Steamd

Just the other day I heard that a family friend was having problems with her computer. A fan went out and she had to have it taken in to get fixed. The technician fixed the fan but also recommended reinstalling the operating system as sort of a Spring cleaning. Now, she doesn’t know anything about computers so when she got it back she had a hard time understanding how to hook it back up, whether she needed to use the installation disc for her Verizon DSL service, where her photos went, and what the hell to do even when she did get it hooked up right. Hearing this made me think of something…

The incumbent computer users, that is anyone who wishes or needs to use a computer, has three things present to properly use a computer: education, prevention, and desire. An incumbent computer is someone who leans on these things heavily in an effort to get the most out of the experience of using a computer.

It’s incumbent of anyone to have a basic fundamental understanding of how computers work. That includes both the hardware and the software. If you don’t know anything about it then pick up a book and learn. Whether you’re on a PC or a Mac, the “Dummies” series of books are an excellent start. Let’s face it, most problems are user error so a little bit of education goes a long way.

It’s also incumbent of any computer user to know some basic things about how to prevent a potential disaster. Prevention and education go hand in hand…but knowing it is only half of it; you also have to practice it as well. The best way to protect yourself from a disaster is to protect yourself and prevent it from happening.

If you’re on a PC using Windows then the threat of viruses and malware is a reality you can’t avoid. As such you have to constantly make sure that you’re antivirus/spyware monitoring software is up-to-date and running properly. You also need to understand some common prevention techniques to avoid getting spam, viruses, and malware from the internet via your web browser or e-mail client.

Hardware failure is a fact of life. Things can and will go wrong with a computer. As such, you need to understand that it’s incumbent of you to backup anything that is important to you. External hard drives and USB key drives are much cheaper these days so there is no reason why you can’t use one to keep your stuff backed up. A good backup system can be as simple as the combination of an external hard drive and some backup utility software that will keep your stuff backed up almost automatically. This is the one thing that will save your butt if and when your computer fails.

The last thing an incumbent computer user needs is desire. Someone who doesn’t want or care to take the time to learn how to use a computer properly obviously doesn’t have much desire to use one. If this is you then you’re screwed and you have no business even using a computer. You might as well turn the computer off and not use it at all. Learning how to properly use a computer doesn’t take that much time. A little reading each day and a few tutorials and tips go a long way over the course of time. Granted, not everyone has the time or money to take classes…but a mere 15 minutes of reading each day is not unrealistic.

Let’s face it, over 75% of the problems people face with computers are due to three problems: a lack of desire, a lack of education, and a lack of prevention. Everything else can be blamed on hardware and software failure but the rest lies entirely in your hands.

Did that headline get your attention? Good! Yes, it’s true, the book “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” has the word nigger in it! Now, before you go nuts and yell “RACISM” on me, finish reading my post…

A couple of weeks or so ago, I opened up the weekend edition of USA Today and read an article entitled School apologizes after ‘Finn’ lesson backfires. After reading it, I was pissed. Go read the article and maybe you’ll see what I mean.

In a nutshell, a teacher was preparing the class to read “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” by going over various racial slurs in the book. One particular student, a black student, was offended by one of the words that the teacher had written on the blackboard. The word was (you guessed it!) nigger. [And, no, I am not going to substitute this word for "the N-word" or the like! A word is just a word and doesn't have any meaning unless it's put into context. More on this in a second.]

The teacher “badgered” Mohamed after denying his request to remove the slur from the chalkboard or change it to the “N-word,” and she continued to say the word during class, said his mother, Tunya Mohamed. The teen said that he felt singled out when the teacher asked whether the word offended him and that she told him, “‘It hurts, doesn’t it?”‘

Now, I’m going to give the kid the benefit of the doubt cause I can understand how a young kid can feel singled out when they are the only black kid in the class, especially given the subject matter. However, I don’t think the teacher was being maliced and pointing a finger at him. I think she was merely making him and everyone else in the class understand that these slurs can hurt people if taken out of the wrong context.

But wait! There’s more:

Birdville Superintendent Stephen Waddell agreed to issue a written apology to the teen and his family and arrange sensitivity training for faculty, said Thomas Muhammad, spokesman of a group called Coalition to Stop the N-Word.

Coalition to Stop the N-Word? Wha??? Sensitivity training? Are they serious?

So the school officials, the student, his parents and members of the coalition have a meeting, the book is removed from the class, the kid enrolls in a different English class, and all is well. Right? Wrong!

“We are here today to say we will not tolerate the N-word being used by any educators anywhere in any school district throughout our region or the state of Texas,” said Ron Price, a Dallas school board member who attended the meeting. “It’s critical that we examine all of our textbooks to ensure that the language is proper and that the language is not being used to abuse any child in any public school.”

This is taking the issue way overboard. What next? Are we going to remove the word bitch too from every textbook and novel? Cause my wife doesn’t like being called that and she certainly won’t want her children to be exposed to that word! Hell, why stop there! Might as well bring back book burning while we’re at it!

Look, you can’t remove every stinky word from every textbook or novel a student might read; that just isn’t any common sense. Teachers don’t need any sensitivity training and students don’t need baby sitting when it comes to the words they could potentially read or hear. There just isn’t any sensitive way of exposing a student to slur words.

“The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” is a part of American history. Like it or not, white people used to refer to black people as niggers. As far as I’m concerned the teacher did the right thing. She wrote all the slur words, including nigger, on the black board and said, “Here are the words you’re going to see in this book and here’s what they meant during the 1800’s”. There are plenty of teacher’s guides and comments about this very thing. As Minnie Phillips on Time.com says:

Thirty years after first teaching the novel in my American literature class at Webster Groves High School in suburban St. Louis, Mo., I’ve decided the novel is not about race but about freedom.

Does this book really call for any special attention? A word in and of itself isn’t bad. It’s the racist son-of-a-bitch who uses the word that you should really be worried about. But this book isn’t about race…it’s about freedom and it’s a part of our history. I think our students can handle it. History is history. Get over it!