Page 34 - Flathead Beacon // 9.3.14

34 | SEPTEMBER 3, 2014
LIKE I WAS SAYIN’ Kellyn Brown
Too Cool for School
SCHOOL HAS BEGUN AS EVIDENCED BY THE first-day-of-class photos of students and their proud parents in my Facebook feed. If you posted one and I saw it, chances are I liked it. I like just about everything, but especially kids dressed in their dapper back-to-school clothes.
Growing up, I moved around a lot. So a few of my firsts days of school were also first days at a new school. I had to look good – or as good as I could afford. Living in Oregon, home of Nike’s headquarters, shoes were a really big deal. One summer I saved up enough money delivering newspa- pers to buy a pair of former tennis star Andre Agassi’s sig- nature sneakers. The department store didn’t have my size available, so I bought a bigger pair and simply stuffed toilet paper in their toes. The next day was the first day of school. I had to look cool.
I showed up with slicked hair, new kicks, florescent spandex shorts with a baggy T-shirt tucked in them, and eager to meet all my new friends. This was the ‘80s – a time when many of us would like to forget our fashion choic- es. But as an elementary school student in that decade, I looked good. I promise.
I arrived at class and eagerly approached my teacher to introduce myself. “Hi, I’m Kellyn, I’m new to the school this year.” She sized me up with a confused look on her face, which had nothing to with the clothes I was wearing.
She pulled out the class roster and looked for my name. She began counting all the boys rummaging around the room. She counted again before telling me I must be in the wrong class. As I explained that I was told to go to Mrs. Burge’s class – her class – she blurted out: “Oh, I thought you were a girl!”
This would be no big deal to an adult, or even a teen- ager, but to an adolescent in a new school with new shoes and florescent spandex, this was a big deal. As I fought back tears, my grand entrance ruined and my classmates snick- ering in my direction, Mrs. Burge made it worse:
“We gave you a pink cubby-hole. You’ll have to use that one today.” As the boys unpacked their new pencils and Trapper Keepers in their blue cubby-holes, I sheepishly wandered over to mine on the girls’ side, convinced my life was over. Seeing my name emblazoned across that small, pink wooden box, I cursed my parents under my breath. I had always hated my name for this very reason. I had asked them if I could change it – suggesting Eric (an easily recog- nizable boy’s name) – to no avail.
Class began, and Mrs. Burge began struggling to close the blinds so she could use her projector. This was a per- fect opportunity to redeem myself. I rushed to assist her, hoping to make a better first impression with my class- mates. She smiled in my direction as we struggled to close the antiquated metal slats. I proudly nodded back, forget- ting that I stored my milk money in my mouth because my spandex didn’t have any pockets, because that’s what kids do. I promptly swallowed the two dimes, which I was cer- tain would kill me.
Sobbing – that uncontrollable kind where you can’t form words – I sprinted to the school nurse. I stared at my bright white, oversized Andre Agassi’s pound the pave- ment as I ran, which only made me cry harder.
Have a great year students. But here’s some advice I can offer with some authority: Remember, you’re never as cool as you think you are. I’m reminded of that every time I visit my parents’ home and see those first-day-of-school photos still hanging on their walls. And once I realized that I would never be cool, the better my life has been.
OPINION FLATHEADBEACON.COM
TWO FOR THOUGHT
Local Topics, Opposing Views
By Joe Carbonari
The full facts aren’t out on what happened when an unarmed black teenager was shot dead, with multiple wounds, by a white police officer in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson. On the face of it, it looks like overreaction on the part of a scared cop, or a life-ending stupid move on the part of the teenager. Both may be true in part.
What is true for sure is that there is a level of frustration and discontent in many of our black communities that needs to be addressed. Blacks, as a whole, don’t feel like they are getting a fair shake in life, particularly job-wise and po- lice-wise. They’re often right.
To justify slavery, blacks were considered less human than whites, as was reflected in our original Constitution – blacks were counted as three-fifths of a person – 60 percent human for political purposes. They are still under-rep- resented politically, badly so in many suburbs like Ferguson, which were once white towns but through urban out-migration have become majority black – about 70 percent black in Fer- guson’s case. The power structure, city gov- ernment, police, et al. has remained nearly all white. The cultures have differences. Misunder- standings and problems arise. Stress builds.
The governor of Missouri just appointed a black ex-police chief from St. Louis to the state’s top law enforcement job. That’s just a start, and the reaching out has to go both ways.
By Tim Baldwin
Having been a prosecutor and criminal defense attorney for over 10 years, I see how many police officers have a dangerous atti- tude that is aggressive and condemning to the general public. Of course, many minori- ties are especially mistreated by police. Un- fortunately, many “conservatives” are too willing to deny or excuse police brutality. They assume police officers respect the law, the Constitution and citizens as they should, so how dare we criticize police. This is a false and dangerous assumption.
This is why I like Rand Paul. He is a Re- publican who understands that police can be just as corrupt as anyone else, that we all share the same human nature, and that our criminal justice systems need to be reformed in various aspects. Paul understands the rea- son that we need police at all demonstrates that citizens must also check police because an unchecked executive branch is dangerous to liberty.
Sadly, the Ferguson event underscores this national trend of police aggression and military-style policing. What is more danger- ous than that, however, are juries who give police undue weight and credibility in trial. If you don’t believe it, just wait until you, your family or your friend is arrested and pros- ecuted.
Following Ferguson
GUEST COLUMN | Jim Elliott
A Holiday Brought to You By Working People
If national holidays have anything in common it’s that those of us who celebrate them by tak- ing the day off don’t give much thought to the ori- gin or meaning of the holiday. That’s true of secu- lar holidays (nevermind religious holidays) from the Fourth of July to Memorial Day and right on through to this week’s day off, Labor Day.
The first Labor Day was held in 1882 – 127 years ago – in New York City. It was proposed, depending on your source, by the Peter McGuire of the Carpen- ters’ Union or Matthew Maguire of the Machinists’ Union. I like the Carpenters’ Union McGuire for it if only because he called it a day to honor those “who from rude nature have delved and carved all the grandeur we behold,” which I think is pretty classy.
It did not take long to establish a foothold; by 1894 23 states had passed laws observing Labor Day, and that same year President Cleveland signed the law that made it a national holiday. The charac- ter of Labor Day has changed somewhat from when it was a day of celebration by working people with parades, picnics, and speeches. We still have the picnics, of course.
No matter what opinions we may have of labor unions, it was organized labor that created this holi- day and a couple of other observances that we may take for granted, but would not want to do without; the weekend and the eight hour day. And as cavalier- ly as we may expect to have the weekend off and work no more than a 40-hour week, we need to remember that those two universal benefits were bought by the sacrifice and blood – yes, blood – of the men and women of the organized labor movement.
movement was a reaction to the often brutal work- ing conditions of the 19th and early 20th centuries. In 1890 15 percent of children between the ages of 10 and 15 were employed, many in extremely haz- ardous conditions. Children often worked a 14 hour day as many as seven days a week. The Triangle Shirt Waist Company fire in 1911 took the lives of 146 young women who were trapped in the upper floors of the 10-story New York City factory build- ing. There were fire escapes, but the doors to them were locked by management to “prevent theft.”
At industrialist John D. Rockefeller’s Colorado Fuel and Iron Company mine in 1914 Colorado Na- tional Guardsmen machine-gunned a tent city of striking miners and their families in what was to be named the Ludlow Massacre. Two women, 12 chil- dren, and 6 miners were killed.
The important point I am trying to make with these examples is that working people do not put their lives in serious jeopardy for petty reasons. What today we take for granted was paid for by the sacrifice of those who have gone before us.
Were the tactics and politics of those labor orga- nizations radical? By any definition of “radical” the answer is yes; but of course, radical is in the eye of the beholder, and what was common sense to Amer- ican colonists in 1776 was treason to the British.
Emma Goldman said in 1917, “The history of hu- man growth is at the same time the history of every new idea heralding the approach of a brighter dawn, and the brighter dawn has always been considered illegal, outside of the law.”
That’s worth thinking about.
Nothing occurs in a vacuum, and the labor
Jim Elliott, of Trout Creek, is a former state senator.