Teaching Values

Via Bad Attitudes, who cites TBogg--and, just wondering--is it just me or is there some sort of trouble with Blogger again? About half the people I read are unavailable, either with a general 404 error or a blogger one. Their new interface also means it's difficult at times to just hit the refresh button.

Anyway, here's a link to a The Daytona Beach News Journal's editorial page. It seems that a New Mexico high school principal was a little too fed up with the idea of free speech, particularly a form of free speech known as slam poetry. Full disclosure: I've slammed--in fact, I used to do so regularly, and have been attempting a comeback, going so far as to put some grievances about Abu Ghraib into spoken form. Hell, I might even post the written version, once I do a rewrite. Last Thursday, I read said poem before a smaller-than-usual crowd at the local event here--for a left-wing j'accuse piece, it was received surprisingly well. But--it was mostly poets listening.

But I digress. Here's an extended lifting from the editorial. Take a look, and consider what sort of message the principal is sending:

Bill Nevins, a New Mexico high school teacher and personal friend, was fired last year and classes in poetry and the poetry club at Rio Rancho High School were permanently terminated. It had nothing to do with obscenity, but it had everything to do with extremist politics.

The "Slam Team" was a group of teenage poets who asked Nevins to serve as faculty adviser to their club. The teens, mostly shy youngsters, were taught to read their poetry aloud and before audiences. Rio Rancho High School gave the Slam Team access to the school's closed-circuit television once a week and the poets thrived.

In March 2003, a teenage girl named Courtney presented one of her poems before an audience at Barnes & Noble bookstore in Albuquerque, then read the poem live on the school's closed-circuit television channel.

A school military liaison and the high school principal accused the girl of being "un-American" because she criticized the war in Iraq and the Bush administration's failure to give substance to its "No child left behind" education policy.

The girl's mother, also a teacher, was ordered by the principal to destroy the child's poetry. The mother refused and may lose her job.

Bill Nevins was suspended for not censoring the poetry of his students. Remember, there is no obscenity to be found in any of the poetry. He was later fired by the principal.

After firing Nevins and terminating the teaching and reading of poetry in the school, the principal and the military liaison read a poem of their own as they raised the flag outside the school. When the principal had the flag at full staff, he applauded the action he'd taken in concert with the military liaison.

Then to all students and faculty who did not share his political opinions, the principal shouted: "Shut your faces." What a wonderful lesson he gave those 3,000 students at the largest public high school in New Mexico. In his mind, only certain opinions are to be allowed.

But more was to come. Posters done by art students were ordered torn down, even though none was termed obscene. Some were satirical, implicating a national policy that had led us into war. Art teachers who refused to rip down the posters on display in their classrooms were not given contracts to return to the school in this current school year.

The message is plain. Critical thinking, questioning of public policies and freedom of speech are not to be allowed to anyone who does not share the thinking of the school principal.

And, if that doesn't make you wonder just what the hell happened to our country, here's the penultimate paragraph of the editorial. I emphasize editorial, because it IS an opinion piece, but if this is true, it's, to be blunt, fucking scary:

Writers and editors who have spent years translating essays, films, poems, scientific articles and books by Iranian, North Korean and Sudanese authors have been warned not to do so by the U.S. Treasury Department under penalty of fine and imprisonment. Publishers and film producers are not allowed to edit works authored by writers in those nations. The Bush administration contends doing so has the effect of trading with the enemy, despite a 1988 law that exempts published materials from sanction under trade rules.

Welcome to America--you're under arrest.