So that would be why Milossarian says “before all the facts are in” then would it?
Let’s look at your OP, Milo:
You lead off by quoting one of the Moonie paper’s more egregious misrepresentations, and respond:
Then you quote another Moonie paper misrepresentation, and get all burned again:
Sure sounds like you’re dumping on how the NEA comes out, overall. If there was balance to their overall presentation, they wouldn’t be ‘indoctrinating’ anyone, would they?? So saying there were parts you agreed with - in passing - still leaves you rather strongly implying that their overall message is screwy.
You say:
Exactly. You don’t think the Moonie paper is unfairly portraying what’s stated on the list. Not just in Paragraphs 4 and 10, but the list as an entity. That’s what you said.
And the Washington Times made it sound like the whole list was one big exercise in America-bashing, and it represented the list as the essence of what the NEA had to say about September 11. So when you said the Washington Times hadn’t unfairly portrayed the list, you said a lot.
It also mischaracterized the list as an actual lesson plan, rather than as additional tips for teachers on top of the numerous lesson plans the NEA put on their Web site. I notice that you carried forward that misrepresentation.
My main gripe at you, if you read my post, was in failing to read the list. Given your commentary on Paragraph 4 in the OP, which is pretty much along the lines of the Moonie Paper’s hatchet job, I’d say the evidence is right there.
Believe it or not, Milo, my entire post wasn’t about you. The Moonie paper gave the impression that their rewrite of Paragraphs 4 and 10 was the NEA’s entire proposal for what should be taught about September 11. I was responding to that. To the extent that you bought in to the notion that the Moonie paper represented the NEA’s September 11 proposal honestly, you’re welcome to take that as applying to you as well.
OK, here’s the passage you felt was the most offensive, and my comments:
I think I’ve gone over this. When the list used ‘group’, throughout, it was talking about religious and ethnic groups present in the U.S. (No really, just try to make a case to the contrary. Be my guest. Later in that same paragraph, it gets specific: “explain that all Arab-Americans are not guilty by association or racial membership.” Does it need to mention “Arab-Americans” or “American Muslims” every fifth word?)
There are conservatives who have a problem with this??
Can’t see a problem there.
I responded to this in my earlier post.
So you can’t say I was ‘silent’ about that passage. I spoke to it quite clearly.
And I see it as explanatory.
The whole thing, though, is that the Moonie paper had to go way, way back into the depths of the extra tips for teachers, bypassing the lesson plans and subject matter source materials, to get to this one list. Then they ignored most of the list, focusing on two paragraphs (out of 24). Then by rearrangement and omission, they made one of those paragraphs (#4) say things that it didn’t say in any way, shape, or form, and (as I’ve argued) blatantly mischaracterized the other.
I won’t argue that the wording, in this one place, in this one part of one paragraph in a 24-item list, in one of hundreds of separate components of the NEA’s classroom resources on September 11, is unclear. But if there’s “evidence” that he means it the way you say, please link to it.
But on to the next thing: I’d somewhat facetiously drawn the analogy
You responded:
I must say this makes zero sense to me. In responding to X, we made mistake Y. Now we’re responding to X’, and the NEA is saying the best way to avoid mistake Y’ is to remember what happened the last time and respond appropriately.
When that happens on an individual level, it’s called “learning from your mistakes”. (The alternative is to “feel good about yourself” by downplaying or ignoring one’s mistakes. I understand that conservatives are against that sort of claptrap. So am I.) Apparently when it’s suggested that we do this on a national level, it’s called “blaming America”. I was taking it back to an individual level to show how stupid that was.
OK, where does the NEA say to make a lesson out of it? They’ve got a bunch of lesson plans on their website; go find me something. This strikes me as more along the lines of providing a moment of context to “don’t lash out at Arabs and Muslims”, should it be necessary.
Remember, these are ‘tips’, not lesson plans. As a former teacher, I’d interpret that as “things to keep in the back of my mind in case they come into play in the classroom.”
To be properly prepared as a teacher, you’ve got to have a lot more tucked away in your head than is actually in your lesson plan, since you don’t know what the kids are going to ask. If you just know what’s in your lecture notes, but can’t explain beyond that, then you’re on thin ice indeed in a classroom.
At least, that was the case in the much tamer precincts of mathematics teaching. I would assume that it’s much more true of, say, social-studies classes, and especially true there when they’re dealing with something like 9/11. To take one little bit of the acres of background thoughts the NEA is suggesting a teacher might want to keep in mind, and turning that into the focal point of a class on 9/11, is fucking absurd, idiotic, and moronic.
Yes, that was dumb, and I didn’t mention it specifically.
Since one of my main points is that the Moonie paper took one small corner of one background resource out of many, and turned it into the entire fucking NEA response to September 11, I’m not going to be too hard on myself for not responding specifically to that one point. Though I must admit that was one thing I had in mind when I said,
Been there. Shredded that.
Princhester:
**
The list-writer wrote: “Use non-speculative terms. Do not suggest any group is responsible. Do not repeat the speculations of others, including newscasters.”
He then also wrote: "we have no reason to believe that the attacks on our country were part of an organized plan of any other country. The terrorists acted independently without the sanctions of any nation. "
That sure strikes me as not using non-speculative terms. I guess that’s only a problem when it comes to blaming the murderers of 3,000 people. When it pushes a far-left spin on Sept. 11, though, it’s OK.
What evidence does he have that the terrorists acted independently, without the sanctions of any nation? Indeed; we have a shitload of evidence that they were harbored and supported by the former government of Afghanistan. We have some evidence that Iraq is an Al Qaeda haven, too.
If you don’t get it now, Princhester, I can’t help you further.
xeno:
**
I think the parenthetical after the statement about self-blame connotes that it could be constructive. If you don’t see that, you don’t see it.
RTF:
**
The list, and the first paragraph of the Washington Times story - oh, sorry, “The Moonie Paper” :rolleyes:, is making reference to the following two statements from the list:
“Do not suggest any group is responsible.” and,
“Blaming is especially difficult in terrorist situations because someone is at fault. In this country, we still believe that all people are innocent until solid, reliable evidence from our legal authorities proves otherwise.”
Where’s the egregious misrepresentation? What babelfish are you using? You like to extrapolate from what’s written. You want to put it into context? Put it into the context that he doesn’t want speculation as far as blaming, but he’s willing to speculate when it comes to absolving possibly implicit nations from blame. You yourself admit that was “dumb.” So why, on the other outrageous points, are you saying he doesn’t mean what he directly says? It fits the context of his “dumb” statement.
**
I imply no such thing. And I went out of my way to not imply it.
And what’s your definition of “balance?” Say several inoffensive things, and a few that are jaw-droppingly offensive, but that’s balanced because of the OK stuff? But, you see it all as OK.
**
Incorrect. The Times is not misrepresenting the quotes from that list that it uses in its story.
**
Again we’re back to your idea that the ridiculous and offensive things are OK if they are couched in other things that are not ridiculous and offensive.
**
Re-reading the opening two paragraphs of the newspaper’s story, I think this could be a legitimate criticism of the way they wrote it.
I also don’t think it absolves the list-writer, or the NEA that is offering it up, from the ridiculous and offensive parts of what they are holding up as an example of what should be used in classrooms as a part of Remembering Sept. 11.
**
Quibble this if you like. It is included in an NEA package under the heading “Remember Sept. 11” and states:
**
Who’s doing the misrepresentation now?
You make it sound as though the list writer was thinking, “Other people are addressing other aspects of the 9/11 remembrance; I’ll focus on a few ancillary sidenotes.” Where you getting that? His tips seemed to rather thoroughly walk through the whole thing to me.
**Here you make it sound as though the list-writer wasn’t intending for his thoughts and ideas to be utilized by teachers and passed on to students. The whole point of his writing, and the whole point of the NEA website where the list is accessible. Or teachers were supposed to filter out the more looney stuff?
On self-blame, you said:
**
The other ideologies that seem to be presented at certain parts of the list, that I’ve already alluded to throughout this thread and in this post, tend to point to him meaning what he says, as he’s said it. That parenthetical sure sounds like it’s viewed as constructive to me. To you it doesn’t. If you disagree; you disagree.
On the mentioning of U.S. internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII, you said:
** December has adequately addressed why the two are incomparable. But I guess you think you “shredded him.”
The list-writer would have no discussion of blame for who killed 3,000 people in the U.S. last year, in classrooms this September 11. The list-writer would have no repeating of newscaster speculation. It’s sure going to be hard to fucking talk about Sept. 11, 2001, on Sept. 11, 2002, then, isn’t it?
But what you can, by all means, do is, expound at length upon bad things America has done in the past. And jam that square peg into the round hole of a Sept. 11 remembrance in the classroom. And you can note that no other governments were responsible, as fact.
How you can, with a straight face, say there is not a particular ideological slant to those particular “tips” astounds me.
**
Yet again, trying to excuse what’s ridiculous, left-wing ideology and offensive for a Sept. 11 remembrance in this list, by talking about all the other reasonable stuff there is. And again seeming to indicate that the writer didn’t intend for this to go from his typing fingers to a teacher’s lesson plan to students’ heads. Which is ridiculous.
Well, one of us doesn’t get it anyway.
Right back atcha, pally.
Well I’ll give it one more try Milossarian.
The author of the list suggests that teachers should not speculate or suggest anyone is to blame or responsible till all the facts are in. They then state that the terrorists acted independently and were not sanctioned by any nation.
You have a problem with that statement because reaches a conclusion of innocence before (according to the author) all the facts are in. An innocent till proven guilty system is not symmetrical. Concluding innocence when all the facts are not in is appropriate until an alternate conclusion is forced. The opposite is not.
I suspect you consider all the facts to be in and thus any conclusion that other nations are innocent to be ridiculous. Fine, that’s your opinion. But the author of the list does not think all the facts are in or that conclusions of responsibility or blame are yet appropriate. and against that background their statement is not inappropriate.
Discussing whether the terrorists were “sanctioned by any nation” simply addresses the wrong question. This statement is irritatingly vague. It looks offensive to me, but others can interpret it as sensible.
Is al Qaeda a nation? Not in the traditional sense, although they have some characteristics of one. So, it’s sort-of true to say the terrorists weren’t sanctioned by any nation. Or, at least it’s arguably unproved that they were sanctioned by a nation.
OTOH the statement could imply that we’re merely dealing with a criminal gang, a POV that’s uninformativep, to say the least.
We do all know that al Qaeda is an international terrorist organization, with bases in dozens of countries, with a OPV informed by a certain view of the Islam religion, and opposed to modern, liberal western values.
The statement seems to encourage teachers not to discuss with their students what we all know is true about our attackers.
The one you used, retard. Let’s quote the Washington Times, as you did:
Then let’s look at how you parsed that:
So in your OP, you (correctly, IMHO) parse the Moonie Paper as making it sound like the NEA’s saying we can’t say what organization was responsible for the hijackings, and we shouldn’t say anything about that until they have their day in court before a judge and jury.
Now here’s Dr. Lippincott’s relevant text, one more farkin’ time:
This paragraph had been directly preceded by such statements as “Children can easily generalize negative statements to students in their classes and community. Focusing on the nationality of the terrorists can create prejudice, anger and mistrust for their group members”, “Make sure that all information is factually true. This is especially important when news reports have negative statements about Arab-Americans or any other ethnic group”, and “Reach out to your neighbors and colleagues who might feel at risk right now because of their ethnicity.”
You may think this is airy-fairy, or not, but that’s totally beside the point here. This is clearly talking about “groups” like “Arab-Americans” and other persons “close by”. It’s talking about people living in America who look like they might be of Middle Eastern origin.
These are the people the paragraph is telling the kids to avoid blaming, not al-Queda. And there’s no Babel fish in the world that can change that, not even yours.
Dispute that if you can. If you can’t, it means what Lippincott wrote, and what the Washington Times made of it, are in direct contradiction.
There. That should even get through your thick head. And if not, maybe it’s time for you to consider voluntary euthanasia.
[sub]Oh yeah, I noticed your :rolleyes: at my use of the phrase “Moonie Paper” to describe the Washington Times. It’s a matter of public record that the Washington Times is owned by the Unification Church, which is the Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s pet church. And feel free to read, from the Unification Church’s web site, what Rev. Moon has to say about the Washington Times’ purpose. So I’ll call it “the Moonie paper” anytime I please, thankyewverymuch.[/sub]
I’ll add here that regardless of who was harboring al-Queda, nobody’s saying, even now, that the Taliban, or Iran, or Iraq, or Saudi Arabia, helped plan the September 11 attack. IOW, “we have no reason to believe that the attacks on our country were part of an organized plan of any other country.”
If you can’t make simple distinctions between, “Nation X gave aid and comfort to al-Queda”, and “Nation X was involved in the planning of the September 11 attack”, then I continue to scratch my head when I recall your occupation.
Of course, you could have a thriving career ahead with the Washington Times.
Next point: I said
and you responded:
OK, so you are saying that their overall message is screwy. Right after saying you imply no such thing. Whatever, my friend! 
Keeping on keeping on, you said:
That is of course ridiculous, for the reasons set down in my previous post. And:
First, you’ve got to show that it’s ridiculous and offensive - and, in the case of the one thing that I described as ‘dumb’, it might also help to show that it’s of sufficient importance to overwhelm everything else they said.
However, I believe I was responding to your notion that the NEA was
For that, you really do have to make a case that a couple of bits in some background material that weren’t even in a lesson plan constitute ‘indoctrination’, while the CIA’s page on terrorism, and the Department of Homeland Security homepage, which are much more prominently linked to as resources, don’t.
Needless to say, you don’t make any such case. That’s because there’s no case to be made.
This is about as slam-dunk as it gets: the only way you can make a case for ‘indoctrination’ in the NEA materials is by a very stringent process of cherry-picking, by ignoring the bulk of their materials, and when you find the one document with ‘possibilities’, so to speak, you cherry-pick individual sentences to deprive them of their context.
If you’re a reporter, Milo, you should know how completely dishonest such an approach is.
Everybody here can read. They don’t need you apologizing or making explanations for what’s self-evident.
Your little camp wants to go with what was meant. Another, uh, slightly larger camp goes with what was said.
Want to know how my job factors into this?
It allows me to know full well that somebody presenting something like that list wouldn’t parse what they had to say in any way. They’d say what they meant to say, exactly the way they meant to say it. And for its expressed purpose.
Want to know how my mother, or your personal insults, factor into this? Not at all. But I’d forgotten it’s a typical tactic of yours. It’s been awhile.
Go fuck a cheese-grater, RT.
- “it represented the list as the essence of what the NEA had to say about September 11.”
Well, at least something is starting to get through.
First you’ve got to demonstrate that there are nontrivial parts of the list that require ‘absolution’. I’ll await your response, in particular, to my second post preceding this one.
Now here’s a fun one: I said the Moonie paper
To which you replied:
at which point you quoted, not the Reviled List, but the main NEA page, as saying:
There’s a direct link from that page to their “War on Terrorism” resource page that I keep bringing up - the one with the CIA, Homeland Security, and all that. They obviously regard it as important that users of their site be able to find what the CIA and Tom Ridge have to say about terrorism.
Now: how long a chain of links does it take to get to the Reviled List? What does that tell you about its relative importance? As I said:
You responded:
Since it wasn’t me, I’m figuring it must’ve been you.
He seemed to be walking through his whole thing, to me.
The question is, was it the NEA’s ‘whole thing’? This thread’s about the NEA. (Check the title. You wrote it.)
I think I’ve conclusively demonstrated that it wasn’t the NEA’s big issue for 9/11.
Maybe you think that was my implication. I’ll try to use small words this time.
Milo, think of a teacher who has an hour to do a lesson on 9/11.
What the teacher intends to be used in the lesson will be in the lesson plan. That’s why lesson plans are important. That’s why it’s important to note the difference between stuff in a lesson plan, and other materials.
It’s possible that a classroom discussion might take off in a variety of directions. Teachers have to be prepared for these. Bad teachers will say, “that’s not on the lesson plan, so we can’t talk about that.” Good teachers will have the background and/or preparation to handle a fair number of tangents from the intended material.
Since Lippincott’s list is on his university’s site, it’s a reasonable assumption that he’s responsible for this list on his own, and the NEA thought that it was a useful resource - although less useful (since much less prominently featured) than the CIA’s terrorism website. So it linked to his list.
The NEA, being a teachers’ outfit, figured that some kids in some classrooms might take the discussion in the direction of an overall blame-the-Muslims, or blame-the-Arabs, or whatever. (I can find you adult commentators on conservative Websites who are doing exactly that.) They probably figured Lippincott’s list would help teachers be prepared in advance for that.
But it wasn’t meant to be a lesson plan, because it wasn’t in their hundreds of lesson plans. So the NEA wasn’t telling teachers, “forget about everything else about 9/11 - the main message to get across is about sensitivity to Arab-Americans, and remembering Japanese interment camps.” But if the discussion started taking a nasty turn, a teacher who read Lippincott’s page might have some responses already in mind.
That’s Dr. Firefly’s Ed 101 lecture for the day.
(And once again, I disagree that there was a nontrivial amount of loony stuff to be filtered out.)
On self-blame, I’ll just leave it as: you’ve got your interpretation, and I’ve got mine, and the best you can do is to say that amounts to a push.
On the mentioning of U.S. internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII, you said:
First of all, I only care about what Dr. Lippincott said, as it reflects on the NEA, because the thread’s about the NEA.
But just to humor you, nowhere does Lippincott say that there should be no such discussion (he does say, “The terrorists caused tremendous harm because they acted violently against innocent people out of blind hate”), and more importantly, the NEA doesn’t use his material in a manner that would suggest that. (I go back to their “War on Terrorism” page with the CIA and Homeland Security links, which opens up directly from their main “Remember September 11” page.)
Milo, you’re in the fucking news business. If you don’t understand the difference between factual reporting and newscaster speculation, I feel sorry for your paper.
Not to mention, (one more time!!), the NEA links to U.S. government cites, including the CIA’s terrorism site, CIA Director Tenet’s testimony on the war on terrorism before the Senate Intelligence Committee, and the Department of Homeland Security. (As well as CNN’s recap of the events of last fall.) I reckon the NEA figured the teachers could find a few facts about 9/11/01 at those sites, ya think? :rolleyes:
I think I’ve pounded this one into a bloody pulp already, so I’ll eschew further response now.
You can’t hang a whole lot on the difference between:
- We have no evidence to suggest that any governments helped plan the 9/11 attacks, and
- No governments helped plan the 9/11 attacks.
Except that the NEA should have been smart enough to make the distinction themselves, and use (1) which is accurate. But that’s in the ‘stupid mistake’ category, not the ‘indoctrinating our kids’ category.
(1) Did I say that? I don’t think so, bub. (2) What of it? The Weekly Standard has an ideological slant; so does Mother Jones. The question is, do they make a good case anyway? If we tossed everyone out of GD who had a particular ideological slant, it would be a very quiet forum, and if one never had to respond to a counterargument from a poster with some sort of ideological slant, one would never have to respond to anyone here. You can’t just wave ‘slant’ as a magic wand.
Feel free to throw all the smoke you want. When it clears, you still don’t have a case against the NEA.
Except you, Milo, as this thread has adequately demonstrated.
I’ll take your claim that your conclusions are ‘self-evident’ as an admission of defeat.
I already know, thanks. A reporter needs to be able to distinguish between what his sources actually said, amidst the verbiage they threw around, and what they didn’t.
You look at Dr. Lippincott’s lengthy repetition that kids shouldn’t blame Arab-Americans for 9/11, and you can’t distinguish between that and the Moonie Paper’s twisting of that message into “we can’t blame al-Queda for 9/11”. No matter how small the words are that we use to explain it to you.
So yeah, I’m amazed that you can hold a reporting job. If that’s too personal for you, then that’s life in the big city. But the news business was directly relevant to part of your previous post, so it did kinda remind me of your connection to it.
[sub]BTW, you got yourself into this one, idjit: I would never have bothered looking at your profile, until the time you threatened to punch me out. (Which, IMO, cuts the ground out from under your feet for complaining about cheap shots.) Then I thought I’d better see whether you lived close by or not. That’s when I saw that you were a reporter. [/sub]
Speaking of which:
Milo, you may remember the school insult, “Did your mother have any children who lived?” I can never remember that being understood as insulting one’s mother: despite the use of “your mother” in the phrase, it’s clearly an insult only of the person being addressed. I deliberately used the same format in my remark. No aspersions on your mother were intended; they’re all for you.
The difference between that line and “your mother swims out to troopships” (which I’m sure yours doesn’t, to eliminate the possibility that you would construe my use of that example as an intentional insult of your mother - which you might, otherwise) is hopefully pretty obvious.
I’ll regard that, too, as admission of defeat.
Respond to posts you think you have a good answer to.
Ignore points that you don’t.
Ignore points where your own impressions indicate the words from the list should be taken at their face. (i.e., people should be non-speculative about assigning blame for Sept. 11, but should feel free to accept as gospel the SPECULATION that no countries were involved in the terrorist attacks. Speculation that has already been proven wrong with regard to Afghanistan, and is beginning to be proven wrong again with Iraq.)
You said that was “dumb” of them. However, on other points that appear to follow a similar ideology of thinking, we’re all supposed to extrapolate from what’s actually said, to what YOU say was intended.
Harboring doesn’t equal sanctioning? Perhaps in that fantasy world in your head, where you “win” every debate.
**
(but on assigning blame for Sept. 11)
My God! RTFirefly’s right! His position is so clear now! Of course it means what he says it means. I was fooled by Lippincott’s crafty arrangement of letters in manners that appeared to form words and sentences. That almost seemed to convey a thought representative of those words and sentences.
Those craftily arranged letters in forms that appear to be words that form a sentence that conveys a thought almost tricked me into believing that the author seems uncomfortable about the fact that, unfortunately, those pesky terrorists have to be blamed for murdering the 3,000 people that they murdered.
Thank God we have RTFirefly here to disavow us of those “retarded” notions we have in our head when we do irresponsible things such as read what somebody wrote.
See, because I was thinking blaming wasn’t “especially difficult.” You know; the photos and information on the hijackers who boarded the airplanes. The Osama videotapes. The information uncovered in Afghanistan. The information that continues to be uncovered there, in Pakistan, in Iraq and other places around the world.
But I lost the debate to RT. He said so. So go figure.
**
I don’t believe the Times said that. I believe the Times said,
From Lippincott’s list:
RTFirefly. The defender of the misrepresented. :rolleyes:
You then blather on, examining my personal life at length. You don’t know THING ONE about how I do my job, you piece of shit. How many awards have you won for your work, dick-nose? If I haven’t won at least twice as many, I’ll give you $100.
You’d stopped being a detestable, low-road-taking, classless asshole in the months since my last blow-up with you. To the point that I’d given you the benefit of the doubt, and had begun to be civil with you again.
Now you’ve done it again. I won’t make the mistake again. I’ll modify what personal information there is about me on my profile (Didn’t think there was much, and never dreamed for a minute someone would do what you’re doing with what’s there), and once again regain control of just what I want to tell a bunch of strangers on a message board, and what I don’t want to tell them.
The joy I take in doing this is, when you’re inevitably classless enough to go the low road again, I’ll have your ass banned.
Not that I’ll have much interest in what you have to say in the future, anyway. Declare victory. Say you “shredded me.”
Milo, stop being a dick. You go on and on about how classless RT is, but you’re the one who crams the most insults into your posts.
RT’s point all along has been that the Washington Times took the quotes out of context. Then, to prove him wrong, you take one or two sentences out of Lippincott’s list, completely out context, then go on to say that “LOOK! The newspaper says the same thing! Why do you talk about misrepresenting?”
If you can’t grasp how monumentally stupid that is, then I don’t really know what to say.
You’ve actually claimed that this paragraph “blames America for 9-11” (:rolleyes: ), and then you have the nerve of accusing RTFirefly of trying to extrapolate other messages than what the professor actually said. I can’t get any other message out of this other than “don’t blame arab kids by guilt-by-association”.
I dare you to tell me that this paragraph is about something else than “not blaming arab-american students”.
The way you’ve absolutely mangled this paragraph is your worst offense in this thread. You’ve constantly cut off the second half of the segment I’ve italicized, which changes the tone of that part dramatically. If both the sentences are there, you get the impression that he doesn’t want Arab-american kids to blame themselves for the terrorist attacks – but if you remove the second one, you could get the impression that he talks about just kids in general who’d take on the blame for 9-11, for no reason at all other than that the professor probably thinks America was at fault. That’s really tacky.
OK, I’ll bite. Are you now an admin, or do Tuba and Lynn report to you? :rolleyes:
Sorry, Charley, but if you’ve won awards for your work, why don’t you use some of those skills here? I mean, it really is hard for me to believe that the skillset for being a good reporter and for being an intelligent poster are that different. And until your posts show at least some basic skills, I’m gonna have to see those awards to believe them.
You clearly evidenced that you can’t tell the difference between factual reportage and newscaster speculation. And that’s in your line of work.
More germane to the discussion, you can’t tell the difference between one guy saying, “don’t blame Arab-Americans” and a so-called newspaper twisting that into “don’t blame al-Queda”, when it’s right there in front of you. And a fistful of awards won’t change that comprehension problem.
I’m kinda boggled that you quote Lippincott’s “Do not suggest any group is responsible” and “Blaming is especially difficult in terrorist situations because someone is at fault” yet one more time, because it shows that you still don’t see it.
Well, yes. Of course, it’s like winning a “how many things are wrong with this picture” competition with a blind man. For the last time:
There, that help on the context? And let me once again add, from surrounding paragraphs:
Take my challenge. Take Lippincott’s list, with large enough chunks to include context (as I’ve provided above), and demonstrate how it says, “Don’t blame al-Queda”. I’ve laid out a detailed case to the contrary; surely you can bust it to shreds.
Oh yeah - you’re so cute when you outright lie. As you said just now:
But in the OP, here was your response to the preceding paragraph:
If that isn’t a restatement of what was in the Moonie Paper, in your own words, I’m a monkey’s uncle.
Actually, Mr. Wordsmith, I was criticizing your professional skills at length, not examining your personal life at all. (Hey, you left yourself wide open for that one. :))
Now, it’s been fun, Milo, but I’ve got to leave. I figure there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell that you’ll respond to my substantive points in any way other than stripping individual sentences of Lippincott’s from their context yet again, and I’ve pointed this out, to no avail, as many ways as I can think of. So I’ve got to be rambling on. It’s kind of you to go out of your way to be so entertaining, though. Cheerio!
RT I am amused by your suggestion that because Milossarian is a journo, he should know better than to distort the facts to suit some populist campaign etc etc.
Get real! What do you think journos do for a living?
It seems that you all are assuming that every teacher in America has read this list thoroughly (teachers don’t have time to pore over every bit of ephemera), taken it completely to heart, and, on 9/11/02, will all synchronize their watches to commence the exact same classroom discussion at the same time.
Whatever you may think of The List, rest assured that it will ultimately be as helpful as the advice “Look out” is to someone headed down a ski slope for the first time ever. There is no way to regulate these discussions.
Look at the disparity in sex-ed experiences, even between people of the same age but different backgrounds. Teachers know their students, and have some idea of where the discussion might go, and what the kids can comprehend. I haven’t perused the list carefully, but I don’t remember any mention of age-appropriate modifications. First graders may have only a dim memory that a year ago, Daddy cried while watching TV, and will have to be brought up to date on the subject before putting it in context. High school kids may have been discussing this all along, and may have to be diverted from spending the whole hour speculating about whether bin Laden is really still alive and playing their downloaded al Quaeda videos. Kids in New York, north Jersey and eastern Connecticut may not be there, out of mourning for a relative who was lost that day, and those who do attend will be prone to cast blame anywhere they feel like it. Kids in Iowa will fervently vow never to prejudge anyone who even appears to be of Middle Eastern descent, which will be easy because they’ve never seen such a person.
I assure you, we are not on Camazotz. If you have kids, and have a problem with their teacher’s lesson plan for the 11th, take it up with them. But don’t project that everyone else’s kid in the whole country got a message you find offensive.
Here’s another point of view on the NEA’s suggested lesson plans.
You have to be registered. Possible to paraphrase it or pull quotes?
Dang. The link seemed to work, but I guess that was only because I was an Official Registered Person. Some excerpts from the editorial:
**"Several of the (NEA lesson) plans have attracted attention and swift condemnation, and rightly so. They are wholly inappropriate to a day of national mourning and show a stunning insensitivity to what the nation will be reliving and feeling that day.
For example, one of the lesson plans, called "Tips for Parents and Schools Regarding the Anniversary of September 11, 2001,’’ makes this recommendation:
"Explore who and what may be to blame for this event. Use nonspeculative terms. Do not suggest any group is responsible.’’
Do not suggest any group is responsible? If the NEA hasn’t heard, it is well-established that al-Qaida, an international network of terrorists espousing an extremist version of Islam, is responsible.
Then comes this declaration: *
"The terrorists acted independently without the sanctions of any nation.’’ *
Oh, really? The NEA should stay after school and write Afghanistan on the blackboard 500 times."**
The editorial also questions whether focusing on “the dark impulses lurking in the hearts of America’s youngsters (i.e. a supposed temptation to commit intolerant acts)” to the exclusion of the extremists responsible for 9/11 is wise.
**"The implication that Americans are naturally prone to knee-jerk ethnic and religious oppression is echoed in another section of the same plan: *
"Some of our country’s darkest moments resulted from prejudice and intolerance for our own people because Americans acted out of fear. We must not repeat terrible mistakes, such as our treatment of Japanese Americans and Arab Americans during times of war.’’ *
It has been nearly a year since the attacks, and no credible American has advocated the internment of any minority group, but the NEA is ever vigilant. Who knows when the internment impulse might break out in America’s schools?"
“If anybody needs a refresher course in anger management, tolerance and the evils of prejudice on Sept. 11, it is not American schoolkids. It is the people who carried out the attack and those who cheered afterward.” **
I thought there might be interest in what a non-Moonie, middle of the road, Democratic newspaper had to say about this.