Hazing, hypocrisy and our children

Regarding the hazing incident at Lake Zurich High School and the racist graffiti incident at Warren Township High School, we applaud the adults for not excusing the students' inappropriate behavior even though it is widely known that incomplete brain development makes adolescents more prone to behave immaturely and impulsively.

The response of the school authorities is in concert with mandates from the state Department of Education, which requires districts to devote resources to provide anti-bullying instruction and to provide counseling services for students who perpetrate or are the victims of bullying.

Given that public schools pass on the cultural norms of the country, one would conclude that anti-bullying is a cultural norm in the U.S. The results of the presidential election would suggest otherwise.

The President-Elect has engaged in unrelenting bullying/hazing of multiple groups, which is explained away as sarcasm or as a campaign device to fire up his supporters.

The moral authority that we claim to have with our children is severely damaged by this hypocritical behavior, in which they are expected to conform their behavior to the cultural norm of anti-bullying while the President-Elect is given a pass because he is simply, "telling it like it is," and his supporters are given a pass because they are angry and scared - interestingly, same reasons that students engage in bullying.

Unlike the President-Elect and his adult supporters, however, the students are punished. It appears that we have traded our moral authority for some yet-to-be-revealed change in the status quo, carried out by a Wall Street billionaire advertised as a non-political outsider, whose transition team primarily includes veteran political operatives and Stephen Bannon, an avowed white supremacist.

Our children are waiting to see how long the hypocrisy continues.

Mary Penny Bates

Ingleside