Evan vs. Shannon
I have returned back from a week of Boy Scout activities and got to read the whole week of Shannon Lake in a single shot. Then I read the Elly’s Coffee Corner comments on the For Better or For Worse website about the Shannon Lake storyline and I found them to be quite interesting. Some commentators take Lynn to task for her poor development of Shannon Lake as anything but a “special needs kids have it bad” spokesperson, but there was a whole line of comments from people who are, or know, or have relatives or children who are special needs who praised Lynn for taking a stand against people who bully special needs kids.
My son has Asperger’s Syndrome and during the course of the week with the Boy Scouts he was on the receiving end of some bullying from 2 of his fellow scouts who called him “Dumb as a Bag of Shit”. I was not a witness to the bullying, as it happened away from me, but I was a witness to the aftermath of my son lying in his tent crying and the long process of getting the story of what happened out of him. Commentators, who say that in today’s high school, bullying of special needs kids no longer occurs because kids are taught this is wrong, are sadly mistaken.
After returning home from Boy Scout Camp, my daughter wanted to see the movie “Evan Almighty”. Before we did this, my family went to a surprise birthday party for one of our church friends. Our friend’s mother was there and hearing what movie we planned to see, praised the movie excessively. I was curious about this, since the reviews for the movie had been, by and large, bad. What I found in the movie was the aspect my friend’s mother liked. Evan talks to God, Evan eventually does the right thing, lives are saved, his family grows closer together, and everyone dances. All positive things, except they are couched in a storyline with plot holes so large you could drive trucks through them. I could see my friend was so excited to have a mainstream Hollywood movie, embrace the idea of God active in the world; she was willing to ignore the more ridiculous parts of the plot.
In this same fashion, I feel the friends and relatives of persons with special needs embraced the Shannon Lake storyline. They are so excited to have someone on a large scale say, “Don’t bully the special needs kids,” they are willing to ignore the silliness of the whole situation. The message is a good one. It needs to be said. Maybe some special needs kid will read the strip and be inspired to stand up for themselves (hopefully not the way Shannon Lake did). It would never work for my son. He knows some kids are just, plain, mean; and he tries to stay away from them.
My son has Asperger’s Syndrome and during the course of the week with the Boy Scouts he was on the receiving end of some bullying from 2 of his fellow scouts who called him “Dumb as a Bag of Shit”. I was not a witness to the bullying, as it happened away from me, but I was a witness to the aftermath of my son lying in his tent crying and the long process of getting the story of what happened out of him. Commentators, who say that in today’s high school, bullying of special needs kids no longer occurs because kids are taught this is wrong, are sadly mistaken.
After returning home from Boy Scout Camp, my daughter wanted to see the movie “Evan Almighty”. Before we did this, my family went to a surprise birthday party for one of our church friends. Our friend’s mother was there and hearing what movie we planned to see, praised the movie excessively. I was curious about this, since the reviews for the movie had been, by and large, bad. What I found in the movie was the aspect my friend’s mother liked. Evan talks to God, Evan eventually does the right thing, lives are saved, his family grows closer together, and everyone dances. All positive things, except they are couched in a storyline with plot holes so large you could drive trucks through them. I could see my friend was so excited to have a mainstream Hollywood movie, embrace the idea of God active in the world; she was willing to ignore the more ridiculous parts of the plot.
In this same fashion, I feel the friends and relatives of persons with special needs embraced the Shannon Lake storyline. They are so excited to have someone on a large scale say, “Don’t bully the special needs kids,” they are willing to ignore the silliness of the whole situation. The message is a good one. It needs to be said. Maybe some special needs kid will read the strip and be inspired to stand up for themselves (hopefully not the way Shannon Lake did). It would never work for my son. He knows some kids are just, plain, mean; and he tries to stay away from them.
posted by howard at 11:34 PM
6 Comments:
I like to read Howard Bunt's Blog because it is interesting, extremely well written, and assertions are supported with examples. This column is superb! Thank you for sharing.
Welcome back, Howtheduck! I'm sorry to hear about your son's experience with the bullying. I think your theory about why people are willing to overlook the flaws in the Shannon are makes sense.
anonymous,
Thank you so much for the kind words about the Howard Bunt Blog. Now I have a compliment to which my future writing can aspire.
aprilp_katje,
It's good to be back. One of the best things about being at a Boy Scout Camp all week, is you really appreciate things like air-conditioning and ice. As for my boy, one of the best things about him is that even when he has a bad experience, he focuses on the positive part. He is quite remarkable in that respect, and I hope it is an attribute he can maintain into adulthood. When he has spoken with his mother and sister about the past week at Boy Scout Camp, the bullying has not been mentioned even once.
Truth be told, I was glad you were away ☺; I didn’t want you to have the opportunity to trash last week’s strips! Your piece today is superb - brought me to tears… Let’s see if Lynn can surprise me this week the way you surprised me today.
anonymous,
I have been working my way through some of the other website FBorFW forum comments about the last week of strips, and it looks like there were plenty of comments without my contribution, and it would have been difficult to find something to say different from everyone else on a daily basis. I do find that a lot of the times, the For Better or For Worse strip can only be properly evaluated after you see the whole story arc, even if that story arc runs over years or over a week. My week with the Boy Scouts worked out well in that regard to the Shannon speech sequence. Thanks again for the compliment on today's piece.
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