Teaching Old Fashioned Values

School Administrators Under Fire for Protecting Female Modesty

Read here part of the article, written by Ralph W. Conner, in: School Reform News; Publication Date: January 1, 2008; The Heartland Institute. Then click on the title above to read the entire article. My, how "the dance" has changed since the days of the "old fashioned ladies".

School administrators nationwide are in a quandary about how to deal with the new freak dancing--or “juking”--craze going on at high school dances and proms.

The Wall Street Journal devoted an article in mid-November to the way the issue is tearing apart the Dallas suburb of Argyle, Texas. And last September, Evanston Township High School in Illinois issued fliers before its homecoming dance admonishing students that “salacious and inappropriate dancing” was outlawed. At Naperville North High, also in the Chicago suburbs, the dance tickets outlawed “sexually explicit and front to back dancing.”

. . .

Part of the problem here is the decline of academic standards. Student achievement and parental involvement are less important to some government school systems than socialization, and that means accepting highly dubious behavior in order to give students a chance to define a set of social mores in which they can feel comfortable.

As a result, rappers such as 50 Cent hold more sway with students than the civil rights icons of the 1960s, who extolled academic excellence as a way to elevate all Americans in a free-market economy.

This tag-team effort causes many parents to stand on the sidelines as another generation of girls is led to believe their self-esteem can be augmented by accepting their own degradation as normal. Those who disagree have to pull their children out of the public schools--while still paying taxes to support the institutions that are contributing to social decay.

Ultimately, of course, it’s up to parents to teach their children the lasting values of self-esteem and self-respect, while accentuating academic excellence as the path to the wonderful opportunities available to everyone not named Beyoncé or Britney.

But the schools certainly shouldn’t work against the process, especially while taking people’s tax money.

Underline this - parents are responsible for the children they have been given. Not everyone understands this, and many children are growing up with no better guidance than peer socialization and weak academic leaders who are not allowed to teach good moral behavior. If we live in a country where we are proud of our rights and freedoms, then we must realize that we live in a country where those civil liberties trump all other rights - such as the rights of all people to grow up safe, contented, and at peace. It is our responsibility, as parents and as concerned people, to train up our children, to correct one another when we harm someone else, to live as we understand to be the wisest, without fear that our government - or our government run school systems - will stop us from doing so. Make it a point, this day and all days ahead, to give the gift of responsibility to children - that is a gift that keeps on blessing in years to come. Putting a leash on a puppy is not as cruel as letting it run free and into a busy highway. How much more valuable is the life of a young human being?

Of course, the whole issue of public dancing has changed drastically from the days of folk and barn dances, and the lovely and complicated rules of Jane Austen era dances. Truly, the "dirty dancing" that our parents and grandparents were concerned about in the 50's and 60's has nothing on what dances are all about today. Some concerned administrators can see the difference. Some parents surely can see the difference in going to the prom in the high class preppy 80's (which still had its problems to be sure) and the "dances" of today. The dance has certainly changed in our culture - don't be fooled.