Selfishness

      There are few things in life that truly and completely annoy me.

 One of them is when people chew with their mouths open or swallow loudly (if I'm honest this is sort of a hypocritical one because I'm sure I do this)

Another one is when people prefer DC over Marvel. Like no offense but if you look at the redeeming qualities of both let's be honest here... All DC has is the Justice League.

In all seriousness I just need to get something off my chest. Something that has been a huge factor in my life and effects the way I see the world.

 To those of you who are reading this and either 1. Think that a teenager who is currently living this experience has no clue what she's on about or 2. Cannot handle the truth in the words I need to say,  I urge you to continue on with your interneting and would seriously recommend you take some of the BuzzFeed quizzes because those things are fun.

 Whew. Now I can tell you about what's been bothering me.

 Right now my highschool Roosevelt is under re-build so we are without a theater... Because of this Roosevelt is doing a joined school musical with Lincoln, another school in our school district. For those of you who don't know, PPS, the school system I currently am enrolled in has placed both of these high schools literally at the opposite ends of the spectrum money and opportunities wise.

 I'm not here to complain about the people we are doing the musical with. In truth, almost all of the students we are doing the play with are wonderful, hilarious people. Both of the theater teachers are great and every rehearsal is enthusiastic and fun.

Musical wise, the Roosevelt students that take a bus to Lincoln everyday are pretty comfortable. (tired yes, but that's what happens in plays) During rehearsals we get along fine and everyone is very nice to each other. During rehearsals, we all get to experience the trauma of musical exhaustion together which is both horrible and super fun.

 So what is it like when there aren't rehearsals going on?

 "Technically, I'm really in the Jefferson-Roosevelt boundaries but I'm not going there."
 I heard when a cluster of both schools students sat mingling during lunch.

 "I live two blocks away from Roosevelt but I'm going to Lincoln instead."
  I hear on the bus as we head back home from an exhausting day of dancing.

 You see, the people that say these things are genuinely nice people. It is the societies norms in our schools that cause us to say these simple things that tear a hole in my heart every time I hear them.

 "That's because Woodlawns ghetto."
 A childhood friend one told me as a group of us ate ice cream in the sixth grade. Not to mention the fact that a grown adult agreed with them.

 "Oh. Your thinking about going to Jeff? I heard that's a bad school."
This particular point is one that I've heard by both peers and outsiders.

 I think that if I wanted to I could now take the time to say you were wrong. I'd give you some wonderful heartfelt points that would ease your mind and then you'd go off and play another round of Color Switch and my words would disappear into the back of your mind. But I'm not going to do that.

 You are the reason I have heard the same crap my entire life.

You are the reason I have attended a school building with a leaky roof and broken tiles.

 You are the reason that the Tongan girl who can take words and weave them into magic can't even pass her basic English tests because in the eyes of this society she is both considered worthless and the school that she goes too can't teach her how to correctly use their and they're. Meanwhile students with such "high intelligence" across the river are able to begin taking creative writing classes in the sixth grade.

 You are the reason that the class sizes in one area are too big because they keep being sent more and more students some of which who LIE about where they live to get in whereas one school has a single eighth grade class that gets a day of dance, a day of PE and possibly a day of art a week for a semester if the art teacher has the time.

 You are the reason that the little girl ends up in the same boat as her parents with a minimum wage job who can hardly speak a word of English because she is deemed as un-teachable by society and because her school size is too small to offer a proper language assistance program. Instead she must live a life like the people who come and collect glass bottles from my waste bins to pay for the rent that week. Much less the food.

 You are the reason that a boy of color can enroll into a rich, white school and be stared at suspiciously when he gets an A on a math test most of the kids in the class failed. Behind the teachers back they accuse him of cheating.

 The list goes on.

 You talk about equity.

 You talk about equality.

 And yet these social norms along with blame and denial cut deeply into the purest truth.

 There is no equity in division.

 There is no equality in selfishness.

 While you speak about what your children "deserve" understand that others are effected by the choices you make on your path to your sense of equity.  When you send your child to another school with more opportunities you are cursing the next 5 children behind you who attended the the public school within your actual area.