood up for themselves, and their self esteem is still amongst the lowest I have ever seen.


> I hope you work on your past with a therapist
> before you continue the cycle, boughxb.
> This thread triggers such strong feelings in you.
> You keep coming back to defend an undefendable
> position. If this child deserves assistance, so
> did you. But you did not receive it and now are
> advocating denying help to this child.
> It's projection.

I'm glad you weren't my therapist. We would have been off on guesswork and tangents all day long.

And no, I am not advocating denying help to this child. I am advocating teaching children to know how to navigate a world that does not play by our happy go lucky view of how the world should work.

Should teachers have to take responsibility for teaching all of the standards and values once taught in the home? No

But here are some facts on the subject of religious bigotry.

1. Early elementary teachers have a profound influence on the social development of students. If teachers work with them, the students can learn to get along with others in much more respectul ways.

2. Students have a right to attend schools that are safe from undue sexual, physical, and emotional intimidation. Any child who feels marginalized because of their religious beliefs and practices has a right to expect school personel to help aleviate the situation if there are obvious practical ways they can help.

Teachers are neglegent if they refuse to lift a finger to help a child who is being unduly pressured because of race, gender, religion, sexual orientation and such. Overt bullying is related to these factors but isn't the central concern. If a child feels harassed, he/she has a right to at least be heard and especially, if the parent expresses concern.

I have never taught in a community with a dominant religion. One child in a school can choose several others to harass and this is still not right. Harassment isn't always at the hand of the majority.

Public schools are for the public. Their purpose is not to spread the word of God for any church. Religious stalking on public school grounds is inappropriate in the same way selling drugs to minors in playgrounds shouldn't be allowed. Parents get to decide about religion for their kids and they get to oversee their children's medication needs.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/18/2010 06:22PM by Cheryl.

Cheryl Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Should teachers have to take responsibility for
> teaching all of the standards and values once
> taught in the home? No
>
> But here are some facts on the subject of
> religious bigotry.
>
> 1. Early elementary teachers have a profound
> influence on the social development of students.
> If teachers work with them, the students can learn
> to get along with others in much more respectul
> ways.
>
> 2. Students have a right to attend schools that
> are safe from undue sexual, physical, and
> emotional intimidation. Any child who feels
> marginalized because of their religious beliefs
> and practices has a right to expect school
> personel to help aleviate the situation if there
> are obvious practical ways they can help.
>
> Teachers are neglegent if they refuse to lift a
> finger to help a child who is being unduly
> pressured because of race, gender, religion,
> sexual orientation and such. Overt bullying is
> related to these factors but isn't the central
> concern. If a child feels harassed, he/she has a
> right to at least be heard and especially, if the
> parent expresses concern.
>
> I have never taught in a community with a dominant
> religion. One child in a school can choose several
> others to harass and this is still not right.
> Harassment isn't always at the hand of the
> majority.
>
> Public schools are for the public. Their purpose
> is not to spread the word of God for any church.
> Religious stalking on public school grounds is
> inappropriate in the same way selling drugs to
> minors in playgrounds shouldn't be allowed.
> Parents get to decide about religion for their
> kids and they get to oversee their children's
> medication needs.


Fabulous response. I also want to add that it's very silly to say that it is not the teacher's responsibility to talk to the parents about this issue. Part of being a teacher is talking to parents about appropriate and inappropriate behavior at school. In many places, (each district is different) teachers can be held responsible for turning a blind eye to behavior considered inappropriate or banned at school. In my district, handing out religious information (whether it be student, parent, stranger, or teacher) is strictly forbidden. Ignoring the behavior and allowing it to continue is not only wrong, but can lead to serious consequences for the teacher.

When a parent asks for help, they're not saying it's the teachers job to take on the full roles of policing, prosecuting, and punishing religious intolerance. The parent is asking for three way cooperation to work out solutions to these problems.

The teacher might talk to the culprits and class and team up with the parent to work on helping victims react in ways that protect him/her and teach the aggressors that they have to stop these behaviors.

Harsh consequeces might be in order for the perpetrators while the victims learn to say, "My family has it's own beliefs. Don't expect me to do what your family does." Then this child can report this to the teacher who can back him/her up.

The parents of the aggressive religion pushers will be put on notice that this kind of behavior isn't tolerated in a public school. I've found that most of these zealous families are unaware that they're doing anything wrong and they back off quickly when they realize that their efforts make them and their church look bad.

The mormons I've taught haven't been problems for me. I have had to have serious a few serious talks with Holy Rollers, JWs, and once with Sikh parents.

Thanks, Tiff. And take care! : )



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/19/2010 08:38AM by Cheryl.

I think part of the problem here is that we haven't defined what is bullying behavior and what is not. Maybe if we had some concrete examples, we would find that we agree more than we think.