What started as a simple, lighthearted post on Facebook by my 14 year old daughter, expressing her opinion, turned into a simple, ugly battle. Silly? Somewhat. But it made me think. We all know how dangerous it is when I think!
My daughter posted that she "loved" the class shirt. She hoped they could do better next year. Obviously this was sarcasm. She didn't love the shirt. She bought it though. Because she wanted to have a class shirt from each year of high school. Ugly or not. It wasn't ugly, it simply made fun of their own class. The front said "Cool Story Freshmen" and the back said "Now Go Back to the Annex". At my daughter's school the freshmen are in a separate building although they do go to the main building for some classes. From my understanding only 21 shirts were bought. The bare minimum to be able to order them. Tells me that my daughter's opinion was shared by many. There was a comment or two from a 10th grader that their 9th grade shirts were bad too. 9th grade is where they're trying to get use to things and that hopefully next year they would have a good student council and the shirts would be better. And then the president of the student council chimed in. He told my daughter she was rude. That "X" had worked hard on the shirt and my daughter should support it not criticize it. I had many problems with his post. First my daughter wasn't rude. IMO. She did support them by buying a shirt. But mainly I had a problem with the fact that it seemed as though he wanted to make sure everyone knew he didn't design this shirt. The way he worded it though looked as though he had his friend's back. I ask him if he was giving her all the credit or all the blame. Because he should have said WE all worked hard on it. He got snippy and made ugly comments and unfriended my daughter and a few others who called him out. My daughter had already told him that if he didn't like her expressing her opinion on her facebook page to unfriend her. Her life didn't revolve around the number of facebook friends she had. And I should add that he didn't buy a shirt himself. And two days earlier had commented on the shirt and how he didn't like it. As the president he signed off on the design. One of my daughter's good friends is on the student council and spoke his mind. One of his best friends got angry with him and says it has ruined their friendship. How good of a friend was she? To allow him speaking his mind, in a tactful manner, ruin a friendship.
Yes this is teenage drama. But it had life lessons in it. Sometimes when you express your opinion other people will get mad. We should try to say what we need to say or want to say, tactfully. We should never hurt others in the process of expressing our own opinion. Get to know your friends well. Often times they are enemies masquerading as our friends. And they will turn on us quickly.
I hope both of my daughters will always stand up for themselves. I hope they will never let others intimidate them into speaking their mind. I just hope they do so gracefully. I hope they remember the golden rule of treating others the way you want to be treated.
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