 |
| Will the buses be full this fall? |
“There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul
than the way in which it treats its children.”
It’s been difficult to listen to anything the White House has to say about schools these days, especially about whether they should be opening as usual this fall, and if so, how? Parents, of course, are eager for their kids to return to school, especially if they rely on schools for the child care that allows them to begin working outside the home again. But parents are far from eager to send their children into harm’s way, risking exposure to the corona virus, and it’s far from certain that schools can be opened safely yet.
So far, Trump
has basically rejected CDC guidelines for safely opening the schools, saying
they’re too “expensive” and “very impractical,” and that no matter what,
schools need to reopen because, after all, the only reason he can imagine for keeping them closed would be to make him look bad in November. Oh, and
by the way, he may withhold their
federal funding if they do not
re-open.
Clearly, the failure of imagination is his…I’m guessing
that every parent can imagine other reasons for keeping their children
home—namely, their children’s safety, not to mention the safety of teachers,
staff and yes, other family members who could be impacted by asymptomatic children
carrying the virus home with them. Still, Trump’s Secretary of Education Betsy
de Vos is echoing Trump’s line that the schools “must be fully operational” in
the fall, and she’s been doubling down on the threat of defunding—which isn’t
even her final call (or Trump’s). Not surprisingly, neither has a plan for
opening schools safely.
As with so many of Neptune’s “hall of mirrors” escapades
these days, the efforts Trump and de Vos are making to politicize our
children’s education, rather than to do anything truly constructive about it
are only too obvious. They’re implying that the schools should open and they
shouldn’t expect extra federal dollars to do so safely (according to the CDC),
either. Some governors who want to comply with Trump have gone so far as to
simply announce that school aged children are “safe” from the virus (when
that’s far from established)—never mind the collateral damage that could be
done to teachers, staff and families if schools reopen too soon, or if the
opening is handled in the haphazard, mediocre way this administration and its
acolytes seem to handle most things.
Bottom line, American children have become pawns in the
ongoing COVID crisis, and if enough parents and communities don’t simply refuse
for them to be used this way, this could get much worse before it gets better.
Context is everything
 |
| Families and experts must concur over the safety of opening schools. |
Context is everything
So, similar to what has happened with the issues of
systemic racism in the U.S., the relentless health crisis we’re faced with as a
society has teased yet another historical skeleton out of our collective
closet—the curious utilitarian relationship we’ve had as a society with children, especially the children of the
poor. There’s a reason pro-family legislation that many developed nations take for
granted—like paid family leave, universal child care and pre-K, and the equal
distribution of resources to every school
district, regardless of the economic demographics of the district—sounds so
radical and “progressive.”
In fact, all of those policy proposals strike at the
heart of America’s Puritan ideological roots, which favored the view that
children had to “earne their keep” and contribute to the coffers of their
communities from a very young age. Child
labor (often under the age of 8) was not only sanctioned by early eastern
seaboard colony governments, according to a 1908 study by social scientist
Edith Abbott, families were obligated by
law to put their children into service spinning yarn, knitting, weaving,
and so on. Abbott reports that,
“In short, there is no lack of
evidence to show that it was regarded as a public duty in the colony of
Massachusetts to provide for the training of children not only in learning but
in ‘labor and other employments which may bee profitable to the Commonwealth.’”[i]
As partial explanation, Abbott cites the Puritan view
that idleness—even among children, but especially
among children of the poor (who may become public “burdens”)—was a grievous
sin, but she’s also quite aware of the commercial use these children were being
put to by these laws. To reinforce that point she relates that (in original
“1640s-speak”),
“In Plymouth, in 1641, it was
ordered that ‘those that have reliefe from the townes and have children and doe
not ymploy them that then it shal be lawfull for the Towneship to take order
that those children shal be put to worke in fitting ymployment according to
their strength and abilities or placed out by the Townes.’ The Town of Boston
in 1673 notifies a list of persons to ‘dispose of their severall
children….abroad for servants, to serve by Indentures according to their ages
and capacities,’ and if they neglect this, ‘the selectmen will take their said
children from them and place them with such masters as they shall provide
according as the law directs.’”[ii]
It’s somewhat shocking to read
about the laws that basically imposed government power over parents and their
children in the American colonies—colonies that were governed by people who had
migrated to the New World for the sake of freedom
(their own, apparently). And what could families expect in return for farming their children out as servants (and who knows what else)? Not
an education that would lift them out of their modest stations in life,
certainly—they might be trained in a trade along the way because that would
make them useful to their developing
economies and would keep them from becoming “public burdens,” but governments felt
no obligation to fully educate children—the obligations all flowed the other way.
 |
| Young children worked in perilous conditions well into the 20th century. |
It wasn’t until 1904 and the
founding of the National
Child Labor Committee, in fact—well after we had shaken colonial rule and
adopted a Constitution—that the idea of public education began to be taken
seriously. The mid-19th century waves of immigration had brought
thousands of families with children to our shores, and the children were
promptly put to work in Industrial Age factories for pennies a day and in
horrendous work conditions, but when the beginnings of the so-called
Progressive Era hit—perhaps a line in the sand helped along by the 1891
Neptune-Pluto conjunction in Gemini—social reformers began to promote childhood
education as a way to advance the entire nation. It appears, in fact, that
Abbott’s 1905 study emerged from this impulse towards reform.
It wasn’t until after the Great Depression produced mass
unemployment and FDR’s New Deal started paying more attention to labor laws
that the Fair
Labor Standards Act of 1938 was passed, placing limitations on, but not totally
outlawing child labor.
In other words, while children
have been somewhat romanticized in our
history by artists such as Kate Greenaway and Norman Rockwell, most
pre-Enlightenment art work pictured children as small adults because that’s how society saw them. And I would
argue that, due to its particularly dour, deeply-rooted Puritan work ethic,
this nation continues to value children for their pecuniary “usefulness,” rather
than for their special qualities as human beings, and (incidentally), as the precious
reserve of brilliance and talent to whom the
nation owes its future.
The Puritan view was heavily
Saturnian, in other words: that children “owed” their parents, churches and communities
for the privilege of living, and they shouldn’t take even the meals on their
table for granted. This was not entirely out of keeping with European attitudes
towards children at the time, of course: Krampus—Europe’s devilish-looking
Saturnian version of Father Christmas was more likely to give “bad” children
lumps of coal in their stockings, instead of candy. We can only imagine that
children who wanted to play rather
than work might have landed on
Krampus’s “bad” list.
 |
| Christmas was far less joyful for children with mean old Krampus. |
So what does all this have to
do with our schools today, and whether they should re-open or not in the fall? First
of all, the Trump administration is promoting a view that children’s immune
systems are “much
stronger than adults” and that this justifies putting them, their teachers
and who knows how many others at risk so the schools can open. There is no definitive scientific data suggesting
kids are immune to COVID—indeed, there are
cases of children being badly stricken by the virus—but there is evidence to show that asymptomatic
people of all ages can carry the virus
to others without knowing. So in that sense, re-opening the schools could cause
unwelcome spikes in cases and enhanced community spread of the disease.
The L.A. Times reports that when De Vos
was asked about the risk to children of re-opening, she said, “nothing in the
data” suggests children being in school is “in any way dangerous” — an
assertion the Times says was
“challenged by a top public health official on the same program.” Did she even read the data, we might wonder? If she
didn’t, of course she doesn’t need to
admit that there’s anything there to worry about!
And when Trump was asked on the
14th about the case of a summer school teacher who just died of the virus in
rural Arizona—the virus also sickened two of her colleagues—all he could
respond with was "Schools
should be opened. Schools should be opened. Those kids want to go to
school. You're losing a lot of lives by keeping things closed. We saved
millions of lives while we did the initial closure." We can probably
be certain he didn’t read the data
either, but more importantly, it’s pretty clear that he simply is not going to
acknowledge that people are dying on his watch. Willful blindness is not leadership, but it gives us a window
into his value system, in which the nation’s children clearly rank very low. Maybe
if they were to make him look better in November, they’d come up a notch?
The parallels with Puritan
Massachusetts are a bit haunting here: Trump knows what he wants in the situation (a better looking situation,
politically), and he’s apparently decided that kids, teachers and communities owe him their cooperation (so as not to
be a “burden” on him), whether anybody
dies or not. After all, how many millions didn’t
die? Really?
So the schools that follow his
lead this fall should start tabulating how many people don’t die in the process? If it’s deemed unsafe by the experts (and
only the experts) to re-open, how
about they stay closed so that more people won’t die?
The astrology
It’s a bit difficult to capture
something as elusive as how the nation
values its children in horoscope form, yet there are hints in our trusty
U.S. Sibly chart that are worth exploring. The Moon in a mundane chart
represents the People, of course, but we can also glean something from the condition
of our progressed Sibly Moon that should be helpful. To establish a framework
for this exploration, let’s consider this upcoming Labor Day (September 7th)
the target day after which the administration would like to see all schools re-opened for the
season. School districts often have
differing schedules, but Labor Day is usually a marker for schools being back
in session, so it’s a fair approximation.
So we’ll consider the Sibly chart against a chart progressed to
September 7, 2020, calculated for dawn—the “dawn” of a new school year. To
complete the triwheel, we’ll place the transits for that same time on
September 7th in the outer wheel.
Let’s begin.
Triwheel #1: (inner wheel) U.S.A.
(Sibly chart), July 4, 1776, 5:10 p.m. LMT, Philadelphia, PA;
(middle wheel) U.S.A. Sibly chart, secondary progression, Solar Arc MC
method, for September 7, 2020 at 6:42 a.m. (dawn) GMT, Washington, D.C.;
(outer wheel) Transits, September 7, 2020, 6:42 a.m. DST (dawn),
Washington, D.C. . Tropical Equal Houses,
True Node. All charts cast, courtesy of Kepler 8.0 (Cosmic Patterns
Software).
Because our concern here is
children and their families, we will of course examine the Sibly Progressed
Moon before anything else, and in these charts, that focus reveals a great
deal. A note of interest: on its own, the Progressed Sibly chart you’ll see in
the middle wheel here features 5°+Virgo
on the ASC and 1°+Gemini
at the MC; both signs suggest a connection to education and learning
(i.e., Gemini is thought to rule the natural 3rd house of lower
education and local schools, and Virgo energy reflects the public service
function of schools and teaching—teachers certainly aren’t in it for the
money!). And Progressed SibMoon (Capricorn) shows up in this chart in
the 5th house of children, reminding
us that “it takes a village” to raise children into the quality citizens and
leaders we need them to be. Let’s see
what happens when we consider all three charts of this triwheel together.
Interchart Grand-Square: Progressed
Moon (Capricorn) conjoins PSoNode-Pluto (Capricorn) and radix Sibly Pluto
(Capricorn), opposing PNoNode-Sibly Mercury-Part-of-Fortune (Cancer) and
transiting Venus (Leo). The Capricorn points are being transited by the
backwards moving Capricorn “train,” Saturn, Pluto and Jupiter, and the whole
Capricorn-Cancer axis is t-squared by fiery Mars-Eris (Aries), opposed to
transiting Juno (Libra). Clearly,
great clashing power dynamics are at work in this grand square, and our
families (PSibMoon) are literally caught up in the midst of it. The 2nd-8th
house axis brings the “big E” Economy into the picture, reminding us that there
are key corporate vested interests also interested in re-opening
schools—especially in the realm of higher education (i.e., Phoenix U and the
like), but also in the private network of charter schools that De Vos favors.
I can’t begin to imagine all the economic fall-out that happens in communities when schools are closed for long stretches, especially under the present conditions, but it appears that someone is clearly aware and lobbying hard for a re-opening.
The Mars-Eris (Aries) opposition to
transiting Juno (Libra) reflects the passion driving those on both
sides of this re-opening debate, although with Mars-Eris over the Sibly
5th house of the nation’s children, I would expect a certain amount of influential outrage
and activism to surface around Labor Day that may determine how the dilemma is
resolved in the end. We should be alert to the possibility of some kind of
police action here, as well—especially considering how this Aries conjunction
plays out in the larger grand square. I am a bit concerned by the 8th
house placement of this conjunction in
the Transit chart itself—violent possibilities do exist with these combined
energies.
 |
| Betsy DeVos announcing that schools must be open this fall. |
Returning to the triwheel, the
presence of queenly Leo Venus over the Sibly 8th, presiding
over the grand square we’ve been considering, is telling—like Betsy De Vos,
she’s not about to be ignored, although she is feeling a bit put off and
impatient that her word alone is not enough for everyone to fling open the
doors of the schools. (Transiting Venus also squares
PSibVenus (Taurus) over the Sibly 5th). Parents and
communities with their children’s best interests in mind are definitely locked
in a power struggle with her, which may be more difficult to navigate than the
one with her boss in the end. Sibly Sun (Cancer) is mostly
impacted by PSibJupiter (Rx, Cancer), trine PSibSun (Pisces)-conjunct-Transiting
Neptune, suggesting that we will see a flood of nebulous and manipulative
pronouncements, but very little administrative substance.
Even the imperious Ms. De Vos may
be out of luck until the 2nd house Capricorn players turn direct and
navigate their respective shadow periods,however. More on this in a bit—suffice
to say here that it doesn’t look like schools will be re-opened to any great
extent on September 7th, if families have anything to say about it
(and they will).
A word about our PSibMoon
conjoining Sibly Pluto: the last time our progressed lunar cycle
aspected Sibly Pluto so closely was in the 1970s, when PSibSun
fell at 26°+Capricorn
and PSibMoon
fell at the same degree in belligerent Aries. Desegregating
schools was the hot button issue and the strategic busing of kids between
school districts was the tool the Supreme Court
approved. For a variety of reasons—some deeply troubling and racist, some
not—families in many communities simply refused to cooperate—at times, violently—thus beginning the phenomenon of
“white flight” from many urban centers. Equal access to quality education remains
a major load-bearing “beam” in the structure of systemic racism in this nation,
but it didn’t take long to realize that busing was clearly not the solution in the 1970s; even so, is it possible that perhaps
this latest PSibMoon-Sibly Pluto passage is forcing our systems to confront
the structural part of all this more head on?
As it happens, there was one
earlier period during which a progressed Sibly quarter began with PSibMoon
in late Capricorn, conjunct Sibly Pluto—it was in 1884, during
the expansion of Horace
Mann’s “common school” system of public schooling beyond urban centers into
rural areas. African-American children also benefited from this trend, although
the beginnings of segregation as a public issue had emerged. By the end of this
progressed quarter, several “historically black colleges” had been established.
Second house Sibly Pluto has always reflected the nation’s most compelling
values, and educating the nation’s children was starting to emerge as one of
those, as the best way, according to Mann,
“to turn the nation’s unruly children into disciplined, judicious republican
citizens.”This was an apt ambition for a Capricorn Progressed Moon then, and
a generally laudable one now, for the sake of kids’ futures.
The 2nd house
placement of all this reminds us that the State has a stake in its citizens’
education: deriving benefits from influencing and forming the masses is right up Sibly Pluto’s alley, in fact—it
rules over taxation, after all, and
as our history attests, there are many ways of “rendering to Caesar” that don’t
involve a tax form. In the 1880s, for instance, the school year was designed
around agricultural needs; today, corporations advertise on school vending
machines, sponsored supplies and sports gear.
 |
| The National parks truly were our best idea! |
More positively, Ken Burns’ The
National Parks: America’s Best Idea (2009) documentary (airing now on
PBS), reminds us that FDR used to inspire and cheer the nation during the
Depression by having his tours of our National Parks (many of them at that time
newly established) filmed. He then used those films to encourage people to
spend as much time in the parks as they could, to enjoy our collective natural
wonders and become more united as a people in the process. Teaching the nation
to value the beauty of nature as an essential aspect of American identity was, IMHO,
one of the highest expressions of presidential leadership and of our Capricorn 2nd house.
Clearly, with our PSibMoon
sitting conjunct Pluto in that house right now and
Trump rolling back
environmental regulations and laws as fast as he can before election
because he thinks that will gain him corporate support (which sadly, may work),
today’s situation speaks volumes about
why we need to heed FDR’s message again. And about why expecting Trump to value
our other collective treasure—our children—is probably a fool’s errand.
Woven into the entire mess and
complicating any solution to our
present school quandary across the
nation is the clearly disproportionate
number of COVID cases afflicting racial minority communities. Related to
this is the frequent difficulty of scheduling all-remote learning in black
communities, due to spotty Wi-Fi coverage and access to adequate technology in
many of them. As I write this, protesters have been arrested
in Detroit for trying to block the busing of Detroit school children to
summer school programs. Surely signs of things to come in Detroit, there are
intense fears (most likely justified) about the prospects of re-opening schools
with live teaching only in the fall.
So there’s a clear echo from
the 1970s at work here, with few ideas about how to overcome such challenges,
especially with our present lack of leadership.
Keeping the focus on student safety above all and doing the responsible thing
in a way that all students receive
the best possible education this fall is going to be major, especially if the
public is fed a misinformation campaign that only confuses the issues and
divides us.
 |
| Vigilance is an important habit to develop during this season of retrogrades. |
Unfortunately, Transiting
Neptune (Rx, Pisces) is not likely to help in this regard, opposing
Sibly Neptune (Virgo), squaring Sibly Mars (Gemini) and trining Sibly Mercury
(Cancer). Unclear, confusing or “scammy” messaging designed to divide
people is likely to continue—just today, news broke about serious hacking
episodes (“bitcoin scams”) against the Twitter
sites of several politicians and celebrities, including Barack Obama, Bill
Gates and Joe Biden. This is shocking, but probably nothing new and we’ll
likely see more of it before these Neptune aspects loosen up, but
clearly we’re going to have to learn to see through this kind of corruption and
fog and to hold the perpetrators responsible to the extent possible. Saturn
is the antidote here—perhaps we’ll see some strict regulations and
security guidelines being imposed on social media platforms as a consequence of
attacks like these.
Transiting Uranus (Rx, Taurus) conjoins
Transiting Moon (Taurus), sextiles Sibly Sun (Cancer), squares Transiting Vesta
(Leo), trines Transiting Pallas (Capricorn) and inconjoins Sibly ASC
(Sagittarius). It’s significant that Uranus
adds to our list of retrograde “heavies” in this chart, but even so, these aspects imply disruption of a sort for the American people (Uranus disposes Sibly Moon) and their households (Vesta), even if it’s coming
across more like a dull ache than an explosive rupture. Truth is, the federal and state aid programs that many families are receiving right now--not to mention other assistance with avoiding evictions and utility shut offs--will gradually be winding down, leaving people to their own devices again, so perhaps a quieter Uranus is a good thing.
From the aspects catalogued above, it seems that the People may feel that they are living on the edge of disaster (Uranus-Moon), with no security whatsoever. Stressed out households (Vesta) are likely pushing the nation overall (ASC) beyond its comfort zone, and in this atmosphere, concerns like justice and fair treatment (Pallas) grow in importance. Nerves are on edge, in other words, and it would help to have some reassuring guidance from people who cared.
From the aspects catalogued above, it seems that the People may feel that they are living on the edge of disaster (Uranus-Moon), with no security whatsoever. Stressed out households (Vesta) are likely pushing the nation overall (ASC) beyond its comfort zone, and in this atmosphere, concerns like justice and fair treatment (Pallas) grow in importance. Nerves are on edge, in other words, and it would help to have some reassuring guidance from people who cared.
A word about the retrogrades
You may have noticed that all of the so-called social and
collective planets—the planets we look to for all mundane astrology analysis—are in retrograde motion in the transits for Labor Day (outer wheel, Triwheel 1), and it’s quite fair to assume that this
powerful drag on collective affairs is slowing down our progress addressing the
virus and, as a consequence, with getting kids back to school. So, when are
things going to loosen up? It’s a more complex story than it first appears.
Let me first say that I
consider Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus the key players in all this
because the slower outer planets—Neptune and Pluto—spend long stretches in retrograde motion not
going very far, and it’s often difficult to distinguish between the impacts of
direct motion from those of retrograde motion. Things just don’t get done with
the optimum focus, speed or efficiency when Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus
are transiting retrograde, so it’s truly no wonder that schools are
having problems getting their “ducks in a row” for fall right now. The beauty
of these retrogrades is—as we’ve discussed—that we have had a chance (somewhat
forced) to deeply examine our values and priorities and to work on those essential plans, but my sense is that we won't begin
to reap the benefits of that inward-looking process until more forward motion
becomes available.
To make sense of all
this, it’s worth laying out the timeline that Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus have
been on for their current retrograde periods (see the table below). What makes
this so interesting (and a bit complex) is that not only are we concerned about
the actual periods in which the planets are moving retrograde, but we’re also
concerned with the so-called “pre-retrograde shadow periods” and the
“post-retrograde shadow periods.” A quick explanation from the Astrology
Dictionary is in order:
“Instead of the retrograde period beginning on the day that the planet
stations retrograde, the events and circumstances associated with the
retrograde are seen as beginning to develop as soon as the planet passes the
pre-retrograde shadow point, which is the degree that the planet will
eventually retrograde back to.
Similarly, instead of the retrograde period ending on the day that the
planet stations direct, in this context the circumstances surrounding the
retrograde are seen as continuing until the planet passes the post-retrograde
shadow point, which is the degree that it originally stationed retrograde at.”
Table 1. Retrograde and “shadow” period timelines.
Date
|
Jupiter
|
Saturn
|
Uranus
|
Shadow periods
|
2/3/2020
|
D, 25° Cap20’
|
Begins pre-rx
shadow period
|
||
2/18/2020
|
D, 17° Cap24’
|
Begins pre-rx
shadow period
|
||
4/29/2020
|
D, 06°Tau43’
|
Begins pre-rx
shadow period
|
||
5/12/2020
|
Rx, 1°Aq57’
|
|||
5/15/2020
|
Rx, 27°Cap14’
|
|||
8/16/2020
|
Rx, 10°Tau42’
|
|||
9/14/2020
|
D, 17°Cap24’
|
Begins post-rx
shadow
|
||
9/30/2020
|
D, 25°Cap20’
|
Begins post-rx
shadow
|
||
12/6/2020
|
27°Cap14’
|
Ends post-rx shadow
|
||
1/15/2021
|
D, 06°Tau43’
|
Begins post-rx
shadow
|
||
1/3/2021
|
1°Aq57’
|
Ends post-rx
shadow
|
||
5/2/2021
|
10°Tau42’
|
Ends post-rx shadow
|
All
data derived from Kepler 8.0 software.
Significantly, the entire
retrograde/shadow saga represented in Table
1 is far from over, but whatever has been accomplished has unfolded over the Sibly 2nd and 5th
houses and will continue to do so for the duration. So, many of the
issues we’ve been discussing with the sluggish official response to the
pandemic and the ham-handed way school re-openings are being handled on high
can be tied to these retrograde energies, and it will be December before the earliest planet on this schedule (Jupiter)
emerges entirely from the residual effects of it all (as it ends its “post-Rx
retrograde period”). Growth-oriented Jupiter plays many helpful functions
in society, so perhaps we can look forward to the national “optimism” meter
getting a lift after that point in December. This could be the consequence of better
guidance with school re-opening and the beginnings of a more clear direction
with the virus crisis overall. Or it could signal that people are feeling relieved after the election. Time will tell!
Do we dare hope that a viable vaccine will come out of this gradual
re-emerging of Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus as forward-moving forces? Obviously,
re-opening the schools could be a lot easier
if we had that. Despite some early testing that sounds hopeful, however, I
suspect we will have to wait until at least Jupiter and Saturn
are fully beyond their respective post-rx shadow periods—beyond December
6th for Jupiter and beyond January 3rd for Saturn.
To the extent that Neptune rules vaccines, its direct turn at the end of November could also be helpful. All of this more or less mirrors the timelines that vaccine development officials have estimated, in fact—as much as Trump may want to say we’ll have a vaccine before the election, Dr.Fauci has repeatedly said that it could be “early next year” when we have a “safe and effective” one—emphasis intended.
Getting this right is no quick turn-around endeavor--to guarantee effectiveness will require serious testing of thousands of people over time, and there may be competing vaccines to sort through, as well.
To the extent that Neptune rules vaccines, its direct turn at the end of November could also be helpful. All of this more or less mirrors the timelines that vaccine development officials have estimated, in fact—as much as Trump may want to say we’ll have a vaccine before the election, Dr.Fauci has repeatedly said that it could be “early next year” when we have a “safe and effective” one—emphasis intended.
Getting this right is no quick turn-around endeavor--to guarantee effectiveness will require serious testing of thousands of people over time, and there may be competing vaccines to sort through, as well.
Clearly, it does not help the cause of completing this
process that hackers in the news (possibly Russian military
intelligence units) have been trying to break into the systems on which our
vaccine development depends. Neptune, Pluto and their often
corrupt power plays in Pisces and Capricorn, respectively,
seem to be more weaponized than usual at the moment, perhaps as a consequence
of Mars
moving into late Aries square Sibly Pluto (and
transiting Cap points) ,and Neptune transiting square
Sibly Mars (Gemini). Whatever
the case, the obstacles to re-opening schools safely and effectively don’t stop
at our borders, and they’re being rendered increasingly political as we speak—not what our families need!
Final thoughts
It’s almost as if the news is
writing the story for us here—what follows is breaking news that suggests we’re
far from being out of the woods with the virus, and we’re certainly not at a point where children across the nation can be
sent back to full-time live school instruction safely: from CNN.com:
“An unpublished document prepared
for the White House coronavirus task force and obtained by the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit
newsroom, recommends that 18 states in the coronavirus ‘red zone’ for cases
should roll back reopening measures amid surging cases.
The ‘red zone’ is defined in the
359-page report as ‘those core-based statistical areas (CBSAs) and counties
that during the last week reported both new cases above 100 per 100,000
population, and a diagnostic test positivity result above 10%.’
The report outlines measures
counties in the red zone should take. It encourages residents to ‘wear a mask
at all times outside the home and maintain physical distance.’ And it recommends
that public officials ‘close bars and gyms’ and ‘limit social gatherings to 10
people or fewer,’ which would mean rolling back reopening provisions in these
places.”
In case anyone in these 18 “red
zone” states is unaware of their status, here’s the list: Alabama, Arkansas,
Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi,
North Carolina, Nevada, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Utah. This
doesn’t mean that the other 32 states are out of the woods (many are
experiencing increasing numbers), but the “red zone” states are in the most
precarious situations at this time.
In the end, what will matter in
this re-opening process is that our national priorities place the health of
children and families first, above their roles in stimulating the
economy, above anyone’s hopes that
all the COVID chaos will be wrapped up in a neat bow before the election, and
most importantly, above our children’s
usefulness as pawns in political games.
Be safe and well, y’all!
Raye
Robertson is a practicing astrologer, writer and former educator. A graduate of
the Faculty of Astrological Studies (U.K.), Raye focuses on mundane,
collective-oriented astrology, with a particular interest in current affairs,
culture and media, the astrology of generations, and public concerns such as
education and health. Several of her articles on these topics have been
featured in The Mountain Astrologer and other publications over the years; see
the sidebar links on the home page for her two most recent publications, now
available as e-books on Amazon.
For
information about individual chart readings, contact: robertsonraye@gmail.com.
© Raye Robertson 2020. All
rights reserved.
[i]
Edith Abbott, “A Study of the Early History of Child Labor in America,” American Journal of Sociologyy, July,
1908, Vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 15-37. PDF document. http://www.jstor.com/stable/s762758.
[ii]
Ibid.
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