Meanwhile across town in Dean Wormer's office, Flounder, Bluto, D-Day, Hoover, and Larry were being told that they, and all of Delta House, were being expelled and were to leave Faber on Monday morning. Exacerbating their woes they were informed that their local draft boards were to be notified that they were now all eligible for military service. Flounder then vomited on Dean Wormer.
Back at Delta House as Flounder was being comforted that he threw up on Dean Wormer, not in front of him by Boon, Otter walked in bruised and beaten with D-Day helping him to the couch. Upon sitting down Otter when asked who did that number to his face said,
"It was Greggie and Douggie... and some of the other Hitler youth."And he then found out they were all kicked out of school.
Get the analogy? Yes, teachers, we are Delta House. Dean Wormer is Mayor Bloomberg. Marmalard is Little Evan (Is it supposed to be this soft?) Stone, and Niedermyer is Whitney Tilson. Oh, and I am Bluto with the 0.0 GPA and 7 years of college down the drain. But I have digressed. Shall we continue? Oh, I wrote something like this a while back if I recall. Back to the meanderings of my mind.
At this point Bluto gets up and screams,
Hey, what's this lying around shit?!?!?!To which he was told that the war is over and Wormer dropped the big one. He went on a lovely soliloquy asking was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor and that it is not over now. He asked,
"Who's with me?"And ran out the door excited only to come back and ask what happened to the Delta House he had known.
"We're too afraid Bluto, we might get in trouble."It was Otter who stood up and supported Bluto. Otter told everyone it would take many lives, many years, but that only a real stupid act by Delta House would win the war. At this point Bluto exclaimed some choice words for Wormer, Marmalard, and Niedermyer. D-Day and Boon said they were in, and Bluto encouraged the charge to arms.
Now, I am not advocating any stupid acts as were done in Animal House, but looking at Chicago we need to get our act together, stop being reactive and being proactive.
Yes, it is nice to start a group, give itself an acronym name and meet, but there is so much more to do.
For quite a while I have been advocating the informational picketing of Whitney Tilson 5th Avenue mansion and/or office and the E4E offices. But do not leave the picketing to their homes or offices, but wherever that might appear. Yes, I keep hearing from well meaning people who I have the utmost of respect for that these two (among many others) are just the symptoms. Yes, they are the symptoms, but so were Marmalard and Niedermyer and they were targeted, along with Dean Wormer.
If one has a cold, does one not treat the symptoms? I had root canal several weeks ago. The pain I experienced before and after the procedure were symptoms, yet they were not ignored. They were treated appropriately with pain pills. That's what must be done with both E4E and Whitney. Take care of the symptoms. When these two symptoms are done with moved on to other symptoms.
Yet, for some reason we allow these two to continue to do what they do. Is it possible that if we shine the light on these two symptoms that like roaches when the lights come on they will scurry away and never come out again? I don't know, but it is worth a try.
What is another lesson advocacy groups can learn from Animal House?
Delta House took their act on the road. They went to check get dates at Emily Dickinson College, they went to a supermarket, they included dorks like Flounder in their fraternity, Flounder's girlfriend Cissy drove up from Lancaster to visit him, and they even had a fun filled toga party. They were a diverse and well traveled fraternity
The acronyms see lower Manhattan as a base for some reason. Lower Manhattan is nice if you live down there, or Brooklyn, or don't have a car. Has anyone tried to drive downtown on a weekday at 4 PM, or having to head back to Jersey, Westchester, or LI at 6 or 7 PM.
There is a life beyond the LES and Brooklyn. The Bronx is up, the Bronx, Queens, and Westchester, anywhere above 125th St is ripe for picking, yet gets ignored constantly. This is where people live. This is where people have their families, children, etc... Sometimes we are too busy in our lives after school. There is such a thing known as weekends.
Meetings don't need to be seemingly so convert or seem like a late 50's Beatnik poetry reading while everyone is sweating their balls off.
It is time to truly reach out beyond the "base of operations" and be more inclusive. This means recruiting more from elementary schools and the outer boroughs and suburbs.
This is no way an indictment against those that are spearheading the acronym advocacy groups. I know these people are well meaning, have our best interests at heart, and work their butts off. But, it is time to hear others out.
It's nice to picket with Con Ed, but Con Ed is not putting food on my table or putting my son through college or baseball training.
6 comments:
I would like a comparison to Revenge of the Nerds a little better. We teachers unassumingly come to the table to educate, and those in power need somebody to beat up to create the illusion that they know something about education and have a plan. The pigs released at the party would be the graduates of the Leadership Academy.
Yeah those in power. But this is really about how educators or organizing in a neglectful way
And 12 people at Tilson's house will put food on the table. I've been dogging E4E events for years all by my lonesome with leaflets I wrote so I'm not up for the call of the wild where you find yourself out in front with no one behind you. Tell you what. Actually try organizing something instead of talking about organizing something. Count heads as to who shows and report back.
I'll tell you one thing. Our friends in Chicago weren't worried about Whitney Tilson or E4E.
12 people is more than zero people. I tried organizing mike check at Cuomo's Ed commision at Hostos. Guess how much support I got? Nada. Bupkus. Zilch.
I guess one of the reasons is Hostos is above 125th St.
There are many who are trying to organize and work for change, I think our biggest obstacle is overcoming the inertia that has taken over the rank and file. It seems like teachers have developed a version of Stockholm Syndrome - so beaten down that they empathize with those who would be their undoing. Between that and the younger teachers who have no idea what it means to belong to a union, and therefore can't relate to the "us", not "me" point of view, and the culture of fear and retaliation in the schools, it's gong to be a tough task for everyone.
And as someone with three school-aged kids living in the 'burbs, lower Manhattan IS tough on a weekday evening. Not to mention the cost of peak train tickets when I haven't had a raise in four years.
Dear South Bronx,
Just a follow up from last years nightmare disgraced principal John Chase. He was indeed removed and is now at Wings Academy in the Bronx. The DOE has LIED to everyone, telling the public that he was "demoted" when in fact he is still being paid as a Principal but has the job title of Assistant Principal. Only in the NYC DOE can shit like this happen. Piece of crap, drunk bastard making $130K+ as an assistant when the DOE stated publicly that he took a pay cut. LIARS!
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