re: who is responsible?

[lmelina@moscow.com (Lois Melina)]

It is tempting to blame adolescence for making some people feel like
outcasts. Those students who feel like outcasts have no idea how insecure
the "popular" kids about their status, which is why they cling to it and
avoid association with other groups.

However, it is worthwhile looking at our behavior as adults, too. Certainly,
responsible parents try to communicate to their children that they should be
tolerant and accepting of people with differences, but each of us needs to
take a close look at our own behavior, on which our children model their
behavior. Certainly there are pockets of "power" in the academic world, and
people who do not have Ph.D.s, or tenure track positions, or degrees from
the "right" universities, or tons of grant money, or who do not research
popular topics in their field feel like outcasts. How many of us are truly
welcoming when someone joins our church or club or organization who doesn't
seem to "fit" because they hold different political views, have a different
lifestyle, or a different socioeconomic background? How many of us regularly
have coffee in a particular restaurant and look askance if someone who
doesn't fit the "culture" of that particular restaurant (granola, cowboy,
long-time farmer) happens in? Because we are more mature than we were as
adolescents, we don't laugh in their face, but they get the message as
surely as the "trench coat mafia" did. Because they are not as impulsive or
perhaps quite as powerless as a teenager, they are not as likely to open
fire in the office or restaurant (although it does happen). 

Truly, the problem seems huge. It seems wrapped in our culture. We feel
powerless to change it. But we can do some things. And we can start with our
own behavior toward people that we feel uncomfortable around.

Lois Melina
************************
Lois Melina
Editor, "Adopted Child" newsletter
P.O. Box 9362
Moscow ID 83843

phone: (208)882-1794
fax: (208)883-8035
Lmelina@moscow.com
www.raisingadoptedchildren.com