Day: July 2, 2019

BEING AGAINST FORCED BUSING DOESN’T MEAN YOU OPPOSE INTEGRATION – Garry Armstrong

I was in the middle of what I honestly call the Boston busing fiasco. On center stage, it played as a racial divide between Boston’s white and minority communities. It played well in the media – especially national and international media where they didn’t understand the local sentiments. The local news stations did a little better — when they tried.

Boston was sarcastically labeled as “The Athens Of America” in this period.

Boston busing – Opposing busing didn’t mean you opposed integration – Boston Globe

The key which I discovered by listening to students and parents – white and minority — was lack of quality education. Busing poor, low-income kids -Black and White – didn’t solve the problem of inferior education. Old, outdated textbooks. Antiquated curriculums. Teachers disenchanted by the lack of respect in pay and regard. Oversized classrooms where teaching was a mission impossible.

Time and again, I heard the same complaints from communities that reportedly were “racially divided” by Federally-mandated busing.

Students were transported from substandard schools in one community to substandard schools in another community. Few bothered to mention this. Most said it was a racial divide which was a cheap way to deflect the ball dropped by courts, legislators and local politicians who saw this as a way to build their constituencies by playing the race card instead of dealing with the fundamental issue: the lack of quality education in Boston’s low-income communities.

After I heard the anger over lack of quality education which was repeated over and over by white and Black families, I went with that as the core of my reports.

Truth be told though, I usually led stories with the standard visual images of angry crowds shouting racial epithets, school buses being stoned, and students threatened. Those images were overemphasized and inaccurately interpreted by national and international journalists and commentators.

I often tried to explain things to the network reporters, but they blew me off, labeling me as a local unable to see the big picture. It was exactly the opposite. They didn’t see the picture and they weren’t looking for it, either.

Many local politicians and community leaders – who really knew better — preyed on their constituents for votes instead of trying to calm the firestorm which often turned violent. We in the local media played the violence up, too because it brought in big ratings and that’s what our bosses wanted. If you wanted your job, there was no escaping the error.

Real efforts to explain the education issues were left to minority affairs shows which aired while most people slept.

Although I was proud of my body of work and earned an Emmy for coverage of that era, it was a bittersweet honor. Had I been able to cover it honestly, it would have been a different story.

There’s certainly no excuse – 50 years later – for Presidential hopefuls to use busing as a political tool. Again, they are ignoring the real issue of that volatile period in the name of getting some votes from people who weren’t here and don’t understand what really happened.

Shame on all of them!

You might find reading today’s Boston Globe’s article:
OPPOSING FORCED BUSING DOESN’T MEAN YOU OPPOSE INTEGRATION by Kevin Cullen -July 1, 2019

LAST CHANCE – Marilyn Armstrong

Most of the stuff I buy online are necessities that are cheaper online or not available (locally) offline. Dog food. Dog biscuits. Over-the-counter medications like generic Tylenol and generic allergy meds.

I buy very little clothing because I don’t wear much and feel I have more than enough probably for the rest of my life. I haven’t bought a pair of shoes in about 4 years. Once a year, I buy underwear for me and Garry. Maybe it’s my imagination, but I swear it wears out faster than it used to. Cheaper fabric?

Olympia Sports

Every now and again, I buy a couple of new tunics tops and loose pants for summer — or yoga pants for winter. When it’s Garry’s birthday, I get him whatever he is currently yearning for. This year, it was Marine Corps garb but that’s only because we’ve run out of NCIS clothing.

Any place from which I’ve ever bought anything sends me advertisements for their sales including cameras, clothing, computers, furniture, cell phones, and phone carriers. Streaming TV stations, shoe stores, LL Bean, and Land’s End. J Jill and Coldwater Creek.

Every single advertisement assures me this is my absolute last chance, my final opportunity to get 40% off, 50% off (with free shipping for purchases over $100 or $75) or cash in on their two for one sale. Don’t forget, if you rope in a friend, he or she will also get a fabulous discount, too.

Every sale is my final opportunity to acquire something. The most annoying thing is even if I want something, they don’t have what I want. Wrong size, wrong model. Too big, too small, too something. Or it’s in some strange color like lime green or delicate baby pink. If I really need it, it’s the one that isn’t on sale.

Yesterday
Today

These final chances to save money never end. I have concluded that the “last chance” will never arrive. Before I have time to delete yesterday’s “last chances,” there is an entirely new set of last chances in my inbox. I remember thinking I got way too much snail mail. I still get way too much snail mail, but the amount of email is catastrophic and overwhelming.

It takes me hours to delete all my final chances to get whatever is on sale at a gigantic, huge, monstrous, final last chance opportunity.

My conclusion from all of this? There is no such thing as a final sale unless the company is really going out of business.

A lot of “going out of business” sales are also endless. I remember when I was growing up in Queens, there were stores that had been going out of business for years. Eventually, a law was passed that you could only go out of business for six months. After that, you were either back IN business, or you had to close your doors.

Also, you couldn’t have a continuous sale. If it lasted past a certain interval (I forget what it was, but something like six weeks), they became your regular prices.

I suspect when any of us really get our final opportunity — our true last chance — it won’t be via email. It won’t even be through snail mail. You or someone will discover someone dead.

That would be the genuine final opportunity

A VERY BLUE JULY GARDEN 2 – Marilyn Armstrong

July Blues – 2

Okay. I’m playing around a bit, but I took a lot of pictures of my garden today and there were so many pictures, one of them clearly needed to be blue.

After all, this IS a blue July, is it not? How could I pass up this magical opportunity to have a beautiful blue garden on this beautiful day in July?

This is my very blue garden full of daylilies of the normally orange kind.

A square, blue garden of daylilies

DAY OF THE BLOOMING DAYLILIES – Marilyn Armstrong

Blooming Daylilies – FOTD – 07/02/19

And so, it did not rain today. No thunder or lightning. Only a few passing clouds. Warm, but not humid. In fact, as close to a perfect summer’s day as one could ask for.

We had a lot of errands to run today — and more tomorrow. But wherever we drove, there were daylilies along the road, in gardens, in the woods. I’ve never seen the roads so green.

Weeds and vines have wrapped the fences by the road, overflowed their usual locations and seem to be trying to enclose the whole world.

Old tractor with daylilies

And everywhere, you could see orange daylilies peeking out from between the greenery. Somehow, these originally imported flowers have become a symbol of summer in New England.

A clump of daylilies
My perfect daylily

I was grateful for the long day because I knew I would be able to photograph the flowers when we came back from doctors, pharmacy, garage, and grocery. It was a long day and I still have had time to go through my email. I don’t think I’m going to get through it today at all. All this evening, I’ve been processing the pictures I took earlier.

Now it’s late. I’m tired. Tomorrow is going to be very much like today. For that matter, Wednesday is going to be very much the same.

By Friday, I’ll need a gurney to move me to the exhaustion ward.

BUSING FAILED. IT’S ABOUT TIME WE SAY SO – Marilyn Armstrong

Watching the Democratic riots (aka “debates”)  the other night, I was surprised that Biden didn’t tell the real truth about busing. Because this is a subject with which we are intimately familiar here. Garry covered Boston’s busing crises and has an Emmy for his work. He interviewed white families, black families, every family. He interviewed politicians, teachers, and the kids who got bused.

I think by the time he was done with the story, he had interviewed almost everyone in Boston. Everyone had an opinion, but the most pointed ones were from the families who were directly affected by busing and the kids who were bused.

Because you see, the outcome has been clear for years: BUSING DIDN’T WORK.

Not one state exceeded 49%!

Educators and other organizations have done study-after-study about it. It did not improve race relations or education. It absolutely failed. However well-intentioned the idea, busing kids long distances to schools which did not welcome the students and where they would not make friends or get a better education didn’t solve any problems. It probably created new ones.

The real issue?

We need to invest in our schools. Money. Schools need money. Teachers need salaries. Schools need better textbooks and materials. Laboratories, computers. It’s not about better cafeterias and larger playing fields.

It’s about better learning.

Moving kids of different races, so you can say you have somehow achieved diversity, is nonsense. I’m surprised Biden didn’t bother to point it out. For that matter, I’m shocked that Kamala didn’t point it out either. I’m sure she knows as well as we do. Should Biden have supported busing despite not believing in it? Because it was the currently “right thing to do”?

I think not, but then again — I’m not a follower of trends or fads, no matter how well-meant.

Our school issues — local and national — are ruined by lack of funding. By an unwillingness of states, towns, and the federal government to spend enough money to make our schools what they ought to be. To pay teachers what they are worth. To make teaching an attractive profession.

Whenever a government runs short of money, the first thing they cut is education. They refuse to buy quality textbooks or even school supplies. The result is a nation full of stupid, ignorant people. Maybe some of them would have been stupid and ignorant anyway, but I’m sure the lack of education didn’t help.

Rebuilt Uxbridge High School. I’m sure the classrooms are nicer, but is education better?

It’s time to start questioning the idea that diversity automatically improves education and thus physically moving children from one school to another is in itself solving some educational problem. It isn’t.

In effect, what happened is anyone who could afford it sent their children to private schools. Since both sets of schools involved in Boston busing were in poor neighborhoods — no accident — the result was non-education for everyone.

If we don’t invest in education, we’ll never have educated students of any color. Bad schools produce poor education. If schools are sufficiently bad, the result is uneducated students.

We talk a good game per education in the U.S., but we don’t live it. We don’t contribute to it. So while we worry about college debt, how about we put a little of that concern into worrying about teaching kids to read and understand what they are reading? Teach them some real history, not the crap they get in their old, out-of-date (and probably never accurate even when they were new) textbooks.