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Monday, March 11, 2019

Perfect Number Watches VeggieTales "Minnesota Cuke and the Search for Samson's Hairbrush" (2005)














































































THIS. "Sometimes you can't do anything to change them." I wish that had been emphasized more- because the rest of the "lesson" very strongly implies that it's your responsibility to change the bullies by "turning the other cheek" etc.











And if a kid tries following this advice and it doesn't "work", then what? It would be easy for the kid to conclude that it's their own fault. They might think they didn't follow the advice correctly and need to try harder. When in reality there will always exist mean/abusive people in the world. Sometimes you just need to cut them out of your life, because trying to change them is not going to work.













"Turn the other cheek" can be an effective strategy for getting people to stop mistreating you. (For example, look at nonviolent protest during the Civil Rights movement.) BUT. It's only going to be effective if you've really thought it through. If you've evaluated the risks and possible outcomes, if you're clear about what your goals are, if you understand the power dynamics of the situation, if you have a plan for how to set up a situation where "turn the other cheek" will make a big impact. In other words, it's only going to work if you're able to carefully evaluate it beforehand and understand exactly what you're doing and have the option to NOT use it if you decide it's not useful. Don't just naively do it because "it's the right thing to do."











I remember I actually tried this, as a little kid. Another kid, let's call him Mark, was always trying to be the first one to get off the school bus, instead of letting us all file out one row at a time from front to back like the bus driver said. I believed Mark's behavior was very unfair to me (and all the kids who were waiting their turn), but I responded by "loving my enemy" and politely letting him go first even when it was my turn. GUESS WHAT? He never said "wow why are you so nice to me when I'm so mean to you?" He probably didn't even know that I believed he was mistreating me. I had extremely strong feelings about how Mark was being such a bad person- and probably nobody else even noticed because I never said anything about it. I just stood quietly and let him go first, imagining that he understood how generous and forgiving I was being, and how unfair his own behavior was. Imagining that I was "heaping burning coals on his head."

















Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa wow they are using the story of SAMSON to teach kids to LOVE THEIR ENEMIES oh my godddd let's take a minute to just marvel at how completely backwards that is.







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To see all my VeggieTales reviews: Perfect Number Watches VeggieTales (Master Post)
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