I'm here bearing cookies. Who wants a cookie?? I like to sing; however, in the shower.Michael: Can you tell who’s gay and who’s not? Dwight: Of course. Michael: What about Oscar? Dwight: Absolutely not. Michael: Well, he is. Dwight: Well, he’s not dressed in women’s clothes, so… Michael: There could be others. I need to know. I don’t want to offend anybody else. Dwight: You could assume everyone is, and not say anything offensive. Michael: Yeah. I’m sure everyone would appreciate me treating them like they were gay. (The Office, Season 3, Episode 1, “Gay Witch Hunt”) * * * In September 2010, the It Gets Better Project was launched by the journalist, Dan Savage, in response to suicides committed by students as a result of being bullied for being gay. The essence of the project is very simple – video clips of members and non-members of the gay community telling young gay viewers that “it gets better”; to instill hope in them. Commendable cause, I’d say. The school I work for contributed to the project by submitting a video of its gay faculty and staff members individually speaking to the camera, sharing a brief story about their past experience with discrimination, but that “it gets better.” Again, commendable, I’d say. Want to know what I’d say isn’t commendable? Showing the video at the school’s annual town-hall type meeting with a preface like, ‘At this school, we truly are pioneers in education. For example, we are addressing the problem of school bullying. Look at this video we made! Someone I showed it to cried after watching it, as did I.’ The same meeting that shows us slides of the construction plans for the new cafeteria being built, complete with a new pizza oven and multiple coffee stations, that we spend 20 minutes collectively oooo-ing and aahh-ing over – that takes place immediately prior to the It Gets Better video. If the school was trying to highlight its progressiveness or raise awareness for gay bullying, it chose the wrong forum. The only effect the video had was spotlighting the gay employees. They should have given us an outline for the meeting at the start of it so I knew what to expect: ‘Today, we’ll be discussing our budget, office leases, grant funding, the new cafeteria - and, as an encore, we’ll show you all the gays who work here!’ Because this is what my face looked like during and after the video. More reactions from the same episode:
One of the professors I work for invited me to sit in on her class this past Tuesday. As excited as I already was to get to observe this renown professor teach, I had no idea that my expectations were much too low. * * * I arrive at the classroom and find the grad students waiting by the entrance, as there was another class still in session. Mere seconds pass before I notice the apparent placement of the students. Notice the group I’m standing closest to.* I guess we can't help but gravitate towards those we look most alike. Nonetheless, my excitement reverts to its original level - there is no way the evening can get much better. Until I enter the classroom and sit down. (After I had accepted my invitation from the professor, she had advised me to find a "less good seat" when I attended the class, as the students need to have the better seats in order to participate. I really thought I had followed her instructions, but, honestly, I couldn't have found myself a less less-good-seat.) Once seated and situated, I find myself next to the class' Teacher’s Pet. To give you a visual, she has hair like this: bangs like these: a face with a permanent smile: and she's wearing ugly cowgirl boots (which is difficult to do; most cowgirl boots are rather cute).
While someone from the tech department is setting up the projector and opening up the room by sliding apart the movable wall, the teacher assistant asks the students to move their chair desks to form a horseshoe shape. I place my chair desk in front of the movable wall. Teacher’s Pet takes it upon herself to get a head start on the sliding of the movable wall. No one has knowledge of this, however, until the tech person is pushing one side of the wall and he hears an alarmed mousey voice from behind the movable wall panel. “What are you doing??” the tech person asks (instead of ‘Oh my goodness, are you all right? I almost accidentally squished you!’ indicating that this must not be the first time she’s overstepped her role as student and interfered with his role as tech personnel during his set-up of the classroom). Teacher’s Pet makes her way out from behind the wall panel and proceeds to assist the tech person with pushing the wall panel (indicating that she thought he said ‘Annoying girl, I need your help on THIS side of the wall!’ and not irritatingly asked her what she was doing on the other side of the wall). Teacher’s Pet goes on to add more chair desks to the horseshoe before finally settling down in her own seat to fidget within her allotted personal space. At the end of class, Teacher’s Pet raises her hand to comment on another student’s comment during the class discussion. Teacher's Pet wanted to express how deeply touched she was by the other student's participation. “[blah blah blah]. [more gibberish]. Thank you for what you said. That’s going to stick with me for a long time,” she says, while holding her hands over her heart. * * * Oh yeah, the professor conducted a wonderful class. ___________________ *I only look like I’m a cool Asian; I am by no means cool. My 8 year-old cousin received his 23rd Good Behavior Ticket from his teacher at school yesterday. 8 year-old cousin: I got 23 tickets! For good behavior. Me: They’re still doing that? Teaching you guys things like “tooth fairies” and “good behavior?” 8 year-old cousin: Yeah. I remember when I was in 2nd grade. It was supposed to be an awesome year of my life, but it was awful. The unsatisfactory box under conduct was checked on my report card! I was being discriminated against for having early-onset humor. * * * The Tale of the Little Girl with Early-Onset Humor The teacher with skin made of leather was teaching a lesson to her class. Bored was the Little Girl. Her attention landed on a white mechanical pencil that did not have an eraser end. The Little Girl thought that end of the pencil loosely resembled a toilet bowl and shared her observation with the other little girl in her group (the students sat in clusters of 4). The other little girl burst out with laughter. The teacher with skin made of leather demanded to know why the other little girl was disrupting the classroom. The other little girl answered, “It was Whitney! She was the one talking and made me laugh.” While pointing outward in an ambiguous direction, the teacher with skin made of leather roared, “Whitney, that was your last strike! Pick up your desk, and get out of the group!” The Little Girl picked up her desk and proceeded to exit the classroom for she misheard ‘group’ as ‘room’ and because the direction of pointing was not made obvious. The teacher with skin made of leather roared again, “Where are you going?” The Little Girl replied, “You told me to get out of the room.” The teacher with skin made of leather corrected the Little Girl and had her move her desk to the back of the classroom and face the wall. (Like this. Except, the desk wasn't cute.) (It was one of these.) The Little Girl was sentenced to solitary confinement for the remainder of the school year (5 months). All because someone laughed out loud at her pencil-toilet joke. The end. * * * I believe the comment that was left under conduct was along the lines of, ‘Whitney is quite the chatterbox.’ Luckily, my English-as-a-second-language parents had no effing clue what that meant. Here is a letter from my 8 year-old cousin's teacher who administers the Good Behavior Tickets. This teacher is a big fat liar. He doesn’t even read his own letter about the importance of reading. See? These teachers make up "good behavior."
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Cabbages
All
Artichokes
August 2020
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