screaming at my tv

Ray Bradbury once said,

" Don't ever look at local television news again. It's all crap. There's no news, there's no information. It's negative, negative, negative. You look at that, and you think the world is coming to an end."

(He also said - in a new afterword to Fahrenheit 451 - that watching local news made people stupid).

I'm inclined to agree with him. I regularly yell at my tv in the morning when I have the local news on. (I watch it for the weather but I suppose maybe getting my blood angried up for the day helps me attack those 8 am classes with more vigor).

But today, two stories:

First: a kid was hit by a car. In a school zone. Granted, the car was going over the school zone speed limit, but:
the kid ran out between two parked cars
the kid was not crossing at a crosswalk
the kid apparently didn't look before he crossed
the kid was leaving the school campus before the crossing guard had arrived for the day.

But what is the conclusion?

"Kids are kids. They don't think like adults."

Yes, but...when I was like FIVE, I learned that you don't run out from between parked cars. I learned that you ONLY cross at corners or set crosswalks. And I sure as heck learned to look both ways. And I learned this not from sad experience, but from my mom, from the Safety Town people, from the nice police officer who came to my kindergarten....

Granted, yes, the driver is mainly at fault. But I've had to slam on my brakes, hard, enough times in this town when small unattended children ran out into the street (and more than once it looked like they were doing it on a dare. Stupid kids). I wonder if they aren't teaching kids that any more, or if the assumption is that kids are so ADD now that they can't remember to look both ways before crossing.

I fully expect there will be a Coalition! Of! Moms! who will now demand that the streets around that school - several of the main arteries here in town - be closed during drop-off and pick-up times. (Already, it's insane trying to get around the school at that hour - parents in cars blocking the road, veering out in front of other cars, acting like they're the only ones who matter. I'm frankly SURPRISED the driver who hit the kid was able to go as fast as she was allegedly going). Because, you know, it's Children Uber Alles these days - and it doesn't matter if it makes it inconvenient for the people who, you know, pay property taxes and the hugacious sales tax in this town that support the schools. God forbid we should be able to easily get to Wal-mart after work!

There's already one school in town where they shut down the streets at dismissal time; I'm bracing for that to happen to the rest. Which means I would never again be able to make a quick trip to the grocery right after work because all of the "close" streets between me and them would be closed.

So anyway. Of course we have to expect the evil evil grownups to always take responsibility for other people's children because children are the Precious Future but we don't want to overstress their brains by teaching them things like "don't run out from between parked cars." I guess that memory-space is needed for stuff on all the standardized tests they make them take now.

Secondly: the Dixie Chicks. I didn't hear this one because I was in the shower, but the teaser line was something like "The Dixie Chicks express concern that their latest album isn't selling."

ARRGGGHHHHH! Look, girls: you don't get to have it both ways. One month, you say, "You know...we really want a more exclusive fan base. We don't want any of these horrible red-state type people listening to our music" and then, the next month say "Whyyyyyy doesn't anyone liiiiiike us? Whyyyyyy is our album selling so poooooorrrly?"

Well, there are several possible explanations:
1. Maybe your new album simply sucks. Maybe word-of-mouth has got around that it's not worth whatever is being charged for it (even if it's the Nice Price)

2. Maybe people are fed up with your posturing. You know, actions carry consequences. If you piss off most country music fans - well, a large portion of country music fans are pro-Bush, like it or not, and if you piss them off, they won't buy your albums.

3. Maybe your popularity has waned. It happens to many entertainers. I hope you invested the obscene amounts of money you were making when you were popular well.

I don't know. I don't get the luxury of sitting around and whining, after I read my student evaluations "whyyyyy don't they like meeeee better? Whyyyyy haven't I ever won a teaching awarrrrrrrrd?" No. What I do is look at the comments, use what I can to improve, maybe relish the good ones a little, and try to ignore the snarky ones.

Guess what, Dixie Chicks? In most professions, people don't GET adulation. In most professions, keeping your job and not getting your paycheck docked for some reasons are the equivalent of a thumbs-up. So I don't have a whole lotta patience for people who, during their heyday, made more in a month than I made in a year, complaining because all of a sudden they're not making that kind of jack any more. Especially when they've spent months griping about or apparently trying to insult their target audience.

Look: if I got up in front of my classes and said something like, "I know only a few of you will get As in here because only a few of you are bright enough to really be college students," I'd be getting a visit from my department chair. I may roll my eyes over some of the goofery of my students - heck, I may even anonymously write about it here - but I'm not going to say it to their faces. Because that's rude, and because I know I'd have unpleasant consequences.

....

And actually...the thing that ties so many of the stories I scream at up in a neat little package, is just that: people who fail to understand (or who willfully choose not to understand) that actions have consequences, and so they bitch and moan when something they did, that even a chimpanzee could see would lead to a bad outcome, has the expected bad outcome. People like that drive me up the wall. (Perhaps because I'm so cautious I never do anything without weighing the consequences for an hour in advance, but there you are).

Edited to add: I just got into a big fight with a friend of mine (who has kids) over the "I hope they don't close down the streets" thing. She, in fact, thinks that's a CAPTIAL idea, closing down three of the main streets in town - streets that lead to the grocery stores, the pharmacies, the gas stations, everything. But of course she has a Beloved Husband that she can send out in the evening to pick up milk.

People forget that when you live alone, it's all you. If I don't get milk on my way home, that means I make a separate trip to do it - or I go without. And my life is busy enough that making an afternoon stop at the grocery is sometimes the only time I can manage, unless I wait until Saturday morning.

I'm sorry, but I don't see how we should further inconvenience the taxpayers of this town because some people are idiots. That was the other tack I took - that if everyone obeyed the rules, things would be safe. But of course, everyone thinks they are Special and can't obey the rules. SO we get oppressive new rules, that punish the people who obeyed the rules before...

and she still can't see why I'd be opposed to shutting those streets down for "just 15 minutes"

Um, honey? Those are also the streets that lead to the feckin' HOSPITAL. If I'm teaching a lab and one of my students gets acid in their eye - or they get stung by fire ants and start to swell up, my priority is to get my student to the hospital before they die. Not to accomodate the children (who should know better - this is the 6th 7th and 8th grade school, not the kindergarten) and their parents.

What they really need to do, if they're gonna continue with the "let's wrap our kids in bubble wrap so they never experience any risk ever" is move the schools to the edge of town, set up a protected campus there, and bus all the kids to it.

And she thought that was a dumb idea. So whatever. I guess I won't hang out in her office and crack jokes today. But I get so fed up with the attitude of "any inconvenience or harm you may suffer is worth it because MY kids are protected from a risk that was admittedly minimal and could be minimized further by people using their God-given brains."