Unlearn16: Class is in Session - The One Where Use The Bully To Change The World

00:00:00.000 class is in session how you doing and welcome to unlearn 16 classes in session guys this week i'm

00:00:09.780 going to handle a i don't know i've kind of avoided this topic for a while because i think

00:00:14.380 it's so big and so multi-layered that i didn't a know how to handle it in a tiktok and b i don't

00:00:21.700 know if i quite know how to wrap my head around it even when it comes to a podcast but we're going

00:00:26.200 to give it a go. Today I'm talking about bullying. A lot of parents have asked me, how do you handle

00:00:32.420 bullying? How does your school handle bullying? What are the strategies? What are the rules?

00:00:37.860 All of that kind of thing. And for a long time, first of all, I constantly correct people because

00:00:44.460 I don't like the term bullying. I like to call it what it is, which is harassment. So there's

00:00:49.680 two levels of this conversation I'm going to have. Number one, we have to talk about our society

00:00:55.940 because what I promise you is that the teens and the elementary school kids that I teach,

00:01:02.860 they don't create society. They tend to mirror it. And by mirror it, I mean it comes from their

00:01:10.320 parents. I'm not saying that they aren't a force for change, but I am saying they do mirror a lot

00:01:16.660 of the negativity that we then put upon them. And they see it in the real world. So I'm going to

00:01:25.620 talk about society and then I'm going to talk about in school. So why don't we talk, you know

00:01:30.400 what, why don't we talk about in school first? Why? Because heaven help me, we can control it a little

00:01:36.100 better if we put our minds to it at all. All right. So you have a kid that's being harassed

00:01:42.600 in your school. Now, now let's take a couple of different forms here. All right. Let's talk about

00:01:49.220 the difference between the kind of harassment that is, let's say, I don't want to minimize

00:01:57.180 it, but I want to sort of put it in different categories because kids have a banter, like

00:02:01.840 it or not. And especially our young boys are taught a banter and our young girls, we're

00:02:07.560 starting to see it emulate across the board. We're starting to see this banter and it's

00:02:13.460 always been there of a teasing nature, right? And we'll talk about that. Oh, it's just teasing

00:02:18.040 you. They're just teasing you. Just get a thicker skin. You're just chirping, right? They have all

00:02:22.520 these different titles for it. So I'm going to put that over there for a second. And then I'm

00:02:27.420 going to talk about underpinnings of harassment that stem from sexism, racism, homophobia,

00:02:36.940 transphobia, these bigger underlying elements of hate and bigotry that might come from home,

00:02:45.840 might come from the media. It might come from a lot of different places. And the way that they

00:02:50.500 direct and push that out is very, very different. Because when you catch kids in the midst of back

00:02:57.520 and forth, quote unquote, teasing, as a teacher, here's the problem. You'll hear it go back and

00:03:05.220 forth, right? I'm sure a lot of parents out there will understand exactly what I'm saying.

00:03:10.660 you won't have a moment where you're like oh you did it you did it first you're the cause you're

00:03:17.420 the foundation no no no they'll go back and forth uh don't put your pencil there oh get your foot

00:03:22.320 over there stop jiggling the table i'm not jiggling table i hate your pants look and it can go back

00:03:27.160 and forth and back and forth that kind of um let's say poor socialized behavior or lack of

00:03:36.460 socialized behavior that can be handled in the classroom. That can be handled in the classroom

00:03:40.640 by take a minute, take a breath, calm down. They're also young kids. So they're very quick

00:03:47.420 to a higher level of temperament. They don't have a lot of self-control. They don't have a lot of

00:03:52.040 impulse control. So it comes out that way. I hilariously enough, even though, please,

00:03:57.900 I don't want to teach any more gym. I think a lot of that kind of behavior actually could be muted

00:04:03.540 if we allowed them or encouraged them and sometimes forced them into being physical

00:04:10.980 every single day. I think they have a lot of energy and sometimes that energy comes out in

00:04:14.760 the wrong way. But let me talk about the bigger forms of, and also that kind of harassment,

00:04:21.680 that kind of harassment or bullying or teasing, whatever you want to call it,

00:04:26.700 tends to come in ebbs and flows and not as fixated or focused. When it's focused,

00:04:33.820 when you can see, or when you become aware of an onslaught of that kind of harassment

00:04:39.780 and it's focused, well, then you can deal with it on a different level. And the way that I deal

00:04:44.760 with it is first and foremost, always dealing with the student who's having the issue, who feels

00:04:50.240 attacked, who feels harassed, or is being bullied or whatever the case may be. And I sit down with

00:04:54.960 them. And I get that story. And as I get that story, I say, okay, I tell them what I'm going

00:05:00.460 to do with that information. Sometimes those kids don't want me to do anything because the first

00:05:04.520 conversation I always have with that student, um, you know, is what's the dynamic? How can you,

00:05:14.840 and I, you guys are going to take this, like I'm, I'm blaming, but how can you stand up for

00:05:18.980 yourself? How can you surround yourself by better people? Because sometimes we tend to want to

00:05:24.680 be around people that don't necessarily treat us very well, but there's a whole host of other

00:05:29.420 people who treat us well. And I'm curious on why we are drawn to the groups of people we're drawn

00:05:35.600 to, and then we take on that kind of attack. So we have that kind of conversation. We have the

00:05:41.220 kind of conversation that goes from, if they're your friends, because a lot of times this comes

00:05:44.800 from your friends, have a conversation with one person at one time. Let's say it continues.

00:05:51.760 if it continues I then talk to the student or students who are perpetrating this I say I sit

00:06:01.260 them down I ask what's going on why are you doing it I ask them I talk about instances and I talk

00:06:07.440 about how damaging and and problematic they can be and if I'm really dealing with a kid who seems

00:06:13.840 to spew vitriol everywhere they go or really is the catalyst in a lot of different situations

00:06:19.140 What I tend to try to talk to that student about is what's going on in their house. In fact, I might lead with that. And again, I am not justifying. I am not, you know, alleviating responsibility for any of their actions. But with kids, if we can't figure out the why and we just deal with the what, you're going to deal with the what every day until the day they graduate to the day they get suspended or expelled. That's my belief.

00:06:46.420 right now if we're dealing with something bigger and i'm about to do a tick talk about this if we're

00:06:52.040 dealing with something bigger let's talk about what i see i think more commonly than anything

00:06:58.820 else because kids aren't stupid they know they're going to get in trouble for so what do kids try

00:07:03.260 to do if they don't like somebody and heaven help us we can't make them like everybody it's not

00:07:09.580 kindergarten not everybody's getting an invitation to the birthday party if they don't like somebody

00:07:14.540 you can see sort of a collaborative effort to exclude.

00:07:21.900 And that kind of exclusion and that kind of the bubble,

00:07:27.760 the creation of this bubble around the person they don't want to be around

00:07:31.040 for whatever their reason, valid or not, because sometimes, by the way,

00:07:35.340 we all have to take accountability of the different things we bring to the table.

00:07:39.040 um but that exclusion is incredibly painful destructive and i've seen more so than yelling

00:07:53.020 about or teasing somebody about their clothes or their hair or their boyfriend or their whatever

00:07:57.360 is the exclusion and the segregation the isolation that is horrifically damaging

00:08:04.760 um number one you try to figure out well what what friend group does everybody have because

00:08:12.820 usually some everybody has a place right you have a place where and i where you feel like you get

00:08:19.480 each other and as adults it's the same thing just wait till i get to adults by the way it's all our

00:08:24.640 fault it's not there it's not it's us it's we're the problem it's us um and then you start to so

00:08:32.620 start to see that and you start to recognize the serious conversations you need to have as a school

00:08:40.380 and to develop a school culture are questions of empathy or questions of mindfulness or questions

00:08:50.860 of mental health and stability and outlets and therapy and good intention those are the

00:08:59.900 conversations you need to start to have and i'm going to lead into the other one that i'm going

00:09:05.980 to talk about in a second because when i start dealing with and and although at my school it's

00:09:12.700 a bit different again i have the lovely ability of working in a very small school so you can see

00:09:19.340 it a little clearer coming anyways um the the waves of racism homophobia transphobia sexism

00:09:32.540 right any of any of that kind of bigotry that gets laced in and usually gets laced in when

00:09:39.020 they're kids as well as adults with jokes they lead with jokes you guys know this i know this

00:09:47.180 it's the number one defense of any student i was just joking and guess what it's the number one

00:09:54.220 defense of people in politics of of comedians of a lot of different people i was just joking

00:10:03.340 it was all jokes can't you can't you take a joke are you that serious right so you and then all of 0.98

00:10:08.860 a sudden you feel like an idiot as the kid that feels harassed or bullied or is being harassed 0.99

00:10:14.460 and as the adult how do i handle that 0.99

00:10:19.100 no jokes no more jokes no you can't really do that

00:10:23.580 because it just doesn't fly and as an adult

00:10:27.180 guess what i can't be there all the time because this is what's super clear

00:10:32.620 kids will do whatever they're going to do

00:10:37.180 as will adults when an authority figure is not there when we're not in the room whether it's

00:10:46.220 at lunch whether it's at recess walking home at home on social media so we can be the hall

00:10:54.060 monitors that try that try to be in every space with every student or we can create a different

00:11:00.220 culture, if I heard racist language and, you know, or anti-Semitic tropes or sexist language or,

00:11:11.800 you know, all of these things, homophobic, transphobic, then I need to recognize that even

00:11:17.580 if it's a student, it's never just a student. Why? Because that student is saying whatever

00:11:26.580 they're saying or acting however they're acting in front of others number one either to purposely

00:11:33.060 purposely diminish one person or a group of people and they're heard and their actions

00:11:41.460 are bolstered supported or and this is where i would love for us to get condemned by their peers

00:11:50.980 so here's what i would do and here's what i've done

00:11:54.020 let's start using because a lot of the times too you don't know so a student comes to you and says

00:12:03.460 so-and-so said this and the person comes in and they said i didn't hear where here we are here we

00:12:08.240 are right they said this no i didn't and we sit in the in-between right and if you can't prove

00:12:17.320 something with a student there's no what are you going to do it's very i don't want to say it's

00:12:23.420 a court of law but in essence it is so and so said something no i didn't they heard me wrong

00:12:29.020 they took it wrong i was talking to somebody else the the list of stuff and then you have

00:12:33.420 students backing them up right here's the problem or here's the i don't know if it's a solution but

00:12:40.620 here's the possible solution you look at those kids and say something's broken i'm not going to

00:12:48.540 sit here and say and and prove i'm not going to bug each classroom and have cameras mounted to

00:12:58.300 read lips and something's broken at my school if this is happening in my space and so i need to fix

00:13:08.860 the culture of my space the culture is broken how do i handle that well you start taking days

00:13:18.380 of your school of your semester in order to educate them on mass not to blame not to point

00:13:26.300 fingers not to just let one kid if they did or if they didn't shoulder all that responsibility

00:13:33.260 because right there in that moment it's not just them and if it's not just them i have a bigger

00:13:41.100 awareness and focus to then deal with the school at large and you can only do that

00:13:46.220 with dealing with the school at large so a metro will develop days that are focused on different

00:13:53.580 kinds of education if something really pops off and and you know we we get into the heart of some

00:14:00.300 of these sort of bigoted kind of mentalities where it's funneling through our school then we

00:14:06.140 go class to class to class to class take all the time we need because you know what we'll get to

00:14:12.800 the math, we'll get to the history, we'll get to the drama, but we're not going to get to any of

00:14:17.720 that in a thoughtful, credible, intelligent way until you understand how to be a good person

00:14:23.700 and what that looks like. And even if it's one student that said it, 10 students listened.

00:14:30.940 So to talk about what it is to be a bystander or what it is to be an upstander or whatever the hell

00:14:37.400 that where it is, what it is to stand up for the things that you think are important, no matter

00:14:43.740 who's in that room. Because if one kid made the joke and 10 kids laughed, I blame all 11.

00:14:50.500 I blame all 11 equally, period. And I think you need to then start tackling the issue.

00:15:01.100 You need to then, and you're not just going to do that once. You're going to do it again and again

00:15:07.120 and again and again, no matter how many times it comes up. Now, if there's an instance where it's

00:15:11.780 clear cut and it's clear cut that somebody said something or did something, you do. You deal with

00:15:17.420 that student directly. Of course you do. Of course you do. But it doesn't mean the culture's not

00:15:22.760 broken. It doesn't mean you don't have a bigger job to do. And dealing with that student would

00:15:27.660 look like figuring out why they said what they said, bringing in their parents, talking to their

00:15:32.580 parents about what's okay and what's not okay. And I'll tell you, I'll tell you, get real quick

00:15:38.880 to the bottom of something. When you bring in parents and you start talking about it on a bigger

00:15:45.280 level, you'll get there real quick. And at that point you get to decide and the parents get to

00:15:52.380 decide and recognize I also work in private school. Is this, you know, whatever ideal of bigotry or

00:16:00.560 hatred or whatever they're perpetrating, is this something, you know, you're going to back as

00:16:06.720 parents? Because if it's something you're going to back as parents, then this isn't the school for

00:16:10.540 you. Now I've worked at a school for 20 years and I can not even on one hand, how many times kids

00:16:19.100 have had to leave that school? Not on, not even on one hand. I'm not saying kids haven't chosen

00:16:23.460 to leave. But on one hand, how many times we have chosen that. And it's because the

00:16:31.560 vitriol or the animosity or the anger or whatever that's come out of the student's mouth is echoed,

00:16:38.800 is supported, is magnified, personified in their parents' reaction in the way that they stand up

00:16:45.660 beside that. So you have to deal with it across the board. But you set a culture. And you set a

00:16:52.220 culture in your school about who's responsible. And I say this to my students all the time. You

00:16:57.920 all are. You all are. I had this conversation not too long ago. I heard a student in the hall make

00:17:03.060 some sort of joke and they were loud and everybody laughed. And I didn't know the kid. It was a new

00:17:08.400 kid to my school. And I walked out and I said, unacceptable. I don't want to hear it in my school.

00:17:15.240 And I pulled him aside and I had a conversation with him. More importantly, I pulled a student

00:17:20.180 aside who I taught for two years. And I said, what are you doing? And he's like, what? I didn't

00:17:25.140 say it, Joanna. I didn't laugh. I didn't. I said, did you tell him to stop? Did you put him in his

00:17:30.960 place? Did you quietly look at him? And again, some kids say things and do things to get attention

00:17:37.680 and be funny and be all of those things. There's all sorts of motivating factors, right? Sometimes,

00:17:43.380 a lot of the times, actually, I don't even think it's hate or bigotry. I said, did you tell him

00:17:47.840 to cut it out did you pull him aside and say not at my school and he's like no I'm like well then

00:17:55.200 you didn't do your job because that's your job and that's not just your job when you're a metro

00:17:59.960 prep that's your job when you're walking this planet and here's where we get to the bigger

00:18:04.660 problem guys heaven help us and we love to talk about kids and we love to talk about their problems

00:18:10.860 and who they are and what they're doing and how they're doing it but guess where they're learning

00:18:14.620 it, folks. Spend a little bit of time on Twitter, and you wonder why they talk to each other like

00:18:21.760 that, or why they think they can talk to each other like that. You look at our politicians,

00:18:26.260 the way they talk about big, significant issues, and people, and human need, and compassion,

00:18:35.480 or lack thereof, and you wonder why kids think it's okay to exclude. It's okay to marginalize.

00:18:43.960 It's okay for somebody to make somebody feel like garbage for who they are because they don't quite fit the mold.

00:18:51.620 Well, that's coming externally. 0.95

00:18:54.060 And in fact, my argument would be if we stopped enforcing so much of our garbage on students and on kids, they'd be way ahead of us.

00:19:04.540 They didn't need the damage they have.

00:19:06.040 It's because we spilt it all over them.

00:19:08.700 Right?

00:19:09.640 We taught them that.

00:19:10.640 We've shown them that in a in whatever sort of tick tock banter or Instagram post or Twitter or the way families are, you know, sit down at Thanksgiving dinner and uncle and aunt so and so have a lot to say, but nobody puts them in their place.

00:19:28.120 Why? Well, they're the we're not going to rock the ball.

00:19:30.100 well if we sit down at family dinner and somebody says something hateful bigoted

00:19:41.380 and we don't believe that and we don't correct them because we don't want to rock the boat

00:19:46.460 I promise your kids are leaving that dinner learning understanding you you just leave it

00:19:53.900 alone it's not your business now I am not telling everybody it sounds like I'm telling everybody how

00:20:00.000 run their lives and i do you know let's be honest like to do that a lot but what i'm saying to you

00:20:06.000 is this you run your life how you want to run your life but don't be shocked when the little people

00:20:13.360 in your world start to parrot and emulate who you are that includes me that includes me um i don't

00:20:25.360 know how much high school students emulate their teachers but that includes me so when i teach

00:20:31.760 let's say and i am sarcastic i'm not gonna make any bones about that of course i'm a sarcastic

00:20:39.760 individual and that hurts some kids and over the years and my initial response was get grow a thick

00:20:47.520 skin i'm generation x please do you have any idea and then i started to learn that when a student

00:20:56.000 doesn't understand the sarcasm it they're not trying to be um unmanageable they're not trying 0.85

00:21:02.960 to be you know problematic they're not trying to be just a big pain in the butt they don't get it 1.00

00:21:10.240 it hurts as though you looked at them and told them to their face that they are a garbage person 0.99

00:21:17.520 Why would I want to keep doing that for the sake of my own kind of humor? I'm still sarcastic. And I, of course, I'm still to some level sarcastic in the classroom. I just try to be very, very careful. 0.99

00:21:31.380 And if a student, if I ever noticed, or if a student ever says, or if I somehow in my head think, oh, maybe I didn't think that was a good, then I shut it down.

00:21:42.440 Oh, oh, oh, and I apologize.

00:21:45.000 And I own it.

00:21:46.400 And I make the phone call to their parent.

00:21:48.460 So the parent knows what went on that day.

00:21:50.280 And that wasn't okay.

00:21:52.560 Sometimes I have to push students, right?

00:21:55.140 I don't mean literally, physically.

00:21:57.560 I mean push them to do better.

00:21:59.200 And in pushing them to do better, somehow, sometimes a kid can take me saying, you have to work harder. You have to get your worth more of a mark. You need to push, push, push to them feeling as though I think less of them feeling as though I, I don't think they're good enough.

00:22:16.480 And in those cases, when I find that out, sometimes I don't.

00:22:20.540 But if I find that out, I have a talk with a student.

00:22:23.280 I have a talk with a parent.

00:22:24.580 And we readdress that.

00:22:26.460 I don't double down on the way that I dealt with them in the first place.

00:22:30.220 Why would I do that?

00:22:32.360 Why would I want to double down just because that's the way that I like to communicate?

00:22:38.840 It's not working.

00:22:40.100 It's not working.

00:22:42.520 Right?

00:22:43.000 And all of this comes on the heels, and I can't help it, comes on the heels of some of the most prominent bullies in our media system today who will say things like, your pronouns aren't my problem.

00:22:58.820 You can be whoever you want to be.

00:23:01.300 We have Jordan Peterson walking around as a historically very respected educator now saying, forget you.

00:23:10.040 I'll respond to you the way I want.

00:23:12.020 don't compel my speech don't compel your speech funny that you take it that way so what you're

00:23:19.720 saying is the idea of being respectful the idea of being of acknowledging individuality which by

00:23:26.820 the way peterson loves peterson hates identity politics until it's men versus women then he's

00:23:31.780 like that's the only identity that exists heaven forbid you try to try trans you know what's the 0.59

00:23:36.920 not transcend that but i'm not going to respect that so i don't care how you feel okay oh okay

00:23:47.100 something so minimal right now do i think that i'm that hurting feelings never happens of course

00:23:54.840 i don't of course it does all the time it's not my point my point isn't what we do incidentally

00:24:01.000 accidentally my point isn't what we do as a byproduct of of a conversation or of an action

00:24:10.060 my point is what we do what we are made aware of that we are doing that is harming that is hurting

00:24:17.580 and what we don't try to adjust nobody's perfect nobody's asking for perfection but we have

00:24:25.760 seemingly role models in academia on social media that believe that whatever their truth is whatever 0.95

00:24:36.840 their ideals are take precedent over everybody else and it's just ridiculous absolutely ridiculous

00:24:46.240 How on earth can we ever hope that kids, that adults, that we start to operate in less of a self-driven, the world revolves around me kind of way?

00:25:08.060 And isn't that what we're condemning kids about?

00:25:10.500 Isn't that what we're talking to kids about?

00:25:14.540 I don't understand.

00:25:15.980 if we can't walk the walk how can we hope that our kids are going to follow how are we going to hope

00:25:25.420 that the the bullying and the harassing and the name calling and all of that stops

00:25:32.620 when grown adults with power and money and heaven help me education how do we

00:25:41.580 transform what they're supposed to emulate well the answer is we need a shift of culture

00:25:51.300 just like we need a shift of culture in school we need a shift of culture in this country

00:25:56.380 in this in in this world we need a shift we need a shift of culture and that doesn't happen

00:26:03.740 overnight but that happens with every instance and every conversation we get to have are we

00:26:08.520 better than yesterday? Absolutely we are. Absolutely we're better than yesterday.

00:26:14.620 But that does not mean that we stop, that we eliminate, that we reduce. You have guys like

00:26:21.420 Ron DeSantis down in Florida emptying bookshelves so kids can't learn the bigger picture. So kids

00:26:31.180 can only learn what he or what that individual political parties deem appropriate for learning. 0.99

00:26:38.520 you have individuals like jordan peterson who wants to cancel things like feminism

00:26:43.800 marxist theory critical theory african-american studies queer theory gender theory thinks they

00:26:49.480 all should be defunded taken off the menu of public universities what that's more knowledge

00:26:58.440 i'm not asking you to take away international relation theory i'm not asking you to take away

00:27:03.640 you know, the political right and talking about right-wing politics and the ideas of what

00:27:09.040 traditionalism can bring. Look, put it all on the table. I just think there's a lot of people

00:27:15.100 really upset that progress is definitely winning out. So they're throwing back and they're throwing

00:27:20.100 it back by bullying and harassing. And if you'll notice, if you'll notice, they do exactly what

00:27:28.500 our teenagers are being accused of doing on the regular as such a childish thing they will point

00:27:35.300 out one person one person you'll have a jordan peterson talk about elliott page or you'll have

00:27:43.060 a ben shapiro talking about um or sorry matt wash talking about dylan mulaney focused on one person

00:27:53.380 on one person and try to make them feel less than try to make them feel less than human

00:28:00.980 less important less of value and you wonder why our kids are acting this way

00:28:09.700 so we got to handle it by two elements a three if you will got to handle what goes on in your house

00:28:18.100 you gotta handle the walk the way you talk the way you stand the way you as a parent as an uncle as

00:28:25.900 a grandparent walks the walk you're in a restaurant you hear something bigoted said you don't just

00:28:33.300 walk away from it i'm not asking nobody's please i'm not advocating fights and and and scenes i am

00:28:40.540 saying not okay do you know if more people simply said to to bigoted ideology in public space

00:28:51.100 if they more calmly went up and said this isn't okay i'm taking my kids somewhere else because

00:28:56.380 i can't control how you speak because i truly believe just like in high school and i truly

00:29:03.020 believe this in the better part of the bigger world there are more amazing souls amazing people

00:29:10.540 people who empathize, people who understand, people who are going to do good things.

00:29:17.120 People want to do good things. They are scared because they feel alone when they're doing them

00:29:23.140 in that circumstance. If you start doing them, just like if the kid stood up to the individual

00:29:28.340 who said the ridiculous statement or made the other one feel like garbage, if they stood up 0.97

00:29:33.160 and said, not okay. Be better. Walk away. We need a level of awareness. Now, I'm not saying 0.99

00:29:43.800 excommunicate that person because again, sometimes stupidity comes out of all of our mouths. 1.00

00:29:49.440 It does. We should have the opportunity to think about it, to reflect upon it, 1.00

00:29:58.880 to change to own it and then to try again i don't believe that everybody should get you know one

00:30:05.100 mistake and you're that's it that's all but what i am saying is you still get called on it you get

00:30:11.680 called on it you get a you get a not okay for me and and you try to do better but our teens aren't

00:30:20.820 going to do that en masse without being taught because unfortunately, and again, no matter how

00:30:29.760 much some people want to deny it, we still have elements of our society that are teaching, that

00:30:37.380 are limiting the lessons our kids learn. They're limiting the history books. They're limiting the

00:30:44.060 theory. They're limiting the ideas and the perspectives of the amazing, the powerful,

00:30:53.240 the impressive diversity that we have on this planet. If we spent more time trying to listen

00:30:59.480 and trying to hear those perspectives, the better off we would be, the more knowledge we would have

00:31:04.540 and the better decisions we would make. That goes for adults. Rather than trying to control the

00:31:10.740 narrative, listen. And that, I promise you, I promise you, will trickle down to our kids

00:31:18.480 and will make them more powerful, more impressive little social beings who will and are

00:31:26.720 changing the world. So threefold. In the classroom, I'll do my job. And if you're in a school,

00:31:35.900 by the by, where this doesn't happen, where the culture is not getting changed by the teachers,

00:31:42.020 or it's not being addressed by the administration, you have power. You have power. You have power

00:31:48.240 with the school board. You have power as a parent. You have power to go to the media.

00:31:53.280 You have power to talk about it openly. You have power. Too many times, people with hate in their

00:32:02.340 minds and in their mouths who are trying to use that, manipulate and work that way up

00:32:08.180 for power are too freaking loud and have too many microphones in their mouths.

00:32:14.040 There's way more great people in this world than there are those.

00:32:17.900 It's just about time we all picked up a microphone, right?

00:32:23.140 And as a teacher, I will do my damnedest to educate, re-educate and educate some more.

00:32:28.860 I will take as much time as I need to to address the curriculum I need to address and the school

00:32:37.100 culture of respect, of awareness, of diversity and equity. And then we got to start demanding

00:32:45.740 it of our politicians. We really truly do. We got to say, no, that wasn't okay. You're going to have

00:32:53.120 sit this one out you're gonna have to maybe run again another time you're gonna have to

00:33:00.080 figure out new ways to address your constituency without using it as a platform

00:33:09.680 for hate and directed bigotry and i think once we do that so maybe we could take care of that

00:33:17.600 next week guys if everybody could just pick up a shovel and we could just handle all this next week

00:33:23.120 we handle this, do it next week. And then maybe let's say come March, April, we tackle the whole

00:33:30.960 environmental thing. Because at the end of the day, the beauty is we are smart. We are passionate.

00:33:38.460 We are empathetic creatures. We just need to make sure we're not being manipulated quickly,

00:33:46.480 a rise of fear, a rise of hatred, which is such an easy emotion to go to when you feel scared,

00:33:51.440 when you feel unaware, when you feel that the unknown is pressing up. If you feel like you

00:33:57.280 don't know, get to know. There are so many different ways, so many different avenues for

00:34:03.120 us to get educated, for us to get aware, for us to truly understand people. And the bottom line

00:34:11.100 is the quicker you go to the simplistic solution is always when you're sitting, I promise you in

00:34:17.540 they're wrong. There's always huge areas of gray, huge shades of gray. And it's up to us to have

00:34:24.120 the conversation calmly, respectfully until we figure it out. Nothing's ever going to be a hundred

00:34:29.700 percent, but we will get better. So I hope that helped. I hope that gives, I don't know if that

00:34:36.680 gave any clarity whatsoever. That was a bit of a rant. I, I still think that conversation,

00:34:44.520 calm, collected conversation on every single issue, no matter what walk of life you happen

00:34:50.420 to be standing in, is the best possible way to end any kind of sort of harassment and bigotry

00:35:00.680 and hatred. That, and let's be honest, guys, let's all just go to therapy. I think that would help

00:35:08.140 anyways. Thank you guys so much for hanging out. I will see you next Tuesday. Same bat time,

00:35:16.700 same bat station, and we'll see what else we can solve. Have a good week. Dismissed. 0.74

Unlearn16: Class is in Session - February 21, 2023

The One Where Use The Bully To Change The World

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