Students in several schools in this area have recently walked out of class to protest ICE. Most of done so without incident, except for igniting debate at the propriety of students leaving school and the punishment that should–or should not–be meted out.
I commend the students who truly believe they needed to act because of the abuses perpetrated by ICE. I would be proud of them if they were my students, and I would not have punished them. They certainly contradict the stereotypical view of narcissistic teenagers.
I’m sure, also, that some of the kids who walked out were doing it to cut class or go along with friends.
Should there be punishment? Part of civil disobedience is being willing to take the consequences of your actions. That’s up to the schools and the parents.
On Facebook, I shared postings about area walkouts, including one at my old high school. This ignited a prolonged discussion, which was surprisingly thoughtful. Of course, that is a low bar on social media, but a step in the right direction.
The least articulate and introspective were some Trump/ICE supporters who defaulted to tired tropes about teachers indoctrinating students into socialism and communism or urging them to protest and name-calling (morons!) and whataboutism.
A former colleague wrote: “Oh– and FYI– the mandatory lecture on Karl Marx on Monday for all educators has been postponed because of snow. Spread the word. Pamphlets will be sent out with future dates of required lectures updated.”
I wonder if everyone got the sarcasm.
“At this point, anyone who believes Biden actually tallied 81 million votes or that J6 was an actual threat event is a cartoon,” wrote one conservative poster.
I came across a separate Facebook post where some of those same supporters were congratulating themselves on “triggering” the “libtards.”
There was plenty of support for the walkouts, too.
“Our neighboring town down here did one on Friday (we have 4-day school weeks at most of the schools locally), and it went phenomenal. Others did it on Saturdays with more traffic,” wrote a poster, who admittedly had mixed feelings about the walkouts but at least was willing to discuss both sides.
A couple of days later, the protest in Quakertown took the discussion to a whole new level. We will discuss that in a future post.
The Q-View 