The "Can't We All Just Get Along" Post

You know, I am sick and tired of the rancor that has been ratcheted up between members of the District 15 community - on both sides. First and foremost, let me save my most withering criticism for those members of our "community" (sadly, a loose term these days) who have taken the situation as an opportunity of sorts to spew the most vile sorts of hatred. It's hard to believe that people really feel that ANY situation warrants allowing a forum for the worst kind of hate-filled diatribes. Imagine a site where people decry the fact that a community has been overrun by residents of a certain race, and bemoan the fact that this group of residents opens their own types of stores, or speak their own language among themselves, or lower property values. Sounds like that site would be a pretty icky place to visit. no? Not exactly the most tolerant, liberal-minded forum. Not quite espousing the values we like to think America stands for, right? Yet somehow, that sense of propriety toward our neighbor no matter how different from ourselves, has been thrown to the wayside when the discussion turns to Orthodox Jews. Do you expect me to believe that comments like this are simply an offshoot of the local school district drama and that otherwise everyone would have no problem at all with Orthodox Jews? Here's a small taste, and I think we can see that these ranting have nothing to do with our district's woes and everything to do with hate:

Well, I have found that people started fleeing this community like a sinking ship as soon as the (...hmmmmm how do I say this while being politically correct...) Staunchly Religious people began moving in (yea, that works). It's going to be like Crown Heights, the only people that will stay are the people that cant afford to leave and then the rest of the country can begin to hate you here also..

And more:

Regardless, the public school population certainly is decreasing because nobody wants to live next to the Orthodox. You seem to have 2 versions of a population, the people who have a great deal of money and have no problem showing it and the people who have their children wear the same clothes day after day after day regardless of the stains…ewwww. You people mass produce faster than rabbits, no wonder you have more children in the school district, non-orthodox average 2.7 children while the Orthodox population is 6.72.

Yet more:

Let me know which districts have the least "cut in" by the private school community so I can move out of this neighborhood, but not before I make sure that I sell it to a nice Palestinian family.

Sweet. The bottom line is that we should not allow ourselves to become tolerant of this type of expression. The First Amendment may allow it, but it certainly shouldn't stop us from stepping back and assessing our comments as to whether they are doing anything to help this conflict. Appealing to hate and bigotry has been tried, presumably as a last resort, by supporters of the "public school candidates" in the last election. It backfired in a big way. The majority of district residents made it clear that they don't want to see the hate card played. Playing up people's hatred or mistrust for another demographic group is simply not the way to achieve any sort of peace in this community. And I don't think anyone can argue that a detente is desperately needed. So to the community at large (on any and every side of the divide): you know who you are. Watch your mouths and your keyboards. You will get us nowhere with your hatred and your rude and bigoted rantings.

To that end, I call out to my fellow private school parents as well. Yes, the Pre-K ruling was a disappointment. Yes, we can still hold out hope for it's reversal. But that shouldn't stop us from feeling invested in the success of our district's public school students. We need to encourage the board - that we helped democratically elect - to find solutions to the district's poor performance, not just constantly use the selfsame poor performance as simply an election season talking point. Let's impress upon our partners in the school district that we are expressing unhappiness with district children's unhealthy scores not as a means to cut funding, but because we want to see them improve. You want free building usage? Have you seen the tracks and the fields at the public schools lately? Maybe if we insist that the board ensures they are in top-notch shape, as opposed to the shape they are currently in, then there will not be as much resistance on the part of public school parents to the peaceful and equitable sharing of facilities.

I think we can all agree that the pre-K busing fiasco was nothing but detrimental to our community as a whole. What may have been proposed with the best of intentions on the part of the board - throwing the private school community a bone so that they could feel more invested in the district's successes and thus more inclined to vote in more generous budget increases to benefit the public school system in the future - instead drove the wedge even deeper. The anger of the public school community against the board for daring to provide the already-resented private school community with a perk, was topped only by the resentment against the public school community for what was seen by most as a retaliatory appeal against the private school community in order to deprive them of a busing service that no one had raised any concerns about in the past.

But seriously, people. Let's pull ourselves together. It's outta control and no one's benefiting from the endless back-and-forth bickering. Certainly not our kids, who seem to be losing services in one retaliatory strike after another. If we don't do it for propriety's sake, at least we can do it for the sake of the innocent precious children we all brought into this world.

UPDATE: A commenter pointed out a inflammatory comment I had missed, as apparently made by a private school community member. In the interest of balance, I am noting that the comment, which is indeed hateful, shows us that there have been inappropriate comments emanating from both sides of the divide (which I did note in my original post as well).