No Child Left Behind

Just a few thoughts.

As troubled as I am by the now infamous terrorizing-the-bus-monitor video, I'm almost as troubled by some of the things I've read and heard said about the kids who committed this horrible act. Were their actions deeply disturbing? That's a given. Was their conduct vile and shocking and reprehensible? Another given. Should they be held accountable and severely chastized? Ditto. But I get very upset whenever I hear people speak about kids being pieces of s**t, or garbage, or hopeless, or "pure evil". They're not 30. They're 12 to 14, and as far as their development as human beings is concerned - they're not done. They've gone woefully off-track, yes. We can give pause, or we can give up.

Some kids are raised steeped in kindness. Some are not. Some are taught that elders in society are to be revered. Some are not. Some have families who make them feel validated and seen. Some do not. Some have the inner strength required to ward off peer pressure. Some do not. Some have bullies for parents or siblings. Some do not. We know that often the bullies carry heavy loads of their own unaddressed pain.  Ill-equipped to deal with it, they turn it outwards. It is deplorable and vicious, and breeds a mob mentality. There is anonimity - and therefore safety - in expressing hostility in a group that doesn't exist expressing it alone. I don't know the kids in that video, but I do know one thing. I know that they, not in spite of how egregious an act they committed - but because of it - need a TREMENDOUS amount of love.

There is something deficient inside of you when you can treat a person like that. A part of the heart has been walled off. These kids may be well acquainted with self-centeredness and self-glorification, but not at all with true self-love.  When you love yourself, you walk through the world with a consciousness of the energy you manifest and the impact you make.  Even as children, we know when we are kind and when we are cruel.  It takes a gross lack of self-regard and self-respect to reduce yourself to the behaviour in that video, and an equal lack of maturity to honestly believe that you can post that online and people will find it hilarious. These kids do not need to be thrown away. They need to be awakened to truth and to consequences.  They need to be confronted, challenged, shaken and pried open. 

I wish I could get them in a theatre workshop for about 10 days, truly. In the most crucial way, they must be shown how to reconnect to the vulnerability inside themselves, so that they can see and honour it in their fellow human beings. I would love to spend time teaching them about sensitivity and empathy not through speech, but through making them inhabit the lives of others. I'm not so naive as to think it would be simple or easy, or that it would impact every child equally.  But if it sowed the seed of compassion in even one of them, it would have been worth it. Still, I've chosen to work so much with children and youth out of a desire to nurture personal and artistic growth and transformation, and I know that at any point along the road to adulthood things can change course,negatively or positively. Those kids did something inhumane, but they are not inhuman. I believe that they have lost touch with a key piece of their humanity, and need willing adults to reach out, reach in, and help them find it. I do believe that are numb. I don't believe that they are empty.

- TT