"Disciplined 8th-grader Jared Marcum returned to class on Monday after being suspended from school and arrested for refusing to change his NRA t-shirt at the request of one of his teachers. The shirt apparently pictured a firearm and the words “protect your rights.”
However, he apparently hasn’t learned his lesson — assuming that there was even any lesson to be learned. Fresh off his suspension, Marcum showed up to school on Monday wearing the exact same NRA shirt that sparked what many have labeled “t-shirt control.”
There were also other people wearing matching shirts in support of Marcum, WOWK-TV reports.
“There’s a lot of people wearing this same exact shirt, showing great, great support and I really appreciate it,” the student said Monday before going to school."
This kid and his friends put us all to shame for our lack of willingness to be truly defiant in the face of soft totalitarian political control.
His bold act reminds me of one of the lines uttered by Rodney Dangerfield's character in the movie Back to School. Thorton Melon, a high school dropout-turned business success, decides to attend the same college as his son. Not interested in doing the work and beset by a snobby business professor who has it out for the new student, Melon hires people to do it for him and gets caught. (The exchange on the phone that he has with one of his "employees", no less than Kurt Vonnegut, is hilarious as the professor stated that whoever did the paper knew nothing about Kurt Vonnegut) As Melon had given the school a huge endowment, the Dean, anxious to avoid expelling the donor, gives him a chance to prove himself by taking a comprehensive oral exam.
After massive cramming, he makes it through most of this ordeal and comes to a point in which he is to be tested by the Literature professor, who has a soft spot for Melon. She has him recite the Dylan Thomas poem Do not go gentle into that good night. Melon, swelling with emotion, positively nails the recitation of the powerful piece. Upon finishing, the professor asks Melon what the poem means to him.
Melon replies:
"It means,.. I don't take s- -t from no one."
Jared Marcum, I and many others tip our hats to you. You are an inspiration to all of us.
As the trailer from the movie Defiance reminds us: "Freedom begins with an act of defiance".
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