I think my comments will be easier to read if I write them interlinearly. jeanne

Hi Jeanne, you had asked that we email you our stories and I had been pondering exactly how to initiate my story and, then, whala, (voila - it's French.) today's class discussion. Although I became disgusted (but you need to tell us what made you disgusted. That's affect, and it's important.) and had to leave class early, the class inspired me. So here goes. . .

I was born and raised in a southern region of Mississippi. I was born in a hospital six miles north of the home in which I was raised. I grew up surrounded by my immediate and extended family. Some of my closest friends were my cousins and my younger aunts. However, I was the first of all these family members to graduate high school. (That's an important distinction. Many of our non-traditional students are "first in family" to achieve their educational goals.)

The paternal elder members of my family were cotton farmers. No, they didn't own the farm. They were, in literal terms, share croppers. My paternal grandfather quit his education in the second grade. At the time, he had taken responsibility for himself and my great aunt, his younger sister. While caring for himself and my great aunt, my grandfather worked on various farms along the Mississippi delta. My paternal grandmother (your father's mother, yes?) married my grandfather when she was 16 and had her first child, my father, within the first year of marriage. She then produced six more children.

My grandfather died of stomach cancer when their youngest daughter was age five. My father dropped out of school to help my grandmother raise his six siblings. My maternal grandfather (your mother's father, yes?) was a WW II veteran who fought in the Pacific. My grandfather (which grandfather? your father's father? or your mother';s grandfather?) worked as an auto mechanic. My grandmother (mother's mother?) was an adopted orphan. She was very insecure and married my protective grandfather. My mother, at 16, became married to her first husband, thereby ending her education at the 8th grade. My father married my mom, and became an instant father to my half brother. No, my mother did not end her education because she had to take care of siblings or any other related responsibilities. She ended her education because she was a pretty young woman.

(OK, at this point, I begin to feel the importance of education. You've given the males in your family a kind of free pass to skip out of school. I'm curious as to why, but suppose they had to work. Now you emphasize your mother's ending her education because it wasn't through the necessity of caring for children, but because "she was a pretty young woman" with more exciting possibilities than school. I suspect this is your first validity claim. That each of us has a responsibility to educate ourselves and move into work that will give our families a better life. That responsibility is excusable if work or childcare responsibilities prevent it; but there is something irresponsible about rejecting an education for entertainment and a fun life. If I'm right here, the validity claim is probably functioning as an unstated assumption. Something you believe so deeply you never bother to question it.

Although she had external beauty (your mom, right?), her inner self was spoiled and black. For as long as I can remember, I heard my mother yell to me and my brother how she despised us and generally these yells were accompanied with single handed blows -if we were lucky- but most of the time she was able to put something in her hands to heighten the blow. Yes, I had my extended family, but in the south in my family things was overlooked. (And so you are telling us the story of child abuse, both physical and emotional. Reminds me of Carolina Bastard.I'm always amazed at how much more devastating some of our stories are than the ones I would have imagined.) I sought escape through spending several nights away from home as a teenager. Earlier in my life (4 though 8 years of age), I spent several hours away from home at neighbors. Neighbors who physically raped me and emotionally raped me into believing it was a game. The anger still lingers. But, is the anger at me? At my parents? At those sick neighbors? I will probably die without knowing.

Once again, the stories continue to amaze. Rape and child abuse are the two charges against which I choose not to defend. They are too close to home. The pain is still too acute. So I understand what you're saying. I find your questioning of the direction of the anger very real. This is the dilemma for the child, or perhaps, even the adult, who suffers abuse and rape. You always wonder it it wasn't your fault. Especially if you're smart enough to survive. There's always the question, Shouldn't I have been just a little bit smarter and avoided it? Was I too gullible? At two years old? At eight years old? Children are supposed to be able to trust. So for anger at yourself, do talk to a local rape counseling group. You need to resolve at least that piece and trust yourself more fully. Also, you need to read the recent bvook on rape recovery. Nag me to link to it.

Anger with the parents who failed to protect and rescue, yes. But it's an anger that doesn't seem to permit of recognition by the parents and a reformatting of the social patterns of the family. If it is a dead end, then perhaps your efforts will be most productive for you in rape counseling that can focus on the here and now, and let real healing take place. This is not a perfect world. Counseling has its limits. It can't change people who do not care that they harm. But it can help you to grow beyond the anger with those who hurt you so.

Anyway, my father, a fundamental Baptist, remained quiet during my mother's escapades. Was this because he feared her wrath? Was this because he is a devout Christian true to his marriage views? Devout Christianity does not excuse child abuse. I will never know. All I know for sure is that I sought the love I was missing in the empty promises of teenage boys and young men. And, yes, those empty promises led to disaster and further humiliation from my sadistic mother and fundamentalist father. The words of their disdain I will never forget, but hope to keep at bay. Anyway, the months I tried to have a miscarriage lead to tragic abortion that resulted in my being in the hospital for a week. I still carry the emotional and physical baggage of that abortion.

Now go back and look at the chocolate bunny, and see how easy it is to be unaware of the harm we cause to others. We'll say more of this later, but sometimes a cartoon says such deep things that are a lot harder to put into words. If someone bites your ears off, don't expect them to realize that they've just harmed you. If someone says really hurtful things, don't expect them to realize how much they've just hurt you. Awareness of the sensitivities of others is a first necessary step to a kinder world of interpersonal relations.

But, you may be wondering, how this relates to today's class discussion. Well, I escaped my mother's abuse on the night of my high school graduation. Yes, exactly 3 hours and 50 minutes following the tossing of our hats, I was in Orlando, FL for naval boot camp. I enlisted in the Navy for four years and out of my E1 paycheck I sacrificed $100 a month so I may be awarded the GI Educational benefits. After 8 years and PFS (injury to the knee), I was medically discharged from the Navy. Then, I worked full time and attended school part time. I completed 100 hours toward a business degree at Louisiana State University - Shreveport before moving to California. Wow, what a shock the cost of living in California was to me! I went to work full time within the business environment. But, I was never contented. My desire had always been to study psychology but because I had always thought three steps ahead and never really placed myself into a situation of being dependent, I refrained from my desire. However, my husband (the one good thing in my life) supported my desire and now I am a student under your instruction at CSUDH. I appreciate my college teaching but I understand that any learning will be of my actions. Now to our class discussion:

Jeanne, what is the meaning of college education? Is it whining about a professor (although not teaching an English course) grading a C on a paper that has grammatical errors? Or, is it accepting your faults and improving your knowledge? Needless to say my beginnings were not conducive to education. Hell, I barely graduated high school with a 1.7 GPA in a school that probably ranked very low in the lowest educational ranking state. Although my grammar, my enunciation, and my writing require a lot of concentration, I do not frown on any teacher correcting my grammar. I am in college to learn and would be ashamed to publicly acknowledge that I received a C on a paper which a professor granted the average grade because I 'forgot' to put a period at the end of a sentence, because my verbiage was incorrect, and because my sentence structure had faults. However in class today, several students proclaimed sympathy toward a student who felt she had credence in her claim. I believe her claim was benign and sad that a college education means that students do not have to learn to write properly, and professors are at fault if they mark a paper in reflection of these errors. I know everyone learns differently, but basic grammar and composition should never be compromised when a student is receiving a higher degree of education. Basic grammar and composition should be EXPECTED in all courses of college. Maybe I appreciate the value of an education more than others. Things in life are not to be taken for granted, nor are they to be given for nothing. Learning requires an active participation from the student. However, from today's discussion, I believe students think that paying their tuition and that by purchasing the over priced textbooks that they are entitled to a college degree regardless of their actual degree of learning. Sure, I know there are professors who are 'out to get their students' - hell, I am in a battle -through written appeals- to have my introductory biology grade changed. But, you know, I would be embarrassd to ask for a legitimate grade change (Out of 70 students, the highest grade was a C- and I know more than I ever wanted to know about the instructor's personal life) when I could not express myself in a grammatically correct letter. Which brings me to my closing point, no matter the course name, society (LIFE) requires written appeals and written requests. And, life does not overlook grammatical errors, life just keeps you on the unemployment line with others who felt their instructors were at fault.

Well, there is my story. I hope it wasn't too boring and long winded.

And now, jeanne's overall comments:

First, I must admit that I have absolutely no idea who wrote this. I remember writing to ask if I could put some of it up, but after that, I just lost track of it. And it's comfortable that way. There's not really ever so much that's personal in the message. I only realized that as I tried to edit it, and discovered that there wasn't so much to edit out. The real message comes at the end. "So you think you've got smething to whine about? I had it much worse than you, and I made it out. You can, too. Just quit whining, and work hard."

It's late, and I'm tired, although beginning to feel better, and I don't want to make myself feel sick again this week. So I'm gonna answer from here on in briefly. More as we have a chance to discuss it. I want to start with your question, "Jeanne, what is the meaning of college education?" Hey, that's one of the fundamental philosophical questions that ranks right up there with what is the meaning of the good life? Well, I don't think I should start with Socrates, though I'm tempted. Let's start with the premise Maria Pia Lara gives us that peace and social justice require a recognition of the harm we cause others. I guess that actually does kind of go with Socrates' "the unexamined life is not worth living."

What you have done in telling your story is turn things around on me. You've looked not at the harm you do unto others, but at the harm that was done unto you. And that's fair. That's the very harm I am trying to teach you to voice so that the silencing cannot harm you on top of the original pain. But now, as we come to reasoned argument, we have to do more than just hear each other in good faith. Now we have to try to reason out what's happening here. To reason out whether we should whine, or whether we should just "grin and bare it" and work hard to make the world come out right.

Yikes! Susan, where are you? Praxis in ethics and morality is tough. Much easier to read and write about it than it is to do it. But here I'm faced with reality. You want an answer. So what is a college education, jeanne? Whining? or Accepting and overcoming in silence? And when you see the question worded like that, I'll bet you can guess what jeann'es gonna say. First of all, it's not an either/or. Whining is important. It's a self-recognition of pain or harm caused. To deny it is to let it assume a larger role than it deserves, because it keeps trying to get out of wherever we store our pain and anger. I haven't thought this one through, so I'll not be able to reference it for you, but lately I've heard a lot of antagonism towards whiners? It's usually identified as a female trait because girls were taught to report misbehavior to the teacher, while boys were expected to slug it out on their own, even though teacher theoretically disapproved. But in criminal justice, I've heard this theme lately, too. Stop whining, clean up your act, and shape up. A male machismo, military-oriented admonition, that draws on the social inacceptability of male crying, or even of male showing weakness. Men are strong. Bullshit. Men are men, which means they're real people with real feelings and real pain, just like women. Look at the devastation wrought on our young males in the Vietnam war. They came back emotionally damaged for a long time, sometimes forever. One reason I don't think war works. It devastates us all.

So my first response to what is college would certainly not be to rule out whining. My first response would be to take the whining I hear as indicative of pain and frustration, and to ask what is bringing on that pain and frustration. My first response would be to try to draw out the stories and hear them in good faith. What we're doing here. The author of this message could be described as whining, and would be by some of my past students. But the author would be forgiven the whining because she proved strong and overcame the pain. I don't think so. I think she was so strong she buried the pain. We call that repression, remember? And so she still sometimes wonder if her anger should be directed at herself. Not good. Anger needs to be resolved, and social justice needs to change the agent which did the harm. Burying the hurt doesn't work.

Once a few years ago I told Sylvia Anne Hewlitt's story to one of my feminist classes. She was a young professor at Barnard College when she became pregnant with her second child. She didn't feel well. She told her gynecologist who told her she was fine. She went to a second, female gynecologist, who again said she was fine, and would also not prescribe that she stop working for medical reasons. If she had left without medical excuse she would have lost her position at Barnard. A month or so later she had a miscarriage in her Barnard office, trying to keep up the standards others had devised for her. She asked for family leave to grieve over the lost twins. It was denied. Today she writes for a conservative think-tank. She wrote her story. I told her story to my class, thinking to illustrate the hidden diescrimination against women in the professional world. But some of my young students called her story "whining." That really made me take a second look at what I mean by "whining." I think my present definition comes closest to "Not accepting in silence what I expect of you."

The child whines for a toy. The woman whines for rest time. The person with a headache whines for a little quiet time. The mother who doesn't want the children whines that they importune her chosen good life. The child whines for love and security. And what is the alternative to whining. Why, what my mother taught me. Lie, dear, lie. The neighbors must never know what really happened, that Daddy is dead drunk. Lie, dear, lie. The neighbors must not know that you're pregnant. Lie, dear, lie. Pretend you've learned the grammar, or at least admit you should have.

Given that we are all so different, we all whine, and then lie about different things. If I must lie to cover up what I do not know, then I must be sure I don't permit any change that expose my not knowing. There is too much information in the world today to know it all. I can barely keep up with all the books I bring you. But I don't have to lie about it. Lying would entail accepting that I should somehow know. I haven't finished reading Raine's book on rape. You're all welcome to know that. I loaned it to Rita, and just got it back last week. But I probably wouldn't have finished it anyway, because the comments are taking too much of my time. Why do we have to lie? Why can't we whine a little when we are traveling in the fast lane in an urban metropolitan area in which kids are asking me to please address the shootings in Washington, D.C. We live in interesting times, folks. It isn't whining if we listen in good faith and try to understand why it hurts. It's only whining when we just let the pain lie there and pretend it's not there, and just whimper about it. If we bring it out to public sphere awareness, we soon discover we're all scared, tired, overworked, and most of us underpaid. But you know what, I still like us all. All the more since we've started drawing out the pain and have come to know each other in our fullness as human beings.

So part of a college education for me is learning to value me in all my many manifestations. If I value me in honest and good faith awareness, I'm far more likely to value you. And if I disrespect myself, there'll be anger buried from that, too, and in my haste to prove I'm OK, I'll probably not notice that I've undervalued or disrespected you. Learning forgiveness is a part of a college education. Learning that there's more to life than "winning" against all others. Learning again what community and family are and what they mean to me is a part of a college education. Making connectiions while I'm here in college with others who share the value of respecting the dignity of all humans; that's a part of a college education.

Redefining or reinterpreting whining into socially acceptable terms of social theory means of course that I won't accept silencing Others. Some of us talk too much. I do. But that's usually because I'm desperate to have a real conversation over real issues that really matter to me, not because I'm unwilling to listen. And silence doesn't mean that I agree. Silence just means that I don't feel I have the power to say anything. Or silence may mean that this issue doesn't affect me as some others do, and I really don't have an opinion to express. Or silence may mean I cede the floor to someone else to talk on that issue. But silence needs interpretation. Lots of it. And all too often, it is translated as acceptance because those in power must legitimate their power, and dismissing all challenges as whining or acceptance works for them, those in power, that is.

Anyway, we all imagine the world differently. Some things matter to us, some don't. We can't cover all the fronts. I'll cover the shootings in Washington, D.C., because Kasie asked that I do so. But in this crazy fast-tracked world, we have to choose. That's why I don't think we can judge others by what they accomplish in spite of all obstacles. For some, the conditions in this story would have led to a social worker intensely committed to caring for kids and ending child abuse. My hope would be that a well trained social worker in child abuse would help the children work through their pain and assure them of their worth, even if they aren't gifted to make up these remedial skills on their own. To say, "I did it; why can't you?" misses the costs, like my health, that I gave up to make it out of there. The "why can't you" also fails to ask "what would you really like out of life?" and does college grammar and writing make up a part of what you would like? If it does, you better work at making it up. But if all you want is a job, that is no longer accessible unless you get a degree, then maybe something is wrong with the infrastructure that insists you can't be a janitor without a B.A.

Maybe. But, maybe people stopped trying when they were hurt. And maybe now they've just accepted lower standards. Would that mean they were whining and should be held to higher standards? Well, it seems to me to come closer to meaning that we destroyed some motivation during decades when we didn't understand. So now we need to re-examine and re-motivate those who do need to try harder. But "try harder" won't cut it. What about teaching methods that would supply the missing pieces, but only the missing pieces as they were needed? Remedial skills in this country have always been taken out of the learner's hide. You missed it when we taught it; you catch up on your own, after school, or with an extra semester or two. But what if it wasn't your fault that you missed it? What if your teacher didn't get it? What if your school wasn't a very good place to learn? Is it fair to ask all students to make that up on their own, even if some can? And here we are back at Rawls' justice as fairness.

I'm tired now. I quit. I hope I've sufficiently confused you that now you don't know which side you're on. That's public sphere governance. I'll get more comments up as fast as I can. jeanne

On Saturday, October 19, 2002, Kimberly Radford wrote:

Hi
I am having a difficult time linking to many of the things you have listed. Wondering if it is just me?

I thought I would share part of my job that disturbs me. I work with families that are off track for whatever the reason, but in any case they are. In the past two weeks there have been 3 students who wanted to die. One that actually cut her wrists with the end of a pencil. It's not the fact that they tried, but the fact that the teachers I work with don't realize that there is a reason why these kids don't learn. They don't understand that these kids have lives outside the 6 hours of school. For some students school is a safe haven away from the hazards of home and for others, they carry with them the burden of what exists in the darkness of that good old house they should be able to call home. We don't look at these kids as victims of their environment. We simply say that if we can make it out than so can they. It's just not true. The past two weeks for me has been difficult. I feel the need to reexamine how I have treated my own kids. I feel I have given much thought to the kids who feel that they can't live with the circumstances from which they come. I am greatly disappointed with the adults I work with. It is hard being a kid when you don't have a bunch of crap in your life. Can you imagine what it would be like if your parent had a problem such as depression? Or maybe one of them is a drug addict? Or maybe you live in fostercare with the lingering thought of why didn't they want me? I guess my point would be that we are all not alike and everyone handles things differently. There is something to be said about people who come out of a situation and teach others the value of selfworth. But...it is something entirely different when you have lived and experienced, but still manage to judge.
Just a thought.
Kimberly Radford

KImberly, take a look at the piece above and see how it fits your comments. jeanne

Fracisco Rodriguez' discussion on Thursday goes here.

So does Denise's story.

And so does some Alfie Kohn.

Francisco, you, too. When you say that the state mandates will give all an equal chance at learning, I think you need to investigate state mandates a little more deeply. jeanne