Poor Halloween!

Landlord said:
Like I said, all of these questions seem to only come from the place of, "this is what we've done in the past so why stop doing it?" If schools celebrating Halloween had never been something that was normal in our culture, nobody would be asking these questions. So, equally as valid of questions are what the point of having Halloween in schools is supposed to be in the first place.

"If there are kids who want to participate in halloween, they can just do it in their neighborhoods/at their churches/with their friend groups" is the same rationale as what you said, just from the other side of the equation. I always tend to lean towards the side that doesn't promote or celebrate specific holidays in public, government funded places. Just doesn't seem to be any need for it imo.

(Also I don't really know any details of this school and their specific context, I'm mostly speaking about the whole thing hypothetically"
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I guess I feel like school should be a place that is view as fun. The halloween celebrations are viewed as a reward for being good kids, hard workers in the class room. 

Why do schools do pep rallys? Not very inclusive of the non sports kids...

Halloween for us is a big deal because we are one building and the elementary love having the high school kids involved and "admiring" their costumes. Makes kids feel good by their older counterparts. It's one day of the year. Why NOT do it? IT'S FUN FOR THE KIDS. Why should a school be place where our kids can't have fun? 

We give shoes to the kids who can't afford separate PE shoes, why can't an art project be to create some sort of costume leading up to this day?

 
The Dude said:
Nobody celebrates Columbus Day.
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I was just exploring some civil war and american history monuments when I was on tour in Des Moines. There were wreaths and flowers all around a bust of Christopher Columbus. A lot of Italians still take a lot of pride in Columbus.

 
ColoradoHusk said:
I did notice more banks open this year on Native American Genocide, err Columbus Day.
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Landlord said:
I was just exploring some civil war and american history monuments when I was on tour in Des Moines. There were wreaths and flowers all around a bust of Christopher Columbus. A lot of Italians still take a lot of pride in Columbus.
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Well, he's pretty much all they got, so.....

Well besides Leonardo Da Vinci.....

And Galileo.....

And Michelangelo....

And Marco Polo.....

Yeah, they should let the Columbus thing go....

 
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@ED, it's not really in the article, but it's the point of this thread: to stoke a controversy.

And 'native genocide' is an accurate descriptor of Columbus and colonialism. Why should we roll our eyes at that? Is that more of that patented "we must protect our American culture"? The "American culture" I was taught prized values that demand a critical evaluation of the darker aspects of our own history. We look down, with reason, on the regimes that insist on sanitizing their own history.

 
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Landlord said:
I was just exploring some civil war and american history monuments when I was on tour in Des Moines. There were wreaths and flowers all around a bust of Christopher Columbus. A lot of Italians still take a lot of pride in Columbus.
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I can believe there are UN Peacekeeping forces in that third-world city.

 
zoogs said:
@ED, it's not really in the article, but it's the point of this thread: to stoke a controversy.

And 'native genocide' is an accurate descriptor of Columbus and colonialism. Why should we roll our eyes at that? Is that more of that patented "we must protect our American culture"? The "American culture" I was taught prized values that demand a critical evaluation of the darker aspects of our own history. We look down, with reason, on the regimes that insist on sanitizing their own history.
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Any kind of genocide is wrong (obviously), but it was kind of the "way of the world" back then. Same with colonialism.  It gets old when many expect Americans to constantly apologize for genocide that we (today's Americans) had nothing to do with. The United States is far from the only country to take part in genocidal activity. We are, however, one of the few countries that have tried to right our historical wrongs.

 
B.B. Hemingway said:
Any kind of genocide is wrong (obviously), but it was kind of the "way of the world" back then. Same with colonialism.  It gets old when many expect Americans to constantly apologize for genocide that we (today's Americans) had nothing to do with. The United States is far from the only country to take part in genocidal activity. We are, however, one of the few countries that have tried to right our historical wrongs.
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You're taking the idea of apology and assuming that it has to do with blame or guilt. That doesn't have to be the case. If a friend of mine tells me they have cancer, I still say, "I'm so sorry", even though I know I didn't give them cancer.

What we can do, is apologize for the fact that that did happen, and that "we" benefit from it happening, even today, and a lot of native people, even today, are affected by that history. Not because it's our fault, but because it's tragic and awful.

We can also make sure not to celebrate those kinds of things and those kinds of people as society continues to grow and advance. It's too simple to either say Christopher Columbus is a Skeletor-esque evil bad guy, the same way it's too simple to say, "Well, that's just how it was back then." People are complex, to be sure, but reality is that the underlying motivations behind his travels/conquering/genocide were acquiring riches and getting human slaves. 

 
B.B. Hemingway said:
Any kind of genocide is wrong (obviously), but it was kind of the "way of the world" back then. Same with colonialism.  It gets old when many expect Americans to constantly apologize for genocide that we (today's Americans) had nothing to do with. The United States is far from the only country to take part in genocidal activity. We are, however, one of the few countries that have tried to right our historical wrongs.
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Maybe don't insist on celebrating it then.

You're completely right that the US should get credit for being one of the few that tries to right our wrongs. Reflection about what we do and don't memorialize is a part of that. 

 
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zoogs said:
@ED, it's not really in the article, but it's the point of this thread: to stoke a controversy.
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I don't know about "stoking a controversy", I thought the purpose was to point out a ridiculous decision to eliminate a little harmless fun by a school in Mass.

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The school's principal issued a letter to parents that reads in part: "The costume parade is out of our ordinary routine and can be difficult for many students. Also, the parade is not inclusive of all the students and it is our goal each and every day to ensure all student's individual differences are respected." 

What that says to me is that they caved in to a very small minority who complained and framed it as "difficult for many students". And "out of our ordinary routine"? Apparently this school is opposed to diversity or changing things up a bit to keep it interesting and fun. They claim their goal each and every day is to ensure all student's individual differences but apparently that does not extend to the silent majority who wanted or liked the Halloween celebration. I really don't care, my kids are past the school Halloween celebration point. And I'm not trying to stoke any controversy but it sure seems like some administrator(s) made a bad decision on this one. Or maybe this one school has a very different clientele than any I've ever been associated with.

 
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