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Wednesday, October 04, 2006
FRC's take on the Amish school shooting
I think there's some code in this FRC missive:
The school year is barely a month along and already the nation has been shaken by a series of school shootings. The latest, just yesterday in Pennsylvania's beautiful Lancaster area, involved the systematic execution of schoolgirls in a one-room Amish school house. ... Last week, in similar fashion, a 53-year-old homeless man held schoolgirls hostage in Bailey, Colorado, sexually abusing several (he had reportedly asked for specific girls he had seen on a popular teen web site) before killing one. He too died at his own hand. How extensive is this year's fall surge of shootings? Since the start of the school year, according to ABC News, there have been 25 incidents across the country involving school shootings, seven involving fatalities. Yesterday President Bush announced plans to convene a summit of education and law enforcement leaders to talk about ways the federal government can help stem the violence. Violence against young, innocent children was once uncommon, even unthinkable, in America. As policy makers meet, there should be time to reflect on how many other taboos modern culture has shattered, how many other unthinkable things are now thought of - and acted upon.
I believe Perkins is making the same point as Brian Rohrbough: that our moral decline and permissive society has resulted in all these tragedies.
One child being shot in a school is one too many. But before we long for the halcyon days of yore, let's remember also what some of those days were like:
There are instances, the report said, that children were taken to work in the coal mines as early as 4 years of age - and sometimes between 5 and 6 - while 8 to 9 was the ordinary age at which employment in the mines commenced.
A good proportion of persons employed in carrying on the work in mines were under 13 years of age: and a still larger proportion were aged between 13 and 18. In several districts female children began work in the mines at the same early ages as the males.
The miners lives depended upon the proper ventilation of air, and this depends on the trapdoors (Brattice) being kept shut after the trucks carrying coal had passed through them. The youngest children called ‘trappers’ had to perform this task. The report said while this was not hard work it was monotonous and painful to contemplate the dull, dungeon-like life, for the most part spent in solitude, in conditions of damp and darkness. They were allowed no light: but sometimes a good-natured collier would bestow a small piece of candle on them. These children had to work the same hours as the men.
It wasn't just hard, awful work demanded of 10 year old boys and girls, it was deadly. Mining deaths took a sharp dive in the 1930s and again in the 1950s. In the 19th century, though, these kids were led as lambs to the slaughter.
My point is simply this: 150 years ago this country had no tolerance for abortion, no protection for homosexuals, and little (if any) knowledge of evolution. And yet the nation was willing to send its children off to mines and mills 6 and 7 days a week, 12 and 14 hours a day, knowing that the jobs were not just dangerous -- they were deadly.
Our children are safer now than they were then -- even though abortion is legal, homosexuals have some protections under the laws, and evolution is grudgingly taught in most schools. We need to make our schools -- our society -- safer and less violent. But we need an honest approach to a terrible challenge. Knee-jerk scapegoating can only delay a more perfect union.
3 Comments:
Hammer, did you really just say that these problems are attributable to "our moral decline?" I for one feel I have not had a moral decline in any way shape or form. Just what is that supposed to mean? That sounds like an awfully conservative statement coming from you.
By 
, at
8:56 AM
No, I'm not attributing the Amish school shooting to a national moral decline, but some conservatives are, including Tony Perkins of the FRC.
My point is a bit confused, so let me try again. You're better off being a child in 2006 than you were in 1856. You're safer and healthier.
Agreed
By , at
9:12 AM
