Michelle Malkin, apparently still trying to be more appalling that Ann Coulter, has succeeded with this week’s column, Abu Ghraib-i-fying America’s Schools.
From the title (which is designed to both denigrate the topic of corporal punishment AND the Abu Graib abuses), right down to the conclusion, which basically urges America to HIT KIDS HARDER, this is a piece which demands a more scathing response than the patented Wo’C good-natured snark. But hey, here is my commentary (or as much of one as I could write without wanting to beat someone myself). Please feel free to add your own comments. Here’s a link to the report, for anyone who wants to do their own research (Michelle, you might want to read it too): A Violent Education: Corporal Punishment of Children in US Public Schools.
Now, here’s Michelle:
The citizens of the world who hate America are going to love the latest agitprop released this week by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union.
Of course, one’s first reaction when reading a report about children being hit in schools should be, “How will the people who hate America view this?, rather than “Shouldn’t we do something about this?”
In a document titled “A Violent Education: Corporal Punishment of Children in U.S. Public Schools,” the left-wing groups seek to paint a horrifying portrait of the nation’s classrooms as Abu Ghraib-like torture chambers.
But since we already know that Abu Ghraib just involved high-spirited shenanigans and fraternity initiation-like antics, what kind of self-respecting agitprop would seek to paint such an ineffective portrait. (Oh, and Michelle, the report doesn’t cover the entire nation’s classrooms, as corporal punishment is banned in 29 states — and Texas is responsible for about a fourth of all the reported incidences of corporal punishment in schools.)
The report compiles sob stories of students humiliated after being disciplined by school officials for unruliness,
And also compiles stories of students sent to the hospital after being beaten for crimes such as not paying attention in class. And if those were “sob stories,” the kids really did have something to sob about.
and claims that minority students are “disproportionately targeted” for punishment.
In that statistics show that they are.
The report says that “more than 200,000 U.S. public school students were punished by beatings during the 2006-2007 school year,” but makes no distinction between “beatings” that take the form of mere knuckle-rapping versus swats on the backside versus over-the-line violent confrontations.
Because that figure comes from the Office for Civil Rights at the United States Department of Education, and it only covers the NUMBER OF STUDENTS that the school REPORTED as having received corporal punishment that year. So, the number of incidents is undoutedly much higher. And while most of the incidents didn’t leave any broken bones, the point is that thousands of kids are being physically disciplined in public schools each year.
In several of the anecdotes cited, it wasn’t bruised bottoms that upset the supposedly brutalized students. It was bruised egos.
And in several other anecdotes cited, the students were severely bruised. However, no matter how much or little physical injury was caused, I, like the authors of the study, believe that corporal punishment is destructive and degrading, and that children should be taught to counteract, not perpetuate, violence.
Peter S., a middle-school student from the Mississippi Delta, whined to the researchers: “The other kids were watching and laughing. It made me want to fight them. When you get a paddling and you see everyone laugh at you, it make you mad and you want to do something about it.” How about ending your bad behavior and flying right?
Actually, Michelle, it was Matthew S. (253) who said that, and I don’t think he was “whining” so much as “angrily contemplating perpetuating the violence that had been shown to him.” His remark was cited in a section of the report about how students and teachers “saw links between corporal punishment and bullying or peer aggression.” And just what “bad behavior” had Matthew been guilty of that earned him a beating with a paddle? The report doesn’t say, but the odds are, it was something like tardiness or talking in class. Here’s a section from the report that Michelle presumably missed:
The large majority of instances of corporal punishment reported to Human Rights Watch was for minor infractions, such as having a shirt untucked,129 being tardy (late to class or to school),130 or talking in class131 or in the hallway.132 [...]Human Rights Watch received reports of corporal punishment in response to a wide range of minor misbehavior. Students were paddled for eating or drinking in class,136 sleeping in class,137 walking on the wrong side of the hallway,138 running in the hallway,139 talking back to a teacher,140 not turning in homework,141 not having a belt in violation of the dress code,142 and going to the bathroom without permission.143
So yeah, Matthew, get that shirt tucked in and fly right, you little criminal!
Of course educators must use common sense when punishing bad apples.
Here, let’s read about one of those “bad apples” from the report.
One very young student in Texas, a three-year-old boy attending a public pre-kindergarten program, was beaten and bruised during paddling. The program was run at the local elementary school and governed by the school district policy on discipline.223 The boy, who has diagnosed Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), was paddled for taking off his shoes and for playing with an air conditioner. He became reluctant to go to school: his mother reported that “all he would say is that ‘she [the principal] hit him with a board.’”224 The child sustained bruises to his hips that reached around to his belly button.
Doesn’t Michelle have a daughter who is about four now? Would she call her kid a “bad apple” if the child takes off her shoes or otherwise acts like a four-year-old? Would she want “educators” striking her child? If not, why is it okay for other kids?
Of course they should be held accountable if they cause undue harm.
So moderate harm is okay.
But the agenda of these outfits is not to ensure the safety of everyone in the classroom. Their agenda is to demonize unapologetic enforcers of order and to impose international dictates on American public institutions.
“Unapologetic enforcers of order” — isn’t that what the S.S. was called? (Okay, it wasn’t, but I really hate how Michelle is defending teachers and school administrators who think HITTING LITTLE KIDS is a good disciplinary method.)
The main author of the report is a special fellow with the Open Society Institute, funded by George (America must be “de-Nazified”) Soros.
The main (or secondary, depending on who you believe) author of Michelle Malkin’s column is a columnist for Town Hall, which was funded by Richard Mellon (“also helped to fund Watergate”) Scaife. Exactly what that says about Michelle, I’m not really sure.
Replete with references to the Convention against Torture and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the report declares in sweeping terms: “All corporal punishment, whether or not it causes significant physical injury, represents a violation of each student’s rights to physical integrity and human dignity. It is degrading and humiliating, damaging the student’s self-esteem and making him or her feel helpless.” It’s Gitmo all over again.
Yes, because Gitmo was just about hurting prisoners’ feelings. And obviously this report is some kind of liberal/commie B.S., because children don’t have any rights, let alone human dignity. And anyway, kids SHOULD feel helpless and degraded — it’s the only way to keep them in their place.
As usual, the Human Rights Watch/ACLU activists inject claims of racial discrimination into the mix — repeatedly underscoring that many of the remaining states that allow corporal punishment are in the South. They infer deliberate targeting of black students based on statistics that reportedly show that “in the 13 southern states where corporal punishment is most prevalent, African-American students are punished at 1.4 times the rate that would be expected given their numbers in the student population, and African-American girls are 2.1 times more likely to be paddled than might be expected.”But that disproportion does not automatically equal discrimination.
The report never claims that it does. The point is that black students disproportionately attend bad schools, schools which use corporal punishment as their method of maintaining order.
What they don’t tell you are the races or ethnicities of the victims of the thugs being disciplined.
Let’s read some more about some of those “thugs” and their “victims” from the report:
Students and teachers reported that students could be paddled for a catch-all category of “disrespect,” a term which is rarely defined in school policy and is used arbitrarily by teachers. [...] One middle schooler described punishments for “disrespect” as: “if you mess up, and don’t say ma’am or sir.”154
And are many of these “victims” of disrespect minorities themselves? Yes, certainly. But it’s still wrong to hit kids.
What they don’t bother to mention — because it doesn’t fit the America-as-torturer-of-minorities narrative — is the unmitigated violence perpetrated in American classrooms against minority teachers.
Because the “unmitigated violence against minority teachers” narrative is the subject of another report, possibly “The Blackboard Jungle’ or “To Sir, With Love.” So, I’m going to skip Michelle’s little digression about all those minority teachers assaulted by students each year, possibly three-year-old students with ADHD. Instead, I’ll quote a brief portion of the report that might be relevent to Michelle’s tangent:
Corporal punishment teaches students that violence is acceptable: it can make students aggressive, angry, and more likely to lash out against their peers or educators, and it can teach them that domestic violence is permissible.
But let us now return to Michelle for the exciting conclusion.
America’s problem isn’t that we’re too tough and cruel in the classroom. It’s that we’ve become too soft and placative, too ashamed and timid to assert authority and take unilateral action to guarantee a secure environment. Exactly where the human rights groups want us.
And, as we learned in “The Violent Years,” it’s just where the Commies want us, because making our students rude and disrespectful is the first step in their plot to RULE THE WORLD. (The second step apparently involves the rape of strapping young men by pearl-wearing debutantes.)
But anyway, if Michelle is right, then instead of just bruising little kids who take off their shoes in class, we should probably amputate their feet. Because only that way will we look strong to our enemies.
Posted by s.z. on Friday, August 22nd, 2008 at 5:35 am.
47 Responses to “We Must Beat Our Kids to Achieve World Peace”
I don’t say this very often, but the world might be a better place if someone had inflicted a few beatings on Michelle. I mean, it could hardly have made her meaner and more violent, so who knows, let’s give it a try. Because, you know, what an evil, hateful asshole.
So this part is actually kind of missing the evil that is Malkin and people like her:
Doesn’t Michelle have a daughter who is about four now? Would she call her kid a “bad apple” if the child takes off her shoes or otherwise acts like a four-year-old? Would she want “educators” striking her child? If not, why is it okay for other kids?
Because the obvious point is, inside realities like Malkin’s, this sort of thing will simply never happen to her children, because her children are good. Just as she will never be beaten for her ethnicity, never be tased by some cop who couldn’t get it up last night and is taking it out on the job, never be accidentally dragnetted by the War on Terror, never lose her home to the crappy economy, never see her child drafted for some stupid war. These things only happen to bad people, who deserve it. The world is full of people who honestly think this way–think is probably the wrong word, it’s merely a set of operating assumptions they never question–and most of them vote for whatever authoritarian regime the process offers them. Personally, I can’t decide whether this represents a charming naivete or just a sociopathic lack of empathy, but I have my suspicions.
As to the report itself, I have nothing to say that represents neither whining nor perpetuating the cycle of violence. The excerpts alone made me want to beat someone, and the commentary from Ms Malkin just offered some worthy targets.
So this part is actually kind of missing the evil that is Malkin and people like her:
Doesn’t Michelle have a daughter who is about four now? Would she call her kid a “bad apple” if the child takes off her shoes or otherwise acts like a four-year-old? Would she want “educators” striking her child? If not, why is it okay for other kids?
Because the obvious point is, inside realities like Malkin’s, this sort of thing will simply never happen to her children, because her children are good. Just as she will never be beaten for her ethnicity, never be tased by some cop who couldn’t get it up last night and is taking it out on the job, never be accidentally dragnetted by the War on Terror, never lose her home to the crappy economy, never see her child drafted for some stupid war. These things only happen to bad people, who deserve it. The world is full of people who honestly think this way–think is probably the wrong word, it’s merely a set of operating assumptions they never question–and most of them vote for whatever authoritarian regime the process offers them. Personally, I can’t decide whether this represents a charming naivete or just a sociopathic lack of empathy, but I have my suspicions.
As to the report itself, I have nothing to say that represents neither whining nor perpetuating the cycle of violence. The excerpts alone made me want to beat someone, and the commentary from Ms Malkin just offered some worthy targets.
Man, I am so glad I don’t live in fucking Texas. Just what is Michelle’s problem anyway? It’s like she goes out of her way to have the vilest opinions possible on every subject. Little wannabe Fascist twerp.
So Mrs. Malkin is suggesting that these overpaid, union-loving members of a bloated government bureaucracy — not content with sucking up our tax dollars and doing nothing — now want their tax-grabbing, big-government overlords to give them special rights to beat our children? With no consequences whatsoever?
And what did these children do, anyway, except show these socialist elitists the contempt that any real American SHOULD be showing them?
The message couldn’t be clearer: Children, if you show that you want the government off your back, the government will beat you black and blue.
And that is why Al Gore is our worst president ever.
And what did these children do, anyway, except show these socialist elitists the contempt that any real American SHOULD be showing them?
The message couldn’t be clearer: Children, if you show that you want the government off your back, the government will beat you black and blue.
And that is why Al Gore is our worst president ever.
Michelle, sweetie, I had a 5th grade teacher I would just LOVE to introduce you to. You’d be a weeping, complaining pile of…oh, wait, you already are a pile of…
Never mind.
Never mind.
Malkinses is the rock-thrower from the tenth row of the mob, the eighth person to attack the prostrate victim, so she kicks a little harder to make up for being a physical coward.
That’s merely commonplace. What’s remarkable is that she, like Goldberg, rapidly approaches forty years of age with no sign of having ever progressed beyond her high-school Reaganism, of having ever learned to construct an argument or evaluate one; in fact, it’s what both have been rewarded for all their adult lives. And it shows. If the Malkinses’ vileness or Goldberg’s stupidity ever required rebuttal that day is past. Today it is sufficient to simply point at them. And warn the children.
That’s merely commonplace. What’s remarkable is that she, like Goldberg, rapidly approaches forty years of age with no sign of having ever progressed beyond her high-school Reaganism, of having ever learned to construct an argument or evaluate one; in fact, it’s what both have been rewarded for all their adult lives. And it shows. If the Malkinses’ vileness or Goldberg’s stupidity ever required rebuttal that day is past. Today it is sufficient to simply point at them. And warn the children.
Well, I do live in fucking Texas (since 1970) and I’ve never been entirely sure if we actually have a disproportionate number of assholes here or if the ones we have are just more flamboyant than the national average and therefore get more attention. In truth, I’m inclined to believe both. I’d like to take comfort in the fact that at least we didn’t produce Malkin, but the fact is that the ones we DID produce make such comfort impossible.
I love coming to Wo’C for the brilliant snark as well as the fun comments.
OK, fun and insightful comments.
But I’m really swamped today (vacation soon, yay!!1!) and Michelle is a big ol’ bag of Teh Stoopid that I really can’t grapple with today.
But, damn, she is getting cranky in her ongoing dumbassedness. Does it never get old?
OK, fun and insightful comments.
But I’m really swamped today (vacation soon, yay!!1!) and Michelle is a big ol’ bag of Teh Stoopid that I really can’t grapple with today.
But, damn, she is getting cranky in her ongoing dumbassedness. Does it never get old?
A side note: according to the Bush administration policies in Iraq and Afghanistan, John McCain was not tortured in Vietnam, which makes him a felonious traitor.
Michelle Malkin…anyone reading this column would call the Maryland children’s protective services in to investigate her.
Michelle Malkin…anyone reading this column would call the Maryland children’s protective services in to investigate her.
placative
Is this even a word? I always use “placating”…
Is this even a word? I always use “placating”…
Way back in the day when Malkin was still getting into the swing of things, I recall her arguing against anti-bullying programs in schools because they would be used to protect gay students. At the time, I wondered how a person could be so heartless as to victimize children to fulfill her political views. That seems quaint now.
Point is, this is nothing new. I guess Malkin decided that allowing kids to be beaten by their peers was insufficient. That and, like D. Sidhe, I think Malkin is under the assumption that this will never happen to her own kin – note the barely repressed antipathy towards black “thugs,” the perpetual other.
Of course, this is all moot to Malkin. She’s late hatred and anger destroy her brain.
Point is, this is nothing new. I guess Malkin decided that allowing kids to be beaten by their peers was insufficient. That and, like D. Sidhe, I think Malkin is under the assumption that this will never happen to her own kin – note the barely repressed antipathy towards black “thugs,” the perpetual other.
Of course, this is all moot to Malkin. She’s late hatred and anger destroy her brain.
Does anybody else suspect that Michelle is just externalizing an intense personal interest in “corporal punishment”? Even if most of the fetish sites out there are too liberal for her, the “Christian Domestic Discipline” community might be able to give her some inspiration.
Hey, it occurs to me: she’s channeling her cheerleading.
“Hit ‘em again! Hit ‘em again! Harder! Harder!”
“Hit ‘em again! Hit ‘em again! Harder! Harder!”
“What they don’t bother to mention — because it doesn’t fit the America-as-torturer-of-minorities narrative — is the unmitigated violence perpetrated in American classrooms against minority teachers.”
Do you see the contradiction in this paragraph?
Do you see the contradiction in this paragraph?
Replete with references to the Convention against Torture and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
This report refutes itself by citing sources which have been proven by government experts to be “quaint.”
This report refutes itself by citing sources which have been proven by government experts to be “quaint.”
Talking in class?
That’s a paddlin’
Not bowing down before the infinate wisdom of Anchor Baby Magalagadingdong?
That’s a paddlin’
That’s a paddlin’
Not bowing down before the infinate wisdom of Anchor Baby Magalagadingdong?
That’s a paddlin’
This is, after all, the same woman who stalked a 12-year-old.
It’s possible that Malkin *was* beaten as a child, and is indulging in the time honored conservative tradition of “since I suffered, you must suffer too.”
It’s also interesting that for all the talk of “protecting children,” conservatives don’t actually seem to want to protect children from anything except, well, learning useful coping skills and moral responsibility.
Think about it: they complain that children are protected from head injuries (just count up how many times you’ll hear a con pundit whine about bike helmets) or explosives (ditto in re firecracker safety) or being abused physically or mentally by bullies, as here. They complain that children are protected from future STDs (whether by vaccination or education.) They complain about pretty much anything that would, you know, constitute safety when it comes to kids.
Why again should we consider them relevant when it comes to “protecting the children”–?
And this all leaves aside the fact that when it comes to personal safety – or even mere comfort – all these same pundits are the biggest bunch of whining weenies and scaredycats you can find in a month of Sundays – scared to live in cities because OMG scary strangers who MIGHT mug them (but whining about the lack of museums in their middle-o-nowhere gated communities), TERRIFIED of the statistically-insanely-unlikely chance of being hurt by a terrorist, whinging in print about minor discomforts lack of AC in their hotels, and making careers out of complaining about the fact that OMG meanie liberals are MAKING FUN OF US!!!
IOW, Malkin should shut up about EVER complaining about getting a nasty email or being mocked by fellow bloggers, let alone being threatened remotely, since she thinks all that – and worse, up to being beaten to bruises – is a GOOD THING for children, the little cowardly hypocrite…
It’s also interesting that for all the talk of “protecting children,” conservatives don’t actually seem to want to protect children from anything except, well, learning useful coping skills and moral responsibility.
Think about it: they complain that children are protected from head injuries (just count up how many times you’ll hear a con pundit whine about bike helmets) or explosives (ditto in re firecracker safety) or being abused physically or mentally by bullies, as here. They complain that children are protected from future STDs (whether by vaccination or education.) They complain about pretty much anything that would, you know, constitute safety when it comes to kids.
Why again should we consider them relevant when it comes to “protecting the children”–?
And this all leaves aside the fact that when it comes to personal safety – or even mere comfort – all these same pundits are the biggest bunch of whining weenies and scaredycats you can find in a month of Sundays – scared to live in cities because OMG scary strangers who MIGHT mug them (but whining about the lack of museums in their middle-o-nowhere gated communities), TERRIFIED of the statistically-insanely-unlikely chance of being hurt by a terrorist, whinging in print about minor discomforts lack of AC in their hotels, and making careers out of complaining about the fact that OMG meanie liberals are MAKING FUN OF US!!!
IOW, Malkin should shut up about EVER complaining about getting a nasty email or being mocked by fellow bloggers, let alone being threatened remotely, since she thinks all that – and worse, up to being beaten to bruises – is a GOOD THING for children, the little cowardly hypocrite…
Malkin: “America’s problem isn’t that we’re too tough and cruel in the classroom. It’s that we’ve become too soft and placative, too ashamed and timid to assert authority and take unilateral action to guarantee a secure environment.”For example, Michelle wasn’t beaten enough as a child, which is why she objects to a central federal authority taking unilateral authority to guarantee a secure school environment.
What’s alarming is that this isn’t just an argument for beating children, it’s a self-contradictory argument for beating children that relies heavily on non sequiturs and a general “throw shit at the wall to see what sticks” mentality. She tosses out a bunch of different arguments hoping that at least one will resonate with her audience, not caring whether they make any sense when combined.
The point is not to explain why schools should have corporal punishment, the point is to get people to beat their children. Why doesn’t enter into it.
Pretty creepy.
It’s also possible that for some reason she needed an article bashing human rights watch and the ACLU, and a tight deadline forced her to just attack the first thing she could find that they had written.
I don’t get Malkin. Is she faking, like Ann Coulter? Or is she really this crazy?
Peter S., a middle-school student from the Mississippi Delta, whined to the researchers: “The other kids were watching and laughing. It made me want to fight them. When you get a paddling and you see everyone laugh at you, it make you mad and you want to do something about it.” How about ending your bad behavior and flying right?
Right! Because, if beating the child doesn’t make him submissive (fly right), the solution is clearly to keep beating him until it does! QED. She’s a real treasure; such a clear thinker.
Right! Because, if beating the child doesn’t make him submissive (fly right), the solution is clearly to keep beating him until it does! QED. She’s a real treasure; such a clear thinker.
What’s the T-shirt slogan?
The beatings will commence until morale improves?
The beatings will commence until morale improves?
Michelle Malkin gives heartless, thoughtless, evil-minded stupid ass worthless piles of human rubbish a bad name.
Malkin uses the word “thug” quite a bit, and demonizes the children being ‘diciplined’in several other ways. She likes to use Gitmo and Abu Garab to mock the serious of the punishments for mild rule breaking (what ever happened to demerits?) But it is growing up in this kind of society which helps lead to Gitmo and Garab. I started school in ’59 in California, moved a LOT, nearly every year, lived in the poorer areas, and never heard of a child being hit. The worst punishment was being sent to the Principal’s office, and it was effective. When authority lashes out at people, people loose respect for authority which seems to amplify the violence. So they end up with a scared populace, less easy to control (despite Machiavelli’s advice) than they believe. Self-perpetuating behavior of the weak cowardly and stupid. Their violence towards children creates violent children which helps them rationalize their first act.
Like them, Michelle is a malevolent moron. I would not be surprised if she WAS beaten as a child. She’s boiling over with rage about something, and I doubt its hyperactive toddlers.
Like them, Michelle is a malevolent moron. I would not be surprised if she WAS beaten as a child. She’s boiling over with rage about something, and I doubt its hyperactive toddlers.
Rebuscado: “Do you see the contradiction in this paragraph?”
Neocon/wingnut arguments are filled with contradiction and senseless easily refuted analogies. Subconscious awareness of this may be one reason for their rage.
Or, as Jonah Dougpants says: “It’s central to my premise.” And it IS!
Neocon/wingnut arguments are filled with contradiction and senseless easily refuted analogies. Subconscious awareness of this may be one reason for their rage.
Or, as Jonah Dougpants says: “It’s central to my premise.” And it IS!
“Speak harshly to your little boy, and beat him when he sneezes! He only does it to annoy, because he knows it teases!” Lewis Carrol
‘The Wormface’s (invective) ended with a blast of hate that must have overtaxed the translator for instead of English we heard a wordless scream. The scream was repeated.” (Heinlein 1958)
‘The Wormface’s (invective) ended with a blast of hate that must have overtaxed the translator for instead of English we heard a wordless scream. The scream was repeated.” (Heinlein 1958)
. . . complain about pretty much anything that would, you know, constitute safety when it comes to kids.
Because a certain number of kids (poor ones, we hope, certainly
not ours) need to suffer firecracker injuries, pregnancies, STDs, being tossed out of school, etc., to scare the rest into compliance.
Because a certain number of kids (poor ones, we hope, certainly
not ours) need to suffer firecracker injuries, pregnancies, STDs, being tossed out of school, etc., to scare the rest into compliance.
She can’t even cite a solid example of a sociopathic child or act who/that is a real danger to society (e.g., arson, beating, cruelty), just things that are artificial and controlling like not being on time or sitting up ramrod straight. Control freakism is as much a pathology as any other psychological condition. Perhaps she should be punished for it.
[...]funded by George (America must be “de-Nazified”) Soros.Um… Just to be clear: does she think this is a bad thing?
The arbitrary nature of the punishment is built into the thing, though. For sociopaths like Malkin, it’s actually more or less the point. *Because* the behavior being punished is so ill-defined, it’s basically a way for authority figures to smack any kid they feel needs it for whatever reason. Which is exactly the sort of thing you can get behind if you lack empathy to the point where you cannot imagine that you will ever be anywhere but doling out the punishment. It is less the sort of thing you can get behind if you’re used to being kicked around by life and you know that you could very well be on the receiving end.
So the whole notion of brutal, arbitrary punishment of schoolchildren allows people like Malkin to imagine a world where thugs are scared straight and she is safer. To the rest of us, it offers a world where kids turn into thugs because they learn that random violence is an effective way to make people do what you want, and where we can all be targeted by authority even if we do nothing wrong, which keeps us all pretty quiet. Which is good, because apparently a greatly placid populace is what cowards like Malkin need to feel safe.
So the whole notion of brutal, arbitrary punishment of schoolchildren allows people like Malkin to imagine a world where thugs are scared straight and she is safer. To the rest of us, it offers a world where kids turn into thugs because they learn that random violence is an effective way to make people do what you want, and where we can all be targeted by authority even if we do nothing wrong, which keeps us all pretty quiet. Which is good, because apparently a greatly placid populace is what cowards like Malkin need to feel safe.
It’s Broken Windows for kids — walloping them for not having their shirts tucked in is supposed to convince them that you’re watching every move they make, so they don’t dare do anything worse. What it really does, of course, is create a whole lot of pissed-off, violent kids who get kicked out of school for being “problems.”
I don’t think Michelle is serious about what she advocates here, she’s just trying to gin up outrage and reactionary anger, like she always does. But there are people out there who believe it. I’ve read internet treatises on the proper method of beating your disobedient 11-month-old. Michelle eggs these lunatics on simply for her own personal aggrandizement. I think that’s even worse than if she was a true believer.
I don’t think Michelle is serious about what she advocates here, she’s just trying to gin up outrage and reactionary anger, like she always does. But there are people out there who believe it. I’ve read internet treatises on the proper method of beating your disobedient 11-month-old. Michelle eggs these lunatics on simply for her own personal aggrandizement. I think that’s even worse than if she was a true believer.
Rugosa, it’s also thought to turn the survivors into the sorts of tough, manly, masochistic warrior- and breeder-drones that our New Imperium will need to remain Strong and Dominant against the encroaching hordes, whoever they may happen to be at the present, Mexico or China or Vietnam or Iraq or Eurasia or Eastasia. I grew up in this stew, this is as old a meme that she is parroting here as the one that women having jobs will Destroy Civilization – and part of it is political, and part of it is psychological, half of it the justification for our own abusive childhoods, half of it the justification for us going on to abuse others. The Right are a collection of self-indulgent, timorous bullies – and who better/safer to bully than a child? Anything that threatens to take away the least bit of power to bully children has always been greeted with shrieks of the impending Decline & Fall of The New Western Rome, and claims that European countries which don’t allow (in this case) spanking are sinkholes of godless depravity and misery where everyone resorts to drugs and suicide to escape the misery of not being able to beat each other up with impunity…
It’s pretty much down to, after 35+ years of this, just filling in the appropriate blanks, mixing and matching paragraphs, and hitting “send.” I’m sure you can find dozens of similar screeds in the Town Hall archives, and even more casual complaints about bleeding-heart liberals not wanting people to be able to bludgeon their own, or even other people’s children…
It’s pretty much down to, after 35+ years of this, just filling in the appropriate blanks, mixing and matching paragraphs, and hitting “send.” I’m sure you can find dozens of similar screeds in the Town Hall archives, and even more casual complaints about bleeding-heart liberals not wanting people to be able to bludgeon their own, or even other people’s children…
It’s Broken Windows for kids — walloping them for not having their shirts tucked in is supposed to convince them that you’re watching every move they make, so they don’t dare do anything worse. What it really does, of course, is create a whole lot of pissed-off, violent kids who get kicked out of school for being “problems.”
Well, sophronia, to be fair, sometimes it creates timid, terrorized, terminally-indecisive neurotics who resort to cutting, alcohol, or other forms of self-medication to cope, to the extent that we didcope, while maintaining a facade of happiness and “traditional” goodness on the outside.
Well, sophronia, to be fair, sometimes it creates timid, terrorized, terminally-indecisive neurotics who resort to cutting, alcohol, or other forms of self-medication to cope, to the extent that we didcope, while maintaining a facade of happiness and “traditional” goodness on the outside.
Wasn’t Malkin whining some time back that cutters were just in it for the attention, having seen some starlet do it and stuff?
Interesting, if typically conservative, concept: It’s only okay if people get fucked against their will. Anything else is immoral.
Interesting, if typically conservative, concept: It’s only okay if people get fucked against their will. Anything else is immoral.
America’s problem isn’t that we’re too tough and cruel in the classroom. It’s that we’ve become too soft and placative, too ashamed and timid to assert authority and take unilateral action to guarantee a secure environment. Exactly where the human rights groups want us.
See, it’s one step from three year olds to coddling terrists in Gitmo or neglecting to put some two-bit country in its place.
See, it’s one step from three year olds to coddling terrists in Gitmo or neglecting to put some two-bit country in its place.
That and, like D. Sidhe, I think Malkin is under the assumption that this will never happen to her own kin
See, I don’t get that vibe. Not at all. And the more I read anything Malkin writes about kids, the uglier the vibe gets. I’m reminded of every third redneck kid’s daddy pulling his belt off and wailing away on the kid in public at the drop of a hat. I’m also reminded of the matched ass-beatings I got from my folks whenever I got in trouble in school. And I had kinfolk all in the school system, so there was no way I was sitting down those nights.
How the Malkins discipline their children is there business, and I won’t make any sort of accusations based merely on gut feeling. Still. That woman puts out one ugly vibe.
See, I don’t get that vibe. Not at all. And the more I read anything Malkin writes about kids, the uglier the vibe gets. I’m reminded of every third redneck kid’s daddy pulling his belt off and wailing away on the kid in public at the drop of a hat. I’m also reminded of the matched ass-beatings I got from my folks whenever I got in trouble in school. And I had kinfolk all in the school system, so there was no way I was sitting down those nights.
How the Malkins discipline their children is there business, and I won’t make any sort of accusations based merely on gut feeling. Still. That woman puts out one ugly vibe.
You’re just now noticing that, Matt?
I don’t know what’s more disturbing-the possibility that she’s putting on an act to placate the sensibilities of her target audience, or the possibility that she actually believes the shit she writes.
I don’t know what’s more disturbing-the possibility that she’s putting on an act to placate the sensibilities of her target audience, or the possibility that she actually believes the shit she writes.
Well, the two aren’t necessarily incompatible: “No one hits my kid but me” is a pretty common refrain among certain types of sociopaths.
But given the out and out hypocrisy with which the woman lives, and the fact that she’s more likely to egg on her flying monkeys than do her own dirty work, it doesn’t seem that likely to me. She may do the “Wait till your father gets home” routine, but I still think it’s more likely she regards her own children as precious, a direct result of her own excellent child care skills, of course, and that a tendency to thuggery is… shall we say “genetic”.
To me, the woman seems sincere, and everything about her screams a belief that “certain other people” are the cause of all the things she hates. I know people see self-loathing in here, but I honestly don’t. I get the impression she’s at ease with where she is and what she does.
But given the out and out hypocrisy with which the woman lives, and the fact that she’s more likely to egg on her flying monkeys than do her own dirty work, it doesn’t seem that likely to me. She may do the “Wait till your father gets home” routine, but I still think it’s more likely she regards her own children as precious, a direct result of her own excellent child care skills, of course, and that a tendency to thuggery is… shall we say “genetic”.
To me, the woman seems sincere, and everything about her screams a belief that “certain other people” are the cause of all the things she hates. I know people see self-loathing in here, but I honestly don’t. I get the impression she’s at ease with where she is and what she does.
So she’s just a genuinely revolting human being then?
My noble bride, Illocano Avenger, hails from the Philippines, and she informed me that if Philipino children act out in public, the parents use discreet but painful two-finger pinches in order to get said children to calm down and act normally.
1. Michelle Malkin should have been utterly “disqualified” from breeding privileges before she ever hit puberty, if psych evaluations were ever codified. See what I’m talking about here?CRAZY PEOPLE(myself obviously included) SHOULDN’T FUCKING *BREED*!!!!!! Nor, obviously, should they be given paying jobs for their bigoted, hate-filled blatherings. See how much stress that these measures would eliminate from our lives? Scott’s back wouldn’t go out, I wouldn’t be a borderline spree killer, and Rush Fatfuck Limbaugh would STILL BE SELLING LAWNMOWERS.
2. As shocking as it may seem, even as a substitute teacher, I’ve never felt the need to beat, berate, mutilate or otherwise rend havoc upon the ankle-biters. So, if I can make it through a 7-hour school day without bloodshed, why in the FUCK can’t the mouth-breathers who get CONTRACTED AND TENURED JOBS AS SO-CALLED “TEACHERS”?!?!?!!? Back to the psych profiling, methinks… Start with the breeders, then go to the cops and all who THINK that they’re cops (Rumsfeld comes to mind…), then the entire educational system (and gutting every single fucking “voucher program” that wastes tax money on ENTITLEMENTS for fucking PRIVATE SCHOOLS!!!), the military and diplomatic corps, and then we can figure out the rest from there.
We’d have plenty of people to fill those minimum-wage jobs that they mock so often, ’cause sociopaths like Malkin wouldn’t be allowed to get ahead any moreso than anyone not born to privilege or connections. I can imagine the perfect job for her, something involving a dull shovel and Clydesdales… and nowhere near Tijuana, thanks.
3. “No Child Left Behind” seems to have focused on just that, never leaving the behinds of children… Aside from the already-mentioned BDSM-wannabe tangents in Malkin’s frothing-at-the-mouth, you have to wonder about the personal depravities/dangers/damages in people who think that they can JUSTIFY beating the snot out of children. That having a teaching certificate entitles them to act-out their racist fantasies about beating “slaves,” or whatever in the fuck they’re playing at… You’ll notice that most ig’nant crackers who hate “teh other” are generally descended from carpetbaggers or other po’ white trash who never owned anything or anyone. SURELY Michelle’s privileged background allowed her to work out those dementia on the servants BEFORE she started spawning, yes? But to get back to behinds, what they’ve deleted in terms of actual TEACHING SKILL and PARTICIPATION (in favor of standardized testing that teaches NOTHING), they obviously glossed-over in converting all educational colleges to the new generic producing-the-servant-class concentration. Or perhaps it IS a conscious part of “No Child Left Behind,” to train the sweatshop and Wally World employees of the future to NEVER QUESTION AUTHORITY, no matter how deserved (or not) it may be. After all, with no jobs left for entry-level youth save the military or the “service industry,” isn’t that how they “should” be raised? To never expect to be treated like human beings, merely “units” who are either “productive” or not, who are not deserving of the sanctity of their own bodies or of any methods of attaining “justice” for their injuries.
I’m sure that teh lawyerz LOOOOOVE this mentality, cuts down on the small-money cases by the ton, if you can keep the “little people” from bitching.
And no, her children will never be brutalized by “teh other,” because they have that wonderful invisible bubble-shield that only money and privilege can provide, so obviously their private-school teachers would never DARE raise a hand.
BTW, Dark Avenger, Filipino moms aren’t the only ones who’ve mastered that back-of-the-arm, tender-layers-of-skin-between-the-fingernails pinch. Teh Fallen Uterus had that built into her DNA. As soon as we’d step away or raise a hand to say, “Ooh, look at THAT, Mama–” OW. And by the age of 2, you’d learned not to draw attention to the pooling purple blood under your skin, especially in stores/malls, etc.
Like cops and rubber hoses, that under-the-radar pinch is as common as dirt and as universal as radiation.
2. As shocking as it may seem, even as a substitute teacher, I’ve never felt the need to beat, berate, mutilate or otherwise rend havoc upon the ankle-biters. So, if I can make it through a 7-hour school day without bloodshed, why in the FUCK can’t the mouth-breathers who get CONTRACTED AND TENURED JOBS AS SO-CALLED “TEACHERS”?!?!?!!? Back to the psych profiling, methinks… Start with the breeders, then go to the cops and all who THINK that they’re cops (Rumsfeld comes to mind…), then the entire educational system (and gutting every single fucking “voucher program” that wastes tax money on ENTITLEMENTS for fucking PRIVATE SCHOOLS!!!), the military and diplomatic corps, and then we can figure out the rest from there.
We’d have plenty of people to fill those minimum-wage jobs that they mock so often, ’cause sociopaths like Malkin wouldn’t be allowed to get ahead any moreso than anyone not born to privilege or connections. I can imagine the perfect job for her, something involving a dull shovel and Clydesdales… and nowhere near Tijuana, thanks.
3. “No Child Left Behind” seems to have focused on just that, never leaving the behinds of children… Aside from the already-mentioned BDSM-wannabe tangents in Malkin’s frothing-at-the-mouth, you have to wonder about the personal depravities/dangers/damages in people who think that they can JUSTIFY beating the snot out of children. That having a teaching certificate entitles them to act-out their racist fantasies about beating “slaves,” or whatever in the fuck they’re playing at… You’ll notice that most ig’nant crackers who hate “teh other” are generally descended from carpetbaggers or other po’ white trash who never owned anything or anyone. SURELY Michelle’s privileged background allowed her to work out those dementia on the servants BEFORE she started spawning, yes? But to get back to behinds, what they’ve deleted in terms of actual TEACHING SKILL and PARTICIPATION (in favor of standardized testing that teaches NOTHING), they obviously glossed-over in converting all educational colleges to the new generic producing-the-servant-class concentration. Or perhaps it IS a conscious part of “No Child Left Behind,” to train the sweatshop and Wally World employees of the future to NEVER QUESTION AUTHORITY, no matter how deserved (or not) it may be. After all, with no jobs left for entry-level youth save the military or the “service industry,” isn’t that how they “should” be raised? To never expect to be treated like human beings, merely “units” who are either “productive” or not, who are not deserving of the sanctity of their own bodies or of any methods of attaining “justice” for their injuries.
I’m sure that teh lawyerz LOOOOOVE this mentality, cuts down on the small-money cases by the ton, if you can keep the “little people” from bitching.
And no, her children will never be brutalized by “teh other,” because they have that wonderful invisible bubble-shield that only money and privilege can provide, so obviously their private-school teachers would never DARE raise a hand.
BTW, Dark Avenger, Filipino moms aren’t the only ones who’ve mastered that back-of-the-arm, tender-layers-of-skin-between-the-fingernails pinch. Teh Fallen Uterus had that built into her DNA. As soon as we’d step away or raise a hand to say, “Ooh, look at THAT, Mama–” OW. And by the age of 2, you’d learned not to draw attention to the pooling purple blood under your skin, especially in stores/malls, etc.
Like cops and rubber hoses, that under-the-radar pinch is as common as dirt and as universal as radiation.
Agreed with *nearly* everything Annti says. One exception: as someone who’s worked minimum wage jobs all her life, I can safely say that the only thing that would make a maid job suckier would be having to do it in the company of a sociopath like Malkin. Frankly, she’s dumb and mean enough to end up as super, and that’s just horrible.
I don’t think Michelle is serious about what she advocates here, she’s just trying to gin up outrage and reactionary anger, like she always does.
Which would be fine if, you know, she didn’t appeal to people who bring guns into a Universalist church or shoot Democratic county legislators…
Which would be fine if, you know, she didn’t appeal to people who bring guns into a Universalist church or shoot Democratic county legislators…
D., honey, I know exactly what you mean, I’ve worked for the worst little-tyrant “supervisors” on the fucking PLANET. A minimum-wage overnight gig at the world’s crappiest oldies station came with a steroid-poisoned TROLL (and no, I don’t mean like online trolls, I mean the motherfucker should’ve been living under a bridge, chewing on a goat’s neck!!!) who air-checked me EVERY FUCKING NIGHT, without my knowledge or consent, so that he could call me EVERY FUCKING DAY, after maybe 4-5 hours of sleep, to scream, rant, rage, and make every misogynistic slur that gives McSenile his viagra-powered woodies.
And yeah, Michelle would be the perfect alleged “affirmative-action hire” (to say, “FUCK YOU!” to the actual INTENT of affirmative action, of course) to fill a job like that, whether she had any actual programming or vocal skills or not. ‘Cause the republicunt local-politician-thinks-he’s-a-mafioso FUCKTARD who owned the station would’ve LOVED IT. Another woman whom he could PURPOSEFULLY pay far less than even the least-skilled “man,” and yet use her to keep the rest of us down.
And that’s not even the worst shit-pay job that I’ve ever had, sadly. Remind me to tell you about the job cleaning HUD-repossessed homes, and the only cleaning agent that they’d let us use was AMMONIA… Ammonia and sarcoidosis get along like, well, like me and Biggus Dickus Cheney. And the cocksucker STILL OWES ME TWO PAYCHECKS. Long story.
And yeah, Michelle would be the perfect alleged “affirmative-action hire” (to say, “FUCK YOU!” to the actual INTENT of affirmative action, of course) to fill a job like that, whether she had any actual programming or vocal skills or not. ‘Cause the republicunt local-politician-thinks-he’s-a-mafioso FUCKTARD who owned the station would’ve LOVED IT. Another woman whom he could PURPOSEFULLY pay far less than even the least-skilled “man,” and yet use her to keep the rest of us down.
And that’s not even the worst shit-pay job that I’ve ever had, sadly. Remind me to tell you about the job cleaning HUD-repossessed homes, and the only cleaning agent that they’d let us use was AMMONIA… Ammonia and sarcoidosis get along like, well, like me and Biggus Dickus Cheney. And the cocksucker STILL OWES ME TWO PAYCHECKS. Long story.
Annti,
I was raised by a Chinese/Scottish/American mother, who used the traditional Chinese parenting formula of fear and terror without physical threats, which is less physically and psychologically scarring than the guilt-based Anglo variety or what you went through.
Professor Avenger would give us spankings that ended at the age of 9 or so, and were non-scarring as well.
The most abuse I’ve received was from my Catholic school 2nd grade teacher who would use her aluminium cane to punish her pupils, she was the reason I was taken out and put into elementary school.
I was raised by a Chinese/Scottish/American mother, who used the traditional Chinese parenting formula of fear and terror without physical threats, which is less physically and psychologically scarring than the guilt-based Anglo variety or what you went through.
Professor Avenger would give us spankings that ended at the age of 9 or so, and were non-scarring as well.
The most abuse I’ve received was from my Catholic school 2nd grade teacher who would use her aluminium cane to punish her pupils, she was the reason I was taken out and put into elementary school.
air-checked me EVERY FUCKING NIGHT, without my knowledge or consent, so that he could call me EVERY FUCKING DAY, after maybe 4-5 hours of sleep, to scream, rant, rage, and make every misogynistic slur that gives McSenile his viagra-powered woodies.
I worked at that station!
I worked at that station!
Well, Actor, if you did work there, I can guarantee that you were paid twice MY hourly rate (for on-air “talent,” you perverts, not the short-lived dom shit).
And DA, um, thanks? I guess, for letting me “win” that “contest”? Can’t say as anybody’s used an aluminum cane on me, as far as I know. How in the hell do sociopathic bitches like that GET JOBS, much less jobs TEACHING?!?!?!
Oh, wait. Vatican. ‘Nuff said.
And DA, um, thanks? I guess, for letting me “win” that “contest”? Can’t say as anybody’s used an aluminum cane on me, as far as I know. How in the hell do sociopathic bitches like that GET JOBS, much less jobs TEACHING?!?!?!
Oh, wait. Vatican. ‘Nuff said.
Said “teacher/torturer” wasn’t a nun, FWIW.
I don’t remember much about my first-grade teacher other than she despaired over my handwriting, and cast me in the lead role in a mini-mini-play about Christ coming out of the tomb in the lead road.(I got points from the gross, I wasn’t a fool even then.)
I don’t remember much about my first-grade teacher other than she despaired over my handwriting, and cast me in the lead role in a mini-mini-play about Christ coming out of the tomb in the lead road.(I got points from the gross, I wasn’t a fool even then.)
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