Monday's Most Active Threads

Earlier this month one of the most active threads that I discussed was focused on articles in the Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School's student newspaper describing drug use in the school's bathrooms. In that thread, parents demanded that something be done about the problem. It turns out that Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS), did do something. The school system restricted access to the bathrooms. The most active thread yesterday, titled, "Bathroom security announcement" and posted in the "Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)" forum, was about that policy change. Generally, posters were in agreement that these restrictions are a bad idea. Some posters described the policy change as "collective punishment" which was unfair and would be ineffective. Many parents said that it would be harmful to students who had medical needs for unfettered bathroom access and menstruating girls. However, there was strong disagreement about what should be done instead of restricting bathroom access. As I have written before, the MCPS forum has a contigent that strongly supports the return of School Resource Officers (SROs), police officers stationed in schools. Other posters are not convinced that armed police officers raiding school bathrooms is the solution. Whenever someone mentions SROs, a poster or posters immediately bring up the failure of police at Parkland and Uvalde. Those schools were mentioned so frequently in this thread that one could be forgiven for thinking they were MCPS schools. Several posters complained that the school security guards don't do anything to stop kids vaping or using drugs in the bathrooms and want these employees to enforce school rules. Others who responded see the bathroom issue in the context of greater societal issues which should be addressed, particularly gun control (there have been a number of gun-related incidents in MCPS schools including a shooting in a school bathroom). It is unlikely that this will be the end of the bathroom controversy so this is probably not going to be the last thread on the topic about which I write.

Yesterday's second most active thread was posted in the "Sports General Discussion" forum. Titled, "How to handle angry Opponent Couch Outburst", the original poster describes an incident involving her 10 year old daughter following a game in which her daughter's team had beaten the opposing team quite severely. The other team's coach got into an argument with the original poster's daughter's coach during which her daughter heard her number mentioned and saw the other coach pointing at her. The original poster's daughter approached the coaches and learned that she was being accused — wrongly in both the mother's and daughter's opinions — of being unsporting. This was fairly traumatizing to the daughter and the original poster asks how she can mitigate her child's distress. The thread reached 9 pages before the original poster asked that it be locked. I've only read the first page of responses and found those responding to be strangely unsympathetic to the 10 year old girl. Most posters assumed that the daughter must be guilty of some transgression, though even if true they agreed that the opposing coach's behavior was unreasonable. Since the original poster is convinced that her daughter was 100% innocent, these responses didn't go over particularly well. I don't know what was discussed on the remaining pages, but I suspect it was more of the same given original poster's desire to lock the thread.

The next thread I'll discuss was titled, "Boyfriend is upset/sad that I am taking a bucket list trip with my sister" and posted in the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum. The original poster describes how she was invited on a two-week trip to Japan by her sister when her bother-in-law found out he was unable to go. The original poster's boyfriend is upset that he wasn't invited and bothered that he will miss her during the two-weeks apart. The original poster is considering dumping the guy over his behavior but wants to know what others think. Something about this post struck me as odd so I checked to see how the original poster had followed-up. It turns out that she only made one additional post in the 8 page thread in which she answered a few questions asked by other posters. This spurred me to see what other posts the original poster had made. Since one of those is a long, detailed post about a planned 13-day Kenya/Tanzania/Zanzibar safari that is supposed to take place in 12 days, my troll detector went into full alert mode. Wouldn't another international trip so close to the Japan trip (scheduled for the end of March) be worth mentioning? If the boyfriend is upset about two weeks in Japan, how does he feel about 13 days in Africa? Moreover, the original poster says that the Japan trip is taking almost all of her paid time off for the year. So, what about the days she will be on safari? Needless to say, my suspicion is that this poster is more of a fantasist than someone with a legitimate problem.

The final thread at which I'll look today was titled, "We make $260k combined….why do I feel like we have no money?" and posted in the "Money and Finances" forum. This type of thread has been a stable of DCUM for as long as I can remember. Posters earning a substantial amount of money — relative to most of the country at least — and not living particularly high on the hog simply can't figure out why they are broke. For most DCUMers, it is because of housing and childcare costs. This thread has a couple of wrinkles, however. The original poster doesn't live in the DC area, disclosing only that she lives "in the desert" and one of her two children has special needs that adds to their living expenses. Still, the budget outlined by the original poster shows that housing and childcare expenses are the problem. Neither of these costs can be easily be reduced though. Much of the cost of childcare is tied to the requirements of the child with special needs. Their home was purchased when interest rates were low and today's higher rates — combined with a rise in home prices — mean that downsizing probably wouldn't save them much. Some posters suggest ideas to save on things such as mobile phone service and potential savings on utilities, but generally there doesn't seem to be much that can be done. Multiple posters advise the original poster that she is stuck in this situation until the kids are in school and childcare costs decrease. The most promising solution at which both the original poster and those responding arrive is for her husband to get a higher-paying job.