Interesting discussion in staff room the other day: The assertion was made that we should rethink the term "Special Education Student" because "Aren't all students 'special'?" The proposition is that we should eliminate the term in everyday speech, although we would have to keep the term for government funding. Essentially, then, should we just keep the term "on paper"? (If that is even possible, for how can term still exist, but never be spoken? Is it possible to have a word exist only as a term for one purpose, i.e., government funding, but not exist at all outside that purpose?)
What is at the heart of this discussion? We want to embrace inclusion, especially as a Christian community, and reject exclusion, which is anti-Christian by definition. (Then there can rise the whole side discussion, which came up after awhile during this staff room discussion, of how different Christian groups do practice exclusion, i.e., Anabaptist churches not allowing membership to persons only baptized as infants.) We want to embrace the whole and resist the labels that lead to defining some group as "the excluded".
Which brings me to another thought and that is how much I am becoming interested in how we use the word "they" and "them" in everyday discussion. Listen for it. Especially try to determine the assumptions behind the use of the word. As Christians we are told there is no distinction between classes, gender, etc. so we struggle with the use of the word "them" In the same discussion a definite line was drawn between Muslim and Christian, for example. Are those of the Muslim faith to be "them"? Is "they" just our common phrase identifying the Other? Aren't we supposed to embrace and include the Other?
We are told constantly in Christian circles that all are made in the image of God and therefore "we" share a commonality with "they" "They" is "us" for all purposes.
