The latest controversy to hit the airwaves has been President Obama's "back-to-school" speech to the nation's children. According to the White House staff, the primary purpose of the President's speech is to encourage students to stay in school and work hard in order to better their education and reduce the drop out rate. However, many people have become so enraged at the thought of this speech and believe that President Obama will use the speech as an opportunity to somehow "brainwash" the young minds in order to better his own political agenda. Many school officials and administrators have been caught in the middle of this mess and have the difficult task of deciding whether or not to show President Obama's speech on the classroom televisions. While some school principals have left the decision in the hands of the individual teachers, others have chosen to show the speech stating "we'll trust his judgment". According to the Republican Governor of Minnesota, Tim Pawlenty, the classroom is no place to show a video address from President Obama. Governor Pawlenty also stated that "at a minimum it's disruptive. Number two, it's uninvited. And number three, if people would like to hear his message they can, on a voluntary basis, go to YouTube or some other source and get it. I don't think he needs to force it upon the nation's school children".
I can definitely see legitimate points from both sides of the spectrum. While I do believe that a speech from the President encouraging our nation's children to stay in school and work hard is harmless and should raise no controversy, I also agree with Governor Pawlenty on the fact that it could potentially be disruptive in the classroom and people should be able to choose whether or not to view the address on a voluntary basis. Overall however, I think that the whole debate going on right now concerning the school speech has become very distorted and people are beginning to lose sight of what the whole purpose of the speech was, which is to encourage children to stay in school and work hard. How much controversy should a subject of that matter really raise? I feel the answer to that question should be "none at all".
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Who would have thought a speech on encouraging students to stay in school would create so much controversy? In today's society half the population has one opinion and the other half has the exact opposite opinion. The same people who think showing the speech would be a great idea would think it was a horrible idea if it was President Bush giving the speech. The ones who think it would be disruptive would think it was great if it was someone else besides Obama was giving it. And like you said there should not be any controversy about a speech encouraging children to stay in school and work hard... but there is, and a lot of that has to do with the media. Someone watching the news might not have ever thought it would be disruptive to see the speech but after hearing that over and over they might think "maybe it could be disruptive". In a perfect world everyone would be unbiased and open minded but I don't see that happening any time soon.
ReplyDeleteI think this whole issue about this speech just goes to show just how polarized the country is now. I really doubt that if any other president wanted to make a speech like this it would be an issue. It has been done before. And it will happen again. I think its a bit ridiculous-
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