Si Se Puede Skip School

So I returned to work today after my week at home while on paternity leave. I must say, I wasn't surprised to find that about a third of my students didn't show up; most of them having hispanic surnames. At least three teachers of hispanic descent didn't show up either. I ended up having to cover for one of them on my prep period because the entire district was short of substitutes. I assume this was because many teachers at other schools in my district didn't show up either. My work email inbox had an email from our principal waiting for us this morning. The email warned us teachers that a lot of students would probably not be showing up today, and that the decision of those students and their parents should "be respected". In fact, here is the email, copied and pasted for your viewing pleasure:

Re: Rumor of May 1st Student Walk Out
I am fully aware of this. There is nothing we can do about it. Many immigrant families are expected not to attend work and school on May 1st. We need to respect this decision.

Abide by the decision because I have to? Okay. Respect it? Bite me! All of this bruhaha was because of the "Day Without an Immigrant" protests that took place today throughout not only California, but all over the nation. I just got done watching 24, my favorite TV show of all time. After 24, the 10pm news on our local Fox affiliate came on. Of course, the lead story was about the protest marches that took place in Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, and Sacramento. Not once in the almost 15 minutes of coverage did any of the reporters use the word "illegal" or "alien" in any of the stories they filed. It was "immigrant" this, and "immigrant" that. This isn't about immigration. It is about ILLEGAL immigration! Specifically, the legal and proper term is "illegal alien". I expect the protesters to repeat the purposeful and outrageous lie that people like me are against immigration, but for the supposedly professional reporters to do it is just disgusting. What was also disgusting was the video footage of todays protests where the Mexican flags were ubiquitous. I guess a lot of these protestors didn't get the message that was learned from their earlier protests that flying the Mexican flag while you are demanding the right to live in the United States kinda pissed a lot of people off. But you can't expect many of these morons to be able to control themselves. They just gotta fly that Mexican flag and demand that I learn to speak Spanish like I heard one caller say to a local AM talk duo while I was driving to work this morning.

To add insult to injury, the teacher for whom I covered today was that Che Guevara-loving Aztlan proponent about whom I discussed in one of my first blog entries way back in August '05. I had time to revisit some of the posters on his classroom wall. One was advertising a Chicano Day March from a few years back that depicted a Zapata-looking character holding in his arms the states of CA, AZ, NM, TX, UT, and NV. Below this guy was a banner that read Let's Take Back What's Ours (or something to that effect). I think I will go in there and take a picture of that poster, along with a couple of other interesting ones I saw, so that you can see the seditious crap that is being exposed to our students. Don't get me wrong, I get along with this teacher just fine, and I think he is a great guy, but his politics scare the hell out of me. Funny, he probably says the same thing about me.

By the way - for those of you not skooled in the Spanish language, "Si Se Puede" means "Yes, We Can". It is on a lot of the signs being carried by the protesters. Now I think the title to this post will make a little more sense. Another common sign was "Today We March, Tomorrow We Vote". Think about that.

Good Day to You, Muchacho