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| courtesy of Pixabay CC0 Public Domain |
Somehow it seems appropriate an incident like the one described
in this article from NBC News took place in a Wal-Mart. As reported by Eli
Panken, a “Thirty-Person
Melee at Walmart Caught on Video” in the Gates, NY Wal-Mart began “after
two 17-year-old-girls started talking smack to a 24-year-old woman about her
clothing…”[i]
Words were exchanged, items were thrown, the assailants’ and the victim’s
families got involved, and the disrespectful acts of the two teenage girls
turned into a thirty-person melee involving baseball bats and thrown cans.
"It was in total chaos when the officers got there,"
VanBrederode told NBC
affiliate WHEC. "It's just disgusting to see that kind of behavior
happening right here."[ii]
This disgusting behavior would come as no surprise to anyone who
works in today’s public school system with a low-to-no income demographic. We
see incidents such as this in the schools all the time. These youths are not
taught to respect others, have little to no respect for their own mothers,
often don’t know or have limited contact with their fathers, and have no
filters on their speech or behavior.
My first introduction to this came about during my first year as
a teacher. The school I taught at then was located in a small, rural town with
a high poverty rate and a majority minority population. Among the lowest
socio-economic bracket, the incidence of children being born to single-mothers
was over 80%. In many cases, these women had multiple children with multiple
partners.
It was at a football game that I learned just how far down the
ladder of civilization some of these mothers and their daughters had slipped. I
was speaking with the police officer on duty at the game – itself a sign of how
badly things have changed since I was in junior high – and heard a mother and
daughter arguing. The police officer and I stopped our conversation and listened.
The daughter was in tears telling the mother that she didn’t
want to go into the game because there was a girl in the bleachers with whom
she’d had a fight earlier – a physical brawl, not an argument – and she didn’t
want to fight her again. The mother shoved the daughter toward the gate, told
her she’d better get in there and take care of business, and that she’d better
not let “the little whore” beat her this time.
I turned to the police officer and asked him if he was going to
do something. He frowned and shook his head. What he told me stunned me. The
police officer said he couldn’t intervene until a fight actually broke out. I
was dumbfounded. That was nearly fifteen years ago. Things have only gotten
worse since.
As a teacher in the public school system, I witness the behavior
of children who have not learned to respect others, who have not been taught
basic courtesy and manners, and who have no filters on what they say to others –
in other words, no tact. These students excuse their rude, hurtful language as “being
honest,” their lack of respect by claiming they only respect those who respect
them first, and most troubling to me, their lack of manners by telling me that
their mothers taught them they didn’t have to say “please” or “thank you” to
anyone.
In my classroom, I enforce courteous, respectful behavior and
manners. I teach my students that if they have nothing nice to say to another
student then they shouldn’t say anything. Another lesson I try to impart to
them is that common courtesy is free to give but can bring many good things
back to them.
While I don’t make my students say “sir” to me, I do require
them to say “yes” instead of “yeah” and “no” instead of “nah.”
“Respect,” I tell them, “is something you earn, not something
you’re entitled to just for showing up.” I treat them with respect and I expect
them to do the same for me. The remarkable thing is, 99.9% of the time, the
students do.
These children want an adult in their lives who has high expectations
of them. They learn that I expect their best in their behavior, in their school
work, and in their expectations for themselves.
As always, I remain,
The Exhausted Educator
[i] http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/thirty-person-melee-at-walmart-caught-on-video/ar-BBu1Eeu?ocid=spartanntp
[ii] ibid
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