Breaking News: High School Still Sucks

Skylar Stains started Peace Shirt Thursdays at Cocoa Beach Jr./Sr. High. Stains and fellow student Lauren Lorraine recruited 30 students for the Peace Shirt Coalition. They then started receiving harassment from fellow students.

"People just turned on us like that," said Lauren Lorraine. "At least 10 boys stood up and yelled things at me at once, and we couldn't even walk through the halls without a harsh comment being made."

Peace Shirt Coalition members placed peace posters on lockers of supporters of the group. The posters were quickly valdalized. "People tore them down and drew swastikas and white power stuff on them," Lorraine said.

Skylar had similar things written on her posters.

"Someone taped an 'I Love Bush' sign over my 'Wage Peace' sign," she said. "So I tore it down, threw it away, and the whole commons starting booing. I walk by later and find that someone has completely tore my sign down and placed an 'I Love America, Because America Loves War' sign up.' "

A valid question is how many these war lovers are going to enlist? Military recruiters are more than happy to sign up these fine young men.

Racist graffiti has nothing to do with patriotism. The swastika symbol was used by the Nazi Army that murdered U.S. servicemen at Malmédy. Students Lydia Pace and Joseph Marianetti stated that wearing Confederate shirts is showing support for troops in Iraq. The Confederate States of America was forced to disband after losing the Civil war. There are no troops serving in Iraq that are members of the Confederacy. Pace's and Marianetti's rationale for wearing a racist symbol doesn't even pass the laugh test.

The school administration is showing hypocrisy by not allowing PSC members to place posters on their lockers. Cheerleaders and football players are allowed to hang posters. The policy favors the school's Alpha males and females. The school is sending out the message that it is okay to bully unpopular students. That is a horrible policy and enables intolerance. The school should be teaching teens to accept people that are different than them.

:: Naked Brunch: Peace, Love, and Understanding Challenge ::

"What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?"

Sine.Qua.Non's Challenge: 

 
My friend Django of P! has dedicated his website to this very subject:  Peace, Love & Understanding.  While the world struggles, it's gentlest souls, who are often the most sensitive and caring, can pay such a heavy and often personally devastating price for carrying such burdens.  

Django, is going through such a struggle.  Right now, P! is his one solid source of independence, but without an income....  Besides the fact that Django and P! provide some of the most well-thought and written articles on the web or anywhere else for that matter, Django himself has been published on sites/publications we could only wish to have our comments aired much less an article published.

You may notice that P! now sports a DONATE button via PayPal.   The donate button (on P! and above) leads to a special Sine.Qua.Non PayPal Account set up specifically to collect Donations for P!  All donations will be sent directly to Django.

The Challenge:  For each (Minimum) $20.00 donation to Django at P!, I will donate an additional match of $10.00.  If you donate less than $20.00, Django thanks you.  Please be generous.  This situation is quite serious.  I will provide the match for the next two weeks and up to an overall $500.00 matching contribution on my end. This doubles the minimum Django indicates as a goal.

I want to thank you for your help.  Please pass the word around and stop on by P! even if you can't donate a farthing or two. 

This infamous little Nick Lowe tune made famous by Elvis Costello back in the day, is even more apropos today: 

Peace Love and Understanding
As I walk through
This wicked world
Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity.
I ask myself
Is all hope lost?
Is there only pain and hatred, and misery?
And each time I feel like this inside,
There's one thing I wanna know:
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

And as I walked on
Through troubled times
My spirit gets so downhearted sometimes
So where are the strong
And who are the trusted?
And where is the harmony?
Sweet harmony.
'Cause each time I feel it slippin' away, just makes me wanna cry.
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

So where are the strong?
And who are the trusted?
And where is the harmony?
Sweet harmony.
'Cause each time I feel it slippin' away, just makes me wanna cry.

tag: P!, django, donate, money drive, peace, love, understanding, challenge, matching funds, war, politics, nick lowe, elvis costello, whats so fun about peace love and understanding, donate to P!, contribution