8/12/2023

JRB,

            TOGIE – that’s our new acronym. Can you guess what it stands for? I’ll give you a hint, it’s a Quaker thing, I’ll reveal later.

            It came to mind after I saw your quote from your fund-raiser in Park City, “when bad folks have problems, they do bad things.” I was disturbed that you applied a good/bad binary to people. Don’t we all have good/bad inside of us? Aren’t we all capable of doing horrible & wonderful things? Who are we to judge whether someone is “good” or “bad”?

            As a teacher educator, I hate it when I hear someone say, “he’s a good kid.” What’s that supposed to mean? We should cut him some slack? Speaking of which, I suspect that some of Hunter’s teachers considered him a “bad kid,” & that designation was not helpful!

The 5th grade I will be visiting next week has a kid with that designation. He’s a refugee from a school where he was expelled for throwing a chair at a teacher. Clearly the child has issues but classifying him as “bad” is not going to help us to bring out the best in him.

            I’m sure this child will transgress & when he does, I hope his teacher & I can follow the example of Andrew Young (AJY2) who likes to say, “don’t get mad, get smart.” Ideally, we will help the child to make peace with himself. Then perhaps the classroom can operate as Atlanta did when AJY2 was mayor, by being “too busy to hate.”

Did you know that AJY2’s peace efforts were part of a long history of such efforts in the GA? According to World Peace Revival, “When British General James Oglethorpe landed on the coast of GA, he was greeted in peace by Chief Tomochichi, who was later granted the rank of king by the British monarchy & received at court in England in 1734. History fun fact :)

Perhaps you can send AJY2 to Burma to help them sort things out. AJ’s article today about the Karenni Nationalities Defense Force is a reminder that WINTA.

FYI: TOGIE = That Of God In Everyone

BYBS,