02-16-2019, 09:36 PM
If anyone has ever been effected by suicide or lost a loved one to suicide, you may not want to read this thread. I had my own battles with thoughts of suicide, so I don't look down on them or anything. As tough as a life as I've had, I know that people fight their own battles that I can't even imagine.
I've been presenting to high schools, public and private, for over fifteen years and have never had a problem with mentioning God or my thoughts on suicide.
The God part is never an issue because it's not coming from the school and it's just my thoughts on God and how I struggled with God's existence and feeling like He hated me, so it's not like I'm preaching or anything.
When I first started with this program, the ladies in charge took my presentation and butchered it to fit their liking and it just sounded stupid and like nothing kids could relate to. As the years have gone on, if they needed me to make a specialized version of my presentation to fit the crowd or the situation, I have done so, but they always just do it themselves and then say they needed it by a certain deadline. Their versions always sound stupid. Keep in mind that none of these ladies majored in communications or anything of the sort in college that would qualify them as experts on public speaking.
Kids always stay after to ask more questions, tell me how much my presentation meant to them, get selfies, and whatever else, so it's obviously well-received. I also continually get asked to the same schools every year and then also new schools.
After 17 years, for the first time, a student at a public school complained that my story says suicide is selfish and taking the easy way out, and then also complained about how my presentation ends with Pascal's Wager (if you live your live like there is a God and there turns out to be no God, what do you lose? If you live your life like there is no God and there turns out to be a God, you spend eternity paying for it) and about my struggles with God in general. They also want me to take out that "everyone suffers. The whole point of life is to suffer, It's what we do in that suffering that makes us human."
How is suicide not selfish and how is it not taking the easy way out? Selfish in saying that your problems are so great that you don't mind hurting your friends and family to get out of your own suffering, and taking the easy way out because death is easier than facing your problems.
Basically, they want to butcher my presentation and offered a bunch of alternatives that sound stupid, are spoon feeding kids, and just don't address real life situations.
I basically refused to take make the changes they requested (I said I would take out Pascal's Wager when I present to public schools, even though it's never a problem), to which she responded that she wasn't expecting that response from me and she basically assumed I'd roll over and let her control what I do, so now she's going to stop giving me programs until she meets with me to resolve this.
The schools always request me, not the other way around, and the program always sends someone to present on the anatomy and things like that, which it's usually to a Health class, so they'd be learning about that stuff anyways. My point is that I'm not going to be held hostage by them and, if they want to kick me out of the program for not changing, that's fine because I'll just email the schools on my own and set them up without the program. If they contact the schools and lie about why I'm not presenting with the organization anymore, that's fine because I'll just sue the program.
Like I said, teachers love having me in and request me year after year, and never have had a problem, and now they're trying to edit my entire presentation because of those things.
I'd love to meet with the student and ask her what she disagrees with in regards to the suicide part because she said that people were sad because they had family members who had committed suicide. Ok, so doesn't that just prove my point that it's selfish?
I feel like kids are coddled way too much these days and it doesn't prepare them for real life.
I'm preparing myself for every point that they'll try to make. I already countered all their points in an email so they just said "we're going to meet about this," instead of just admitting I was right and they'll just throw out bullshit in the meeting and attempt to intimidate me.
Sorry for the venting but I had to get that off my chest.
I've been presenting to high schools, public and private, for over fifteen years and have never had a problem with mentioning God or my thoughts on suicide.
The God part is never an issue because it's not coming from the school and it's just my thoughts on God and how I struggled with God's existence and feeling like He hated me, so it's not like I'm preaching or anything.
When I first started with this program, the ladies in charge took my presentation and butchered it to fit their liking and it just sounded stupid and like nothing kids could relate to. As the years have gone on, if they needed me to make a specialized version of my presentation to fit the crowd or the situation, I have done so, but they always just do it themselves and then say they needed it by a certain deadline. Their versions always sound stupid. Keep in mind that none of these ladies majored in communications or anything of the sort in college that would qualify them as experts on public speaking.
Kids always stay after to ask more questions, tell me how much my presentation meant to them, get selfies, and whatever else, so it's obviously well-received. I also continually get asked to the same schools every year and then also new schools.
After 17 years, for the first time, a student at a public school complained that my story says suicide is selfish and taking the easy way out, and then also complained about how my presentation ends with Pascal's Wager (if you live your live like there is a God and there turns out to be no God, what do you lose? If you live your life like there is no God and there turns out to be a God, you spend eternity paying for it) and about my struggles with God in general. They also want me to take out that "everyone suffers. The whole point of life is to suffer, It's what we do in that suffering that makes us human."
How is suicide not selfish and how is it not taking the easy way out? Selfish in saying that your problems are so great that you don't mind hurting your friends and family to get out of your own suffering, and taking the easy way out because death is easier than facing your problems.
Basically, they want to butcher my presentation and offered a bunch of alternatives that sound stupid, are spoon feeding kids, and just don't address real life situations.
I basically refused to take make the changes they requested (I said I would take out Pascal's Wager when I present to public schools, even though it's never a problem), to which she responded that she wasn't expecting that response from me and she basically assumed I'd roll over and let her control what I do, so now she's going to stop giving me programs until she meets with me to resolve this.
The schools always request me, not the other way around, and the program always sends someone to present on the anatomy and things like that, which it's usually to a Health class, so they'd be learning about that stuff anyways. My point is that I'm not going to be held hostage by them and, if they want to kick me out of the program for not changing, that's fine because I'll just email the schools on my own and set them up without the program. If they contact the schools and lie about why I'm not presenting with the organization anymore, that's fine because I'll just sue the program.
Like I said, teachers love having me in and request me year after year, and never have had a problem, and now they're trying to edit my entire presentation because of those things.
I'd love to meet with the student and ask her what she disagrees with in regards to the suicide part because she said that people were sad because they had family members who had committed suicide. Ok, so doesn't that just prove my point that it's selfish?
I feel like kids are coddled way too much these days and it doesn't prepare them for real life.
I'm preparing myself for every point that they'll try to make. I already countered all their points in an email so they just said "we're going to meet about this," instead of just admitting I was right and they'll just throw out bullshit in the meeting and attempt to intimidate me.
Sorry for the venting but I had to get that off my chest.
![[Image: 7LNf.gif]](https://i.gifer.com/7LNf.gif)
