F-bombs in the U.K.

Old Johnny Rotten was off by about twenty-eight years. Seems young Brits are going to be allowed to drop the dreaded f-words in the classroom, drawing us a bit closer to "Anarchy in the UK". We've come a long way since "God Save the Queen" had to appear as "*** **** *** *****" when it reached number one on the British charts.

I am of course being slightly facetious about the degree of chaos present in Britain. A couple of f-words isn't going to cause complete chaous or the Sex Pistols would have brought the whole world to come apart years ago. Nonetheless, the story has some merit, if only for it's sheer preposterousness.

A secondary school is to allow pupils to swear at teachers - as long as they don't do so more than five times in a lesson. A running tally of how many times the f-word has been used will be kept on the board. If a class goes over the limit, they will be 'spoken' to at the end of the lesson.

One can make an argument against the on the sole basis that keeping track of profanities is a waste of class time. As far as I know, the Brits can beat the bloody tar out of us when it comes to education, but I can't see how wasting time on a tally will help matters.

"Within each lesson the teacher will initially tolerate (although not condone) the use of the f-word (or derivatives) five times and these will be tallied on the board so all students can see the running score," he wrote in the letter

"Over this number the class will be spoken to by the teacher at the end of the lesson."

Only five times! What about the poor kiddies free-speech rights? The fascists.

And ah yes, the dreaded lecture from the teacher to save the day. The "talking-to" always worked for little wimps like me because my parents taught me to fear and respect authority. It is also true that I didn't get into a whole lot of trouble. When the kid--me--cries when his name is "on the board" no additional discipline is required. Suffice it to say, these kids, who are fifteen and sixteen are not like the pathetic little child I was back in kindergarten. In short, this policy is of course going to be woefully ineffective.

"This appears to be a misguided attempt to speak to kids on their own level," said the father of one pupil.

Herein lies the crux of the issue. Children are not adults. They are foolish and naive--as are many adults, it is true--and are incapable of being treated as responsible adults. Children do not have all of the rights that apply to adults, especially in a school situation. Allowing kids to cuss the instructor is disrespectful to the teacher as well as to the children themselves.

Allow me to explain. With rights come responsibilities. If we extend rights to kids without responsibilities we all end up acting like Paris Hilton--to use just one appropriate skape goat. Enough said. When the kids become adults we can give them rights with responsibilities as well. This will ensure they appreciate their rights. It also means they are less likely to be irresponsible f-ups--in the modern nomenclature--by oh, having kids while in high school, dropping out, using drugs, etc.

When we treat children like adults they will stay children. Allowing kids to swear at the teachers isn't the end of the world, but it's a bad move. One can be sure that these kids will not learn to respect authority and neither will their brat kids. Forunately it looks like saner heads will prevail and this experiment will die in the planning stage.

Still, one can't help but ask what they work thinking. Sometimes I just don't get people.