Facebook is the parking lot for "anonymous opinions" or at least that's what people think. I decided to make this blog to bring my Facebook page back to low key. Still hasn't happened, but sometimes there is information that I just don't need to say out loud in writing to friends. I need to say out loud in person. This is one of those time. So to get this off of my chest, I come to my blog.
I have never been a Paula Deen fan. When I started seeing information about the N-bomb I really just shook my head. Read pieces of her disposition and thought well, she didn't do her or her brother justice. I pretty much moved past this star who has dug a hole for herself. It reopens conversation that needs to be had, but she isn't someone I care about rallying for or against. She likes butter, I like people who want to make the world a better place.
What gets me is seeing friends of mine taking a piece of the controversy and running with it. You have an opinion "If 'they' can use it, why can't 'we' ?". That's an old conversation to me. Has no one actually looked up why Paula Deen is "on trial"? All this was talked about in the first place because her brother admittedly discriminated against women and people of color in the business he ran. From the disposition, she knew about it, talked with him and moved on, letting it fester into a lawsuit. All this is body of proof to why she would do something like that. Does anyone have a problem with that?
Should we be mad at Walmart because they dropped Deen from their payroll for the n-word while still selling rap with the n-word, or should we be mad, because they are double dipping by getting tax breaks and making the work place as such that many, many of their employees have to be on public assistance. Many of them women. They've been slapped for discriminating against women and locking the glass ceiling on many. They provide jobs that turn the jobless poor into the working poor.
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Saturday, June 8, 2013
Christian Student Cheered for Prayer, Native Student Snubbed for Feather
See the difference to me is one felt that a conversation between him and his god need to be publicized and required all to partake. The other student quietly included his custom, not requiring anything of anyone else, but was made to pay for it. I've always been told that religion is a personal walk with the person and the god that they believe in. Sometimes this stuff seems like a who is on stage next exhibition.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Christian Student Cheered for Prayer, Native Student Snubbed for Feather
June 07, 2013
Valedictorian
Roy Costner IV of Liberty High School in South Carolina rips up his
speech before reciting the Lord's Prayer instead.
While
a Native American student from Alabama could still face a copy,000 fine
and has yet to receive her diploma for wearing a single eagle feather
on her graduation cap May 23, the Christian Valedictorian of a South
Carolina school was cheered for reciting the Lord’s Prayer during his
graduation speech.
When Roy Costner IV took the stage June 1 to recite his speech to the graduating class of Liberty High School in Liberty, South Carolina, he ripped up his speech and instead recited the Lord’s Prayer.
As soon as he begins, the crowd erupts in cheers because the Pickens County School District had recently decided to no longer include prayer in graduation ceremonies. In the video you can see no visible reaction from the teachers seated behind him. According to reports on MSN and Yahoo News he was not disciplined for breaking the new rules.
“The bottom line is: We’re not going to punish students for expressing their religious faiths,” John Eby, a spokesperson for the Pickens County School District, told Yahoo News.
Chelsey Ramer, a member of the Poarch Creek Band of Indians, wore an eagle feather in her cap at her May 23 graduation from Escambia Academy in Atmore, Alabama. Before the ceremony the school board wanted all the students to sign a contract forbidding any “extraneous items during graduation exercises.”
Ramer never signed the contract but still faces disciplinary action for expressing her Native heritage during the ceremony. (Related story: “Poarch Creek Student Fined for Wearing Eagle Feather at Graduation”)
So a white student decides to stand up and demonstrate his religious beliefs and gets cheered. A Native student does the same and can’t get her diploma and gets fined? A juxtaposition that hasn’t gone unnoticed by the online community.
A user-generated post titled “So a Native American girl gets no diploma and a copy000 fine for putting a feather in her cap, while a Christian valedictorian disobeys rules by reciting prayer and gets standing ovation” on Reddit has been pushed to the front page of the site by other users with more than 15,000 upvotes and 1,630 comments. And those numbers are steadily increasing.
The original poster on Reddit says, “It’s just frustrating to me that when reading these two stories side by side, it comes across as ‘Hey you Indian, stop expressing your culture! This is no place for your savagery. No diploma for you, and now you owe me money for some reason! Oh, hey Christian kid, you weren’t supposed to be inciting prayer at this event. Ahh well, whattya gonna do? You little skamp, hehehe.’”
User Azbug on Reddit says, “What kills me is she worked for four years to get those grades and walk with her class. Somehow, showing one small bit of honor and pride in her ancestry automatically erases her four years of achievement... The other sad commentary is that young man had the opportunity to speak directly to his class, faculty, and the families of the graduates. Instead of saying something interesting or profound, he chose to cough up something that shows no introspection on growing up... On the other hand, the native girl merely whispers deep personal convictions, and is mercilessly stepped on.”
Ramer’s family is currently not commenting on the events and Escambia Academy is closed until Monday. Maybe next week we will find out if and when Ramer will get her diploma and if the school board will in fact make her family pay the fine. At least she won’t have to pay the fine out of her college fund.
An indiegogo fund started by Dan Morrison, communications director at First Peoples Worldwide, raised the full amount to pay the fine in just five days. As of today, the fund has copy,070 in it. If the family does not have to pay the fine, the money will go toward her education. (Related story: “Poarch Creek Student’s Fine Raised by Online Donations”)
When Roy Costner IV took the stage June 1 to recite his speech to the graduating class of Liberty High School in Liberty, South Carolina, he ripped up his speech and instead recited the Lord’s Prayer.
As soon as he begins, the crowd erupts in cheers because the Pickens County School District had recently decided to no longer include prayer in graduation ceremonies. In the video you can see no visible reaction from the teachers seated behind him. According to reports on MSN and Yahoo News he was not disciplined for breaking the new rules.
“The bottom line is: We’re not going to punish students for expressing their religious faiths,” John Eby, a spokesperson for the Pickens County School District, told Yahoo News.
Chelsey Ramer, a member of the Poarch Creek Band of Indians, wore an eagle feather in her cap at her May 23 graduation from Escambia Academy in Atmore, Alabama. Before the ceremony the school board wanted all the students to sign a contract forbidding any “extraneous items during graduation exercises.”
Ramer never signed the contract but still faces disciplinary action for expressing her Native heritage during the ceremony. (Related story: “Poarch Creek Student Fined for Wearing Eagle Feather at Graduation”)
So a white student decides to stand up and demonstrate his religious beliefs and gets cheered. A Native student does the same and can’t get her diploma and gets fined? A juxtaposition that hasn’t gone unnoticed by the online community.
A user-generated post titled “So a Native American girl gets no diploma and a copy000 fine for putting a feather in her cap, while a Christian valedictorian disobeys rules by reciting prayer and gets standing ovation” on Reddit has been pushed to the front page of the site by other users with more than 15,000 upvotes and 1,630 comments. And those numbers are steadily increasing.
The original poster on Reddit says, “It’s just frustrating to me that when reading these two stories side by side, it comes across as ‘Hey you Indian, stop expressing your culture! This is no place for your savagery. No diploma for you, and now you owe me money for some reason! Oh, hey Christian kid, you weren’t supposed to be inciting prayer at this event. Ahh well, whattya gonna do? You little skamp, hehehe.’”
User Azbug on Reddit says, “What kills me is she worked for four years to get those grades and walk with her class. Somehow, showing one small bit of honor and pride in her ancestry automatically erases her four years of achievement... The other sad commentary is that young man had the opportunity to speak directly to his class, faculty, and the families of the graduates. Instead of saying something interesting or profound, he chose to cough up something that shows no introspection on growing up... On the other hand, the native girl merely whispers deep personal convictions, and is mercilessly stepped on.”
Ramer’s family is currently not commenting on the events and Escambia Academy is closed until Monday. Maybe next week we will find out if and when Ramer will get her diploma and if the school board will in fact make her family pay the fine. At least she won’t have to pay the fine out of her college fund.
An indiegogo fund started by Dan Morrison, communications director at First Peoples Worldwide, raised the full amount to pay the fine in just five days. As of today, the fund has copy,070 in it. If the family does not have to pay the fine, the money will go toward her education. (Related story: “Poarch Creek Student’s Fine Raised by Online Donations”)
Read more at http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2013/06/07/christian-student-cheered-prayer-native-student-snubbed-feather-149772
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