Thursday, September 3, 2009

Political Soap Box

Today we received a note/permission slip from the school district. It said:

"As you may be aware, the President of the United States will be addressing the school children of America at 10 a.m. on Tuesday morning,.... During this special address, the President will speak directly to the nation's children and youth about persisting and succeeding in school. The President will challenge students to work hard, set educational goals, and take responsibility for their learning. This broadcast will be made available at this time in the classrooms..... in grades 3-12.
We fully recognize that there may be some of you who are not comfortable allowing your child to tune into this broadcast. For those students we will provide an alternate setting. Please notify us..."

Here I go on my soap box...

To make my position very clear, I did not vote for President Obama. I do not like most of his policies. For the most part, I think he is taking America down a very, very bad path.

BUT, it doesn't sound like he is talking about anything controversial. (i.e. health care reform) And, we are talking about a PUBLIC school system sending out this letter. We, as a country, voted for President Obama. He is our President and deserves a certain level of respect. During election time my kids have been taught who is running and the basics (very basic) of the candidates platform. Do parents "pull" their kids out of school every time any of that is discussed?

Here's my questions for the parents that will demand an alternate setting for their child next Tuesday. Exactly what are you afraid the President might say? Are you using your kids to show YOUR political agenda? Don't you think that Tuesday evening would be a great time for a discussion about what was said? Maybe a discussion on tolerance for opinions that differ from our own? Or better yet, even though there are differing opinions, there are some things we can agree on. Like, the importance of an education, working hard and setting goals.

Personally, I think it's a good thing for my kids to hear from the President. I encourage them to listen to the debates during election time (although they are usually bored to tears after a few minutes). Frankly, it will be nice to hear him talk about something so "non-controversial". I will be listening in. Because, I'm the parent. And if clarification or conversation needs to happen, then I want to know what was said. But I'm not going to arbitrarily boycott the President's speech and take something that can be good away from my kids.

3 comments:

Stimey said...

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I absolutely cannot understand why everyone is so upset about this. I hate so much how partisan this country is getting. Both parties do it. It seems to not matter anymore what someone is suggesting, just what party they belong to. THAT scares me more than anything.

Thank you so much for this post.

We'll see what happens... said...

Very well put! I feel the same, if you don't know what is said, if you don't participate, you don't have the necessary information. I felt the same way about the "sex ed" films, OH am I ever so grateful I "embarrassed" my boy's by attending, I wanted to scream at the parents who weren't present, they had no clue what horrible things were being taught to there young boy's.
As for politics, I will never forget the first time our boy's watched the "State of the Union" address, the president would speak and the camera's would wander the room, Hillary Clinton would be on and off the camera's but when ever she noticed one on her she would toss on a fake smile and giggle. Finally one of the boy's out of nowhere said "Who's the chick running for prom queen" I could have died laughing. I think kids are far more perceptive than we give them credit for.

Navi said...

Thanks for this. It's good to hear some sense from people that don't like Obama. Unfortunately it's the ones that don't make sense that get the press.