It may be worth noting that the Rocky Mountain News runs an editorial page column by Mike Rosen, the radio host on whose show the student appeared.
Here is the Denver Post story, which has a quote not contained in the News:
And for me, that’s appropriate. I don’t think he needs to be fired, though some sort of chastisement should occur.
Why do you assume that?
And the SDMB is full of lefties who do nothing but persecute all the goodly Gawd-fearing Righties around here.
As such, the fact you haven’t been banned yet is evidence of…what, a vast conspiracy to get rid of you by not getting rid of you?
Or, possibly, it is possible to allow opposing viewpoints without having one’s own bis crush those different from yourself?
Nah…impossible!
-Joe
How do you know that?
Jeez, Bricker, poison the well much? Why not offer up a debate without prejudging people’s responses.
The guy seems like a bit of a kook, but I’d be interested in hearing what he has to say about the lectures before drawing any conclusions. Does anyone have a link to an interview with him?
Did you listen to the teacher’s speech? Did you hear the tone, as well as the words?
Because that was the complaint, wasn’t it?
This was a twenty minute rant. Where during it were opposing viewpoints offered, solicited or entertained?
What if it’s not the first incident?
Was I wrong?
You may as well have told me to wear the fur coat into a PETA meeting, and not prejudge their response. Don’t have to. I know what it will be.
And of course here we are, with plenty of people stepping right up to defend the poor teacher and his ideas. He criticized Bush, he hates capitalism, Israelis are the real terrorists – for an SDMB audience, what’s not to love?
It was inappropriate unless (and I would interview his students to find out) he was intentionally being extreme in a Socratic method. I’ve known professors (not high school teachers admittedly) who would make comments this extreme when discussing capitalism, and then make comments equally extreme when discussing communism, so for example the next day they may make the comment “Communism is not as concerned with personal potential and fulfillment as they are with securing the total power of the state over production and information and all other facets” or “The Jews did more to make Israel agriculturally and financially a major and productive and progressive nature than the Arabs and other Muslims did in a thousand years and the lives of Arabs living under Israeli rule were better than the lives of those living under the rule of fellow Arabs in terms of freedom and prosperity, so this being the case should the Palestinians have a right to regain control?” Basically the whole thesis/antithesis/synthesis teaching mechanism.
If this was what he was doing, I would commend him.
If this was not what he was doing, I would give him a warning that this was not appropriate and that the classroom is not his personal political forum, but I would not fire him for a first offense. Frankly, I would be glad that he brought such enthusiasm, I would just ask him to redirect it into dialogue as opposed to monologue. If he did not comply, then I would fire him, regardless of if or to what degree his opinions coincided with my own or those of the community.
How does the school board define a “balanced political viewpoint”? Your link doesn’t cover that.
I’ll take that with a big grain of salt. How did Amole know it occured if he didn’t have details? I think a reporter asked a leading question.
But, if it isn’t the first incident, then I think his punishment should be more severe than if it is.
[quote=Bricker]
And of course here we are, with plenty of people stepping right up to defend the poor teacher and his ideas.**
Who has defended his ideas? I’ve only defended him insofar as you think he should be fired and I don’t.
Lovely.
I absolutely agree with this, by the way. If it should develop that this was merely a Socratic exercise, then I have no problem with it.
Based on the entire tape, though, I would say it’s a pretty safe bet that it’s not.
I am certain that thousands of teachers say equally unbalanced things that lean to the right in classrooms every day – I would be more inclined to support the conservative posters’ claims of lack of blaance if they were equally incensed about the right wing stuff.
That said, if I were a teacher and wanted to introduce subversive stuff into class, I’d do it in a manner that seemed more fair and balanced – frex, I’d have class debate whether or not capitalism is by nature opposed to human rights.
Frankly, the teacher just sounds like a decent guy who’s been driven nuts by Bush over the years and finally had to spew about it. Understandable, really.
While I don’t ‘know’ about this teacher’s openness to opposing viewpoints, my gut feeling is that he wouldn’t be very open. Personal experience tells me that the further one travels down an ideological path, the less likely one is to entertain the opposition. Additionally, unlike the SDMB, a teacher to a 10th grade class is in a power position; the righty/lefty thing on this board, while favoring lefties numerically, is fought by equals, including some on both sides with more moderate viewpoints, the ability to articulate them, and the willingness to hear both sides of a debate.
Yes, you were wrong. I don’t see a lot of defending of this guy, and none of the kind you predicted. Mostly what I see, in terms of “defending” him, are people saying we should be just as concerned about someone teaching similarly to this guy but from the right-wing persepective.
If Mr. Bennish was put on leave for going off on irrelevant tangents, then I’d be all for it; his rants certainly seem largely irrelevant to a geography class. But I find the idea of restricting the teacher’s speech regardless of the relevence of the material to the subject matter to be repugnant.
Academic freedom is one of the few checks in society which help ensure that minorities views are heard as well as majority ones. Take away the right to heresy, the right to be wrong, and we’re one step closer to the society in which schools are nothing more than western madrassas.
About expecting “the usual crowd here to cheer this teacher for his cogent analysis of Bush’s similarity to Hitler, and agree with him that capitalism is at odds with human rights”? Yes.
Oh I dunno…maybe because Amole is a district admin, not a building admin?
Ergo Amole probably has a basic knowledge that it happened, but as of yet he hasn’t obtained all of the details from the building admin.
As a part of the SDMB audience I resent this every bit as much as if you had made a sweeping generalization of southerners, gays, fastly aging white boys or any other demographic of which I am a part. I loathe Bush with a passion, I’ll admit, but there’s valid reason behind it that even other Republicans share in huge numbers. As for capitalism I would paraphrase Churchill on democracy in that it’s the least effective financial system ever employed with the exception of all the others; only an ardent fool would type on a Microsoft operated computer created by a multibillion dollar company on the incompetency of capitalism.
Such prejudicial comments must really make me shudder as to your views on race and religion and other demographics.
Politics and history are relevant to geography.