SpinnerofTales
Posts: 1586
Joined: 5/30/2006 Status: offline
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quote:
Not so, Arpig. The President of the United States does not decide what goes into school curriculum, and has no authority to make himself part of it. The decision about honoring his suggestions would go to the locally elected school boards, or, for a home school situation, to the parents. Censorship is an awfully strong and provocative term to apply to the exercise of lawful discretion. ORIGINAL: TheHeretic I have to agree with you, Heretic. It is not a matter of censorship. The school boards have the right to show or not show what they choose in school as relates to their curriculum. What disturbs me is this sudden thought that having the president of the United States address the children of the country is somehow a matter for controversy. As has been mentioned before, when Regan and Bush made similar speeches, there may have been a bit of comment on the political nature of their remarks, but the concept of the President addressing the children of the country was not viewed as a harmful thing in and of itself. What I have seen that is concerning for me is the rapid succession of reasons for not wanting Obama to speak. The initial reason given was a fear of "indoctrination" (see the title of this thread for example). When that notion was more or less debunked, suddenly it became an issue of wasting student's times by having them spend 20 minutes (call it an hour to get everything set up and taken down) listening to the President talk to them about staying in school and working hard. Now we've shifted to the idea that every individual school board should have been contacted and asked "is it ok if the President speaks?" Again, I have to wonder if it isn't a matter of "the president addressing" school children but of "Obama addressing school children." If that is the case, isn't the lesson we're teaching our children is that what a politician who doesn't agree with one's views is 100% bad. Isn't the brother of that thought what a politician who does agree with my views does is 100% good. And is that the lesson we really want to teach our children?
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