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The issue of the Confederate Flag and Glenelg students has taken up a good share of my Facebook conversations for the past few days. There have been some soul-searching discussions. And, when Ken Ulman and Courtney Watson stepped up and squarely addressed the problem, some unbelievable nastiness and name-calling spewed forth.

It all depends on what you read.

But the place to go for on the ground observations is Twitter. Why? Because here you will find teens sounding off. And, in the nature of teens, they are sounding off without any real understanding that the whole world might be watching, so they are entirely candid. It's fascinating. I encourage you to do your own search. These are primary sources, after all.

I'm sharing a few today. I'm including all the raw language because I think it is necessary.

Search "Glenelg Confederate"

• Sad to say this is not the 1st time us Glenelg people have seen the confederate flag around school Its been going on forever with no actions
• I swear I haven't seen one black person get mad about the confederate flag😂 only white people
• Dear Rednecks of Glenelg, the confederate flag was the flag of the southern army which stood for; Keeping black ppl as slaves and
• People are acting surprised about this confederate flag issue. Glenelg has always been on that bullshit
• Lets all make peace with glenelg, we can bring gifts of moonshine and ride there in our lifted trucks, confederate flags flying
• Since when did the confederate flag become news at glenelg. I've seen it everyday since I've been there lol
• For everyone who is so upset about the Confederate Flag appearing at Glenelg. Learn something. http://t.co/E0YY52AJ3T http://t.co/ROVOmNPNUM

Search "Glenelg"

• Honestly see nothing wrong with what those Glenelg kids did
• but there are like a total of 200 non-white students at glenelg who are probably feeling pretty small right now.
• Only Glenelg kids would think holding up a confederate flag isnt racist
• & I can see how glenelg kids are offended by all of hoco saying they're all racist as a whole, just like we hate how ppl think OM is ghetto
• For once River Hill isn't the one hated by the county 🙏 Shoutout to those select few at Glenelg for making terrible choices 🎉
• Stuff like this has been happening for years at Glenelg but everyone just "forgets about it" bye. You can forget but I refuse.
• I had no idea how much I underestimated the pure rascim at Glenelg, I don't know whether to be afraid or sad
• One student does not and should not define glenelg...
• And the kids from glenelg saying its them expressing their southern pride and someone said you "niggers need to calm down" or something?
• i wish people would stop .. Glenelg is NOT a racist school at all !! there is just a certain group of people that are ignorant .

Search "Dr. Foose"

• Dr. Foose is now addressing the Glenelg Confederate Flag issue
• She tried to clarify the issue and give it some context after noting that such actions are completely unacceptable
• Dr. Foose says that it was a response to River Hill kids calling Glenelg kids hill billies and hicks. The flag went too far.

*****

Some thoughts. I don't know how you can read what students are saying and then accept that the incident on Friday night was an isolated prank as Dr. Foose describes. It doesn't add up. We clearly have work to do, as a community, to address this issue with our kids. If you have read the responses to Ulman and Watson's statements, you know we have our work cut out for us.

Kudos to Sun reporter Luke Lavoie for pursuing yesterday's story about the students who wore Confederate flags to school.

Numbers. It takes more than one student to hold up a banner. Pretty sure there were at least two, if not three or four kids participating in Friday's night's event. But the school system mentions only one. The photograph taken in school yesterday clearly shows three students wearing confederate flags. School system mentions only two. What happened to those other kids? Something really doesn't add up there.

It wasn't that long ago that I was in a room at Bridgeway Community Church listening to a presentation about Building Bridges across racial divides. The incidents this week in Howard County show how local, and how uncomfortable, these divides can be. We must not try to gloss over this to make ourselves feel better. It's wrong, and it's dangerous.

Our future truly hangs in the balance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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