Reading an NPR story earlier this week, I learned about a school district in New York State where children with disabilities were being confined to wooden boxes. The story made me sick and hurt even more when I read that many of the children who’ve been mistreated in this way are members of the Mohawk nation. Weren’t we over this already? I thought the Native boarding schools closed decades ago along with the institutions for those with disabilities and yet here we are in this land of the free with children being kept in boxes.

I kept looking at the news and came across a story closer to home. It happened this past week in Watertown, Wisconsin, less than an hour from where I live in Madison. The high school band was preparing for its upcoming concert when the school board made the decision to deny them the opportunity to publicly play a piece that they’d been practicing for months. They held a special meeting to stop the band from playing “Mother of a Revolution” an instrumental piece celebrating the legacy of Marsha P Johnson, a transgender activist who was central to the Stonewall uprising. This piece had been chosen for the youth to play to help the kids understand how music can used to encourage empathy and resilience. Parents had been informed by the band teacher when practice began and were given the option to have their student not play the piece. Still, that wasn’t enough for the board and they stepped in denying the band’s right to play the song. I am happy to say that many people protested and students walked out of school because they believed the board to be wrong in their actions.

Seeing these stories is just making me wonder– where are we? What is this “land of the free” where we can’t publicly acknowledge the history of one group and we can force others to relive the worst pieces of their histories? I just don’t understand.

The other day I was rocking a child to sleep at my work. As I rocked, I looked at the face of this sweet little one, all wrapped in their blanket. I looked at that dear little face, long lashes, button nose, little cherub lips, and soft, curly hair. This little one has already seen too much of the rough side of life, but still is so dear and just simply perfect. How can we do anything other than fall in love?

How can we hurt our children? What is wrong with us? How can we fix this wrong and heal ourselves so that we might keep our future generations safe and show our love for them? What would it be like if we did heal and stop harming our children? Can we even imagine a world in which all the children are safe? What steps might we take today?