Also totally agree on the bullying thing. I think it’s good that it’s changed and that adults and institutions take it so seriously now, but that means the word has taken on a whole new subtext. When I was a lad and a friend was held down in a locker room and defecated upon, or when a group of older boys surrounded me and beat and kicked me until they were tired, or when that kid from DeLaSalle was stomped to death in the early 90′s, so many people seemed to say “boys will be boys”. It meant that there was no hope, no adults to tell and no reason to do anything but start carrying around heavy metal objects that might be used as weapons in a pinch.
It at least seems as if times are better, but then I haven’t been in school for a few decades now. Plus these days I’m a 6ft tall, 210lb guy. So maybe it just seems better from where I sit. I can’t say for sure.
]]>Bless you. You betray your optimistic, youthful soul with this line, David Eric… A funny, compelling & pithy piece: I’ll do my part to bring it viral. Thanks!
]]>[1] For instance, my friend Michael Dinwiddie, now a well-known playwright and the first gay black person I ever knew, used to, whenever he got the ball, run down the field screaming “UNGAWA!!” At prep schools this was not the done thing.
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