Gregory Freeman: Never Teach Your Children They're Victims. StL P-D 4/25/1999

Headline: NEVER TEACH YOUR CHILDREN THEY'RE VICTIMS
Reporter: By Gregory Freeman

Publication: ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Last Printed: Sun., Aprl. 25, 1999
Section: METRO, Page: C3, Edition: FIVE STAR LIFT

Lessons from Colorado

After Tuesday's tragedy in Littleton, Colo., I received a call from a reader with an opinion I hadn't heard.
   "Those students who were shot deserved what they got, " he said. "That should send a message to people who bully other people."
   Whoa, I thought. This guy is coming at this issue from an entirely different angle. To him, members of the "Trench Coat Mafia" were victims who had been pushed too far. As far as he was concerned, this was simply a case of victims fighting back.
   I started to dismiss the comment as being an extreme one until I began paying attention to some of the news programs. Several times I heard child psychologists and sociologists talk about these kids as "poor souls" to whom society had not paid attention. Their dress and behavior had been exhibits of "cries for help, " and when society didn't respond, they reacted violently.

That may be the theory that some are selling, but I'm not buying.
   A former colleague and I often joke about growing up as "blerds" - black nerds.
   I arrived at Beaumont High School in 1970 as a geeky freshman. A look at my high school yearbook shows a picture of a goofy-looking kid with nerdy, black eyeglasses. I was uncomfortable and lost when I got there. Mine was an overcrowded school of 3,500 students, and I was a bookwormish kind of kid who preferred reading a book to throwing a football.
   Girls wouldn't give me the time of day. One of my high school nightmares came true when I wrote a love poem to a girl I had a crush on. Not only did she reject me, she shared the poem with a couple dozen other students, who found it hilarious. I was crushed.

According to some of those evaluating the tragedy in Colorado, I would have been a victim. According to them, I would almost have been justified to go to school one day with a gun and blow away those who teased me or who laughed at me.
Of course, I never even thought of such a thing.
Perhaps it was because I was taught not to feel that I was a victim. My parents taught me that I control my own destiny. I believed it to the point that I went from being a hopeless geek my freshman year to president of the class my senior year.

Feelings of victimization can be polarizing. Over the years, I've encountered more than one black youngster with real potential but who's come to believe that he couldn't succeed because "it's a white man's world."
What they fail to understand is that it's possible to successfully navigate in any world.
The worst thing in the world is to stew over whose fault it is that you're not as successful as you'd like to be.

I wonder how many parents teach their kids to turn toward self-determination and away from feelings of victimization?
For that matter, how many parents take the time to sit down and try to understand their teen-agers?
How many take the time to teach their youngsters that we're all unique, that it's possible to be successful, even if you're different from other people?

A chill came over me when I learned about the Colorado shootings as I felt the anguish of the parents at Columbine High School.
At the same time, I know that my son's school encourages students to explore, even celebrate, their differences. Students are taught that they are unique beings with control of their own destinies. More kids need to be taught that.
But they've also got to be taught that they're not helpless victims, picked on and over by society.

There's no one answer to prevent future Columbine High Schools. Better efforts to keep guns off the streets and out of the hands of children, improved conflict resolution courses and better parent-child relationships all would be among ways to help.
But equally as important is to teach our youngsters that they should never view themselves as victims. The more youngsters who learn that, the less the chances of a Littleton, Colo., happening again.

Daniel Schesch - Webweaver

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