‘At Risk’ Kids at Risk of Being Relabled ‘At Hope’ Kids

Published on January 13th, 2010

We should extend this concept to, say, politicians whose feelings might be hurt by calling them ’stupid’ or ‘greedy’ or any number of things with bad connotations with which one sees so many of them associated. Any ideas what we could use instead to eliminate the hurtful stigma of these words?

Decades ago, poor children became known as “disadvantaged” to soften the stigma of poverty. Then they were “at-risk.” Now, a Washington lawmaker wants to replace those euphemisms with a new one, “at hope.”

Democratic State Sen. Rosa Franklin says negative labels are hurting kids’ chances for success and she’s not a bit concerned that people will be confused by her proposed rewrite of the 54 places in state law where words like “at risk” and “disadvantaged” are used.

The bill has gotten a warm welcome among fellow lawmakers, state officials and advocacy groups.

“We really put too many negatives on our kids,” says Franklin, who is the state Senate’s president pro tem. “We need to come up with positive terms.”

34 users responded in " ‘At Risk’ Kids at Risk of Being Relabled ‘At Hope’ Kids "

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# 1 Pikachu said, on January 13th, 2010 at 5:50 am

In the UK, hiking in the nude leads to… prison, in fact life in prison. The insanity of British fascism has no bounds.

UK = fascist

# 2 Alan C said, on January 13th, 2010 at 6:10 am

maybe they should consider this approach for banks? I doubt there will be any bank runs if you see that your bank has been put on the “At Hope” list by the FDIC

# 3 Uncle Dave said, on January 13th, 2010 at 6:11 am

#1: Excellent!

# 4 Benjamin said, on January 13th, 2010 at 6:19 am

Changing terms just confuses the issue. Is detention going to be renamed as “After School Study Hall” to change those negative connotations? Lets call racists “Preferred Pigmentation Advocates” to remove those negative connotations too.

# 5 Zybch said, on January 13th, 2010 at 6:20 am

What a crock of shit!!
Hey, lets now call cancer ‘happy growths’ because if we refer to them as that there is no way the disease could survive more than 3 weeks before turning into gold encrusted bundles of goodness that people would be forming a long line to contract.

# 6 pedro said, on January 13th, 2010 at 6:20 am

I think it’s time to call all this PC people by their names: Pansies!

# 7 Wretched Gnu said, on January 13th, 2010 at 6:47 am

Are you kidding? It’s perfect! Do you know any teenager who wouldn’t move heaven and earth to shed the label “At Hope Youth”?

# 8 JustJeri said, on January 13th, 2010 at 7:29 am

#6: Brilliant! “At Risk” is way too cool to affect change.

# 9 GigG said, on January 13th, 2010 at 7:56 am

This is the problem with politicians in general and liberals in particular. It doesn’t matter what they say or do as long as they put a nice name on it.

# 10 Dallas said, on January 13th, 2010 at 8:14 am

This is a great idea.

“At risk” has negative connotations for young kids that need help.

I agree. Naturally, this point is lost on heartless conservatives.

# 11 Jess Hurchist said, on January 13th, 2010 at 8:34 am

I think the problem word is ‘at’ let’s change that to another preposition then no-one will have a clue what is being talked about.

# 12 OvenMaster said, on January 13th, 2010 at 8:36 am

“At hope” vs. “At risk”? Sure, why not? Yet another way to sugarcoat the real world.

# 13 Mr Diesel said, on January 13th, 2010 at 8:43 am

Of course you would think that Dallas.

All this will do is increase the number of candy-assed pussies that can’t do anything for themselves because oh poor fucking me.

Liberalism at its finest.

# 14 Dallas said, on January 13th, 2010 at 8:43 am

#11 Well, you can call it sugar coating, I cal it empathy.

It was better than the conservative choice submitted “Hopeless Losers”

# 15 Animby said, on January 13th, 2010 at 9:07 am

Call ‘em whatever you want. The kids who are better off will start to use the term in a derogatory fashion.

Loons.

# 16 SparkyOne said, on January 13th, 2010 at 9:09 am

This ‘hope’ bull is not an antidote to the despair that is really out there.

# 17 Thinker said, on January 13th, 2010 at 9:36 am

#15 Ding! for the win.

The sooner they can get exposed to reality the better off it will be for them.

# 18 TooManyPuppies said, on January 13th, 2010 at 9:55 am

It’s a way to reduce programs and cut costs to forget about them. When they’re called “at risk” people think they need help. Remove that “at risk” and who gives two shits about them? They’re at hope, the big O will take care of them, so no need to give a crap.

# 19 The Party said, on January 13th, 2010 at 12:00 pm

Orwellian Newspeak

# 20 ECA said, on January 13th, 2010 at 12:05 pm

NAMES/LABELS/..

There are interesting thoughts about this.
In most cases, if you are called something in EARNEST, with real meaning, then you will fight to change it or ADAPT with it.
Being called POOR isnt a bad thing.
its a designation that you are in a situation that you can WORK HARD to get out of, we hope.
Being called an ASS, means you should wonder if you are doing the RIGHT THING.

what is happening, is like collecting all the designations for something that tha happened BETWEEN a child and an adult and grouping them under 1 header..CHILD ABUSE. which is NOT a very good description of what happened.

ALL these folks are doing is SOFTENING the wording for THEIR own concerns. when they see a word like DISADVANTAGED.. What does that have to do with being POOR, HANDICAPPED, MENTALLY RETARDED, QUADRIPLEGIC, or anything else. It just makes it EASIER for them NOT TO KNOW, and NOT TO CARE.

Its also a way to HIDE things. AS you can make these words MEAN ANYTHING. A person making LESS THAN $100,000 per year is DISADVANTAGED. Its like reading a LAW journal or Science manual and not knowing the language.

# 21 OvenMaster said, on January 13th, 2010 at 3:28 pm

#13: That sounds like the time when some adults got the bright idea to not keep score when kids play sports. That way everyone was a winner!

Or when I was a kid, my grade school principal wanted to throw out the A, B, C, D, F grade scale and use only “Pass/Fail”. Nothing like making those kids who barely passed “just as smart and just as good” as the kid with the IQ of 150!

FAIL! In life there are winners and there are losers. Not everyone is going to be a success, and not everyone is going to be a failure. You’re going to be graded, you’re going to be rated, you’re going to get ranked. To do otherwise is unfair to those who have skills and abilities.

# 22 LOWER CASE SCREEN NAME said, on January 13th, 2010 at 4:06 pm

Good God these liberal anusfaces are stupid! All this does is change the meaning of perfectly good words. A “special” child is still a retard. All that’s changed is you can now insult someone by calling them “special”.

This will cheer the kids up? They’re not that stupid. Call them “at hope” and they’ll immediately know you’re putting them down.

Unbelievable cluelessness. (Well, I guess it is believable – look at who we elected to run our country.)

# 23 Dallas said, on January 13th, 2010 at 4:35 pm

#22. Good example. At one time “Special needs” children were referred to “retard children”. Seems “Special needs” was a better term and it is. Same deal here.

Again, lost on your pathetic minds.

SO when you were a kid, did you prefer mom refer to you as “Husky” or “Porker” ?

# 24 ECA said, on January 13th, 2010 at 4:53 pm

#23,
Dallas..
“SO when you were a kid, did you prefer mom refer to you as “Husky” or “Porker” ?”

UMM, neither, mother would change what was for dinner, as IF’ we knew what was happening, since WE WERE POOR, and eating wasnt important.

# 25 LOWER CASE SCREEN NAME said, on January 13th, 2010 at 4:55 pm

#23 – Better in what way?

Calling someone “special” is an insult. No kid who’s worth a shit want to be called special and I wouldn’t criticize someone for punching someone who called them special.

# 26 LOWER CASE SCREEN NAME said, on January 13th, 2010 at 4:57 pm

Dammit, hit submit too fast.

Changing the word does not change the underlying concept.

Fat is fat. Tard is tard. Calling someone follicly challenged doesn’t magically grow hair. etc. etc.

# 27 jbellies said, on January 13th, 2010 at 5:28 pm

As in “if you do that, you’d better hope your mother finds out first, ’cause if it’s me, I’m going full Kuru. I’ll be eating your brain, son. Oh yeah.”

I agree with several posters that the tone of voice in which the at hope is applied, will be more important than the words themselves. It may be like 60,000 fans whining out the nickname of one of the visiting team’s star players.

# 28 Dale said, on January 13th, 2010 at 5:48 pm

A more vague term isn’t going to help clarify anything, be it positive or negative. Of course the politicians like it, it’s a gutless, uncontroversial idea that really does nothing.

# 29 deowll said, on January 13th, 2010 at 9:09 pm

Why doesn’t she call them the advanced class kids? That should be sufficiently stupid. You walk into the class. You see who is there and you know all you need to know. Duh! They aren’t that gullible.

# 30 ECA said, on January 14th, 2010 at 1:19 am

For those that DONT understand WORDS..

RETARD isnt the word..RETARDED is the word.

Which means SLOWED. which only meant that you Slowed down and learned alittle differently, or slower. You might have Missed an explanation or something. I found that out with Allot of people that couldnt do math. 1 or 2 little explanations, and they did VERY well.

# 31 Lone Wolf said, on January 14th, 2010 at 2:56 am

This is a great idea! In fact we should replace every name with a politically correct one. “Evil” should be replaced with “morally impaired”, “criminal” should be replaced with “legal non-observant”, “child” should be replaced with “under age american”, “parent” should be “under age american caretaker” and when the living impaired rise up we shouldn’t run or shoot them in their heads, we should try to help them and guide them to a non-living flesh diet.

# 32 pedro said, on January 14th, 2010 at 4:25 am

#23 From your behavior, seem you didn’t have one but a handful of nicknames. Now, you have Dullas to deal with. PC people are so stoopid.

# 33 Dallas said, on January 14th, 2010 at 6:31 am

#30 Always nice to have a spell checker in here. Correct. “Retarded” was changed to “Special Needs”.

Again. The term “Special Needs Child” is a lot more empathetic vs “Retarded Child”. Both the child and family likely view it as a better reference to a loved one.

The Conservatives can continue to say “retarded”, of course. No point breaking tradition.

# 34 pedro said, on January 14th, 2010 at 7:33 am

Right, and the change of name will make it disappear. It’ll be all better now. Morons!

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