Tuesday, September 8, 2009

An Address To School Children

Look around. Think about how you are treated, about the walls, the 'security' measures that somehow don't make you safe, and the constant disregard for what you want. You know what? School is prison.
Chances are, someone told you that something great happened when Barack Obama was elected President. Look around again. Are you still in school? Is it still prison?
Here's another little secret you already know; those of you who want to learn something are the only ones who learn anything. I'm mentioning this because the people who make a living off of building prisons like to pretend that no one will learn anything if there weren't any prisons, but we know that's not true; if you want to learn karate, you'll bug your mom until she sends you to classes. The same thing works for algebra, eventually. The prisons actually make learning harder, because you have to deal with others who don't want to be there, and are usually happy to make your life hell the second you start enjoying yourself in school.

Pretending that Obama is somehow better because of the color of his skin, or his intelligence, or whatever it is he supposedly has that Bush didn't isn't going to change the fact that schools are prisons. No, we need what neither have- the understanding and the will to stop imprisoning people all day just because they happen to be a certain age. It may seem like this is the only way to educate people, but as I mentioned above you already know classmates who simply refuse to learn anything, so obviously this method doesn't work as well as they pretend it does. What we need so very badly is for you to grow up knowing that we need to get rid of the prisons. I know it's tough, but try to keep it together until we have a chance to change things. School doesn't need to be a prison.

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