THE PERIMETER PRIMATE: Not For the Squeamish

Friday, February 29, 2008

Not For the Squeamish

For a time, when I was working at the school, I would occasionally check on the conditions in the girls’ bathroom. A number of the young ladies I knew would avoid using the bathrooms all day long because they thought they were just too disgusting. They would manage this feat by not drinking very much at school and would “hold it” until they got home at the end of the day.

Sometimes the girls’ bathroom was fine. Other times, a little too frequently, it was a realm of un-flushed toilets, perhaps a used sanitary napkin dropped in a stall, wads of dried toilet paper sticking to the ceiling (thrown up there while wet), and massive heaps of saturated brown paper towels left in the sinks and tossed all over the floor. It wouldn't be unusual to see every possible surface covered with graffiti – the walls, the broken hand dryers, the paper towel dispensers, the scratched metal mirrors, and the insides and outsides of the bathroom stalls.

The graffiti was applied in flurries. One day there would be hardly any, and a few days later everything would be covered. Permanent markers were the medium of choice, but pen, pencil and “white-out” would work, too.

Periodically, a team of school district painters would arrive to paint the entire bathroom. Afterwards the principals would lock the bathrooms for a day or two while the paint dried. The surfaces stayed clean for a short time and then graffiti would start to appear again. Once, a student scrawled this in a freshly painted bathroom: “You stupid to paint this cuz we just gonna do it again!”

There was so much accumulated paint on the walls that I started to wonder if a thick sheet of it could ever peel away from the drywall and fall on the floor. After years of repeated paintings, I wondered what a cross section of the paint layer might look like under the microscope – like tree rings perhaps.

One time, the PTA sponsored a mural contest, hoping that student artwork in the bathrooms would deter graffiti. It did, on that wall, for a short time until Randy Ward (the first OUSD State Administrator) dictated that all school bathrooms had to be freshly painted in colors determined by the district. That was the end of our student designed and painted bathroom murals.

From what I observed, girls and boys did different types of graffiti, and in different amounts. The girls’ bathroom always had much more graffiti and it could be very mean and gossipy. Their graffiti could lead to some of those ever-so-exciting girl fights that would happen periodically on campus.

The boys’ graffiti was mostly tagging, the scribbling of neighborhood locations and gang names (3800, E.S.O., Dog Town, Norte, etc.) which seems to be the young male marking of territory and the announcing of allegiances. The boys were also more likely to destroy fixtures in the bathrooms, like the time three of them spent a period in the bathroom dislodging a toilet completely out of its bolted fitting on the floor.

I was fascinated with the adolescent mindset behind the graffiti and what these kids were saying to each other, and to their world. For girls it was mostly the professing of love, and of hate.

This is some of the graffiti in the girls’ bathroom that I recorded a few years ago.* I want to warn you that it is disgusting, and not for the squeamish or politically correct. Remember, this is only one episode of graffiti. It was written by 11 to 14 year old girls who wanted it to be seen by other 11 to 14 year old girls.

T-Baye waz here, but now she’s gone. She left her name to carry on. Those who knew her, knew her well. Those who didn’t can go to hell!! Whaaa! Dashell waz here, but now she’s gone. She left her name to carry on Those who knew her, knew her well. Those who didn’t can go to hell!! Nigga T-Baye [scratched through paint] Dashell [scratched through paint] Hopkinson is a Hoe pimple bitch Vanessa Shakela Smith is a Bicth with hair looking as she look like a man Jessica humped dis pole ### is a ##### lick her #### Bitch you Go to Hell Her name aint Even T-Baye Bitch. Bitch Pryde HBG we stay smashing Mexican Puerto-Rican Latin Bitch Fuck U! Puerto Rican Pride Bitch Asn B2K Omarion & Tanya Mexican [crossed out] Asn [crossed out] Fuck [crossed out] Fuck Lil Bow Wow>>Fuck whoever wrote this Hoe Like what it is Bitch T-Baye Bitch Get it Right Hoe you heard me you ugly hoe suck you momma pussy How the FUCK YO PUSSY Smell ass gone tell me WHAT MY name is Mayra doesn’t love Malik SDF Fuck this school Stupid 30’s Lil zane is a fine ass Fuck John M [drawing of a heart] Latanya 4-ever Latanya still loves Daniel Morris 4-Ever R.I.P. Lil’ Dewayne you BEATENEM BOY!!! A WELL RESPECTED S.T.I. BOY!!! S.T.G.’z BITCH LOWER BOTTOM W.S.O. WHAT IZ IT ##### ## ### ASS Dick Sucking Bitch RiP LiL SHAN ALL WELL Respect 77th GREENSIDE ST Boy FUCK MRT [Crossed out] Dina & Travis Knight for Life=forever R.I.P. lil will Vanessa waz here but now she’s gone Angie Saephan A BITCH she left her name because she suck dick ASS Crack!!! N She Better WATCH HER HOE Shes a 1c Hoe Maria is a Fucking DICK SUCKING BACK! Miss Handleton suck dick HB Bitch FUCK STI SDF MARIA A HOE ### Mary suck dick John Mallon [crossed out] Ms. Handleton is a Bitch Maria eate Pussy [with arrow pointing to a drawing] Pauline is a BITCH fuck ##T Pauling Hong is a DICK SUCKeR Jessica Hong suck DICKS Jessica Hong is a little fatass Bitch Jessica Hong is a bitch Jessica Hong said that she was sucking her brothers Dicks! Jessica Hong is a bitch Maria is a slut SIGN PAULINE HONG Lidia is a beach Maria is a dick sucking slut!!! Fuck yall bitches Aliana Martinez sucke John Mitchells + Akeem+ her big brothers NUTS Hoe not! J. Anders is a bitch Nelly is fine cuties ### better watch her mouth BOOG OMARION LIC FIZZ Raz B Mayra + Malik is some dick sucking Bitches! 6500 VG’s ### Fuck who ever wrote this must be black [with arrow pointing to above] you jealous bitch #### is a ### who ever wrote that stank ## shit eat not bitch 6th & 7th ## VGS VGS d better watch your back Lil Bowwow is hella fine S.T.G.’z BITCH LOWER BOTTOM Mexican Pride 4ever Mexican Bitches can suck they daddys dicks Like they always do W.S.O. WHAT IZ IT!!! From a black bitch Laquisha and Tyrina is some stank ass hoes and Shamila need to stop wasting her time with then and Nina need to too They some stupid bitches Jalana ia a bitch Prosty Nelly is fine [crossed out] Fuck. took the Pic-away Bitch Sing Bitch asshole Nelly Ciera & Ernest HBG Condom use them S.T.I. [crossed out] Bitch you’z A HOE! Kristen WhiTe suck dick Arianna Martinez dose this Fuck [arrow] This person who wrote this is a bitch Keiu Pham 4 Life!!! Fuck you samerit you lick yo moma pussy Bicth Maria is a HOE she even suck moma’s dick And her mama is a man!!! HOE

# = crossed out to become illegible

*Names have been changed

Don't these words have an odd, poetic charm?

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Inform yourself about the Gulen movement!

1. WATCH the Gulen Movement 101: Session One webinar presentation (1/22/2014)
2. READ the "Expose the Gulen Movement" report.
3. LISTEN to my interview with At The Chalk Face , slide marker to 32:00 min. (5/19/2013)
4. WATCH the 60 Minutes segment "U.S. charter schools tied to powerful Turkish imam" broadcast. (5/13/2012)
5. READ my response to the 60 Minutes piece.
6. READ my guest article about Gulen charter schools published by The Washington Post. (3/27/2012)
7. WATCH my interview talking about Gulen charter schools, or my presentation at LaborFest (segment between 49:18 min. & 1:07:36 min.)
8. READ my postings labeled "Gulen movement" HERE.

As one observer tweeted, "U.S. media have focused too much on the Islamic nature of the Gulen movement. Real concern is its shady dealings and improprieties."

Please be aware that Gulenists have created a large number of anonymously-operated damage control websites. They started to appear a few months after publication of Greg Toppo's article in USA Today (August 2010).

WE CAN DO IT!

Jim Hightower on populism:

"... what populism is at its essence is just a determined focus on helping people be able to get out of the iron grip of the corporate power that is overwhelming our economy, our environment, energy, the media, government."

Jim Hightower on plutocracy:

"Plutocracy and democracy don't mix."

More Jim Hightower HERE.
Read his Lowdown newsletter HERE.

Plutocracy is rule by the wealthy, or power provided by wealth. In a plutocracy, the degree of economic inequality is high while the level of social mobility is low.

On Bill Gates' ed reform

Joel Shatzky's comment on Huffington Post:

The inferior "test-prep" agenda which bases the pedagogically fraudulent "data" standardized test scores serves as a way of diverting the concerns of working parents who hope that better test scores will lead to better job opportunities for their children. If they realized that they were being given a con job, they might consider other, more "active" forms of political and social protest than simply lobbying for more money for charter and public schools.

New wealth gap report

Research and Policy Brief from the Institute on Assets and Social Policy, Brandeis University, May 2010:

"New evidence reveals that the wealth gap between white and African-American families has more than quadrupled over the course of a generation."

You absolutely must click on this link to view the graph.

Now compare that graph to the one you'll see here.

Now read this entry.

And if you are a person who blames the schools, or believes they are responsible for fixing these problems, you can stop that type of thinking right now.

A Keeper

Posted on the Oakland Public School Parents listserv by a member:*

As a public health nurse, I am working with a generation of young parents who were drug-exposed, who are now having children who are drug-exposed, and it's a whole new ballgame. Many who were premature and will carry some deficits for life.

There are also many other families who have several generations of all kinds of abuse, not enough to eat, violence in and out of their homes, as well as chronic exposure to pollution and nutritional deficits. And there are regular people in the same neighborhoods who are just trying to live, but are poor and can't get ahead.

And there is major grief, and continuous LOSS. So many folks have lost so many folks, people around them dying, of one thing or another, every month almost. Young people (cousins, brothers, friends) dying from violent means, the elders dying too young of chronic disease and disparities in health care, among other things.

What we know about learning and development is that stressed nervous systems CANNOT learn, and that's what we have. Children with many major stressors. Abandonment, attachment disorders, fear, post traumatic stress, sadness, inability to trust or sleep. Many children. Many.

Resulting in: Lack of impulse control, lack of executive function, difficulty in expressing and controlling emotions, difficulty in sleeping, holding still, and paying attention, not to mention following directions and prioritizing tasks.

Our teachers will (perhaps already do) need more training, support, and smaller class sizes. They need major support and help with mental health issues. We really need some kind of expanded vocational track for those who can't perform even at the community college level.

We can't expect teachers to undo years and years of living. The availability of universal preschool would help. Sometimes a classroom is the first kindly, safe, structured, stimulating environment a child encounters.

Wise insights such as these are never uttered by people like Eli Broad, Joel Klein, Michelle Rhee, Arne Duncan, Joe Williams, or any others who are of this type of school reform ilk. And this is why I know for certain that they just don't "get it." Maybe they don’t want to, OR maybe they don’t care.

* Thank you, B.R.

What Children Need

From Playing to Learn by Susan Engel (New York Times, 2/1/2010):

"Our current educational approach — and the testing that is driving it — is completely at odds with what scientists understand about how children develop during the elementary school years and has led to a curriculum that is strangling children and teachers alike.

…Simply put, what children need to do in elementary school is not to cram for high school or college, but to develop ways of thinking and behaving that will lead to valuable knowledge and skills later on."

And to tag onto that, check out this video about the wood shop at one of Oakland's middle schools.

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Friday, February 29, 2008

Not For the Squeamish

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