BLOG ENTRY SIXTEEN: I’d like to make a formal complaint to the Board of Education concerning the controversial inclusion and celebration of Red Ribbon Week.
Red Ribbon Week is an annually endorsed school holiday with which educates and advises kids about the dangers and long lasting effects of drugs. My very first point I’d like to bring into light would be this: children (aged six to ten) do not yet even know what drugs are. To back up my argument with first-hand accounts, I asked several kids on the bus who were actively participating in Red Ribbon Week activities if they were acquainted with drugs. When most of them replied with a shy head shake, I began rambling off just a few of the most commonly seen/used drugs (e.g. weed, cocaine, meth, even some of their “street” names) to test if maybe they’ve heard of them at home. Again, I received no as an answer from all seven of them.
YET, all seven of those little kids wore red sticker bearing “SAY NO TO DRUGS” attached to the front of their pajamas (the theme that day was “GOOD NIGHT, SLEEP TIGHT, DON’T LET THE DRUG BUGS BITE,” in which students wore their pajamas to school).
The next point was one in which I came up with myself going through school at the ripe old age of eight and a quarter. I knew two things: pancakes with syrup on picture day was not a good idea and if the teachers wanted us to avoid drugs and drug usage wouldn’t it be smarter to not teach us about it at such an impressionable age? As I grew older, I realized something else. Laws and rules set with childish whims is bound to have a major whiplash as the children grow into rebellious teenagers whose minds are unconsciously set on “putting it to the man” in every form and manner. Preferably without using manners at all.
So, after not making out as many points as I had wished, I do believe that I did bring out two very strong ones. I request that the Bored of Education considers removing Red Ribbon Week from the school’s activities list or revises to something a little more kid friendly.
Sincerely,
Ophelia Tombstone
*I apologize, it is the Board of Education, not bored.