Originally posted at From the Mixed-Up Files of Middle-Grade Authors.
Dec 17, 2012
This is a group blog of people who write books for children, and it’s safe to say that people who write for children care about children. The same can be said of teachers: they care deeply about children’s well-being. So do their classroom aides and the school librarians, bus drivers, crossing guards and custodians. Even the literary archetype of evil-lunchroom-lady-beneath-the-hairnet cares about children. Mothers and fathers, of course, care about children. As do grandparents, principals, office secretaries, coaches, school nurses, babysitters, daycare workers, pediatricians, and child psychologists. Aunts, uncles, cousins, brothers, sisters – they all care about children.
I’d go so far as to say the vast majority of people on the planet care about children.
I am a mother, and I reject the notion that advocating for children’s safety and well-being is a political act. I reject all false equivalencies between cars and assault weapons, knives and assault weapons, falling-off-ladders and assault weapons. I also reject the notion that there’s a right and wrong time to discuss massacre prevention. Because if not now, when?
Please understand: I don’t pretend to have the absolute solution. All I know for sure, with every fiber of my being, is that we must make some changes. Big changes. Meaningful changes. A society is measured by its treatment of its most vulnerable, and few are more vulnerable than kindergarten children.
If not now, when?
Tracy Abell is a former teacher who is very grateful for the men and women who work in the schools with our children.
Tracy Abell 