Speak Out

Last week Chico State’s president generated a message condemning the actions of a few hateful people. It seems that some misguided person or group had defaced the campaign poster of a non-white candidate for student government. The behavior was deemed unacceptable, declared intolerable. Then, as 23 year-old Joseph Igbineweka, Chico State’s A.S. president who is from Fresno but is of Nigerian descent, was walking alone in the early morning hours of Sunday, he was attacked and repeatedly stabbed by one of two men shouting racial slurs. He sustained multiple stab wounds, one of them nearly fatal. It was only by chance that Igbineweka’s girlfriend was out of town and not with him, or a horrific event could have been much worse. On Tuesday, Chico Police Chief Mike Maloney referred to the incident as a “brutal assault” “characterized as a hate crime” by the Chico police department. On Wednesday, Chico Mayor Ann Schwab promised united efforts between the city and the university in addressing the attack and its future implications. It seems everyone is up in arms over what the general population wants to dismiss as a random occurrence. Why then did the Chico Enterprise-Record website have to remove the comments option from the e-version of the story due to hate speech? The voice speaking on behalf of tolerance must be louder than the intolerant. Which is why I chose to read Muriel Feelings’ Swahili-alphabet book jambo means hello to Scarlett. I’m loud. She’s loud. I figure that’s a good start.

http://www.chicoer.com/advertise/ci_14912583?IADID=Search-www.chicoer.com-www.chicoer.com

http://www.amazon.com/Jambo-Means-Hello-Swahili-Alphabet/dp/0140546529


http://www.answers.com/topic/muriel-l-feelings

Who's The Boss?

My girls have been called “assertive,” “independent,” and “natural leaders,” but those are all just polite ways of saying “bossy.” When I picked Keilana up from the Children’s Center at Chico State, I knew she would be in the fantasy play area telling her poor little friend Eddie what to do in a stern voice. She was bossy. Addison was the only child to get kicked out of school on the first day of kindergarten for staging a coup against the regime requiring her to make the letter “d” differently than she had learned. The principal called and asked if I had ever considered putting Addie in the afternoon kindergarten. When I inquired why she would ask, she told me there was an opening in the afternoon for a girl with a “strong personality.” Which means bossy. Scarlett goes around the sandbox at the park and collects sand toys from other children to redistribute as she sees fit. And they let her. I’m telling you, these girls are bossy. Certainly they all three came here with their own spirit, but I admit to encouraging them in asserting themselves. For me, it’s hard to know, let alone teach, where to draw the line between enforcing personal boundaries and infringing on the space of others. The little angel friends in Nancy Parent’s I Have Feelings, Too have to find a way to do that very thing. Sometimes playing well with others, and showing love, means someone else gets to be the boss.


http://isbndb.com/d/book/i_have_feelings_too_a01.html

http://www.allbookstores.com/author/Nancy_Parent.html