Violence!

I just read an article describing how many Utah schools are either not commemorating 9/11 or are downplaying it. The text of the article stated, regarding the children, "we don't want them to dwell on violence".

It occurs to me that, though we all want to protect our children from violence, hiding it from them may be a mistake of major proportions. After all, it is a violent world!

Now, I'm not saying we should support violence, or put a positive spin on it. But I am saying that our children will have to learn how to deal with it at some point in their lives. The ability to deal with violence, both emotionally and physically, needs to be part of the training and education of every person, so that when confronted with it, a reasoned response can be generated.

This might be anything from calming down someone who is about to go ballistic, all the way to taking the initiative to defend yourself when physically attacked instead of just giving up. Right now, so many people are being taught that, when attacked, give the aggressor what he wants and he will go away. Sometimes it does happen like that. But many times, it does not. As witness the Virginia Tech massacre. Some of the students and teachers were mentally prepared to defend themselves - and some were not. Particularly in an execution scenario, doing nothing is not a survival strategy that works.

I believe that educating people about violence would improve the ratio of those able to defend themselves, if done correctly. And I think we would become a healthier society because of this. Denying that violence exists will not make it go away - therefore it is absolutely necessary to learn how to deal with it.

God help us if we ever get a U.S. President that believes in going belly-up at the first sign of aggression.

-Pop