Wading into culture wars

Among the challenges public school administrators and faculty confront – helping young people to learn academic rudiments, complying with sometimes ridiculous state and federal testing standards and, a big one, keeping young minds focused for the better part of a day – none may be more difficult than discerning amid shifting sands the proper boundaries for a culture that forever pushes. That officials at a place like Stuarts Draft Middle School sense this acutely at the moment is a testament to the times.

A controversy has been stirred over a parent’s claim that songs containing sexually explicit lyrics were played at a school dance. Rapper Flo Rida’s No. 1 hit “Right Round” was among the selections, according to a complaint filed with the district by Robin Horton, of Waynesboro. That song was featured in a recent segment on “Good Morning America” focusing on what ABC’s John Berman called the “hidden” vulgarity in popular music targeting tweens. “Right Round,” Rolling Stone’s Caryn Ganz told Berman, is “pretty clearly an oral sex song.”

Complaints about music’s influence go back at least to the swaying of Elvis’ hips in the 1950s and have ebbed and flowed ever since, rising in the ’60s, abating some then rising again with the rise of rap. This is regarded in some corners as recurring evidence of generation gaps. But the inclination to dismiss concerns like those raised here should be resisted, says the Culture and Media Institute, a conservative media watchdog group based in Alexandria.

That organization points to research showing that “16 percent of high schoolers ranked music among the top three sources of moral guidance.” The institute cites another study, released in 2006 and published in Pediatrics, finding “that adolescents who listen to music with degrading sexual lyrics were more likely to initiate sexual intercourse and engage in other sexual behavior.”

However one views modern music, in communities like Stuarts Draft and others spread throughout the central Shenandoah Valley, pop culture’s influence and its potential ills are likely to garner greater scrutiny than in other places. That’s why we’re inclined to believe the Stuarts Draft Middle School parent who called the newspaper Monday morning to defend the administration and the school, saying that officials there are vigilant about ensuring appropriate behavior and dress.

We also agree with a superintendent in another district, Waynesboro’s Robin Crowder, who said that had the parent raised concerns with an administrator at the dance rather than filing a complaint later, the music would have stopped. Further, we recognize that spotting “hidden” vulgarity in pop songs can be a daunting enterprise. And, finally, we know the school still has some work to do in determining precisely what happened. Augusta County Superintendent Gary McQuain vows he will get answers, and those, we’re confident, will produce solutions. That is his record.

Still, while there is no evidence that we consider even remotely likely to emerge that would taint the reputations of the district or its administrators, Robin Horton’s concerns should be carefully considered. The culture has coarsened, a fact for which no school official can be blamed and none can subvert. But to the greatest extent possible, the culture’s seediest aspects should remain locked outside school doors. Inside those doors, learning needs to be the focal point.

Ms. Horton’s complaint should be seen as a means to help ensure this. That, we believe and expect, is precisely how Augusta officials will treat it. In so doing, they will act rightly and wisely.