A group of 8th graders were touring the Capitol, and they ran into the Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan.
When he offered to take a picture with them, half of them refused, because they thought that he was a scumbag:
About 100 eighth grade students refused to pose with Speaker of the House Paul Ryan on Friday, snubbing the top Republican to protest his policies.
Though Ryan’s official Instagram features a photo of him waving to a group students from South Orange Middle School in South Orange, New Jersey, it does not show their peers sitting in a park lot across the street, in an apparent rebuff of the GOP leader.
“It’s not just a picture,” student Matthew Malespina told ABC News. “It’s being associated with a person who puts his party before his country.”
When he learned of his school’s impending photo op with Ryan, Malespina texted his mother he’s “just not going to do it.”
“The point was, ‘I don’t want to be associated with him, and his policies and what he stands for,’” Matthew’s mother Elissa Malespina said.
An equal number of students opted to participate in the photo.
Good on them.
I know that some tossers will bleat about “civility”, but this was a political photo-op. If you disagree with the politics, you are obligated to refuse.
The photo-refusniks should be getting extra credit in their civics class.