If you want something done right...

Never send a man to do a specific task.  That sounds counter-intuitive.  You'd think that the more specific you are with what you want, the more likely he will be of success.  Simply untrue.  If you are dreaming of something and you have a picture of it in your mind, you will need to be very careful in your instructions.

It's not that he's incompetent or can't get it done.  It's not that at all.  What happens is that after he departs to do the task (fetch something from the store, run an errand), he will decide that what you told him is not what you really wanted.  He will decide that, since he's a problem solver, he will get you what you really wanted.  What you would have wanted if you'd known it was available.  Something better than what you asked for.  Perhaps you had subconscious desires that you failed to communicate.  Perhaps instead of Tide, you really wanted Cheer.  It's on sale, and you like a sale, right?  Perhaps instead of depositing to checking, you'd like it in savings.  You do need to save, after all.  What a great man he will be when he returns, victorious, with the thing you didn't even know you wanted.  Men are problem solvers.

Perhaps instead of going to the bagel shop and buying your favorite bagel and toppings, he'll go to your least favorite grocery store and buy bacon.  You like bacon, right?  Never mind that you said specifically, "Go to XX Bagel Shop and get me XX Bagel.  That's all I want.  That's my heart's desire.  That's what I'm having for breakfast."  When he returns with bacon, he will explain that they also had bagels at your least favorite grocery store, and no, he didn't get your favorite topping, and no, they don't have the good kind of bagels at your least favorite grocery store.  But he is already cooking the bacon, and a good man he is indeed, because it's already cooked for you and you don't have to do a thing.  And plus, he also got bagels.

I have learned to be very specific with my wishes when sending a man (any man) to fetch me something specific that I want.  I explain the size, the brand, price doesn't matter.  If they don't have that brand and size, please don't buy me something else.  This is all I want.

Alas, today I forgot.  I am having bacon and inferior bagels for brunch.

Virtue

You don't have to dress sexy for me to like you.

You are beautiful just the way you are.

It's hard to find fault with these statements.  You ARE beautiful just the way you are.  And you SHOULDN'T have to dress provocatively to get attention.  So what's wrong with it?

I'm not sure.  It's difficult to pin down perfectly, because it's webbed into our entire social structure.  There's nothing wrong with it and everything wrong with it.

I was thinking about it this morning, after watching a video a friend shared on facebook.

There's this one.  And then there's this video that my friend shared that got my attention:




"We don't know why
You want a guy
That only cares
What he sees with his eye"
(Read the lyrics from sportsleader.org at the end of this post.)

Ok, I can get behind that message. But there's a more subtle message here that bothers me.

I realized some time last year that there's a sortof "virtue movement" going on, particularly with young people.  The idea seems to be twofold:  first, that you don't have to be sexy to have worth and your appearance should be dictated by personal tastes and not a desire to attract attention; and second that a girl's appearance causes a reaction in the boys that the boys may not like or appreciate.  Dissecting this, the first portion is fine.  You shouldn't have to show skin to get attention; you should be judged on your personal qualities.  And our society does put too much pressure on people to look a certain way, a way that may not even be healthy.  A girl should dress for herself.  But dissecting the second part takes you somewhere a bit more slippery.

A girl's appearance causes a reaction in boys that the boys may not like or appreciate.  Some of the boys put it in the perspective of manners.  They don't want to think of you in only a physical way, but it's hard not to when you're practically naked.  It's impolite for you to cause them to think those "impure thoughts" when they don't really want to.  In a way, I do think that it's impolite to impose your sexual presence on other people.  Whether you are male or female, showing too much has always been considered in poor taste.  And there's certainly a lot of tasteless fashion out there these days.  But as a matter of taste, mainly it's just annoying to those who have to look at your "I'm with Stupid" tee shirts or your low-hanging pants.  Right?  I just shake my head.  Those people aren't making me think anything other than what an idiot they are.  But what about this idea that it's maybe sortof a violation of privacy to interject your sexuality into a guy's perfectly peaceful day and change this thoughts for the next few minutes?

Some people think this "modesty movement" is a women's movement.  That girls and women are behind it, wanting to be appreciated for their personality and not their appearance.  I don't think it is.  Women may want those things, but the writing I've read is mostly written by men, particularly young men.  It's not often you hear teenage boys wishing for less skin, right?  So it got my attention.  They say they can't concentrate when you wear shorts or tank tops.  That it's not fair for you to dress that way and take their mind off liking you for you.  Poor things.  It's a power trip.

That's right, it's about power.

After much thought, I realized that what women are doing when they dress provocatively is that they are taking power away from the men.  Men can't concentrate when they are distracted by a sexy female.  It takes over the conversation, their inner thoughts even.  It is a violation of privacy.  And that is why women do it.  That is why women have always done it.  Because this is the power that we have.  It is such a rush to know that you can control a man's thoughts, even his actions for a little while.  That you can get noticed, can direct the conversation for a little while.  Women are usually smaller and less physically strong.  But women have used this tactic to get ahead at home, in politics and in business for time immemorial.  In many places and in many times, it is the only power women have had.

The modesty movement subtly plays into rape culture.  It promotes the idea that women are making men think a certain way and the men just can't help it.  Probably they can't help their thoughts.  This is a hard-wired thing, and it's integral to our humanity.  Women have thoughts too, by the way.  And we are imposed on just as much if a man reveals his maleness in a way we find attractive.  But men can help their actions.  There is a huge difference between thinking "wow...I'd really like to...." and "I'm going to...whether she likes it or not."  So this whole "she was asking for it" thing is just absurd.  However in places where women are required to cover up their skin, the argument is inevitably made that they are safer that way.  That they are valued for their skills and personality and not for their sexual beauty.  That clothing that obscures their sexuality promotes their equality.  What it does is it takes away their power.

These men want women to give up their power.  Because it's impolite.  Damn straight it's impolite.  I'll wear what I want, thank you.

Virtue Makes You Beautiful Lyrics
1
2
3 Dressing modest, we know it is rough
When the world is making it so tough
Don’t need short skirts or low cut shirts
Being the way that you are is enough ou ough
Everyone else doesn’t seem to care
Everyone but you
Baby you light up the world like nobody else
By the way that you speak and respect yourself
Girls with integrity are hard to find these days
You gotta know Oh Oh
You are so beautiful
If only you saw what I can see
You’d understand why I need your modesty
Right now I’m talking to you and you must believe
You gotta know Oh Oh
Virtue is so beautiful oh oh oh
That’s what makes you beautiful
Yo, big men…only think of the girls that are virtuous baby
.So c-come on
Must have it wrong
.To prove we are right we put it in a song.
We don’t know why (you, you ,you)
You’d want a guy
That only cares what he sees with his eyes (here here)
Everyone else doesn’t seem to care
Everyone else but you
Baby you light up the world like nobody else
By the way that you speak and respect yourself
Girls with integrity are hard to find this days
You gotta know Oh Oh
You are so beautiful
If only you saw what I can see
You’d understand why I need your modesty
Right now I’m talking to you and you must believe
You gotta know oh oh
Virtue is so beautiful oh oh oh
That’s what makes you beautiful
Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na
Na Na Na Na Na Na Na
Na na na na na na na na na na na na
Na na na na na na

(Softly)
Baby you light up the world like nobody else
By the way that you speak and respect yourself
Girls with integrity are hard to find these days
You gotta know Oh Oh
You are so beautiful
(Louder)
Baby you light up the world like nobody else
By the way that you speak and respect yourself
Girls with integrity are hard to find these days
You gotta know Oh Oh
You are so beautiful
If only you saw what I can see
You’d understand why I need your modesty
Right now I’m talking to you and you must believe
You gotta know oh oh
Virtue is so beautiful oh oh oh
That’s what makes you beautiful
That’s what makes you beautiful

Some more reading:

The False Modesty Movement

Curvy in a Christian Home (the comments are particularly interesting)

The Modesty Movement (oy)

And this one I just like:  4000 Years of Uppity Women

Women of my generation decided that the supermom thing was bogus.  We decided to stay home and raise our children.  We innocently thought that we would do our best, spend our years with our children and then go back to work.  But many have found that after even just a few years, they cannot resume the careers they left.

I have observed that many women are beginning to get the feeling that their decisions to be housewives or stay at home moms for a time may turn out to be irreversible.  It's true that some of it is possibly our "fault."  At this point in our lives, we are loathe to take shitty jobs that we might have settled for right out of college.  It's simply not worth it for us to make less to work more than the part-time and freelance gigs we have now, or go completely back to the beginning.  It is simply not worth it to drive an hour each way to work.  Women feel that their education and experience, including life experience, is valuable.  Employers, apparently, do not.

When I make a comment that, as soon as my knee is healed, I will go back to waitressing, my friends are aghast.  "Surely," they say, "you should be doing something else.  You have skills, you have talent."  That may be, but either there is not a place I fit, or there is not a need for my skills, or I am not effectively conveying those skills in my resume, my letters or my interviews.  The truth is that I really couldn't even get hired as a waitress without relying on personal connections.  Thankfully, I have a job, and one that I like.  But I am underemployed and underearning.

This whole thing makes me wonder:  What untapped talent must be quietly folding laundry and cooking dinners all across our great country?  What great minds and strong backs must be keeping schedules and running fundraisers?  I am not sad that this talent is going to the benefit of our children and our society.  But I am disappointed that when women want to go back to work, they kindof can't.  And I am concerned that the realization of this phenomenon will place women in a position where they must make a life choice at a young age:  be a mother OR have a career.

Yep. Found this one on Copyblogger. It's perfect. Not preachy, not sarcastic, just helpful. The sarcastic ones are afterward. :)
Like this infographic? Get more content marketing tips from Copyblogger.

I'm not perfect, I have to stop and think about these things sometimes too. It's nice to have them all in one place.

Is Teach too good for San Luis Obispo?

Really?  That's what it comes down to?

San Luis Obispo has a national Blue Ribbon School and California Distinguished School in our school district.  It's a 10 out of 10 school, with an API score of 987 (2011).  It's so popular that we had to have a lottery this year for admissions.

...And so our school board, in its wisdom, would like to vote to close it.

Why?

Charles E. Teach Elementary was once a larger school.  In the '90s, enrollment dropped at the same time as our district had budget cuts.  So the school was moved onto the site of another neighborhood school, Bishop's Peak, which had also declined in enrollment and had extra space.  Fast forward to 2012 and it became clear that both schools are overcrowded.  This is a true thing, and something must be done.

Our district has an open enrollment policy.  As long as there's room, any child may attend any school they wish.  Teach is a school of choice, with an accelerated program for high-level learners that need an extra challenge and a different school environment.  There is another school of choice in our district, Pacheco Elementary, which is a dual language immersion program, teaching in English and Spanish.  Pacheco Elementary is also very popular, and holds a lottery each year to determine which kindergarteners will be admitted.  This year, Teach also held a lottery.  When we arrived in San Luis Obispo in 2009, our neighborhood school, Hawthorne Elementary, was full in our child's grade.  Though it is one block away from our house, we had to choose another school.  We chose Bishop's Peak, across town.

For some reason, this over-enrollment policy does not seem to apply to Bishop's Peak.  When the school became crowded, we simply "made room" for more students.  Rather than sending the additional residents to other schools, we just put more desks in the classrooms.  We have classes at both schools with 33 students.  When Teach became overcrowded, we did the same thing.  I'm personally glad for that, because my second child was not chosen in the lottery, and if a few more seats had not been made available (and a few above her on the waiting list hadn't dropped off), she would not be going to Teach today.  She would be at Bishop's Peak - an equally crowded school.

If Pacheco can have a lottery, why can't Teach?  If Hawthorne can turn away children that live in the area because it's full, why can't Bishop's Peak?

Of course that is not ideal.  It's not even fair.  How sad is it to live across the street from a school you'd like to attend, yet have to drive across town?  But if the board wants to talk about hard choices, that's one they can consider.  Pacheco is a school of choice, and though I think Spanish is a very important skill for children in California to learn, no one is arguing that children need it to be successful and happy.  Yet no one is considering closing Pacheco and poaching their classrooms.  Advanced programs for advanced students are necessary.  This is what the school board members in question don't understand.  They* believe that these children will get a perfectly good education at a neighborhood school.  That they will thrive just as well if they are in the mainstream, differentiated classrooms.  The evidence of research does not bear out that conclusion.  Clearly, the parents of Teach students do not believe this to be true, or we wouldn't be driving our kids from other cities to attend school in San Luis Obispo.  The commute is a burden on families, but we are willing to do it because it is necessary for the welfare and education of our children.  In spite of research showing that gifted children need gifted education, the San Luis Coastal Unified School District board, on the whole, simply does not care about the educational needs of our special needs children.  On the contrary, they do not even believe they have special needs.

I can't say that the board is rushing to a decision.  True, they only have a few weeks within which to reach a decision about what to do to solve the overcrowding problem at Bishop's Peak and Teach.  But they have known about the issue since September, and should have been researching and discussing it all this time.  They have simply ignored the issue.  They do not even know how much it would cost to re-open one of our closed schools to accomodate Teach, only that it would cost and they don't have any money.  They have not researched traffic options except to drive by the school, view the traffic, and conclude that yes, "it is bad."  No concrete information was presented at the most recent board meeting.  Members said they "would like to know" how much things would cost.  But no one was assigned specifically to find out.  The only concrete information that was requested was from the president - who asked the staff of Bishop's Peak and Teach to begin making a plan for consolidation and closure.

They have not even considered the option of doing nothing at all and simply capping enrollment at both schools.  At least for a year or two until a better solution can be had.  Why is that option not even on the table?  No options appear to be viable for our board president except closing the school.

What on earth is going through people's heads when they take the best school in the district and simply lay it aside to pillage its resources for the other schools?  It's almost as if our one shining jewel makes them insecure.  The more successful you are, the more you are despised.


*When I say "they" referring to the school board, I am referring only to those members who have already made their mind up to close Teach Elementary, not those who are in favor of keeping it or who are honestly trying to look at all options and make a good choice.  Unfortunately, I believe that those who can't wait to close our school are in the majority.