Michael J. Bowler

The Writings of Michael J. Bowler

“What is Normal?” – Guest Post From Author Mia Kerick

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Bryan the hero

Mia Kerick is a best-selling author I had heard a lot about on Facebook, and our paths often crossed in commenting on the same pictures or articles. As she points out below, because I saw her name so often I thought we were already FB friends and was startled when she sent me a friend request and I realized we were not. That has been corrected, much to my delight. She is an amazing lady filled with compassion, boundless energy, enthusiasm, the ability to multi-task so well that I’m envious, and she’s a terrific and successful writer.

To celebrate the unfurling of her newest, and already a best-seller, book for young adults, The Red Sheet, I offered to host Mia on my blog because she and I are very much on the same page. Be sure to check out the links to her book and (YES!) there are giveaways at the rafflecopter link. I have not yet read The Red Sheet, but it is on order and I will dig in as soon as it arrives.

Mia’s post is about the definition of “normal,” a subject I address in my own trilogy of books that began with Children of the Knight. I’m going to add my own little spin to what she said and then you will hear from this great lady yourself. Having worked with special education students for most of my life, and being one myself in the sense that I have always been hearing impaired, I sought  to make a distinction for my kids. They always felt abnormal, as did the gay kids I worked with in the Gay Straight Alliance, because people kept telling them that, often their own parents, siblings, or relatives. I would  tell them to keep this in mind: people who are hard of hearing or visually impaired or gay or learning disabled or physically disabled or whatever are not “the norm” in life because “the norm” would be considered what is standard or typical. But they, and myself, are completely normal because these things are part of how we were born and are thus “normal.”  Everyone one of us is normal because every human being is unique and special, even the ones who think they are perfect because they fit the arbitrary “norms” society has created. The bottom line is, people need to stop trying to make everyone exactly like them and accept inherent differentiations from “the norm” as normal. There, that’s my little soapbox to piggyback on Mia’s post. So without further adieu, I bring you the one, the only, the magical Mia Kerick! Yea!

Hello and thanks for inviting me over…

I recently “met” Michael Bowler during a Facebook conversation about YA books. I must admit, I tried to tag him and I couldn’t. We weren’t friends! Well, not in the FB “official” sense of the word, which came as a surprise to me. We quickly remedied the not-friends thing, and since then we have very quickly come to be real friends. We certainly have a lot to talk about.

So I would like to thank Michael for allowing me to post on his blog, and I don’t think he’ll be too surprised by what I say.

Anybody have a soapbox I can stand on? I think I’m gonna need one.

What makes something seem “normal” to us? Well, first of all, let’s take a look at the word “normal”. (I love examining definitions!)

For the most part, I trust Merriam-Webster, do you?

Here’s what MW had to say:

1nor•mal adjective ˈnȯr-məl

: usual or ordinary : not strange

: mentally and physically healthy

Synonyms can tell you a lot about a word’s meaning. Here is Merriam-Webster’s list of synonyms for the word normal:

average, common, commonplace, cut-and-dried (also cut-and-dry), everyday

But do you want to know what can tell you even MORE about a word? What it is not. In other words, a word’s antonyms. (Also very informative!)

MW’s list of antonyms for the word normal:

abnormal, exceptional, extraordinary, odd, out-of-the-way, strange, unusual

And these “Near Antonyms” further illustrate the point I plan to make:

Near antonyms for the word normal include:

curious, funny, peculiar, quaint, queer; aberrant, anomalous, atypical, irregular, untypical; rare, recherché, scarce; fantastic (also fantastical), phenomenal; bizarre, far-out, Kafkaesque, outrageous, outré, wacky (also whacky), way-out, weird, wild; eccentric, idiosyncratic, kooky (also kookie), nonconformist, oddball, offbeat, unconventional, unorthodox; freak, freakish

There were a lot more…

So, can we agree for the sake of argument that the word normal refers to that which is usual? That which is ordinary? Something that is not strange. And for something to be considered ordinary, we must see it a lot. Cheeseburgers are ordinary. You can get one (or two-who’s counting?) at every fast food store and cookout you attend. You never stop and stare when you see a guy eating a burger. It is NOT a strange sight; you see it every day.

But chowing down on a Witchetty grub? I can tell you this much: if you stand on the corner of Main and Maple streets, and sink your teeth into an oversized, juicy white moth larvae, you might solicit some strange looks. A fair amount of staring would be directed your way. Let’s admit it: in the United States of America the consumption of Witchetty grubs is unusual. Bordering on peculiar.

Dare I say abnormal? Yes, I dare. Eating grubs is abnormal behavior in our neck of the woods.

SO now that we have a working definition of the word normal, let’s apply it to an important topic: relationships. What constitutes a conventional romantic relationship? A normal, ordinary, garden-variety love affair… We should start with a boy and a girl, right? You see standard M/F couples like this absolutely everywhere in real life—and also in fiction—including in movies, television, books. The more you see and read about the boy and the girl—entwined on a hammock, holding hands on a beach, kissing on a sidewalk—the more commonplace it becomes. So normal.

Let’s, for today’s purposes, focus on reading material, though. Would it be fair to say that almost every time we crack open a book, from the age of infancy (“that’s a mommy and that’s a daddy”) to school age (Fun with Dick and Jane) to high school (much less fun with Romeo and Juliet) to YA parent-approved free reading books (Twilight’s Edward and Bella), all kids see is the “conventional” male-female couple. And thus, this pairing becomes “normal” to us. Usual. And somehow, usual morphs into acceptable.

Now, I don’t know about you, but I never came across two boys kissing in any of my middle school English literature books. I never had the option of choosing a novel about a girl discovering her feelings of attraction to other girls in my high school summer reading book options. Were there books covering those topics? I didn’t know.  I never thought of that. I never thought of them. “Them” being gay and lesbian young people. Bisexuals and transgenders? Huh? Books about trans-what certainly weren’t on the Young Adult shelf of my local town library.

I never read about these kinds of relationships. Seeing a gay couple, up-close, live and in-person was rare for me, as well as for most of the kids I knew. Reading about them in any of the literature to which I had access was practically unheard of.  It is not a very far leap from rare and unheard of to weird and strange. And from weird and strange, it is a mere hop, skip, and jump to abnormal.

I have illustrated that due to the fact that preteens and teens rarely have exposure to LGBT young adults and their love relationships, it has become widely considered NOT NORMAL to be LGBT and in a same-sex relationship. (Hold the applause… there’s more.)

NOT NORMAL= odd, bizarre, funny, aberrant, freakish. Hmm….

Now, just say you are an LGBT young adult.  How does feeling peculiar, weird, and abnormal—simply for being who you were born to be—affect your emotional growth and development? Your ability to form relationships with friends as well as with possible romantic partners? Not positively, I’d wager. People who feel weird and abnormal tend to hide or act out because being who they are is, in its very essence, wrong.

Next, say you are not an LGBT young adult. When you see a student you suspect is gay, or a gay couple, how do you react? Well, you stop and stare, never having had much exposure to this unconventional type. You giggle because it is funny and peculiar. You become uncomfortable because what you see in this person or couple is freakish. Because this sight is not NORMAL to you.

See where I’m going with this?

For something to be normal to us, we must be exposed to it. We must allow our youth to be exposed to it. We, as adults, must offer to young adults a wide range of fiction and nonfiction, showing protagonists and heroes, lovers and friends, saints and sinners, lovers and enemies, in all of the sexual diversity that exists in the real world.

We must integrate LGBT literature into Young Adult literature.

Mainstream LGBT literature in school and libraries and everywhere.

Because LGBT IS normal.

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One October morning, high school junior Bryan Dennison wakes up a different person—helpful, generous, and chivalrous—a person whose new admirable qualities he doesn’t recognize. Stranger still is the urge to tie a red sheet around his neck like a cape.

Bryan soon realizes this compulsion to wear a red cape is accompanied by more unusual behavior. He can’t hold back from retrieving kittens from tall trees, helping little old ladies cross busy streets, and defending innocence anywhere he finds it.
Shockingly, at school, he realizes he used to be a bully. He’s attracted to the former victim of his bullying, Scott Beckett, though he has no memory of Scott from before “the change.” Where he’d been lazy in academics, overly aggressive in sports, and socially insecure, he’s a new person. And although he can recall behaving egotistically, he cannot remember his motivations.
Everyone, from his mother to his teachers to his “superjock” former pals, is shocked by his dramatic transformation. However, Scott Beckett is not impressed by Bryan’s newfound virtue. And convincing Scott he’s genuinely changed and improved, hopefully gaining Scott’s trust and maybe even his love, becomes Bryan’s obsession.

With a foreword by C. Kennedy

Book Links:

Dreamspinner  Ι  Goodreads

Excerpt:

I was back to being the very same guy I had been before the change—

insecure, lazy, selfish, uncharitable—

a guy I didn’t like….

and a guy I didn’t want to be….

but here he was again.

Looking at the world with his frightened and egotistical eyes.

And that’s when it hit me. I popped up off my bed and walked rather hurriedly over to the dresser. I gazed into the mirror that hung above it, and I saw Bryan Dennison.

I reached out my hand and placed my fingertips lightly on the image of the person looking back at me—the vulnerability in his eyes revealed how very lost he was. The person who looked back at me, my very own reflection, had absolutely no direction in his life. None whatsoever.

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Mia Kerick is the mother of four exceptional children—all named after saints—and five non-pedigreed cats—all named after the next best thing to saints, Boston Red Sox players. Her husband of twenty years has been told by many that he has the patience of Job, but don’t ask Mia about that, as it is a sensitive subject.

Mia focuses her stories on the emotional growth of troubled men and their relationships, and she believes that sex has a place in a love story, but not until it is firmly established as a love story. As a teen, Mia filled spiral-bound notebooks with romantic tales of tortured heroes (most of whom happened to strongly resemble lead vocalists of 1980s big-hair bands) and stuffed them under her mattress for safekeeping. She is thankful to Dreamspinner Press for providing her with an alternate place to stash her stories.

Mia is proud of her involvement with the Human Rights Campaign and cheers for each and every victory made in the name of marital equality. Her only major regret: never having taken typing or computer class in school, destining her to a life consumed with two-fingered pecking and constant prayer to the Gods of Technology.

My themes I always write about:

Sweetness. Unconventional love, tortured/damaged heroes- only love can save them.

Author Links:

http://miakerick.com/

https://www.facebook.com/mia.kerick

http://www.amazon.com/Mia-Kerick/e/B009KSTG9E/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1389575652&sr=1-1

Rafflecopter Giveaway:  http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/91bbb15/

Should 14-year-olds Have the Right to Vote?

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Children of the Knight Mid Res CoverIn the United States today a citizen must be 18 years old to vote in any federal, state or local elections. How many of you out there believe, as I do, that the voting age should be lowered to fourteen? A crazy idea? Let’s explore it, shall we?

The cons are easiest to start with since most adults would instantly say them: Fourteen-year-olds aren’t mature enough. Heard that one before? Fourteen year olds aren’t smart enough. Fourteen year olds aren’t educated enough. Fourteen year olds are just kids and they don’t have any life experience to go by. How about this one – if we let them vote, they’ll get to sit on juries. Then what’s next – they drop out of school and join the work force? That would cheapen the adult workers because non-union kids would work for less and take jobs away from adults! And if they can vote, they’ll want to drive cars and join the military. That would undermine the entire social fabric because we’d have a bunch of immature kids on equal footing with mature and capable adults. Are these arguments sound? Do they seem reasonable to you? Is it idiotic to allow fourteen-year-old kids to “be” adults and participate fully in the adult decision-making world? Maybe. Maybe not.

How many of you out there are aware that in 45 out of 50 states, juveniles as young as fourteen, sometimes thirteen, are already considered legal adults? You didn’t know this? Oh, maybe that’s because the adult voters in those states decided that juveniles are adults in only one way – when they get in trouble with the law. In every other way, hell no, they’re just immature kids who don’t know anything! But when it comes to crime, to life in the streets, to gangs and their overreaching influence, to resisting peer pressure – suddenly and magically they become adults. But only for that moment when they made the bad choice. Oddly enough, when they do something good or positive for society, they’re still just punk-ass kids who know nothing and should be seen but not heard, and sometimes not even seen unless they’re good-looking or get good grades.

Make sense to you? How many of you out there truly believe that thirteen or fourteen-year-olds can be an adult today to get caught up in a crime, but not be an adult tomorrow to sit on the jury to hear that crime, or to vote on the very laws that “adultified” them in the first place?

I have spent my entire life working with kids, particularly teenagers. And they’re not adults. Not yet, even though many states like to pretend they are when they get in trouble. Kids don’t have the experience to process feelings like we do, and they can’t reason things out as well. It’s not built in yet. This country wants to pretend children are adults so we can put them in prison when they screw up because we are too lazy and caught up in ourselves to give them a second chance, or a third, or even a fourth. Kids screw up. That’s been the case throughout all of human history, and when they do, those kids need adults to help them become better so they don’t keep screwing up. They don’t need adults who just want to toss them into prison, out of sight and out of mind.

Too many adults in this country want kids to be magically grown up so they don’t have to parent them and role model for them and set good examples for them, but the bottom line is children are children and need to be allowed to be children. Children can’t, and never will, think and feel like adults because they aren’t adults. Not yet. And the adult society in this country has a throw-away mentality. If the kid screws up, throw him away. We’ll just get another. That’s like the farmer who leaves the barn unlocked and his horse escapes and tramples his crops. Farmer’s solution? Shoot the horse and just buy another. After all, it was the horse’s fault right, for trampling the crops?

So we return to my original question – should fourteen-year-olds be allowed to vote and by extension sit on juries to hear the cases against them? I say yes. If, in our collective idiocy, we are going to pretend they’re adults for doing something wrong, then they sure as hell can be adults to do something right! Or are we, as country, simply afraid of our young people? We seem to be incarcerating a vast number these days, so the answer would appear to be yes. But are we even more afraid of giving them the power to decide laws, to elect presidents and representatives, to pass or reject propositions that would seek to criminalize them just for being kids?

I say if fourteen-year-olds are adult enough to commit a crime then they are more than adult enough to vote! Who’s with me? C’mon, people, let’s start a revolution. . . a children’s crusade for equal rights. . .

Sir Lance says, “I’m fourteen-years-old. I can go to prison, but I can’t drive a car. Crazy, huh?”

Evil Begins With Hate

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no HateToday’s posting is a bit of a rant, but Sir Lance says it’s a legitimate rant, especially with everything going on in Russia with the upcoming Olympics and the country’s new law forbidding people to be gay. So here’s Sir Lance’s thought for the day: every so often random photos pop up on Facebook, very innocuous and usually romantic shots of two boys kissing. Maybe they’re at home, on a park bench, or leaving the prom. They’re just random boys kissing each other. Every time I see these kinds of photos, they are accompanied by some of the most horrendous, vicious, poisonous vitriol I’ve ever seen on FB, the kind of vitriol that inspires laws like they have in Russia. These comments attack the two boys as though one was Hitler and the other Stalin! Are these boys eviscerating children? Are they committing mass murder? Are they plotting some huge act of terrorism? No. They’re kissing. Why are they kissing? Probably because they love each other. Why do they love each other? Their brains are wired that way, because they were born to love others of the same gender. Wow! What a heinous crime, right? Worthy of hate, right? Obviously some people think so! We have enormous problems facing this country and this world and two boys kissing is what gets people fired up? Those people need a life.

Well, here’s a message to the haters out there, and any of you reading this may feel free to share it with haters you know personally: If all of you males out there hating on gay boys are so sure they simply woke up one day and decided to be attracted to other boys, I challenge you to try it yourselves. Do your homework. Show the world that same sex attraction is simply a choice by eschewing all attraction to females and turning all of your drives toward males. Let us know how that works out for you, huh? Oh, and while you’re at it, let us know how you enjoy being hated on by people like yourselves, how much you like being bullied and called names and mocked and ostracized. Give us FB users a full account of how “deciding to be gay” works. It should be quite instructive.

Since I know none of you will do this (because it can’t be done), then may I humbly suggest you get your hate off the Internet and get yourselves a real life. Obviously, your own relationships must be so bad that you can’t stand seeing two boys happy together. Too bad. Get over it. Get out into your community and do some volunteer work. Actually get to know people other than yourselves and maybe you won’t be so ignorant. And if you can’t do this, maybe the U.S. should start its own version of “Battle Royale” and throw all the haters into a big arena so you can wipe each other out. Sounds brutal, but then, you all should relish the violence since you already enjoy spewing so much of it with your words, and often your physical actions, when you bully and beat up boys who love boys. It seems to me that eliminating evil from the world could only be a good thing. After all, evil always begins with hate.

As for you so-called religious haters out there – bear in mind Jesus’ number one commandment: “love your neighbor as yourself.” Also bear in mind that he only condemned one group of people as a “brood of vipers,” and that was the Pharisees. Why? Because they were hypocrites, just like you. You claim to follow Christ, who did not condemn people and did not address the issue of same-sex love, but who did decry fornication among heterosexual couples, i.e. “hooking up” (I’m sure none of you good Christians have had multiple sex partners in your lives, right?), and yet you do exactly what he never did – you condemn. That makes you hypocrites, a brood of vipers. So don’t start taking lines from the Bible out of context to feed your own personal bigotries – that’s the last refuge of haters. And please note the line from the previous paragraph, because it applies to you, too: evil always begins with hate.

I don’t know who any of these kissing boys are. I don’t even know if any of them are still together. The part of me that loves seeing happy people hopes that they are. But them being happy and, yes, EVEN KISSING, doesn’t hurt me or you or the world. In fact, as a rule, happy people make the world a much better place. And this world has MUCH bigger problems than two boys in love. So does this country, and so does your own community. So turn off your hate meters and get out there to contribute something positive to your community. Make this world better for your having passed through it, rather than doing what you’re doing now – making it worse.

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King Arthur’s Camelot and Its Relevance to 21st Century America

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The story of King Arthur and his Round Table of knights has great relevance to modern America in the 21st Century, especially within the context of my new novel, Children of the Knight.

First of all, the Britain of Arthur’s time was a fractured, divisive land with disparate groups of peoples like the Gauls, the Gales, the Normans and others vying for power and prestige.  In America today, many in the public sector make their livelihood and base their political survival on pitting this group against that group or this race against that one and they never allow for real unity because with unity might come an end to said public person’s career and funding base. The media is even worse, always stirring the pot, often by dispensing inaccurate or incomplete information in the hopes of generating controversy. In simpler terms, divisiveness is profitable.

When Arthur became High King of Britain his first order of business was to unite all the distinct groups warring against him and each other, which he eventually did through numerous costly battles. However, once done, he had to keep the peace, so as he tells young Lance in Children of the Knight, “I gave them all a purpose in life other than hating one another.” He brings that same purpose to the warring gangs and unrelated street kids he recruits as his new Round Table in the newly released novel.

America of today has systematically failed her children in every area of life, from education to criminal justice to media influences. The one-size-must-fit-all-or-you-can-get-out approach to modern public education is disgusting and antithetical to human nature. Since we can never all be the same, what happens to those kids who just don’t “fit” that one size? They drop out, join gangs or crews, do drugs, make babies they can’t take care of, and engage in all manner of anti-social behaviors they have learned from adults. And what about the war adults have waged against gay youth with their preposterous notion that these kids willingly made a choice to love someone of the same gender and thus willingly chose the hate, mockery, bullying, and marginalization that go with being gay in America today? Let’s face it, there are a lot of stupid, selfish people in this country, and kids are paying the price.

In my book, Arthur returns from Avalon and finds all of this discarded and wasted “might” at his disposal, kids no one else wants, most of them boys with a lot of potential energy within them for good or ill. There are a lot of homegirls on the streets, as well, but most gangs are male-dominated because of the sense of empowerment these usually poor, ethnic, marginalized kids desperately seek. Before Arthur, all the combined might of these gangs and street youth has been directed toward the detriment of society because that’s all they’ve been taught by the adult world that raised them. They make war on each other and on the innocent. But Arthur comes along and teaches them discipline through mastery of swordplay and archery, and he convinces them, as he convinced the various factions all those centuries ago in Britain, to put aside their own petty rivalries and use their collected might for right in order to finally gain the power they had previously sought through violence and mayhem.

Arthur’s objective is to win the approval and support of the voting public and use that support to take on the feckless, self-absorbed politicians who run Los Angeles. From LA the crusade will then move on to all of California and then to the country as a whole. Its ultimate goal: restoration of the right of children to be children, and human beings, and not the mere property of adults. Will he succeed? You have to read the book to find out.

ChildrenoftheKnight-Bowler_bookmarkV_Harmony

Oh, and why did Arthur come to America rather than Britain? Since his purpose is to save childhood it is also, by extension, to save this most promising child of Britain from itself. After all, a country that fails its children is ultimately doomed to assume a well-earned place on the scrap heap of history.

Is the Code of Chivalry Relevant in the 21st Century?

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In Children of the Knight, King Arthur returns from Avalon to 21st Century Los Angeles to start a new crusade of lost and discarded children against the adult society that has abused, neglected, and marginalized them. He recruits the homeless, the unwanted, the rejected, and the gang affiliated. Among the many lessons he teaches and models for them, none are more important than the tenets of chivalry, once thought to be a very civilized and civilizing code. In our uncouth and very uncivilized America today, could such a code still have relevance? Sir Lance says it can, so let’s examine a few major tenets and find out.

In no particular order, one tenet is “To fear God and maintain His commands.” I know, in America today the “G” word is forbidden in public discourse lest some atheist be offended. Not so in the old days. In fact, the majority of Americans still believe in God and attend some kind of worship service on a consistent basis, so most don’t actually fear the “G” word––it’s only the media that does. Whether we admit it or not, believing in something greater than ourselves helps keep our own human ego in check. Also, all of our laws to some extent are tendrils branching off from those Ten Commandments atheists hate so much. Isn’t disdaining murder a good thing? What about bearing false witness against someone else and sending that person to prison as a result? Both crimes happen every day, especially the second because, according to the enlightened people, those old commandments are outdated and we don’t need to follow them anymore. Really? Arthur doesn’t think so and, while he doesn’t force any of his charges to pray, he himself does and the kids see in him a healthy respect for a power higher than themselves.

“To protect the weak and defenseless.” The lost children of today, especially the gang members, know from their own experiences growing up that the adult society does not support this particular tenet; in fact, adults often do the exact opposite, and most of the kids in this story were hurt or abused or neglected by adults their whole lives. Gang members often punk the defenseless and the weak and take pride in doing so. Why? Because they were taught these behaviors by the grownup world, including our elected officials who gleefully take vicious aim at this person or that group in order to score some polling points. What about the prevalent bullying of gay kids today? Why do some kids bully others, especially the gay ones? Because they have been taught to do so. Arthur makes it a fundamental requirement of his new Round Table that his knights will always aid and assist those in need. How terrible would it be if everyone adopted that philosophy?

“To refrain from the excessive giving of offense.” In today’s society, what with Facebook and Twitter and every other social media site, offending others has become a cottage industry. It seems people today go out of their way to be offensive, to hurt others and attempt to knock them down, marginalize them, make them feel less than human. If kids today were taught to refrain from such behavior as the Code suggests, wouldn’t this be a better country? ’Nuff said.

How about this one––“To fight for the welfare of all.” Arthur discovers that in America of the 21st Century kids are taught the “It’s all about me” philosophy because that’s how adults, including many parents, want to live their lives. If everyone is out to serve only himself or herself, does anything in society ever improve? Of course not! Hence, Arthur teaches and models this tenet of the Code. If each of us thinks more about the welfare of others ahead of our own wants in life, everyone would be covered because we’d be looked after, too. This isn’t socialism or any tyrannical left-wing idea––it’s simply common sense, and helps ensure a more cohesive and civil society because we’d know we could count on each other, and that all adults had the best interests of children at heart.

Here’s another “outdated” tenet of chivalry: “To avoid unfairness, meanness, and deceit.” Gee, that’s a pretty radical idea, isn’t it? Oh, yeah, but those egalitarian-types would argue, “What’s your definition of meanness or deceit?” I think most of us regular Americans who have even a smidgen of common sense know the answer to that question. Arthur seems to feel this tenet is crucial to his campaign in America and models it each and every day. Thus, he respects every kid and culture and sexual orientation. He passes no judgments on these kids, but merely accepts them as they come to him and strives to help them become better. He does not allow for name-calling or bullying or disrespect amongst his knights. Now if only the public school system in American could adopt this ideal! Ah well, one can dream.

Another absolutely outrageous tenet of chivalry that would doom virtually every politician in America is, “At all times speak the truth.” Wow. What a different country we’d live in if the politicians who wanted to take every dime we earn and use it for their own pet projects actually said that during a campaign? Or those who might want to overturn the 2nd Amendment; or those who want America to pretend the rest of the world doesn’t exist and close its borders for good. And what if parents actually told their kids the truth, and kids did likewise? Would the country be so awful if truth was as highly valued as it is in the Code? As a former president once said, depends on what the meaning of the word “is” is, I suppose.

Another very outdated tenet, and one directed squarely at males, is “To respect the honor of women.” The whole movement in America today to make kids believe there is no essential difference between male and female has created a host of problems, from girls trying to act masculine and boys acting feminine, to a general attitude among boys that girls are not special, but merely “boys” with different equipment. Men today not only don’t hold a door open for a lady, but often slam it in her face. And women today, in their understandable quest to be taken seriously as equals, don’t seem to notice what has been lost. Chivalry isn’t chauvinism, but rather a healthy respect for the uber-significant role women play in any society. Men, by their nature, tend toward the uncivilized, and they need women to help them in this regard to become better and more productive, rather than destructive. But if there is “no difference” between the genders, as is being taught to kids today, what ultimate damage to civilization will we have wrought? In Children of the Knight, most of the discarded youth and gang members are male, and Arthur teaches them straight off to address any female, especially adult females, with respect. How terrible is that?

The final tenet of note is perhaps the most radical of all: “To finish any venture you have begun.” Again, another brain-twister and completely outdated for our hip, modern, social networking society, right? Most of the kids in Arthur’s Round Table have dropped out of school. Admittedly, schools in America make no effort to address the individual needs and future goals of students, so many of those kids understandably feel it’s a waste of their time to attend. However, under Arthur they come to realize that finishing any venture, even one they may deem of little value, is important because of the life-long habit such completion instills.

Too often today kids quit on something they began because they see adults doing the same. I taught high school for twenty-five years and this particular tenet was at the top of my list, especially with the at-risk youth I taught. Even my writing of Children of the Knight has inspired a number of them to follow through on their dreams or some goal others have told them isn’t “practical,” and thus they may now complete something they began but were tempted to let languish. I told them I began writing this story probably fifteen years ago, but work and other obligations got in the way of finishing it. Now I have completed it and feel good for having done so. Finishing what we start––assuming what we have started is a good thing––is necessary to the success of every generation, and Arthur recognizes this need straight away and works to instill it.

Is the old-school Code of Chivalry outdated and useless to kids of the 21st Century? Or can they learn something yet from that centuries-old set of beliefs? Arthur believes they can, and Sir Lance says to check out the result of his efforts in Children of the Knight. Then judge for yourself.

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Why Education in America is Failing Our Kids

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In Children of the Knight, King Arthur comes to America from Avalon to launch a children’s crusade against an adult society that has neglected and marginalized its youth. No greater example of failure is evident than our public school system as a whole. Are there some good public schools out there? Of course there are! Is the system failing to do justice to the youth of this country? Absolutely.

When I was in school, I was not only taught how to think and critically evaluate material, I was given choices, too, choices that fit me and my own individuality. Today, public education is cookie cutter, one-size-fits-all and seemingly designed to turn everyone into mindless clones of each other, apparently to serve some authoritarian power since schools are controlled and directed by politicians and bureaucrats.

Children and teens today are taught how to memorize facts, names and dates in order to pass tests. For the most part they aren’t asked or required to apply any of this information to the creation of something new, even an essay of evaluation. Rote busy work is the mainstay of public education, including the busy work called homework. Even in kindergarten today teachers are assigning really long homework packets weekly, and if the kid doesn’t finish the oh-so-important packet of busy work, he’s assigned another and must turn in both, or else! Kindergarten? You’ve gotta be kidding!

Even so-called AP classes in high school which are supposed to replicate and ultimately take the place of college courses, are rife with busy work and in no way replicate the college experience. As with all school courses, they exist for memorization, not innovation, passing tests, not creating something new. The idea that passing rote standardized tests will turn out the best possible adults in society is absurd! The only thing those tests prove is which ones have the best memory for routine information.

Since every single child is uniquely different, kids should be given opportunities to be who they already are rather than what the “system” or even their parents think they should be. Every child is gifted in some way and it should be the goal of the school system to draw out that gift, nurture it, and help the child perfect it. Not every kid should go to college and many wouldn’t even benefit from a bachelor’s degree. All they would acquire is massive debt that might trail them the rest of their lives. There are so many careers and niches kids can become a part of and make a good living so doing, if they were given proper guidance and choices, of course. But no, the “powers that be” insist on everyone going to college because it’s all part of the drone-like indoctrination government schools have been known for since their inception. Oh, and don’t forget the money these colleges rake in! The more useless classes college students are “required” to take, the more money is fed into the system as a whole. Oh, and of course, the college textbook industry is a complete monopoly, designed to rip off each and every student. And people say corporate America is greedy?

And don’t get me started on what’s the least important element in the minds of the adults running the school system, because that element is the kids. The teachers union is out for itself, the administrators for themselves, and the policy makers for themselves. All want to pat themselves on the back for their “service” to kids, and yet the group-think these bodies engage in is destructive and anathema to good education. For example, whose brilliant idea was it to teach first graders about sexual harassment, as is done in many schools today? The only way first graders can at even the most elemental level sexually harass someone is after they have been taught the behavior by adults. In the first grade! We’re talking about six year olds here! Creativity in schools is banned. Choices are banned. But sexualizing young children is acceptable because some adult has an agenda? Sick!

And don’t get me going on about the teacher’s union. Yes, if you’re a lazy or lousy teacher, the union will support you. If you’re a good teacher who stands up for the kids, you’re on your own. Case in point: as a special education teacher and case carrier it was always my job to advocate for the needs of the kids on my caseload. A former principal took it into his head to kick one of my special ed kids out of the school because he was a gang member in a wheelchair and the principal wanted to make an example out of him.

As per my job, I contacted Sacramento for advice and they sent a letter to the superintendent that my principal was in violation of the law and to return said student to campus. That got the principal into trouble so he took it out on me. One day during class several maintenance guys showed up with carts and began hauling all my stuff away. Per the principal’s orders, I was to be moved to a broom-closet-sized storage room with no windows and would from that day on teach my classes from this hot, dirty, airless room with no ventilation. Sounds pretty healthy for me and the kids, doesn’t it?

Did the teacher’s union step in to help me because I did my job properly? I think you already know the answer. But teachers with no classroom control or who show movies all the time or pass out worksheets or teach science from books and worksheets with no hands-on experiments, these teachers are good to go. The union doesn’t hesitate to step in if a principal wants to move them to another school or in any way demand they do their job better. Sadly, the union is out for itself, its political power, and the dues it extorts from teachers. It makes no demands upon said teachers that they have to do certain things (like actually teach) in order for the union to defend them. Tragic, but typical of the “It’s all about me” philosophy permeating our society today. And then these same adults complain that children are selfish and demanding. Gee, wonder where they learned those behaviors?

Schools also fare poorly when it comes to common sense. Brain research has clearly shown that languages are best learned when children are young, like in the first grade (but, oh, wait, that might interfere with their sexual harassment training) and NOT in high school when the language portions of the brain are more dormant. Likewise, math skills (other than basic ones) are best learned from the age of ten on because that’s when that portion of the human brain kicks into gear.

And what about freedom to choose your own path? Do kids in high school have a choice to go into a college-bound academic track or a more vocational/creative track that might lead to a career they’re actually interested in? No. They are all to be college bound because, dammit, we adults know better! No wonder the drop out rate at LA Unified is around fifty percent. The classes kids really want – the “so-called electives” – are the ones most often cut because it’s expedient for the adults to do so. Never mind that these so-called electives might be exactly what a particular kid needs to hone his or her skills in some area that he or she could continue to pursue after high school and that might actually lead to a career of choice. Hell no, kids, you have to get that bachelor’s degree because it makes us, the teachers and counselors, look like we’re doing our job! Do we ever consult the kids about what courses they might like to take, or whether they even want a standard bachelor’s degree? Obviously, the answer is no. The self-centered arrogance of adults running our government, and by extension, our government schools, at both a state and national level, is staggering in its totality.

Were I ever elected president (which I won’t be, so don’t worry, all you bureaucrats), the first sweeping change I’d make would be the elimination of the Department of Education. If ever a body was useless (and unconstitutional), it’s that one. Imagine, taking state money, funneling it through a bunch of unneeded paper pushers who create idiotic, untenable laws that purport to know the needs of every school in the country, and then returning that money to the states at something like ten or twenty cents on the dollar. Unbelievable! The next person who runs as “the education president,” vote for someone else!

These are but a few of the failures permeating our education system, and our youth, in this country. Arthur provides these disaffected kids with an alternative to standardized public education. Does it work? Read the book to find out.

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