Rant 2, from Three Cat Night

Apparently, in the darling desert state of Arizona, there is a mural on a school depicting four students, elementary aged, I believe, promoting green transportation. Unfortunately, one or two of the students are not white, leaving the largely white populace of the town of Prescott enraged, screaming things like "Get the N__/Sp__ off the wall!" Seriously? Against elementary school students, you're going to be shouting horrible, racist remarks? And why is the principal of the school on board with all this? He's supposed to be one of the first people protecting his students, not infringing upon their rights as human beings, not letting the bigots of his town do mental and emotional damage to them. Luckily, the city councilman who was encouraging all of this on his radio show, one Mr. Steve Blair, was fired for his inappropriate cheerleading.

When adults are intolerant of other adults, it's annoying, it's frustrating, it's terrible. But when adults are intolerant of children, it's far more damaging than they probably realize. What child in that school is going to come away from this without being changed, somehow? What dark skinned child is going to believe that they are not different, worse, perhaps, than the white children? Even if such thoughts are not conscious, no doubt they'll be in there somewhere. And the white children will, quite possibly, take this as a lesson that they are better than others, that they don't have to practice tolerance because the white adults don't practice tolerance. The vicious cycle continues.

I am beyond angry at this entire mess. Far, far beyond angry. If Adrian ever, ever comes home and tells me that something like this is going on at his school, there will be blood. Massive amounts of it. And then he'll be asking Daddy why Mommy is in jail. For the time being, I'm simply saddened beyond words that children are the focus of this hateful stance.