DCUM Weblog

On Monday one of the most active threads that I wrote about dealt with a fight between Montgomery County Public Schools high school students from Bethesda-Chevy Chase and Walter Johnson high schools. As I noted in that post, I had locked that thread because several users had fixated on the race of those involved with some posts including racist statements. Posters asked me to unlock the thread so that more details about what had occurred could be learned, but I asked that a new thread be started instead. That thread, titled, "WJ/BCC Fight - No racism please!" and, of course, posted in the "Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)" forum, was the most active thread yesterday. Despite the interest in the thread, there was not much news to be shared. Posters reported that the police were investigating the incident and relayed rumors learned from students at the school. There was considerable discussion about the reaction by MCPS officials, something with which several posters expressed dissatisfaction. Filling the vacuum of actual news were esoteric discussions such as whether the incident Friday night constituted a "fight" which some posters argued might be legal or an "assault" which would clearly be against the law. Similarly, a number of posters debated why students would have been congregating near the Metro station. One poster seemed completely incapable of understanding that kids might actually be there for the purpose of accessing transportation. In addition to the Metro train, several Metro buses have pickup locations at the station. Moreover, nearby restaurants are popular with the students. As in the earlier thread, some posters argued that what had occurred was less a fight between students from opposing schools and more of an attack on WJ students by students from B-CC. In contrast, at least one poster questioned whether students from either high school were actually involved. There was continued discussion about the appropriate punishment for the attackers. The lack of news about what, if anything, would be done frustrated some posters, while others reminded that information about juveniles was normally not released. There was a lot of concern expressed about the condition of the students who were seen on video being beaten and hope that they would recover quickly. But, as with most other aspects of this topic, there were very few actual facts in this regard to be shared.

Frequently when I look at the list of the most active threads there are a few that I don't recognize and know nothing about. That's normally an indication that no posts from that thread were reported but also means that the topic didn't catch my eye for whatever reason. However, it is rare when every thread in the list is unfamiliar to me. That is essentially the case today. The most active thread was titled, "Where are people’s manners?" and posted in the "Travel Discussion" forum. When I saw the thread's title, I was quite sure that this was the first time I was encountering it. But, then I remembered that there had been a single report complaining that posters were piling on the original poster. I had glanced at the last page of the thread and decided things didn't look too bad and left it alone. So, while, strictly speaking, this morning was not the first time I've been exposed to the thread, I really didn't know anything about it. The original poster says that her family and another family rented a beach house together. They invited a third family to visit for one day. When that family arrived, the kids were hungry and immediately ate all the snacks in the house. Even the dog was hungry and the orignal poster had to feed it. The family went through the refrigerator, kitchen cabinets, bedroom closets, and made use of the bedroom and swimming equipment. All without asking. The original poster wonders whether people have no sense of personal space or personal property anymore. Based on the responses, people do not. Surprising to me, posters seem to have no problem with the guests rummaging through the cabinets and closets and eating everything in sight. Most of those responding found ways to place blame on the original poster. The original poster might be faulted for not having adequate snacks on hand and maybe could have been a bit more assertive in offering things before the visitors were compelled to take things into their own hands, but generally those responding seemed eager to find fault with the original poster. Some posters straight out claimed that the original poster was either inventing or embellishing the story. This leads me to an observation about the DCUM forum. The perceived tone of a post has a hugely significant impact on how others respond to it. If a poster is perceived to be whiny, they are not likely to find much sympathy. Similarly with posters who appear to be exaggerating or over-reacting. The forum can be very supportive of those whose situations appear to be objectively difficult, but it can be quite mean to those believed to be complaining unnecessarily. Several posters were almost explicit about this, complaining that the original poster was being overly dramatic and justifying their unsupportive responses on that basis. Multiple posters said that the original poster sounded "really uptight". A few posters did pay more attention to the facts than the tone and those posters tended to side more with the original poster. It makes me wonder whether the same post, written slightly differently in order to evoke a different tone, would have generated a more supportive response.

The most active thread since I last posted on Friday was titled, "Fight btw BCC & WJ students after game @ 8:30 Friday night" and posted in the "Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)" forum. The original poster embedded an X (formerly tweet) showing video of a brawl near the Bethesda Metro station between students from Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School and Walter Johnson High School. The incident apparently occurred following a football game between the two schools. The thread grew to 30 pages before I locked it yesterday. If you appreciate careful analysis and thoughtful dialogue, this is not the thread for you. Instead, posters seemed to simply use the thread as an opportunity to spout off about their own personal agenda. Several posters immediately acted to distance MCPS and the two schools from the violence by pointing out that it occurred off school property and that there had been good security at the game itself. Proponents of MCPS high schools in other parts of the county congratulated themselves on the outcomes of their schools' games that did not include fighting. Critics of MCPS claimed that this was another sign of the school system's decline. One poster even blamed "teaching controversial topics rather than focusing on academics" and school closures during the Covid pandemic for the fighting. Those opposed to the restorative justice process practiced by MCPS made their usual snide remarks. There were demands to kick aggressors out of school and send them to prison. Other posters demanded that parents be held responsible. The video included in the original poster showed an attacker kicking a White student who was on the grown. Many thought the student doing the kicking was Black and, as a result, fixated on race. For instance, one poster wrote that this was bad because, "People already fear and mistrust black teenagers". Racism is never far from the surface in these discussions. But, others thought the attacker was White. Subsequent video showed that both White and Black kids were attacking other students. But, the issue of race remained throughout the thread with a number of posters insistent that this was a racially-based hate crime, Most posters simply saw it as a fight between students from different high schools in which race was not a factor. At least one poster, and probably more, was adamant that B-CC students had initiated the fighting by seeking out WJ students and attacking them. Administrators of both high schools issued a joint letter in which they condemned the violence and promised that those involved would be disciplined. Other posters quoted similar letters going back several years to demonstrate that fights such as this are nothing new.

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "Thomas Jefferson High School drops to 5th in latest US News ranking" and posted in the "Advanced Academic Programs (AAP)" forum. This thread was inspired by a new release of U.S. News & World Report’s “Best High School Rankings”. Thomas Jefferson High School, or TJ, as the school is normally called, has led these rankings for the past three years but is listed as 5th in the latest list. U.S. News says that this is not a big deal, the school's supporters say it is not a big deal, and those who think it is a big deal are largely ignoring the facts. So, in many ways, this thread is a whole lot of todo about nothing. First, regarding the position change itself. As a U.S. News managing editor is quoted as saying, the top schools are so close that very small changes in the data can result in what appear to be big changes. "But it doesn’t mean too much has really changed there." Next, the reason for the change. As anyone even vaguely familiar with the recent history of TJ will well know, the school recently underwent a change in its admission policies. Opponents of the changes have warned that the best applicants are no longer being selected and, as a result, the quality of the school will decline. Therefore, some saw this drop in rankings as an indication that their prediction is coming true. The flaw in that thinking, however, is that, as the article to which the original poster linked makes clear, the data on which the rankings were based was collected prior the admissions changes. This did not prevent some posters from still blaming the changes. One poster was so insistent that the admissions changes have harmed the school's quality that he literally wrote that it didn't matter how many times others posted the quote saying that the data was prior to the changes. He claimed that the significant impact of the changes was being ignored. Other posters pointed out that TJ must indeed be a leading STEM school if it was capable of developing a time machine that went back to the past to influence data based on changes that hadn't occurred. As is the case with almost all TJ threads these days, this one soon devolved into a debate about race and ethnicity. Posters argued that Asian students were denied admissions in favor of less-well prepared minority students. Others pointed out that Asians remain the largest group of students admitted to the school. The rhetoric suggesting that Asians have been victims of discrimination often has as unfortunate tendency to become racist itself. One poster suggested that minority students admitted under the new policies are "lazy kids who just want a quota for them to get in". To be clear, no quota exists and the new admissions system is race blind. The racist slant of these threads tends to snowball, causing me to lock the threads. So, it's not clear how long this thread will remain open.

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "Leaked training shows teachers being directed to allow gender & name changes without parent consent, transitioning?" and posted in the "Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS)" forum. Let me be clear and say that this thread was an extremely successful trolling exercise. How schools deal with transgender issues has been a hot topic in most of our schools forums (and even a few non-school forums), but the Fairfax County Public Schools forum has been absolutely obsessed with the topic. Much of that has to do with the school system's refusal to strictly comply with new model policies released by Governor Glenn Youngkin's administration. This thread starts out with the original poster linking to a Fox News report about "leaked" FCPS training documents regarding names that students wish to use at school. One document displayed shows three scenarios in which students might choose to use names other than their legal names. In each of the cases, the document indicates that parental permission is not required in order for teachers to use chosen names instead of legal names. The original poster described these documents as "recently leaked" and complains that they do not adhere to the state guidelines. While nobody seems to have noticed until the 10th page of the thread, the X (formerally tweet) that the original poster embedded is from August 2022, just over a year ago. I have no way of knowing whether the original poster intentionally misrepresented this news or was simply unaware of the date of her own sources. But, either way, the training material preceded the new state guidelines and is certainly not "recent". Regardless of the age of the material, heated debate ensued. Several posters agree with the training document and don't believe parental permission should be required for something as mundane as which name is used in school. Both parents and teachers alike argue that teachers are far too busy and have more important things about which to worry than what name a child wants to be called. Other posters fear that schools' adoption of chosen names of a different gender affirms a student's gender transition which they believe should not be done without parental involvement. I think from now on whenever I have to discuss a thread of this nature I am going to remind readers of the Grimm v. Gloucester County School Board decision. The US Supreme Court let stand a decision that sided with Gavin Grimm, a transgender Virginia high school student, and required that he be allowed to use bathrooms and locker rooms matching his gender. While several posters in this thread criticized FCPS for not adhering to the state model policies, they seem to ignore the fact that Youngkin's guidelines are not consistent with current legal precedence. The only mention of the Grimm case I saw in the thread was a single link that offered no explanation concerning to what it was linking. But, I think this case needs to be part of all of these discussions.

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "University of Alabama - ‘ peak neo-antebellum white Southern culture’ - NYT" and posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. As I have been required to read a great many threads from the college forum in order to produce these blog posts, I've noticed that discussions of southern universities almost universally devolve into culture wars. Conservatives tout the schools as having lenient Covid policies, a lack of "wokeness", and inviting campus atmospheres. And, yes, there is one fanatical University of Alabama supporter who is obsessed with the attractiveness of the women. Roll tide my good man, roll tide indeed. So, I guess that it shouldn't be a surprise that we now have a thread that skips the pretense of addressing academics and goes directly to the cultural war. The original poster of this thread critiques a recent opinion article in the New York Time by Tressie McMillan Cottom, "a sociologist, professor and cultural critic". McMillan Cottom takes a side-eyed look at the phenomenon of the University of Alabama's sorority rush. This is something that I had hitherto not known about, but which has become popular on TikTok. The original poster is clearly not a fan of either the article or McMillan Cottom. To say that his summary of the article is rather sophomoric is being generous. His primary point is that McMillan Cottom is "big mad". The irony is that I suspect the original poster agrees with nearly all of McMillan Cottom's points. But, whereas McMillan Cottom sees the situation as disappointing, the original poster likely takes pride in it. This thread is 21 pages long so I can't read the entire thing. But, I've read enough to see that, as expected, there are posters who don't like the article and posters who agree with much of it. The thrust of McMillan Cottom's article seems to be that Alabama's rush tradition is an unapologetic rebuttal of "woke" northeastern universities, though she doesn't use that word. She sees the sorority system has a means for women to get "close to the women who are close to the men who tend to dominate the state’s network power." According to McMillan Cottom, the system demands conformity, which leads to a lack of diversity and, as such, non-White women are largely left out. Reading the article I had two thoughts. First, McMillan Cottom was taking a very cheerless view of something that is generally considered to be full of fun and joy. Regardless of the validity of her critique, she had no hope of coming off as anything other than a scold and that is how many of those responding viewed her. Second, underlying much of McMillan Cottom's analysis is the fundamental fact that a system such as she portrays cannot simply be reformed by adding diversity. This is a point that she makes explicitly. The idea that women should seek power through the men they marry rather than due to their own accord is not one that modern feminism can accept. That is true for women of color as equally as it is for the blond, haired, blue-eyed, White women rushing in Alabama. The more of the article I read, the more that I understood that McMillan Cottom could not be simply seeking the doors of the sororities to be opened to a wider group of recruits, but rather the complete abolishment of the system. Therefore, I was not surprised to read — in the very last sentence of the article — McMillan Cottom's suggestion that Alabama Rush is a tradition that should be left in the past.

The thread that I discussed yesterday about the wife who is rigid about being on time led as the most active thread yesterday. Skipping that one, the next most active thread was titled, "A teacher who pronounces library as ‘liberry’" and posted in the "Off-Topic" forum. In her original post, the original poster simply says that hearing "library" pronounced as "liberry" is "like nails on a chalkboard". Despite the brevity of her post, the original poster touched on two separate issues, both of which provoked considerable response. Because the post appeared to be criticizing a teacher, many posters addressed that aspect. This often resulted in defenses of teachers and expressions of sympathy for the things with which they must put up. Others thought that this mispronunciation was more egregious because it was done by a teacher who is expected to be well-educated and might pass the mistake on to her students. The other aspect of the topic was about the pronunciation itself. Many posters argued that this pronunciation reflects a regional dialect or accent, something that some posters greatly appreciate. Others, including the original poster, argued that the pronunciation revealed an accent that demonstrated a lack of education. Some saw racial connotations in criticism of the pronunciation, while others said that individuals of various races said "liberry". Posters also brought up other words that are commonly pronounced differently depending on the accent of the speaker. Given the nature of language, especially English, in which the "rules" are often arbitrary or extremely flexible, I am not sure that pronunciations should necessarily be described as "correct" or "incorrect". Rather, I think it would be better to discuss "accepted" or "standard" pronunciations. In a subsequent post, the original poster herself seemed to find the regional pronunciation of certain words acceptable and not reflective of poor education, but continued to take issue with "liberry". This was clearly a subjective and personal conclusion. I was thinking about the topic of pronunciation recently after I started a new hobby that involves soldering electronic components. In the US, we pronounce "solder" as "sod-er". Those with a British accent pronounce it as "sold-er". Based on the spelling of the word, the British would appear to have the stronger argument with regard to the correct pronunciation. However, "solder" apparently came from the French word "souder", which has no "L" letter or sound. So, perhaps a point for the Americans. But the bottom line is that if you want to be understood and not thought to be mispronouncing things, you should probably adopt the accepted pronunciation of your environment. Conversely, if you think that someone else has mispronounced something, you might not want to immediately jump to conclusions.

The two most active threads over the weekend were the thread about DCPS's release of PARCC scores and the thread about Arlington County Schools closing Nottingham Elementary School. I've written about both of those already, so I'll start with the third most active thread over the weekend which was titled, "Wife is super rigid about showing up on time" and was posted in the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum. The original poster says that his wife has always been strict about arriving on time to events. She believes that arriving late demonstrates a lack of respect for others' time. The original poster then goes on to describe a recent incident in which the couple, along with their three-year-old daughter were preparing to go to dinner at the original poster's in-laws home. The three-year-old began to engage in typical three-year-old behavior which delayed them. When the original poster's wife noticed that it was the time that they had planned to leave and their daughter was still not ready, she walked out of the house telling the original poster that she would take one car in order to be on time and he should come in the other car with their daughter when they were ready. In the original poster's opinion, it would have been alright to have been a few minutes late in this instance and he asks whether his wife is too rigid. As far as I can tell, the original poster did not provide any further input into this thread and may not have even read the responses. Most posters agreed that the wife is acting very rigid. However, several of them offered potential explanations that excuse the behavior. Some posters suggested the wife might have anxiety that causes her to want to be on time. Others suggested that the original poster, either being habitually late or by not always carrying his parental weight, might have triggered her. A few posters sided with the wife, agreeing that being on time is important. The thread eventually veered off of talk of the original incident and simply became a discussion of the importance of being on time. On that topic, posters were very divided. A number of posters described their frustration with those who arrive late to things and, like the original poster's wife, consider being late to be disrespectful of others' time. Other posters argue that being a few minutes late is normal and acceptable. Some posters even argue that being exactly on time is rude with one poster saying that she dislikes people arriving exactly on time to her home. Another poster consulted Emily Post about this, but there is still disagreement even about her advice. She says that it is rude to arrive early or more than 15 minutes late.

Since I didn't post yesterday, today I'll look at the most active threads during the past two days. The most active thread over those days was titled, "Republican Debate 8/23/23" and posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. This is currently a 28-page thread, most of which I haven't read. This thread demonstrates the limitation of a moderating system that depends almost entirely on one person and that person being me. I didn't watch the debate and wasn't reading this thread when it started Wednesday evening. But, as I prepared for bed that night, reports started coming in regarding inappropriate posts in the thread. Very shortly, my inbox was full of reports. Eventually the number was well over 50 I believe. Given the choice of reviewing the large number of  reports or sleeping, I chose sleep. Thursday morning was spent loading the car and heading off on a drive to take one of our sons to college. I decided that I wasn't going to be able to address the pile of reports still in my inbox and just deleted them. My feeling was that this thread would either be fairly short-lived or turn into a complete dumpster fire regardless of any efforts to save it and neither case made cleaning it up a priority. Arriving home in the early evening, I found my inbox filled a second time with another round of reports of posts in this thread. Again, I decided the reports were not worth my effort and deleted them. I'm sorry to those posters who took the time to report the posts. Generally I greatly appreciate your willingness to help moderate the site. But, there are times — hopefully few in number — when I'm just not available or have to prioritize my work. The result is that this thread is in what you might call a state of nature. If you are interested in what an unmoderated DCUM political thread looks like, here is an example. Based on the reports that I glanced at, there are many off-topic posts, several that are not factual, and a lot that are otherwise inappropriate. I also noticed from my very limited skimming of the thread that there are a lot of posts about Democrats which should be surprising in a thread about a debate in which no Democrats participated. But, it is not surprising since the favored tactic of conservative posters is to engage in "whataboutism", or replying to any criticism of conservatives by saying "what about" some unrelated Democrat. Recently, some conservative posters have even started arguing that "whataboutism" is a term that Democrats made up in order to stifle debate and shut down conservative speech. I can't think of any clearer acknowledgement of how wedded they are to this method of debate. But, it makes it completely unsurprising that the reaction of conservatives to criticism of the debate performance of Republican candidates was to criticize Jen Psaki.

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "AITA: Getting crap for not attending a Friday wedding because we have no childcare" and posted in the "Family Relationships" forum. The original poster explains that she and her husband have been invited to her husband's cousin's wedding which will be held on a Friday afternoon at a location two hours away. The original poster has two children and has not been able to arrange childcare for them. Moreover, both the original poster and her husband are planning to use their paid time off for an upcoming vacation. Therefore, they have decided to skip the wedding. This has led to some family drama due to another relative coming into town with two kids. He first asked whether he could share childcare with the original poster and when told they were planning to miss the wedding, suggested renting short-term housing at the wedding location and hiring a local babysitter. The original poster is not interested in having her children cared for in a strange house by a stranger. Then the original poster's in-laws suggested that she care for all four kids while her husband went to the wedding. This does not solve the problem of a lack of paid time off and the original poster doesn't want to care for four kids. She wants to know if she is wrong in this situation. This thread is 12 pages and I don't have time to read it so I can't say what happened in most of the thread. But, from what I did read, some posters think the original poster is wrong because she doesn't appear to have tried very hard to find a solution for this issue. Others disagree and put blame on the others who are looking to the original poster to solve both her and the relative's childcare problem.