I went to my little nephew’s Christmas program at his school yesterday evening. It was a nice, cute little affair. But the kids sang one song that saddened me as much as if they had been forced to act in an Everyone Loves Raymond episode.

It was a song about Dad putting up lights on the rooftop. And the kids were expressing concern – hoping that he wouldn’t fall off and get hurt. Of course to set up those sentimental thoughts, the song had to portray dad as an imbecilic Homer Simpson-type who would decide not to take any safety precautions, and would choose to decorate on the day where the rooftops were covered in ice.

My brother and I both noticed this.

Yes, I know there are bigger injustices to fight about, but it bothered me that the school’s music teacher saw fit to teach this song, with it’s male-desparaging attitudes to young children in kindergarten and primary grades. This indoctrination simply reinforces attitudes that lead to those larger injustices.

This entry was posted on Friday, December 12th, 2008 at 12:17 pm and is filed under Rants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.