We Need to Stop Teaching...

Education is incredibly important, whether it be at home or in an institution.  But there is one thing we need to STOP teaching.  And Oscar Hammerstein II eloquently lyricized it back in the 1940s:

"You've got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You've got to be taught
From year to year,
It's got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade,
You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You've got to be carefully taught!"

Yet we're still being taught the lessons of hatred.  "They" are not like us.  Their skin is a different color. Their sexual orientation does not fit "our norm."  Their religion is not ours.  They speak a different language.  

We are all different; we are all the same.  That's what we need to be carefully taught.

Hate is not okay.  Violence is not okay.  It's time that we were taught THAT lesson.


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