Yep

At work we are having a lot of trouble with issues of identity, group identity, me vs other.
Some students are so "advanced" they forget what its like to be introduced to these ideas and concepts, making the "advanced" students comments sound like close minded rants. "I'm right, I'm morally right, I'm intellectually right, I'm right because the teachers say so." <---this is not their argument, but it is what it must sound like to those newly exposed.

Then we have those who are so repulsed by this that they are repressing themselves, they can't speak for fear of being trounced on... and they would be - and that's sad.

Its sad like when I laugh and talk down about people who are conservative, or who vote republican, or who don't vote at all. As if they knew nothing, or didn't know enough. As if I was some sort of perfect judge. That of course I am not.

They won't speak for the pride of their own values, for the defense of them. For their parents, their language, the way they see life... who wants to be told that what they see isn't right? Who could bare that? And in any case, it could never be true... except to say that they are only partially right, making them partially wrong. But is it wrong to believe something negative about others when in every real life case it seems to be validated? "Those people are weird."
Yes, they are, but does that have to be a negative?
What if we joined them? Would it be so bad? What if we already were them? Would it be so hard to enjoy?

And then there are those like the first who believe they are "advanced" for we all think we are "advanced." But their assumptions keep them from seeing the value of others feelings. For in a Utopian world we would all be heard, but none of us would have anything to complain about. These students, so sure of their Utopian dreams, they forget the reality, some are oppressed, and the oppression of one part of society (without validation) becomes the oppression and injustice that drags us all down.


________________________________________________________________

It's a lot easier to say these things when they are separate from us.
The other day I asked my students what a gang was? and if it was negative.
We picked it apart, we analyzed, compared and contrasted. We concluded that it was a group of people, an organization, and like all human organizations, will have negative and positive.

frats, social clubs, militias and the military, mafia, political parties, activist orgs, etc etc etc.

positive and negative.

I wish I could snap kids out of their worlds for a second. Its not so simple.


These people are you and you are them.