The Days of Cheerleading

Growing up, I can remember doing cheers on the blacktop at school with all my friends. It was an everyday activity for us. We had probably 20 to 30 cheers and dances that we would do and we had so much fun. I was watching the news just recently and saw a story about how a six year old was removed from her cheerleading squad because her mother felt one cheer was inappropriate. The mother did not approve of three lines in the cheer which stated “my back hurts, my skirts to tight, my booty is shaking left to right.” The mother of this little girl went straight to the news about her daughter’s cheerleading squad. Her goal was to have the squad remove this cheer from the list, but instead the squad suspended the little girl from cheering for the rest of the season. When I saw this story on the news, I could see the disappointment in the little girls face. She is a six year old who loves cheering and now she can not cheer. It is not as if a young cheerleading squad is trying to be racy and say inappropriate things, at their age it is cute because you can see how excited they are about cheering in general. I can remember back in grade school doing that same cheer, and never thinking anything of it. We were just innocent kids doing something we loved. It is amazing to me the way some parents react to situations.

Check out this website to see the full news story:
      http://news.yahoo.com/video/entertainment-15749636/mom-complains-about-racy-cheer-21949860

And I thought I knew him

One week ago on August 31, a 15 year old boy from my hometown of Chester, shot his nine year old brother in the leg. A 911 call was made to the boys’ home around 8:00 that evening. When the police arrived, the 15 year old boy stated that “he and his brother had been arguing and his little brother made him mad so he shot him with a shotgun.” Luckily for the nine year old boy, this shot was not fatal. He was transferred to a St. Louis hospital, and was then released within a day or two. The older brother was taken to juvenile detention. When I heard about this story, I was so shocked. The 15 year old boy was in my PE class last year, and I saw him around the school everyday. I never thought he would be the type of person to do something like this. It also made me think that if he could pull a gun on his own brother, he is more than likely the type to pull a gun out a school. It is amazing how you think you know the people around you, but when it comes down to it you never know what someone is capable of or might actually do.