School Dist.: Thanksgiving "a time of mourning" for Native American students

[Jim Johnson]

Prepare to Upchuck!
FOXNews

Seattle Schools' Thanksgiving 'Myths' Stir Controversy
Wednesday, November 21, 2007

By Robert Shaffer

Seattle public schools want a side of political correctness served on your Thanksgiving table.

Washington state's largest school district sent letters to teachers and other employees suggesting Thanksgiving should be "a time of mourning" for its Native American students.

Click here to view the report from FOX News' Dan Springer.

The memo, from Caprice Hollins, the district's director of Equity, Race & Learning Support, included an attachment to a paper titled "Deconstructing the Myths of 'The First Thanksgiving.'"

It includes 11 "myths" disputing everything from what was served at the first Thanksgiving (no mashed potatoes or cranberries) and who provided the food to the nature of the Pilgrims themselves: Myth No. 3 calls the colonists "rigid fundamentalists" who came to the New World "fully intending to take the land away from its native inhabitants."

But what got the Internet abuzz was Myth No. 11: "Thanksgiving is a happy time." It was followed by "Fact: For many Indian people, 'Thanksgiving' is a time of mourning ... a bitter reminder of 500 years of betrayal returned for friendship."

Hollins would not defend her letter, but David Tucker, a spokesman for the district, said it was an effort to be sensitive to minorities in Seattle schools.

"One of the core elements in education is not just understanding your own life history but also those of others," he said.

But one Seattle-area tribe says Thanksgiving is not somber on the reservation but a time to see friends and family, as it is for other Americans.

Native Americans in the Northwest celebrate the holiday with turkey and salmon, said Daryl Williams of the Tulalip Tribes. Before the period of bitter and violent relationships between natives and their culturally European counterparts, they worked together to survive, he said.

"The spirit of Thanksgiving, of people working together to help each other, is the spirit I think that needs to grow in this country, because this country has gotten very divisive," he said.

Nationally syndicated talk show host Michael Medved was more blunt.

"The notion that now you have a major school system sending out a message that, no, rather than expressing thanks we should emphasize guilt on this holiday — that is sick, it is destructive and it is anti-American."

Seattle Public Schools has been in the news before, not always for the performance of its students.

The U.S. Department of Education investigated in April after the district spent part of a federal Smaller Learning Communities grant to send 20 students to the "Eighth Annual White Privilege Conference."

After complaints last year, the district removed from its Web site a definition of racism that claimed planning ahead and individualism were examples of cultural racism.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,312480,00.html

[anthonybpugh]

OH boo hoo.  Just have National Feel Sorry for Your Worthless Self month and be done with it. 

[Kat Kanning]

LOL Anthony.

[kola]

How to you think fullblood NA Indians feel about Mt Rushmore? Columbus day?

It would be similar to having a hillside rockcarving monument in honor of Hitler, Stalin, Bush and Cheney.

Kola

[MaineShark]

Speaking as a pagan, "Thanksgiving" is a pagan holiday which far predated Christianity.  All major pagan religions had (and have) harvest festivals.

The fact that Christians (and members of other religions, as well as agnostics) also celebrate at the same time, for similar reasons, is not exactly upsetting.

Saying that "Thanksgiving is a time of mourning" is just silly.  Why would the harvest festival, celebrating the plenty of the season and the hope for the same next year, be a time of mourning?

No, I'll celebrate.  If my Christian, Jewish, pagan, atheist, agnostic, Muslim, Buddhist, (etc) friends want to celebrate with me, I'm glad to have them.

Joe

[Puke]

I HAVE A RIGHT TO NOT BE OFFENDED!
Don't offend me! Don't offend someone else!
WAAAHHHHHH Waaaaaaaa!
I'm going to tell mommy gov't on you!!

These Liberal/Socialist/Progressive morons are out of control. And the Liberal/Socialist/Progressive media are all too happy to report it.
I was listening to a show called Cavino and Rich on the Maxim channel (Sirius Satellite Radio) and they were talking about this "pussification" of America and mentioned the "ho-ho-ho" ban in Australia. If this stuff is getting noticed by idiot pop-culture talk show hosts then it's getting bad. They didn't realize where the problem is coming from (gov't schools) and I couldn't call in b/c it was a rerun.

[anthonybpugh]

Dear Mr God.

I would like to Give thanks for not being a whining ass bitch. 

Amen

[Jim Johnson]

I HAVE A RIGHT TO NOT BE OFFENDED!
Don't offend me! Don't offend someone else!
WAAAHHHHHH Waaaaaaaa!
I'm going to tell mommy gov't on you!!

These Liberal/Socialist/Progressive morons are out of control.

You said man, I got dinged three times just for posting this FOXNews story.

[Tom Sawyer]

One unding from me.

[Pat K]

Dear Mr God.

I would like to Give thanks for not being a whining ass bitch. 

Amen

LoL perfect!

[Ogre]

Hey government-run school system and anyone else who is suddenly "offended" by something that happened between two people you don't know five hundred years ago:

Here's my ass: *

Start with the kissing.

How can anyone support these worthless bureaucrats that run these schools?

[Dreepa]

This was my favorite part:

claimed planning ahead and individualism were examples of cultural racism.

Oh no I planned ahead... I must be racist.

[CNHT]

I HAVE A RIGHT TO NOT BE OFFENDED!
Don't offend me! Don't offend someone else!
WAAAHHHHHH Waaaaaaaa!
I'm going to tell mommy gov't on you!!

These Liberal/Socialist/Progressive morons are out of control. And the Liberal/Socialist/Progressive media are all too happy to report it.
I was listening to a show called Cavino and Rich on the Maxim channel (Sirius Satellite Radio) and they were talking about this "pussification" of America and mentioned the "ho-ho-ho" ban in Australia. If this stuff is getting noticed by idiot pop-culture talk show hosts then it's getting bad. They didn't realize where the problem is coming from (gov't schools) and I couldn't call in b/c it was a rerun.

Uh, I'm still scratching my head about why it's racist to plan ahead and to believe individualism.....

[Pat McCotter]

Uh, I'm still scratching my head about why it's racist to plan ahead and to believe individualism.....

Planning ahead is considered racist?

By ANDREW J. COULSON
GUEST COLUMNIST
Thursday, June 1, 2006

Are you salting away a little money for your retirement? Trying to plan for your kids' education? If so, Seattle Public Schools seems to think you're a racist.

According to the district's official Web site, "having a future time orientation" (academese for having long-term goals) is among the "aspects of society that overtly and covertly attribute value and normality to white people and Whiteness, and devalue, stereotype and label people of color."

Huh?

Not all the district's definitions of racism (and there are lots of them) are so cryptic. The site goes on immediately to say, "Emphasizing individualism as opposed to a more collective ideology" is another form of "cultural racism."

Did I mention that the district thinks only whites can be racist in America?

Regardless of your color, your affinity for planning or your penchant for reading "Das Kapital" under Fremont's Lenin statue, does this make any sense to you?

See if this sounds familiar: a government agency redefining a highly charged word to advance a particular ideology. ... Um, note to the Seattle School Board and administration: George Orwell's novel "1984" was a cautionary tale, not a how-to book. And the folks trying to control people's thoughts through state manipulation of the language -- they were the bad guys.

But this is still a free country. Thanks to our (ostensibly racist) regard for individual liberty, Seattle Public Schools board members and officials are free to adopt whatever definitions of racism they choose. It is inherently divisive, however, for an official government school system to promote one ideology over another.

Unfortunately, it is also unavoidable.

Whenever there is a single official school system for which everyone is compelled to pay, it results in endless battles over the content of that schooling. This pattern holds true across nations and across time. Think of our own recurrent battles over school prayer, the Pledge of Allegiance, the teaching of human origins, the selection and banning of textbooks and library books, dress codes, history standards, sex education, etc. Similar battles are fought over wearing Islamic headscarves in French public schools and over the National Curriculum in England.

There is an alternative: cultural détente through school choice.

Historically, societies have suffered far less conflict when families have been able to get the sort of education they deemed best for their own children without having to foist their preferences on their neighbors.

Some people fear that unfettered school choice would Balkanize our nation. Their concern is commendable but precisely backward. The chief source of education-related tensions is not diversity; it is compulsion. Why is there no cultural warfare over the diverse teachings of non-government schools? Because no one is forced to attend or pay for an independent school that violates their convictions.

It would not be difficult to design a school choice program that would ensure universal access to the educational marketplace without forcing anyone to attend or pay for schools whose teachings they opposed. It could be done by combining and expanding some of the education tax credit programs already operating in such places as Pennsylvania, Arizona and Illinois.

Such a system would not be a threat to the ideals of public education. On the contrary, it would be a far more effective means of advancing those ideals than the official state schools that have gnawed at our social fabric -- and failed our most disadvantaged children academically -- for generations.

Under such a choice-based system, those wanting to promote their own cultural and political philosophies could hang out a shingle and offer their services to any and all interested families. But they would lack the power, used and abused in Seattle, to impose their ideologies.

Andrew J. Coulson is director of the Cato Institute's Center for Educational Freedom and author of "Market Education: The Unknown History." He lives in Washington state.

[Lloyd Danforth]

One unding from me.

Me too! and 1 applaud for everyone on this page!  Happy Thanksgiving! 



Don't expect anything for Christmas!