Racism

Tonight, Daddy was doing this, what you see above, until after eleven or so.  It was the start of the ONE Marriage Conference today, and the church built this elevator above as a photo op.  It's a recreation of an elevator used during a video at the Golden Globe Awards this past year.  The door would open and celebrities would be in there dancing or doing zany things.  At the conference, there wasn't a single person that told me, "Hey, that's the elevator from the Golden Globes!"  In fact, I had to look it up a few days ago to see why there's this elevator photo op up there.  Still, it was a neat idea, and there were quite a few people posing for pictures - and videos - in this elevator that doesn't go anywhere.  Daddy had their cell phones to take pictures with, and a remote control to open and shut the door.

Being at a marriage conference, there was one thing that couples were largely doing when the door was opening, and you can see that above.  So yes, for the next two days, my official job is pretty much taking pictures of people making out in an elevator.

Yeah.

Unfortunately, the thing that has been on my mind - and will be for this whole weekend - is an incident on the bus this afternoon involving my daughter, Madison.

This portion of the blog was written a few days later, mainly because I was waiting to get the account of things from different witnesses, and I've been a bit too distressed to actually type it out.  I won't go into tremendous detail here, but I do have all the specifics because I was able to interview a girl who saw all of this, and there were two (or three) other witnesses to confirm what happened.

First of all, there were the bullies.  These were eighth grade boys on the bus, and evidently they have been able to make fun of other kids on the bus for a good deal of time.  They were trouble, and they were moved from their seats earlier in the year because they were trouble.  But now they have become trouble again, for reasons you'll read about in a moment.  They were sitting near Madison.

They were taunting a special needs girl, which says all you need to know about their character at this point.  When I was younger, you never teased a girl.  If you do that, if you make fun of a girl, you can never win.  Ever.  I think that rule still applies of course.  And these boys in just a few short days would learn that the hard way, but I'm getting ahead of myself - as I said, I'm typing this a few days after the event occurred.  It's actually Tuesday morning now.

So these boys were making fun of a special needs girl, and that's when Madison told the boys to leave her alone.  And here's where I have to say the obvious:  I'm so proud of her for this moment.  She knew what they were doing was wrong, and she called them out on it.

But she's in sixth grade, and they are eighth grade boys, so they now began to focus their insults on her instead.  And lacking any dignity or self control, they went for the jugular.  Initially, their questions were obscene.  I know what they were asking, and for anyone to ask a sixth grader these types of things, it's obscene.  If I asked these types of questions to a sixth grade girl, I would be arrested.

As if that were bad enough, next, it went to race.  We don't understand racism.  I don't understand it, and of course at the same time I have the benefit of not being affected as others are.  But my daughter experienced it on the bus today - these two boys were saying a lot of racist things, and they didn't stop.  Madison called them out on it, and told them to stop being racist.  But it was two older boys versus one sixth grader.

But not for long.  She wasn't completely alone, and here's where I'm so amazingly grateful for her friend Jaycie.  This other girl goes to church with Madison, and in fact her mom is a big part of the KidPak acting team.  And there's another boy on the bus too, one named Jackson.  He stood up for Madison too.  Both of them are bigger, and both began telling the boys to stop.

But the boys don't have common sense.  They didn't stop.  They were poking fun of Madison's skin color, and her hair, and asking her if she was from North Korea and wanted to bomb America. They said that she wasn't white, and that was gross.  Madison was upset.  I'm upset typing this.

You might ask where the bus driver was in all of this.  I don't know.  And neither do the kids - that was one of their biggest complaints.  Madison complained, why doesn't he do anything?  Jaycie felt the same way.

Again, I have the benefit of typing this now, a few days later.  I know how things work out looking back a few days.  But at this time on Friday, I am distressed.  We are distressed on Saturday and Sunday too.  We don't know the whole story until Sunday, including these awful details.  I'll be honest:  I broke down and cried at one point, hearing some of the racial slurs and obscene questions.  It weighed on our hearts all weekend:  what will those "in charge" do about this?  Please don't let Madison down on this, I prayed.  She needs to be able to trust in the system and the authorities.

It was Sunday afternoon that it just so happened that the main instigator was literally in our front yard on the way home from church.  This was just after I heard every detail.  There he was, and I've never really seen him before on this side of the neighborhood.  What an odd coincidence.  He was wandering around with some friends on bikes, and just so happened to stop there.  And of course I'm a dad and I want to obliterate him.  I want to threaten him with his life.  I spoke with Pastor Lance and one of our security folks here, and they too wanted to "visit" this boy right away.  But I held back and didn't even really look his way:  he's in for a surprise, I thought.  You're dead and you just don't know it yet.

And we were right - by Monday afternoon, we knew he was in serious trouble.  The assistant principal couldn't say specifically, but he is a dad to a little girl too, and that's why I reached out to him.  But he said that "we won't have to worry about those boys anymore."

Because this was serious.  These days, it's odd how you could probably be caught with a beer in school, and that's a huge deal.  But it's not as big a deal as using racial slurs.  And of course, it's not as big a deal as obscene questions to a sixth grade girl.

We were worried all weekend.  These boys really hurt her, and Madison didn't want to talk about it much, only when pressed for details.  Even so, she wasn't going to retell the story, because she was trying to blot it from her mind.  That part was left to her friend Jaycie, who was thankfully there to tell every detail and stand up for her friend. I cannot even begin to express how thankful I am for Jaycie right now.  This girl stood up for Madison, and was a real hero today.  She got called names too:  she was called a feminist by those boys.  Was that supposed to be an insult?  A feminist is someone who believes that girls should be treated the same as boys.  Look it up, kiddos.  We had to laugh at the lack of intelligence on display, particularly with some of the other completely inane things they were saying.

But Jaycie said the smart things, and did the right thing - even if the bus driver did not.  She was the hero, and she spoke to the assistant principal on Monday morning as well, sealing the deal.  So did the other boy, Jackson.  He testified as well.  We have yet to reach out to him to thank him.  And when Madison came in to that office on Monday, she was nervous, but she told them what happened as well.  Or, at least she confirmed it all when they read the story to her.  She was the primary victim here, so she didn't need to say that much.  The witnesses said all that was needed to be said.  Those boys were toast.  They're not riding the bus for a while.

For a time this weekend, our hearts were so heavy.  All of us.  Contrast that to what things would be like Monday afternoon, after the "sentencing."  To quote The Tick, the boys got "a justice sandwich, no toppings necessary."

At this point Tuesday morning, they haven't apologized to Madison.  I've never met them.  We passed by them at the bus stop Monday morning on the way to school, and they probably had no idea this was the last time they were using that bus stop for a long time.

Hopefully their behavior will change here.  Because this sort of uncontrolled dialogue could get them hospitalized.  Seriously, there are other dads who would see to that.  There are other friends that would see to that.  There are people in high school, people of other races, that won't be so friendly when they see a person known to spout out racism walking down the hallway.  There are girls that won't think you're such a nice guy when they hear about you asking a sixth grader obscene questions. In all of this, hopefully they're learning a lesson earlier here, one that will save them a lot more pain later.  It hurts now, but it will be worse later.

Racism is ugly, isn't it?  As we said earlier, we don't understand it.  But now our family has been affected by it, if only slightly.  It's such an odd thing because it makes no sense.  It makes no sense to Madison either.  It's as if you're speaking another language - the words coming out of your mouth are so ridiculous.  How can you even think that way?  We're not insulted, but instead we pity you for having some major brain malfunction.  You're the one with the problem, not us.  And that's Madison's general feeling about this.  If you're a racist, you're the one with the problem.  I'm doing just fine, thank you.

The great thing is that as of this writing, she's just fine.  She ran up the front yard after getting off the bus Monday afternoon, laughing and talking non-stop about her day.  She even talked a bit about her visit with the principal, and how that one boy wasn't on the bus for some reason.  We knew the reason:  his parents came to school to pick him up.  The other boy had to go home on the bus, but won't be riding it anymore either.

Madison had a pleasant ride home, and is now sitting next to Jaycie, happy and as if nothing happened.  She internalizes things and wants to move on, and who wouldn't?  But knowing how it all worked out, she's not revisiting this whole experience in an unhealthy way.  It's nice to know that in her internal system of "the way things should work," that there is accountability, and that people cannot and do not get away with saying and doing things so awful.

This has been an unusual posting, because I'm writing for a four day period.  I know how things worked out here on Tuesday morning.  Friday, though, we were worried and burdened.  Daddy was taking pictures and working the conference, but this was on his mind so very much.   I love my little girl so much.  Rage and grief swept over me, and also a frustration at the inability to do anything specific.  But it all worked out, and God took care of all of this, just like He always does.  Weeping may endure for the night, but joy comes in the morning.  It's actually Tuesday morning that I'm writing this.  The sun is about to come up here, and the birds are chirping, and our family is happy and very blessed.