No invitation for you too.

[rah]

Now we've gone too far. Giving out participation trophy's or schools without grades.

Swedish school seizes boy's birthday invitations
Updated Sun. Jun. 29 2008 4:07 PM ET

The Associated Press

STOCKHOLM, Sweden -- Officials at a school in Sweden have confiscated birthday invitations handed out in class by an eight-year-old boy.

The reason: they see it as a matter of discrimination.

A Swedish newspaper says the school in Lund, southern Sweden, seized the invitations because the boy failed to invited two boys because they were not his friends.

The newspaper Sydsvenskan quotes officials as saying they had a duty to prevent discrimination.

The newspaper did not identify the boy or his family, but says his father has filed a complaint with the parliamentary ombudsman.

The father told the newspaper that the two classmates were not invited because one had bullied his son and the other had not invited him to his birthday.

So how silly do you think this is. If you want to pass out invitations at school you must invite everyone.

You can't discriminate against bullies and people that don't like you.

I think we've gone a bit too far.


What next. If you want to give out valentines at school you're also going to have to give one to the gay guy so you're not discriminating against anyone.

Sometimes being excluded is part of life. Where better to learn something than school. Now granted kids can sometime be overly cruel in this area but nothing makes a lesson stick like a little cruelty.

[Krill]

wtfSweden?

[rah]

Even though this is Sweden, it wouldn't shock me to hear that this also happened in a US school.

[Elok]

You mean either. "No invitation for you either."

[Patroklos]

Wow, now not only do those two kids feel like losers for not getting invited, but now they feel like even bigger losers because people across the world are talking about what losers they are.

Best backfire ever. Sweden

[SlowwHand]

Jiminey. I thought "What are they going to do, take away my birthday?" was just an old saying.

[Winston]

This is hardly much of a news story. At least not to people who are familiar with the traditional harassment of Swedish citizens by public officials who know so much better.

The Swedes generally seem to love it, though. They're not trying to change anything about it.

[-Jrabbit]

[rah]

Originally posted by Elok
You mean either. "No invitation for you either."

No it was an attempt at being clever.

Instead of using the word two for the two excluded in the invitation, I was trying to twist it to personalize it using too instead of two.
I guess it's not TOO clever if I have to explain it or some ENGLISH NAZI comes along and takes issue with it.

Get the room at the resting home ready, I'll be there soon.

[Whoha]

How did this come to the attention of School officials?

[Aeson]

The kid needs to realize he just has to give invitations with the wrong date/address on them for his "not-friends".

[Patroklos]

How did this come to the attention of School officials?

The teacher noticed that he was handing the invitations out and that two of the kids didn't get one so she confiscated them all. But more importantly SHE didn't get one, which is what I suspect really set off all the hubub.

[Spec]

So this means that when ever you hold a party, it HAS to be an open house?

Wtf?!

Spec.

[rah]

Gee, times have changed.
In the old days, not only was it proper to not invite everyone, it was also quite acceptable to make sure the person felt humiliated for not being invited. It built character. (and rooftop snipers)

Another example of the wussification of the next generation.

[Tattila the Hun]

I wasn't invited; I feel discriminated!

Who do I sue?

[rah]

Take it like a man.
Go find a rifle.

[b etor]

Originally posted by rah

So how silly do you think this is. If you want to pass out invitations at school you must invite everyone.

Oh that's how it was when I was in grade school. I passed out illegal invitations.

[Pekka]

Yeah, it's pretty scary how social reality is manufactured on little kids like this. This is nothing but a sick experiment on what equality and fairness means, and how people shoudl treat each other.

Lesson learned? Like robots. We're all the same, we should like all people the same, we shoudln't have real friends, just everyone is oru friend or NO friends at all, got it? NO party for you, becuase you are an *******!

That's the lesson. Wait until they grow up. Wait until they have a real job and see what behaving like an adult means. That is, it was all BS they told you .

[rah]

Originally posted by b etor


Oh that's how it was when I was in grade school. I passed out illegal invitations.

Grade school isn't exactly ancient history for you is it.

[b etor]

1st grade was TEN years ago. almost eleven now. That's a long time for me.

[Dauphin]

What was the size of the class? I think it generally silly, but I can think of specific reasons why it could be seen as reasonable.

It reminds me of work-based RESPECT courses when I was seconded to the SFO. I was told it discriminatory to invite people to the pub, en masse, by e-mail. For two reasons - it specificially excluded certain people from knowing, and more importantly... those who do not drink alcohol would not be able to join in!

[rah]

Much graditude for reminding me just how old I am.
Back in our days 8th grade was still part of grammer school so not that far back for you.

But I bet your teachers didn't confiscate all the invitations that weren't totally inclusive.

[Ben Kenobi]

So silly.

Invitations to birthday parties were part of the fun.

Parties with 3,4 friends are way more fun then a whole class. We never ever thought about giving them out to everyone.

Valentines, they were the same way. You handed them out to the folks you liked.

[Arrian]

Conclusion: Finland is evil, and therefore kinda cool. Sweden is just pathetic.

-Arrian

[rah]

Yeah if you have to invite the class bully and those people you don't like, it wouldn't be that fun of a party in my book.
Hmm, have a party and get beat up or not have a party.
Seems like an easy choice for me.

[Pekka]

Think of the trauma when they turn 13 and suddenly they notice that they don't get automatic invites.

If anyone wants to throw a party at all, of course.

IMO this teaches the exact opposite. The idea is to learn social skills and be nice to people but this isn't it. This just isn't cutting it, this is not just pathetic, but IMO sick as hell.

To assume, that I don't have to do anything, to befriend a person or to be nice to them, and still get invited? That lesson will backfire later on. And them lonely kids, it sucks for them but something else should be thought to help these kids out to make new friends, this is not the way.

[Pekka]

rah, and what if your parents say you can have 10 people in it max? What if now you have to have like 25, and that's just your class mates, or none at all?

There's all kinds of problems with this equation.

[UnOrthOdOx]

Originally posted by rah
What next. If you want to give out valentines at school you're also going to have to give one to the gay guy so you're not discriminating against anyone.

Better.

My kids HAD to make valentines for EVERYONE in the class as a part of HOMEWORK.

Not kidding.

[Wiglaf]

The real injustice here is the terrible AP article. Even the grammar is ****ed up. Bonus points for using the word 'ombudsman' though

[Asmodean]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
The real injustice here is the terrible AP article. Even the grammar is ****ed up. Bonus points for using the word 'ombudsman' though

Aye...one of very few Danish contributions to the world's vocabulary

On topic: Typically Swedish. Besserwissers galore in Swedish public administration.

Asmodean