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Adults should not abdicate their authority, in the face of student unrest and by students making ridiculous demands

Is the Tail Wagging the Dog?


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By —— Bio and Archives March 16, 2018

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Is the Tail Wagging the Dog? Have adults relinquished their authority in making rules and regulations and enforcing them? In other words, is the tail wagging the dog? A good example of why the headline has some relevance is the recent horrendous event in Parkland, Florida at the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas H.S., when a crazed former student, Nikolas Cruz, killed 17 innocent students and teachers, and in the aftermath of that terrible event, some outspoken students, ranging in age from 14 to 17, have become media darlings as they ranted against guns, in general, and the NRA, in particular. Of course, anyone, including students, have a right to express themselves, but should their emotional appeals be the driving force behind a change of public policy? Do they have the knowledge and experience, at that young age, to have that authority to be the final arbiter in making those changes in policy?
Before the reports of shots had finished reverberating in Parkland, the anti-gun zealots were jumping in to voice their outrage and they started to recruit some of the traumatized teens to jump on the anti-gun bandwagon. Organized anti-gun groups, such as Michael Bloomberg's, “Everytown for Gun Safety”, and radical George Soros, injected themselves in this traumatic event with money and advice to organize protests in Florida and around the country. The designated militant anti-gun students were propped up by the various news outlets, and by CNN who glorified them at a rigged town hall meeting by giving them loaded questions to embarrass invited guests, Sen. Marco Rubio and NRA spokeswoman, Dana Loesch. It was a disgraceful display of hubris by a national media outlet in letting this meeting become an anti-gun crusade rather than a real town hall meeting. In addition to the attempt at mobilizing high school students, over the past few years, many colleges and universities have abdicated their authority to students representing various militant groups with the assent and encouragement of their radical professors and weak-kneed administrators. Shouting down conservative or religious speakers, that have been invited by mainly conservative student clubs, and then engaging in rioting and property damage to show their displeasure at the scheduling of those speakers on campus, has become almost a rite of passage at many colleges and universities. The University of California at Berkeley, the birthplace of the so-called “Free Speech Movement” in the 60s and 70s, is a perfect example of the abdication of the rights of schools and their right of free speech and assembly as guaranteed in the 1st Amendment of our Constitution. In addition, some schools have designated “Free Speech Zones” and student “Safe Zones”, to shield students from views that are contrary to their own and which might upset them. That's where the term “Snowflake” was coined to describe that wuss behavior. It seems that the “tail is wagging the dog” in many of these educational institutions where the young people do what they please and then make outrageous demands of the authorities. It seems that discipline, at the high school and college level, has broken down and that anarchy has raised its ugly head in far too many cases. In conclusion, adults should not abdicate their authority, in the face of student unrest and by students making ridiculous demands, and they should reclaim their vested authority in keeping their institution as a place of learning where all views are discussed and debated free of coercion and of being shouted down. The hell with “political correctness”, and start acting like adults so that the “tail stops wagging the dog”.



Chuck Lehmann -- Bio and Archives | Comments

Conservative commentary by Chuck Lehmann (Chuck on the Right Side


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