The Origin Story:
On February 14th of this year, 14 students and 3 teachers were gunned down at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. In response, the survivors of the attack issued a call to action for the one month anniversary of the tragedy. They called for students across the country to walk out of their classrooms on March 14th, stand in solidarity, and demand change in our nation's gun laws and gun culture. This is where the story begins.
In the days leading up to the Walk Out, there was a new movement beginning to take shape on the internet. It was a call on students to Walk Up Not Out. It issued a challenge to students to seek out and befriend other students who were lonely or bullied and befriend them. It was a call to be nice. And what is wrong with being nice?
What Is Wrong with Being Nice?
So let's all be clear here: There is nothing wrong with being kind. There is nothing wrong with being respectful. There is nothing wrong with reaching out to those who are hurting and offering a shoulder to them. There is nothing wrong with seeking to spread positive energy.
A friend suggested that the Walk Out vs Walk Up Not Out has become just another division in our culture, another battle line that we didn't need. That reasonable people have staked positions and that it's a silly thing to be fighting over. Can't we all just get along, already?
So before we delve any deeper, dear reader, let's put that particular issue to bed here and now. There is no reasonable objection to a call to civility in our communities. There is no reasonable objection to a call to end bullying.
None.
Being respectful, being civil, being welcoming and being kind are core values we should all strive for in all of our communities.
There.
But before starting up the next sub-title, let us take note that being a thoughtful partner is a wonderful goal in a marriage. There is nothing at all objectionable to asking people to share labor, share affection and support each other. Who can argue that when two people are together, that they are strongest when they share responsibilities? This will come up again.
What is Victim Blaming?
If we're going to talk about victim blaming we need a working definition. While there are many definitions out there, let us consider this one:
Victim Blaming is the act of attributing the cause of an assault to the victim of such instead of the perpetrator. It also is the act of assigning responsibility for the prevention of the assault to the would-be victim rather than the would-be perpetrator.
For example, a woman does not have dinner on the table when her husband comes home from happy hour. Angered, he hits her and blackens her eye. When her friend sees her the next day her friend says, "Well what did you expect? You didn't have dinner ready."
A second example could be the same friend saying to the woman in the afternoon, "Don't you want to get home and get dinner on the table? You know he'll hit you again if dinner is not ready on time." In this case the woman is not yet a victim, but it is still her responsibility to act in a way so as to avoid being assaulted.
And most important in this responsibility, is that it requires her to take special action to avoid this assault. She must act to avoid being hurt by another.
The Issue of Timing
One of the first major challenges in this new "debate" is the timing of the call to kindness. The memes most circulated on the web do not show a suggestion that kids simply be kinder but they present an either/or choice. The message is "Instead of Walking Out, Walk Up!" The goal of these posts is, apparently, to present an alternative to action against guns and gun culture. And it is cleverly designed because the act of being kind cannot possibly raise objection. If a student is forced to choose between being kind or marching out to protest guns, and they still elect to walk out, doesn't that mean they are rejecting being kind?
Of course not, yet that is the argument implied when Walk Up Not Out is presented as the alternative. It is a well crafted message that permits some to vilify students who walked by labeling them as unkind. They have rejected the "alternative" of Walking Up by Walking Out, so they must reject being kind as well.
It is impossible to separate this new push to kindness from the timing. The implication is clear: If you walk out, we will all say that you do not support being kind because we are presenting it as a choice.
If Walk Up Not Out were truly about being kind, it would have come at any other time than to be presented as the alternative on the day of action called for by the survivors of the Stoneman-Douglas shooting. It would have come after any other act of school mass murder. It would have come immediately after the Parkland Shooting. It would have come as anything but an alternative action on March 14.
But is it Victim Blaming?
In a video of one of the Walk Outs, a young lady addresses the crowd and asks challenging questions.
“These shootings are happening from these kids that you’re cornering out, that you’re bullying...because you think it’s funny. And it’s not funny,” she said. “All of these kids just want to be themselves, they want to be who they wanna be in their own schools.” (Source Link)
This is a thought provoking challenge but it is also dangerous in its implication.
Remember our earlier agreement about being partners in a marriage? Let's reframe this girl's words in that context:
"That black eye happened because you didn't have dinner on the table. You didn't care and you should have. All your husband wanted was to have dinner on his table."
Can there be any doubt that this is victim blaming? In the re-written statement, the blame falls squarely on the woman. She did not perform as she should have in order to avoid being hit. She should have done something different. She should have been more aware of her husband's wants. And for that she was beaten.
Many of us know what it is like to be bullied, marginalized and "cornered out". We lived that torture daily. We were picked on, hazed and harassed. We looked out into the crowd for a kind eye, or a hand to pick us back up. We wanted to be respected. The call to be kind resonates.
But look again at the words of the young woman. "These shootings are happening from kids that you're bullying." In other words: Your bullying is causing these; if you stop bullying and start being nice, the shootings will end.
In other words: You didn't have dinner on the table, what did you expect him to do? Of course he beat you.
You didn't reach out and befriend him. So, of course he murdered your classmates and teachers.
Does This Mean Bullying is Okay?
We as a culture absolutely need to address bullying. Bullying is not okay. In the information age, it has become frightfully easy for bullies to predate though social media and private messages. As our world becomes ever more connected, it is easier for those who want to abuse and harass to do so. And that is not okay. That is not acceptable.
Bullying is not okay.
When a Call to Kindness Becomes Victim Blaming
If we are to suggest that being kind will end these school shootings, then on who's shoulders have we placed the responsibility?
If, when called to action to end gun violence and address gun culture, we instead send our students out to be kind to each other instead, what have we said about our own beliefs about the causes and who should repair the damage?
When students have cried out for action, the Walk Up Not Out movement answers with "stop being bullies". When the actual kids who ran past the bodies of their friends asked us to stand with them, many schools instead said "We hear you, but today we want to spread positive energy because that's more important to us."
What is consistent in all of this, from the memes calling on students to Walk Up Not Out to schools sponsoring school-wide act of kindness is this: students are being forced to take the responsibility to end gun violence in the school. They are being told, just as the woman was with dinner and her subsequent black eye, that it is up to them to prevent this.
Rather than hiring more counselors to address troubled kids, students are given the responsibility to be nicer and reach out instead.
Rather than reducing class sizes so teachers, who can use their experience to get to know their kids and reach out, students themselves are given the responsibility to be nice and all will be fine.
Rather than addressing the ease with which a trouble kid can get a powerful gun to bring and use, students are give the responsibility to be nice to him, and hope he won't want to fire it.
Rather than moving reasonable and sensible legislation forward, students are told that their acts of kindness will be the only real fix.
And rather than telling the survivors of the Stoneman Douglas shooting that their loss will be the last, they are told that they brought this upon themselves with their bullying ways.
"These shootings are happening from kids that you're bullying."
We Cannot Force our Children to Fix This
It is not up to our children to be counselors. No student should feel compelled to eat lunch with a kid they don't like because they are afraid of becoming a victim. No girl should have to smile at a boy she doesn't like out of fear he will bring a gun to school. It is not up to our children to make this right by being there for everyone else, regardless of their own wishes and desires.
By reacting to the March for our Lives Movement, the #NeverAgain Movement and others with commentary about bullying and about being kind, we are effectively laying the responsibility for fixing this at the feet of our children.
That is victim blaming.
And it's wrong.
It is not the responsibility of our youth to address gun violence in their schools by simply being kinder. Should they be? Of course. Everyone should be kind.
But that is where the responsibility ends. Not with befriending the neo Nazi. Not with taking taking a date with the stalker so that he will be appeased. Not with smiling at the boy who calls girls he dislikes dykes and boys he dislikes faggots. None of these are the responsibility of our youth.
And it is sad that our refusal to lead, as adults, has forced us to the point it even needs to be said.
No comments:
Post a Comment