May 29, 2006

"What if the gum had been given to a student with a heart condition?"

Says the principal, justifying suspending the student who shared Jolt gum -- caffeinated gum -- with a fellow student. Hey, wait... on that theory you can't share a Coke! But they do turn off the soda vending maching during class hours. So doesn't that vindicate the principles of the principal?

Yes, kids, you'll have to suffer through the long hours of classes caffeine-free -- unless you bring your own supply of Jolt gum. Then, after class, step right up to our machines, slip in your coins, and partake of the semi-forbidden substance.

And don't you think the makers of Jolt love this story? Thanks for reminding all the kids about our little product, and thanks for forcing each student to buy his own. And thanks for glamorizing some dumb gum into an exciting drug-like product. That meshes nicely with our ad campaign and spikes it with messages we dare not say directly.

IN THE COMMENTS: Lotsa comments, so go in there and read. I'm just going to front page a long comment I made along the way:
Thanks for the link to the old "Coffee Achievers" commercials. That ad campaign dates back to a time when coffee drinking was dying out, and they really thought the new generations would only drink soda. I remember thinking the commercials were a pathetic attempt to bring back the past! I'm laughing as I type this in a café with a $3.50 coffee drink next to the laptop. I think back then people also thought written communication would die out, and the new generations would rely solely on images and the spoken word. But here we are hopelessly immersed in coffee and the written word.

Anyway, I'd like to say that I don't think all the news stories like this gum one imply that schools are full of folks who do things like this. It wouldn't be news if it were so common. That a dinky story like this gets reported proves it's anomalous. And I think a lot of the teachers themselves oppose the petty rules. I note that I'm a teacher, and I'm making fun of stuff like this.

As [one commenter observed], the principal is probably concerned about lawsuits. But the principal is probably also concerned with the way Jolt gum mimics drugs. I've seen kids drink Jolt cola and then act as if they are totally high. It's disturbing to adults to see that, but the trick is to find the right response. It's not obvious what it is.

I think opposing all gum and soda in the school -- during and after hours -- would be best. Kids have forgotten how to drink water. When I was a kid, in school, if you were thirsty, you got a drink from the water fountain. There was nothing else, except at lunch, and at lunch, there was only one drink: milk.

I'm just going to guess that the biggest cause of the obesity problem in America is soda. Years ago, a soda was a treat, and the bottles were 6 1/2 ounces. You were lucky if you got even one of those things a day.

I'm a cranky old person!

As I write this, the song playing in the café is -- I'm not kidding -- Bob Dylan's "4th Time Around," with the lines about gum:

I stood there and hummed,
I tapped on her drum and asked her how come.
And she buttoned her boot,
And straightened her suit,
Then she said, "Don't get cute."
So I forced my hands in my pockets
And felt with my thumbs,
And gallantly handed her
My very last piece of gum.

She threw me outside,
I stood in the dirt where ev'ryone walked.
And after finding I'd
Forgotten my shirt,
I went back and knocked.
I waited in the hallway, she went to get it,
And I tried to make sense
Out of that picture of you in your wheelchair
That leaned up against . . .

Her Jamaican rum
And when she did come, I asked her for some.
She said, "No, dear."
I said, "Your words aren't clear,
You'd better spit out your gum."

25 comments:

Bissage said...

I'm sure Jolt is good stuff, but there are other ways. For example, what got me through my mid-afternoon Administrative Law classes was my own special blend of Diet Cherry Coke and Peanut M&Ms.

Oh, and the Sudafed. That too.

Word Verification: "etssv." Isn't that some kind of new stuff all the kids are taking these days?

bearbee said...

Products acting as a stimulant are prohibited....

Does this extend to the curriculum?

Ann Althouse said...

"But they does..."

Whoops... (corrected).

Bissage said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Ann Althouse said...

I was just reading a book by those guys who write the blog Language Log, and they not only accept but recommend "they" following "someone."

knox said...

Still, it's a passive-aggressive and bitchy thing to bother posting a comment about.

Get a life, dave

Ann Althouse said...

I appreciate having mistakes flagged so I can correct them, but the snark in this case would have made more sense if I had been siding with the authority figure and being schoolmarmish myself. So it's not actually rich.

Hey, back to the gum, etc, etc. Don't get sidetracked!

Bissage said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Bissage said...

Well, it looks like the caffeine meme is going nowhere. Still, we need to keep all this in perspective.

Tibore said...

Well, on the one hand, I'm glad that the principal cares about her students' well being. But on the other hand... caffeinated gum? Come on! It's not as if those students aren't getting a busload of caffeine from other sources? And that "what if" she gave ("What if the gum had been given to a student with a heart condition?" Palermo said Thursday.)... What, the kids are so young they won't know who in their class is sick and who's not?

I mean, I want someone in her position to watch out for each individual child's well being. I really do. But still... I can't see this as being anything less than an overreaction.

Anyone got a different point of view? I consume so much caffeine, I don't see a problem with it (other than the twitchiness, hyper-alertness (is that a fly buzzing 200 yards away?), irritability (Hey, officemate! Quit bumping into me!), frequent bathroom trips (whoops. BRB...), sudden crashes when it wears out (zzzzz....)). Anyway, I don't see a problem with it, but I don't have any kids, nor do I know how much of a problem that product could be with a kid with heart problems. Anyone think I'm full of it?

Tibore said...

Er... addendum: Anyone think I'm full with it in regards to my opinion with this specific subject? Gotta disclaim; otherwise, you all'd run me over with "Yup's", "Uh huh's", and "hell yeah's". :)

Ann Althouse said...

Bissage: Thanks for the link to the old "Coffee Achievers" commercials. That ad campaign dates back to a time when coffee drinking was dying out and they really thought the new generations would only drink soda. I remember thinking the commercials were a pathetic attempt to bring back the past! I'm laughing as I type this in a café with a $3.50 coffee drink next to the laptop. I think back then people also thought written communication would die out, and the new generations would rely solely on images and the spoken word. But here we are hopelessly immersed in coffee and the written word.

Anyway, I'd like to say that I don't think all the news stories like this gum one imply that schools are full of folks who do things like this. It wouldn't be news if it were so common. That a dinky story like this gets reported proves it's anomalous. And I think a lot of the teachers themselves oppose the petty rules. I note that I'm a teacher, and I'm making fun of stuff like this.

As noted above, the principal is probably concerned about lawsuits. But the principal is probably also concerned with the way Jolt gum mimics drugs. I've seen kids drink Jolt cola and then act as if they are totally high. It's disturbing to adults to see that, but the trick is to find the right response. It's not obvious what it is.

I think opposing all gum and soda in the school -- during and after hours -- would be best. Kids have forgotten how to drink water. When I was a kid, in school, if you were thirsty, you got a drink from the water fountain. There was nothing else, except at lunch, and at lunch, there was only one drink: milk.

I'm just going to guess that the biggest cause of the obesity problem in America is soda. Years ago, a soda was a treat, and the bottles were 6 1/2 ounces. You were lucky if you got even one of those things a day.

I'm a cranky old person!

As I write this, the song playing in the café: is -- I'm not kidding -- Bob Dylan's "4th Time Around," with the lines about gum:

I stood there and hummed,
I tapped on her drum and asked her how come.
And she buttoned her boot,
And straightened her suit,
Then she said, "Don't get cute."
So I forced my hands in my pockets
And felt with my thumbs,
And gallantly handed her
My very last piece of gum.

She threw me outside,
I stood in the dirt where ev'ryone walked.
And after finding I'd
Forgotten my shirt,
I went back and knocked.
I waited in the hallway, she went to get it,
And I tried to make sense
Out of that picture of you in your wheelchair
That leaned up against . . .

Her Jamaican rum
And when she did come, I asked her for some.
She said, "No, dear."
I said, "Your words aren't clear,
You'd better spit out your gum."

Beth said...

The use of "they" as a singular pronoun dates back to the late middle ages. We got all Aristotelian in our pursuit of logic in grammar in the 18th century; before that, the double negative didn't upset us, either. It must meant really not; I'm not kidding, no; so not, so no that you won't believe it.

I admire this kid coming up with a dodge around the ban on caffeine drinks. I've always hated, with a passion, the petty controls schools enforce over students, from the time a principal in my brother's school used to come through with a little ruler, sending home boys whose hair was 1/8" past their collars. When our city schools decided girls had to wear bras, we wondered how the hell they'd check. A friend showed up with a bright red bra under a sheer white shirt. She got suspended, but she's still my hero, 30 years later.

Ann Althouse said...

Elizabeth: I remember when they made girls kneel on the floor to check if the skirt touched the floor. Shorter than that was forbidden in the early 60s. A few years later, we were constantly rehemming skirts. One inch above the knee looked short, but only for a while. Then you needed two, then three, then four inches above the knee to look right. I was my school's trend setter and got sent to the vice principal's office all the time -- for skirts and for long bangs too. I still feel antagonistic toward that vice principle, Mr. Ginter. Yeesh... (Refer to today's other school repression post, the "Breakfast Club" one.)

Beth said...

Creepy Mr. Ginter and his kneeling schoolgirls. Yech! Thanks for fighting the good fight on that one. The skirt rules were gone by the time I hit high school, except for Catholic schools. Those girls knew how to artfully roll their waistbands so that they had on stylish minis by the time they reached the bus stop after school.

Ann Althouse said...

Elizabeth: I should, to be fair, say that the kneeling girls thing was just the rule of thumb. I never heard of anyone actually having to kneel.

Beth said...

I'm glad to hear that, Ann. The whole scenario sounded a bit fetishy, though believable.

bearing said...

It's not the fact that sodas exist, however, that makes them fat. It's the fact that kids consume more calories than they expend. Diet books aside, no one has ever managed to defy the laws of thermodynamics; if you take in more energy than you expend, you're going to gain weight.

True, but if there's something special about soda that causes drinkers to consume more calories than they would if they were drinking something else, and doesn't cause them to expend more, then yes, the availability of soda can cause overall weight gain.

Since non-diet soda (along with most fruit juices) contains a great deal of calories in the form of sugar, and none in the form of fat and protein (both of which are satiating in a way that sugar is not), my guess is that soda availability does contribute to obesity. I suspect that chocolate milk at lunch isn't nearly as bad, b/c (a) it's a smaller serving --- 8 oz vs. 12 or 20; and (b) it's consumed with food, which tends to inhibit sugar absorption.

If they didn't have soda, they'd be drinking water (or at lunch, milk). Soda's got a LOT of calories.

Side note: When I was in elementary school in the 80s, we were offered only milk at lunch. Lots of kids packed their lunches, of course, but --- although I do not think there was a rule against it --- parents NEVER sent cans of soda with their kids' lunches. So, no, we didn't get pop during the school day. I don't see why it's a good idea to have it now.

Ann Althouse said...

"Pop"

Well, I also referred to the drinking fountain without calling it a bubbler. You don't change your basic words just because you live somewhere a long time.

bearbee said...

Soda vs Pop

How I LOVE the Internet.....

Ann Althouse said...

More I love the Internet: here's the info on the use of "bubbler" instead of "drinking/water fountain}... and even the "drinking/water" part is regional, which surprises me. I seemed to have picked up "drinking fountain" over my original region's "water fountain."

reader_iam said...

I have seen, multiple times (!) toddlers in strollers drinking soda pop. I also think that kids drink a staggering amount of "juice" today. It's really easy to suck up lots o' calories that way, and an awful lot of kids do.

I think there are also "size" issues, of products. The standard size of cookies and muffins, for example, from back in my childhood would be considered very small, now.

Plus, Ann, as you've noted elsewhere here, people just seem to eat all the time, and it seems the kids are encouraged to do that, also.

I can understand, for example, why there is snack time for pre-schoolers and maybe even kindergartners (though why that has to take place an hour before lunch is a bone of contention of mine, but never mind).

But now I understand that in many places, snack times are continued throughout elementary school! What the--? Maybe it's because many of the kids aren't getting real breakfasts or something. But it's not like the "snacks" that most parents send in are what a kid should be having for breakfast (at least I hope). I mean, cupcakes? Cookies? Nothing wrong with those things in and of themselves, but they're not breakfast. And for kids who have had breakfast and will have lunch, why do they need that type of snack mid-morning?

It's the cumulative effect of these things, plus less exercise.

Regarding the gum, I think the 3-day-suspension was an over-reaction. Frankly, I don't think a little bit of caffeine is all that big of deal at that age. (I do know what you mean about the Jolt cola, but when I've noticed that, it's not like the kids have drunk only one. Excess is excess.)

But then, my mother came from a farm family, where in addition to water, people drank iced tea from an early age. No one's growth seemed stunted.

SODA VS. POP! Man, oh, man. I grew saying "pop," having been raised for the first 10 years in Indiana and Illinois. When we moved to Delaware, I had to train myself to say "soda," because the other kids either didn't know what I saying or teased. (Either way, I didn't get it very often, at all, until late high school.)

Then we moved to Iowa, and I had to try and train myself back to "pop" again.

Basically, I just stutter now, or use the coy "soft drink." Life's just too darn short.

reader_iam said...

7M and John Jenkins: What's the big deal about soda vs. pop vs. whatever?

7: I had to laugh--"pop" is a "descration" of the English language? Good Lord.

JJ: Cop-outs sometimes save time. Not to mention that "soft drink" sounds better than "s--pop," when I'm in Iowa, or "p--soda," when I'm back East every summer. ("Soda pop" itself seems so "bicycle-built-for-two" to me. Don't ask; haven't a clue.)

Sometimes the whole "when in Rome ... " thing is a real bitch, and usually over the most trivial of things.

; )

reader_iam said...

JJ: That's true. I was thinking of more in context of "Would you like a soft drink of some type?" to a guest or something. As opposed to, "Do you want a drink?" which of course covers the "adult beverage" category

For myself, I just ask for the specific thing I want (tea, lemonade, diet Coke, or whatever).

reader_iam said...

creek, crick
a[u]nt, aunt
sack, bag

Thank goodness my intake of caffeine has been low today, or I could just go on and on!!!

Maybe I should run out and get some of that gun (but hide it from the kid).

OK, now I'm sorta back on topic.