Local teacher told to remove Nazi flag from classroom

[NVMojo]

Reno: Washoe County School District officials quickly ordered a middle school teacher to take down a Hitler Youth flag — emblazoned with a black Nazi swastika — from his classroom Thursday after complaints from the Jewish Defense League.

“We take this symbol to be as serious as a heart attack,” said Bill Maniaci, spokesman for the Jewish Defense League. “This is a symbol of someone who wants to kill Jews.”

Pine Middle School teacher Michael MacDonald said he put the flag up as an historical artifact in teaching his German language class lessons on the manipulation of youth in Nazi Germany during the 1930s.

Yet the Jewish Defense League protested after MacDonald kept the flag up for nine days. Although school officials have apologized, no disciplinary action is expected, interim Superintendent Paul Dugan said.

more...

http://www.rgj.com/news/stories/html/2004/12/09/87300.php?sps=rgj.com&sch=LocalNews&sp1=rgj&sp2=News&sp3=Local+News&sp5=RGJ.com&sp6=news&sp7=local_news

[trotsky]

1. Slight overreaction?

While obviously the Nazi era was one of the darkest blotches on humanity, we will gain nothing from trying to erase it from our collective memory. I think it's important to tell people what happened and especially HOW it happened so that the mistakes can be avoided in the future.

Those who do not remember the past are doomed to repeat it - isn't that the saying?

[lonestarnot]

3. Teach probably bushitchimp's sister

[NVMojo]

24. Rove sister and her family live in this area.

[Skittles]

4. yeah but.............................

nine days? Was it intended to become a permanent classroom fixture?

[DoNotRefill]

22. Do you think you could teach somebody....

the entire history of WWII in nine days?

I took a 3 credit class on JUST the 1931-1933 period of Weimar and the Nazi's rise to power which ran the entire semester, and covered TONS of material. I'd suggest such a course to EVERYBODY. It's becoming more and more relevant.

[Skittles]

35. most Americans do not know Russia was America's ally in WWII

freaking sad

[genieroze]

15. Love this quote.

“If a teacher is going to fly any flag in a classroom, then it should be the U.S. flag, a symbol of freedom and justice,”
Oh really, where has she been the last four years? The way this country is going our flag will be comparable with the Nazi one.

[donsu]

18. not overreaction - the teacher needs more education himself

or he liked the way the nazi did things.

[intheflow]

25. I think bringing it in for one day

would have been fine, and in keeping with the pirit of your post. But as a history buff myself I think keeping it up for 9 days was more time than was necessary for the teaacher to make his point.

[benburch]

2. I have mixed feelings about this.

Using it to teach today's youth that the State sometimes does its best to manipulate them is probably OK, but I wonder if there wasn't another message here?

[ContraBass Black]

5. Aother message? Hmmm....

It sounds too dangerous a tool to be used to make a point so subtly.

[fliesincircles]

6. Should have put up

one of the "W" shaped flag stickers right next to it. Show the subtle nature of visual manipulation.

[one_true_leroy]

9. Bingo!!

[gratuitous]

7. What? Too soon?

"Sorry, didn't mean to tip the administration's hand. Of course I'll take down the flag."

Historical artifacts are fascinating and can bring the story of our shared journey alive in ways that films, books and reports just can't do. But keeping the flag on display for days after the lesson had been taught was a mistake. I think the district handled it right: Take down the flag and apologize. Much beyond that, and I think you grant those human pimples the Nazis a continuing power that they don't deserve.

[oldschoolguy]

8. Nine days is too long...

To actually make the point about manipulation of youth, etc..., I think putting that flag up for A DAY would have been very helpful to keeping the kids' attention for the lesson.

However, the teacher should have had enough common sense to not keep it there for NINE freaking days.

[SKKY]

10. Someone please show me in the Constitution where it says...

...you have the right to never be offended. I seem to have missed that part, and can't find it to this day.

[Cats Against Frist]

16. BRA-VO

It takes two people to be offended. One to make an opinion or statement, and one to find a reason to be offended -- usually by accepting common binary-oppositional constructs or the acceptance of taboo or historically loaded language.

Offense is all smoke & mirrors -- and it contributes to a society where a bunch of assholes who are directing foreign policy are messing with the language, because they can't come right out say they're for Oil Empire, and that the deaths of anyone involved in this conflict are so we can have enough gas to run our giant cars.

The GOP uses offense to chastise the democrats all the time -- anytime someone mentions that they just might be fascist, or culturally supremacist -- the job of the GOP is to make people be "offended," so the point is never taken seriously.

[jobycom]

20. It's in the part where the government is not allowed to alienate our right

While I think this is an overreaction from a schoolboard and the complaintants, and I really don't understand why they even hire teachers in this nation since the last thing anyone wants to do is let them teach, it is certainly the spirit of the Constitution that government is supposed to represent ALL the people, and not just the people who aren't offended by certain symbols.

No government agency has any right to use a symbol that offends large groups of people, especially when that symbol is offensive for a good reason.

As for the teacher, he should be aloud to teach, though why it took nine days for someone to pull him aside and say "You know, that may not be the best way to make your point..." When I was in high school, our class dressed up in costumes of notorious villians for a class picture. One kid dressed in a sheet and hood. We all knew the kid dressed that way because he hated the KKK, and was making the statement that they were the most notorious of bad guys. Our teacher understood it, too, and was going to let it go. But on our way down the hall to get the picture made, our drama teacher pulled her aside and told her, in a friendly but stern way, that he thought that costume represented too many things we didn't really want to represent. We all got it then, even though minutes before we didn't. The costume was turned into a ghost costume before the picture was taken.

If someone from the local school board had come down with an executive decision, we would never have understood the complaint, and some of those students to this day would be whining about political correctness run amuck.

I wonder what message these kids got? That you can't learn anything not approved by someone higher up? That it was best not to ask why, to just bury their heads and not think? If the teacher was making a statement about kids being brainwashed by overbearing government officials, what message did the school board really give them?

[itzamirakul]

11. It was wrong to hang the flag...

the teacher could have shown the flag and discusssed its implications, but to hang it in the classroom for even one period is too much. I think the teacher is probably a neonazi - they hide in some of the best places.

[Griffy]

31. and they love to teach your kids... posion candy! nt

[rhyfeddu]

36. Did you read the article??

This is a quote from the teacher:


MacDonald, who said he has used the flag as part of lessons in German and World War II history for at least 10 years....

“I approach the lesson as to how Hitler manipulated children,” MacDonald said. “He gave them their own flag. He gave them their own uniform. He gave them their own songs.

“Then we talk about the death camps under that flag,” MacDonald said. “We talk about Hitler sending children to war under that flag, not knowing that when they said they would die for that flag, that they were really going to do it.

“I show them pictures of the concentration camps, the bodies,” MacDonald said. “I show them what really happened under that flag.”


Strange recruitment tactic for a neo-nazi.

[THUNDER HANDS]

12. i once showed nazi ribbons in a show and tell class

my grandfather had taken them off a german he killed during WWII and had a collection of them. He gave me some ribbons and medals that had a swastika on them and I brought them to class.

Everyone was fascinated by them.

Of course, I didn't bring them every day for a week, but nobody took offense when I did bring them in that one day.

[bobthedrummer]

13. It's going to be the replacement for Old Glory if we don't prevent it.

9 days of "preview" for the new BFEE flag, whack.

[ilovenicepeople]

28. It's terrible act to show a nazi flag in your country,

but there is no problem implementing a nazi type government in your country.So following that logic you cannot talk about consentration camps but you can be put in one.

[Gregorian]

14. But killing Iraqis is OK.

Edit- It's early. I know it was the JDL. But somehow it just seems to coincide with political sentiment, these days.

Too close for comfort. Pull it off the wall, because we're getting ready for our own purges. It makes us uncomfortable.

Last night I was thinking of a friend who's mom was a teacher of fifth graders. This was back in 1965 or so. She has her students read the Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. I wonder what they're teaching in that classroom. I suspect that reading that book might be much more effective than hiding the truth.

Just remember, it's the adults who are causing all of the problems. As though a flag could ever mean anything. Maybe I'm stupid. Maybe I just don't get the image oriented bs. But it seems that adults ignore the truth, and dwell on the images.

[Stuckinthebush]

17. That picture cracks me up

There was a qualitative/program evaluation text I read in graduate school (I wish I could remember which one), that began with a story about living in Japan in the eighties. The author was amused when he went into a Japanese department store in December and they had a huge Christmas display in the center of which was Santa Claus being crucified. Now, this was not supposed to be a provocative display by the owners of the store, it simply highlighted the confusion of what Christmas means to Westerners.

[Gregorian]

21. Those darned Japanese

Wow, that is weird! I like their candor. But I came up with this all on my own. Maybe I'm turning Japanese. Doh. Sorry.
Oh, we're not confused. It's all about the dollar.
I suppose the Nazi flag, and all it stood for, was also all about the money.

[DoNotRefill]

19. Is this the same JDL....

that got busted for trying to blow up Mosques in California?

[medeak]

23. How about the crucifixes in son's high school classrooms

up all year long? (public school)

Funny how that's never complained about.

[Bridget Burke]

26. What district? What state?

What happened when you complained?

[Griffy]

33. it is complained about...

effort to keep religion out of schools is a fight underway.. 10 commandment, school prayerand so on... there should not be crosses either

[Tighthead Prop]

27. Political Correctness

Since I am going to college to be a history teacher this really bothers me. I think he maybe shouldnt have had it hanging up in his class, but it has always been my opinion that sometimes it is necessary to be historically accurate than politically correct.

[Bridget Burke]

32. "Political correctness"

Is a construct of the far right.

Aren't you worried about being surrounded by all those liberals in college?

People complained about the flag. He should not have left it up in the classroom.

[appal_jack]

39. not

> ""Political correctness""
> Posted by Bridget Burke

> Is a construct of the far right.

I must respectfully disagree about this assertion. I attended Antioch College during the late '80's and early '90's, and a true, bona-fide political correctness held plenty of sway there, i.e.- there were some things that simply could not be said, and some people whose voices were marginalized based upon mistaken and/or twisted notions of their "power" and "privilege." Basically, it amounted to petty tyrants constructing their own "liberal" (not) la-la land.

Fortunately, not all of the school was like that (the whole Science Institute was a great place, full of wonderful people), and indeed even the parts that could tend toward political correctness had chinks in the armor (I was a co-coordinator of the Peace Center during Gulf War 1, and our attempts to inject humor into our very serious work of countering military recruitment, etc. sometimes got me into PC-trouble, but it's not like I was tarred and feathered or anything - just severely scolded by people whose opinion did not count for much in my book). :grr:

My point is not to pretend that I was scarred by PC-tyranny. I wasn't, but I do get a little fired-up when people pretend it never existed. Of course, I don't even begin to equate the self-censorship encouraged by a small, twisted segment of the Left, with the explicit, heavy-handed censorship practiced by the corporatist-rightists who hold many more reins of power today. But it wasn't until after graduating Antioch that I really learned to stand up to that bullshit-self-censorship-mock-sensitivity that some fools, who happened to hold some reins of power back there and then, demanded in order to feel "safe."

PC-dogma is an ugly skeleton in the Left's closet. An ugly, small, shriveled skeleton that the right ridiculously exaggerated, but an undeniable one nonetheless. I prefer to acknowledge its presence in the past, and reaffirm my commitment to freedom of expression henceforth.

-app:hippie:

[Griffy]

34. Sometimes teaching becomes preaching

and historical accuracy can be subjective (some say the holocaust never happened)

[Just Me]

29. Good grief! The man was teaching a very important lesson,...

,...which would assist these kids in maintaining their humanity!!!

If my son ever sees a swastika, I want to make sure he understands the implications and runs far away from those who are soliciting such things.

WTF is the matter with people these days? It's like a perverse paranoia.

Meanwhile, they don't even blink at a government which is increasingly controlled by corporations and ripping apart our Constitution. They don't recognize an evolving fascism right under their noses.

[leftofcool]

38. As a retired teacher, I agree with Just me

Ya can't teach kids to avoid something they have never seen. Hanging it, however might not have been a good idea. Maybe just showing it would have been the best thing.

Left of cool

[Griffy]

30. Why does he have it? Why hang it at all...

the closet nazis have been waiting for this political atmosphere to assert themselves... like ORielly said yesterday, "go to Israel". here is NO excuseo hang that flag.... show it perhaps, but a picture of the flag is enough to learn what it looks like. This is about teaching hate.. dont forget that... some people STILL deny that the holocaust happened.

[rhyfeddu]

37. You can't learn from history from a position of ignorance

I think the Jewish Defense League is being very self-defeating in this instance...from every thing the teacher said in the article, he seems to be fervently anti-Nazi in his beliefs and teachings. They should pray for MORE teachers out there actively educating against the fascist/racist teachings of the Nazis.

Yet, they seem fixated on the tool, not the message (quote in article):

<snip>
The Jewish Defense League, however, would like to see MacDonald disciplined, Maniaci said.

“What they do with him is their affair, but this should not be swept under the carpet and forgotten,” Maniaci said. “I think he should be taken to task. All of us would be better served if Mr. MacDonald instead worked at the restaurant that bears his name.”
<snip>

Seems rather harsh towards someone teaching AGAINST Nazism. And a dangerous silencing of discussion. If the issue is how long it was up, set guidlines...But 3-D material on any subject is more compelling, a better teaching tool, and shouldn't be forbidden altogether.

Yes - the flag and other Nazi symbols are imflammatory. They should REMAIN so, by making sure young people know exactly what they were used for. Neo-nazism is on the rise, some misguided kids think the swastiki is "cool" (Ever see young boys draw one on their notebooks? I have. Many times.)...to talk about what these symbols really represent is the only way to take the mystique out of them. (Should the Southern Poverty Law Center try and educate us about this, too, without showing us any pictures of their existence?)

Not discussing the truth about the Nazis, is an "abstinence program for evil". "Let's not talk about it, let the kids be blissfully ignorant, and hope for the best". We have to look the Devil in the eye, and not flinch.

With our own gallop towards fascism, we have to have more people educated about propaganda and how easily it takes hold.

[bunny planet]

40. * must've called to get his flag back.