Are We Arguing Dangerously?

Who would have ever thought that I, an “elder millenial”, should live at the same time as we are experiencing so very many historic, unprecedented lifetime events? I’ve been alive through 9/11, Columbine, a global pandemic, and now Alberta’s book ban, all very memorable and right up my dystopian speculative fiction alley. As a high school English teacher of 12 years, I’ve been (stupidly) reading all the comments even as I try not to stress myself out more than I already am, thinking about looming job action, outing students who’d like to use different names or pronouns, and girls having to confirm their physical sex in order to participate in sports teams. It’s a LOT right now. And a huge part of it is that we seem to have lost sight of how to effectively debate.

In my ELA classroom I have this game I’ve developed, it’s called “Yes! No. Maybe?”, and the goal of this game is conversation in service of entertaining ideas. The host shares a statement, players take a position (Are you a ‘Yes!’, a ‘No.’, or a ‘Maybe?’), and then players defend their positions with examples of experiences or history or contexts that demonstrate their choice. There is only one rule: Attack the argument, NOT the arguer.

We have fun and engage with each other in courageously vulnerable ways as we share. My hope has always been that this practice translates in my learner’s future lives, helping them to navigate conflict, negotiate, and consider. We are great at critical, future-minded thinking in Alberta, but we aren’t always the most empathic. I would love to see social threads and digital spaces reflect more consideration of where people are coming from, and I know starting from a place of agreement builds bridges and draws a circle of inclusion around those involved.

I can draw a circle around us with one simple statement: we all want the best for Alberta’s students.

If that much is true, and we can agree on that truth, there is no reason all other conflicts can’t be negotiated and settled. If that statement is the absolute truth, then I can appreciate the concerns about what kids are seeing and when in literature, AND that classrooms are one of the most safe spaces in which to do this.

I have copies of The Handmaid’s Tale, Brave New World, and To Kill a Mockingbird, all containing explicit scenes. I also have them in graphic novel form, as well as The Handmaid’s Tale miniseries and TKAM film (with the gorgeous Gregory Peck, being a stern lawyer and a good Dad all over the place, dreamy). I know the graphic novels don’t belong in my room. I have once or twice brought in BNW to show a student Huxley’s imagined society, but we didn’t look at the more graphic scenes (“Orgy! Porgy! Orgy! Porgy!”, Chapter 3). I have never shown The Handmaid’s Tale miniseries, rarely offered the book as a student personal novel option, never used the racial slur in TKAM, taught on why that derogatory language is not what is used in most social circles and interactions (choice-based exceptions remain, there’s a whole argument for this beyond this post’s scope), and given warning pre- the court scene when Mayella Ewell is questioned about her assault. I have mostly cut texts that feature sexual assault because it can have such a hard impact on some learners for various reasons. I let classes know that at the semester start to put minds at ease – and it does.

These choices do not mean I don’t take risks – in fact, I think that in the classroom is the perfect place for students to take risks – there are parachutes and landing mats and nets to work with. As I hope we’ve all recently learned, it’s pretty tough to find explicit material in school libraries, but on cellphones? One wrong tap of a button and your childhood innocence is over, sorry kid!

I went to The Great Outdoor Comedy Festival this summer, and saw some incredible, hilarious performances. Two absolute highlights were Pete Holmes and John Delaney: not only because they were amazing performers, but because they stayed away from the low hanging fruit that some others had so heavily picked earlier in the weekend. There were a few who really bombed, and the audience let them know, mostly through silence and non-reaction. They knew the super racist, womanizing, derogatory punch-down jokes weren’t landing, a few even commenting about how they’ll never be invited back to Edmonton again (yup, probably not); they didn’t take the temperature of the audience, they didn’t know their crowd, and they went for easy but gross and rude. And we didn’t laugh at their bad jokes made in poor taste. But Pete Homes, John Delaney, and more did an amazing thing: they didn’t grab low-hanging anything. Delaney had a thing going about a dryer that was made even more hilarious because my parents who were with me have that dryer, and that exact issue, and they were crying laughing in solidarity with John’s problem as it was their problem too.

The Western mind LOVES a dichotomy. We want to split ideas in half and yell “Black or White!”, “Yes or No!”, and “Us or Them!”. But it takes focus away from the real issues. And it makes us forget that we have this one true commonality, this most important one. Everything we can’t agree on yet can be viewed through that lens.

I want to teach. I understand parents want kids to feel safe and be safe. I’m with you – I want the best for your kids too. I also understand that, especially when we do lock down drills or hold and secure drills, that every kid needs a champion, and there aren’t enough of us to go around. I want us to have the ability to make sure every single kid feels connected to people in the building: seen, cared for, supported, and included. There are social and economic levers we can pull. There are things we could all do so much better.There is room for designing and building. Words are where we start.

Photo by Elīna Arāja: Phothttps://www.pexels.com/photo/tic-tac-toe-game-3400795/