He Never Thought a Parent Would Complain.

After all, one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.

Remember this story when the defenders of the status quo tell you that “public education” is important because it unifies and brings all Americans together. From the L.A. Daily News.


Government teacher Nareg Keshishian never expected a parent to complain when he advised his Advanced Placement class he planned to show a documentary on media bias in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
But a parent did, telling the principal of Glendale's Hoover High School that the documentary "Outfoxed," which alleges right-wing bias at Fox News, was one-sided and that Keshishian wasn't presenting the "facts" about the attacks in a fair and balanced way.
"When they come up with a documentary showing the bias in CNN, I will happily air it. I want to bring to the students' attention that one person's freedom fighter is another person's terrorist," said Keshishian, a self-described liberal, who decided not to show the documentary.
"My students are encouraged to have any opinion they like, so long as they support it with facts. I'm giving them as many facts as I can and my goal is to make the classroom feel safe for everyone's opinion - including my own."
As some local schools wait for the official version of 9-11 and its aftermath to appear in textbooks, many teachers have allowed their own passionate views to guide classroom discussions of an event that transformed the nation's understanding of security and reshaped its foreign and domestic policies.
Others have been relying on filmmakers' documentaries and articles from newspapers and magazines, which they feel fairly depict both sides of the story.
But, aside from being careful about presenting all sides of broad topics like religion, foreign policy and impacts on the economy, teachers should become sensitive about seemingly obvious "facts" like calling the people who perpetrated the attacks terrorists, said Etta Hollins, professor of teacher education at the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California.
Already, some textbooks refer to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, without using the word "terrorist."
But it all comes down to discussing terms and concepts with students to teach them how to be critical readers, Hollins said.
"I think we should all be careful about the language we use and the conditions under which we use language. We should look at how words are defined and used," she said.
"Is terrorism something that occurs only by someone from a foreign country? Or were there acts of terrorism committed before 9-11? They have to understand the definition of the word and how it's being used."
Veteran educator Ron Wood, who sits on the committee tasked with recommending which social studies textbooks will be used in Los Angeles Unified School District classrooms beginning in 2006-07 - which will include the 9-11 attacks and the subsequent wars - questions the lessons some teachers are presenting about Sept. 11 in the meantime.

Labor Days' Real Heros

Solidarity’s long struggle brought freedom to millions .


Aug. 31, 2005, marked the 25th anniversary of the emergence of Solidarity, the trade union whose stand for the truth about the human person and against the lie of Marxism, contributed immeasurably to the collapse of one of the two great totalitarian evils that disfigured the 20th century. Few organizations, let alone individuals, can claim to have changed the world. Solidarity, however, altered history itself. When a group of Polish steelworkers in the port of Gdansk began their 17-day strike in August 1980, the odds that they would emerge as the first free trade union in the Communist bloc were very long indeed. This was a world in which Marxist regimes ruled one-third of the planet. Many, if not most, Western political scientists, economists, religious leaders and governments had resigned themselves to the notion that Communist systems were here to stay and that such regimes needed to be managed rather than morally confronted. The Solidarity movement that gained the Polish nation’s allegiance, however, did not base its claims upon pragmatism or the usual ideological rationalizations common to all Marxist practitioners. Instead, Solidarity based its claims upon the truth: the full truth about the human person, the truth that is the only foundation for any coherent theory of human rights and duties. Here, they were clearly inspired by the late Pope John Paul the Great, whose 1979 visit to Poland galvanized thousands to stop living the lie that propped up all Marxist regimes. During one of his 1979 homilies in Poland, he proclaimed: “Remember this: Christ will never agree to man being viewed only as a means of production, or agree to man viewing himself as such. He will not agree that man should be valued, measured, or evaluated only on this basis. Christ will never agree to that!” It is difficult to imagine a more direct swipe at the philosophical materialism that lay at the heart of Communist systems and which remains so virulent in much of the West. Human beings were, as Solidarity insisted, more than just objects. They were also “subjects”; that is, creative beings endowed with the power of right reason and thus the unique ability to make truly free choices. To treat people solely as objects — as Marxism cannot help but do — is therefore to deny their essence as human beings, to de-humanize them. The fact that Solidarity was unembarrassed about making such statements perhaps explains why it puzzled many West Europeans and North Americans. In the wake of the determination of the generation of May 1968 to interpret everything as a struggle for power, some West Europeans and Americans found Solidarity’s language literally incomprehensible. Given the extent to which much of the West’s intelligentsia had consciously or otherwise bought into Marxist principles and theory, not to mention its mindset of moral relativism, it was little wonder that they could not quite grasp why Polish workers were defying an ostensible “workers’ state.” By underlining the extent to which Communism relied upon lies to perpetuate its existence (as Polish workers were fond of saying, “We pretend to work while they pretend to pay us”), Solidarity’s ability to bring light to bear upon this darkness exposed the moral hollowness of Communist regimes. From that moment, Communism was finished. Since those momentous events, much has changed in Poland. Where 15,000 once toiled, only 3000 workers are now employed in Gdansk’s shipyards. Poland even has a “post-Communist” president and government. The Solidarity union is now a shadow of its former self. And yet the achievement of the Gdansk workers who chose the path of truth over lies 25 years ago is literally incalculable. For by cracking open Marxism-Leninism’s cold, criminal edifice, they allowed millions through Europe and the former USSR the opportunity to take the risk of political, social and economic freedom to which all are called. Solidarity’s struggle thus truly embodied the promise of their Polish forebears who, in fighting oppression, were fond of reminding everyone that they did so “for our freedom and yours.” Such is the essence of the virtue of solidarity. Gregg is Director of Research at the Acton Institute (www.acton.org) in Grand Rapids, Mich.