One day, in a school yard, a little boy and a little girl got angry at each
other. She called him a "booger". He called her a "double slimy booger".
They argued.
A teacher came to break up the disagreement, and wondered "how do I
best turn this difficult situation into a teachable moment, so the children
will learn, and no-one will suffer irreparable damage"?
A child psychologist postulated that, in order to avoid self-esteem issues,
children should not call each other names.
Then, the same situation happens at two other schools. A TV station
picks up the story and starts referring to it as a "booger epidemic".
And, in a completely unrelated incident, the Child Suffrage Movement
succeeds in its hard fought efforts to lower the voting requirement to
five years of age...in order to ensure that the rights of children are
protected in the political system.
And, Washington politicians do become involved in the "booger
epidemic," with Congress identifying children as a protected class,
and identifying "booger" as hate speech under its new "Snot Crimes"
legislation.
Not to be outdone, the President notes that studies have found it
unfair that some children have more Kleenex than others, and
proposes new taxes to invest in a "Kleenex Redistribution Bill,"
as a part of a social justice agenda.
And then, I woke up. It was all a bad dream. We still teach our
children about "sticks and stones". Our children still learn to be
tough enough to stand up to bullies and others who don't like them,
or attempt to intimidate them.
We don't really attempt to limit free speech with politically correct
speech. We don't really try to over-legislate to score political points
with lobbyists or special interest groups.
Our children know that there will always be someone who dislikes
them because they have too much, or too little, or look too good, or
too bad, or are the wrong religion, or the wrong color, or are too smart,
or too stupid, and on, and on.
We have taught our children not to expect a perfect world, but to stand
up and deal with an imperfect world, and make the best of it, all with
minimum help from the Feds.
They can "man-up" on their own. Sorry...that should be "child-up" on their
own. I don't want to offend gender or age demographics.
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