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[patentparanyc]

Originally posted by tmdiva
The local library is having an adult spelling bee. Anyone wanna sign up with me? Ollie? See, I'm still harboring resentment over my participation in the state spelling contest when I was in high school, when my chances for victory were demolished by the repeated mispronunciation of a word by the celebrity word-reader, a local news anchor (who apparently is *still* the celebrity word-reader, lo these 20+ years later).

The other thing is an etiquette question. My sister recently sent out an e-mail to the whole family, telling how much she loves her daughter's new third-grade teacher, who is SUPER strict. Every day she has the kids shake her hand as they are leaving the room and say, "Thank you for teaching me today." Last weekend she gave them a homework assignment of doing a household chore that they don't normally do. Awesome.

Anyway, my dad's response to the whole group was "She sounds like a great teacher. I hope the ACLU doesn't get wind of this." This is not the first time he's made a comment of this variety. Is there any way for me to respond without compounding his rudeness with my own? Would something like "Yes, because as we all know, children's civil rights are violated when they are encouraged to be contributing members of their families and society" work, or is that too subtle (and therefore likely to be seen as agreeing with his underlying, baseless point)? Or should I just give up, ignore it and figure there's no hope?

tm

How is teaching them to be polite and productive a violation of their civil rights? I'm not following here.