I don’t make friends with people whose views contradict mine. That being said, I basically have two friends, one of them doesn’t care about politics (she’s young and lost) but we do agree on important topics while the other is a leftist but does not care much about politics either. The only person I can fully discuss politics with us my boyfriend, which I’m very grateful for.

As for making friends, I would probably make friends outside communist circles in the future. Having come to the same conclusion is not necessary for a friendship to work, but not agreeing on major issues is. The communist scene in my country is mostly old people who don’t represent ML values, just a force of habit. The anti communist propaganda is really strong so while many young people agree with what we are saying, they are afraid to associate with the commies or have no/false information about the movement.

This sounds fair to me. You didn’t buy the property to profit from renting it. I’d like to either do something like this or find a tenant whose company pays for the rent, there are many in the city - if I were to rent it.

Then you these are all really useful pieces of advice. Selling it to the person living in it would work too.

Landlord culture is different in my country, it’s almost exclusively private people and not companies renting out their inheritance while they figure out what to do, or for example, old people selling their huge house, buying 2 flats, renting one out and living in the other, etc so it’s not as horrible as in other places, imo.

It would be really unfortunate for me to sell the apartment financially, due to local regulations and having bought and sold real estate recently (sold our cottage and moved in with parents) so I’d rather hold onto it for now. We’re talking about money that wouldn’t get me a year’s worth of rent in another country, so nothing fancy but i want to make smart decisions and just having a big sum of money sitting in the bank is not that. I’d rather rent it to a company (the local factory has lots of foreign workers and they pay for their rent)

This is a really interesting thought. Can you elaborate a bit?

Property management as a service is a little different here, but i definitely don’t want either of the things you mentioned. I haven’t done the full research on what it would take me to rent the place out, but u definitely will. Thank you.

I’m really interested in the answers because I’m about to inherit an apartment that I don’t plan to live in. Looking at the market, I’m hesitant to sell, as I would have to pay hefty taxes. Letting it stand empty does not make sense.

I did not purposefully purchase this apartment to make money on it, I’d much rather have grandma around, and I’m planning to sell it in about 5 years when we’re gonna be looking for a new place with my parents.

My best bet is renting it out below market price and being a kind and understanding landlord, which sounds like an oxymoron to me too…

Any thoughts on my situation?

A must is for our core values to be aligned: the way they see the world, as in politics religion (or lack thereof in my case), ethics, etc. Anything that might result in coming to a crossroads down the line. I don’t want children so I wouldn’t be with someone who is hard set on having them. I don’t eat animals or animal products so I wouldn’t be with someone who does. Above all, I look for kindness in people and I’m very grateful that there is so much of it in my current life partner 💕

I don’t think taste is something that has to match, or interests. A general curiosity regarding what your partner likes is great but to me, a shared taste in music or movies is not necessary.

I am her teacher, not her peer. I want her to come out a better person on the other end, that is the only approach I am willing to take because that is my role here. I get your anger, I was furious when it happened, and so was the other teacher (who is part of this minority group I mentioned) but still. It’s a child and so the parents are to be held responsible for something going SO wrong.

Thank you for this really extensive comment!!

As for the term POC, I understand how unuseful it is in this situation, so let me clarify: We have a Roma/Romani minority, especially in the part of the country where I live, which causes lots of tension and unfortunately, normalised racism.

I am very young (one time I was stopped on my way to the car and asked where I was going during school time) so I don’t feel like I have authority or that anyone looks up to me, for now at least. Instead, I try to be open with them and make them feel like they can come talk to me about anything, but as I already mentioned, I don’t spend much time with this group of kids and spend only two days in the school myself.

I will definitely think about what options I have here because my ultimate goal is to educate her, and everyone else.

I made it very clear that she should not wear white laces again, but other than that I tried my best to explain why.

I’m willing to give her the time to figure things out and ask for guidance if needed, but this was unacceptable in my eyes.

As for her origin, I don’t believe she’s German herself, just lived there for a while. But encouraging her to explore other parts of the culture might be worth a shot. Thank you again!

Thank you, this is a really reasonable reply and leaves no space for jokes.

Also, if you allow me to pick your brain with another question: How would you react to a student using the n-word or a similar, generally recognised expression, especially with people of that group present?

Thank you for your comment! First of all, it’s all great advice and I’ll try my best to apply it in my practice.

They are a great group of intelligent kids and we often have adult discussions, I always make space for their interests and questions and nothing is taboo, we often talk about current events, politics, etc. They like me, as far as I’m concerned. Unfortunately, I don’t spend that much time with them, I only work at the school two days a week and have no means of organising any events or lectures myself.

I think her feeling is stemming from her interest in her origin, as she grew up in Germany and showed lots of interest in history, but I feel like she went off track somewhere around December or January. She also mentioned having skinhead friends at one point. How do you think I could learn more about this?

I am not one for punishment and never used any dominance or anger, I try to be very approachable and ask for feedback on my lessons from kids and parents, but I feel like this might be where I draw the line. There are lots of minority POC kids in our school and general area, I want them to feel safe, so I would really like to be firm with not allowing the above mentioned display of racism. At the same time, I want her to really understand and become a better person from this experience, so I’m really at loss about how I could achieve this.

Thank you, this is great advice. I am not from the US but rather an Eastern European country with lots of POC in my area - in fact, our sister school has about 90% POC.

I also believe that everybody should wear whatever they want and make it a point to encourage my young students’ discovery of their unique style - lots of funky hair colours and split brows these days. However, lace code IS a thing (even if not very well recognised anymore, it’s still used in many places) and she knew about it when she chose to wear the white laces, which is what bothers me here. If it was ignorance, I’d give her a heads up to avoid her getting into real trouble because of her choice of footwear but she did it knowing what it means and even made it a point for them to be fully visible.

It is clear to me that I cannot fight fire with fire and I want what’s best for my student’s personal development, but at the same time I feel like I need to be very clear about the fact that no racism will be tolerated in my classroom, just like I wouldn’t tolerate any physical or verbal abuse. Pretty much everything is a go, we have great discussions about different topics and they are a great group of kids, but racism is a very real issue in our area. We do not have any POC in our group but imagine if we had… There are plenty of POC kids in the school and I want them to feel safe more than I want this kid to wear whatever she wants.

Your story highlights how important my reaction is here, and since it’s my first year on the job, I’m really taking it seriously. However, I’m only part time and spend little time with them so I cannot really organise any workshops or lectures, but hopefully our principal will be open to the idea.

How do you think I could approach her in this case? I am generally liked by the students, but I just cannot seem to get through to her.