Lessons from Our President

I originally published this here because it started out as a post about buying Al Capone new books. It got picked up in a trending topic on Twitter last night and I got a couple hundred hits in ten minutes, 3 pieces of hate mail (two were really nasty, but my favorite was "You call me ignorant for keeping my child home and you named your kid Al Capone."), lots of positive comments, and probably some really confused people who ended up on my other blog thinking it was about censorship, Obama, children's literature, etc and discovered that really it was an isolated post buried among 1 million reasons I think I have the cutest baby on the planet. So I'm reposting here as well...

Those who know me, know that I feel very strongly about discussions of appropriateness and children (and their books). I write about* children's books for a living. I can honestly say that I have one of the best jobs in the world, yet on days like today I get very frustrated.

This morning President Obama spoke to school children directly. Our local newspaper ran an article about the speech and posted the entire text of the speech online and still parents went ballistic. They called school board members, they kept kids out of school, they declared it propaganda, they demanded alternative assignments, they filled the newspaper comments section with hateful and racist comments. All of this name calling and hate speech because the President of the United States wants kids to stay in school, pay attention, live up to their potential, ask questions, watch less tv, work hard, and never give up. If this is brainwashing, I'm okay with these messages.

What I'm not okay with is parents who try to take over the schools because they don't like the President. I'm not okay with teaching kids that it's okay to skip school if you don't like the person who is talking. I'm not okay with teaching kids that you don't even have to listen if you don't agree with a person. I'm not okay with teaching kids that it's okay to make up your mind before you know the whole story. I'm not okay with teaching kids that it's okay to disrespect the President, their teachers, or other adults role models. I'm not okay with teaching kids that there is only one right way of thinking or one right answer to a problem. I start every semester by telling my students that I will never ask them to agree with everyone's point of view, but I will ask them to listen and treat each other with respect. It makes me sad when I see parents who use children as an excuse to perpetuate intolerance, disrespect, and hatred.

If Al Capone was old enough to understand and watch television, I would have hoped that he would have watched in school and we would have watched again as a family after school. Since he's not old enough and won't be any time soon, I went online and bought books that are often banned or challenged by people who feel that they have the obligation to protect children from the harmful ideas like diversity. Unfortunately, he won't be able to grow up and say that he remembers when he listened to President Obama at school, but maybe he will grow up being open minded enough that when classmates or their parents try and close down conversations with narrow minded, ignorant rhetoric, he will fight back. Hopefully he will never call our President by hateful slurs because he doesn't agree with his ideologies. Hopefully, he will never make fun of a classmate who's skin or family or religion or ability is different from his own.

We can't afford to buy Al Capone all of the books that I would like him to read, but today I added a few more to his library. Here's what I got him in honor of all of the ignorant parents who think it's okay to breed hatred and intolerance in children.

• The Family Book--because families come in all different shapes and sizes
• And Tango Makes Three--because some of those families have two mommies or two daddies
• The Lorax--because recycling is a good thing and we should take care of the environment
• In the Night Kitchen--because naked baby butts are not bad
• Halloween books--because Halloween is not the work of the devil

Obviously, this is a mishmash of books. Diversity and tolerance cannot be taught in a single book, but when children grow up with images of diversity, hopefully they do not turn into close minded adults.

*For those who don't know me well I do NOT write children's books, I write about them. I teach critical analysis of children's and adolescent literature to future teachers.

Gmail Prez

I love Gmail, but apparently so does the current administration.

Two years after launching the most technologically savvy presidential campaign in history, Obama officials ran smack into the constraints of the federal bureaucracy yesterday, encountering a jumble of disconnected phone lines, old computer software, and security regulations forbidding outside e-mail accounts.

Oddly reminiscent of the move back into the-not-quite-completed-Stevenson-Hall move we experienced August, I can't even imagine trying to run the country with outdated or non-existent technology. Clearly they only way to tackle the bureaucracy is to call on Google.

officials in the press office were prepared: In addition to having their own cellphones, they set up Gmail accounts, with approval from the White House counsel, so they could send information in more than one way.

New staff find White House in tech Dark Ages - Washington Post- msnbc.com

Prop 8: The Musical

I'm sure you've probably already seen Prop 8: The Musical, but I feel compelled to post it anyway. Enjoy!

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

Crossing the Line

Just when I thought that I was done with election stories that would greatly upset me, I read this article about a SC priest wrote his parishioners a letter telling them they were ineligible for communion if they vote for Barack Obama. I've been very lucky that our particular parish is both one of the most liberal Catholic churches I've ever been to, and has stayed away from mixing politics and religion.

I realize that this is by no means the only instance of organized religion using it's power to affect policy. We saw numerous instances of this in both CA and AR last week, among other places, but it makes me even more sad when a church official uses his position to essentially excommunicate* people who chose to vote in a particular way.

I won't go into all of the reasons why abortion isn't the only human rights issue that should be considered when voting. Encouraging church members to vote one way is bad enough, but to punish them when they prioritize different ideologies (many of which involve other human rights issues) crosses a line that makes me very sad. I am very glad that other church officials are denouncing the move, but I don't know that is enough to undo the damage that individuals like this priest have done.

*for those unfamiliar with Catholic doctrine, excommunication literally means that you are no longer in "communion" with the church. While sometimes, this is irreversible, the act is essentially the same here.

YA For Obama

I haven't had a lot of time to explore YA for Obama, but from what I've seen it looks pretty interesting. When I first saw it, I was a little confused because it seems like a rather haphazard group (young adult writer, readers and friends, according the website), but in reality this is not different than nurses, teachers, or steel workers for Obama, plus it offers an interesting glimpse into the political lives of people who are usually only defined by their books. Regardless of whether or not you support him, if you teach ya lit, it's a sight you might want to check out.

I did quickly google YA for McCain to see if such a group existed, but nothing turned up. I guess in terms of ideology it would be more likely to see Children's Authors for McCain. If I thought it wouldn't offend students, it would be interesting to examine the ideologies of children's literature in terms of the election.

Offensive Politics

Recently I've heard conversations about the inappropriate nature of a recent (and unapproved, I might add) slogan that says: "Jesus Christ was a community organizer and Pontius Pilate was a Governor." What I find most unnerving about the conversations labeling such a slogan as blasphemous and offensive, is that they imply that religion is off limits for humor and satire.

I find this unnerving because this afternoon I returned from lunch where we had a lovely, intelligent, and productive conversation about religion, ideology, politics, feminism, and other issues worthy of discussion to read a story about "Obama Waffles." The waffles invoke two major stereotypes: the racist imagery of Aunt Jemima combined with the head coverings worn by Muslim men.* The mixes were sold at a forum co-sponsored by American Values and Focus on the Family Action. To be fair, the forum later discontinued sales of the waffle mix (after 3 days): saying they had not realized the boxes displayed "offensive material." The creators had this to say about the problematic images:

"We had some people mention that to us, but you think of Newman's Own or Emeril's — there are tons and tons of personality-branded food products on the market. So we've taken that model and, using political satire, have highlighted his policies, his position changes.

So here's my question, are we going to label this as blamphemous or is it okay to make race and religion the subject of satires as long the religion isn't Chritianity. For all of those who cried fowl at the unauthorized Jesus Christ was a community organizer slogan, I challenge you to demand aplogies for this as well. If religion is off limits, then shouldn't everyone's religion be off limits, especially when that satire is used to falsely perpertrate the image of Obama as Muslim, when he is not, and never has been. And if he were Muslim, would you protect his religion from satire in the same way you object to Christianity being used in satire?

Politics are dirty, but the rules should be the same for both parties.

*I struggled with the question of whether or not to place the images on my blog, and I have decided that the racism in the images is too great for me to reproduce here. If you wish to see the images, please click on the Obama Waffles link.