November 25, 2008
P.C. police arrive in time for the holiday season
The war on American culture continues apace, as multi-culti members of the International World Without Borders P.C. Brigade seek to erase all traditions that bind us together and celebrate "America."
Today's edition: Eliminating Thanksgiving from the schools.
For decades, Claremont kindergartners have celebrated Thanksgiving by dressing up as pilgrims and Native Americans and sharing a feast. But on Tuesday, when the youngsters meet for their turkey and songs, they won't be wearing their hand-made bonnets, headdresses and fringed vests.
Parents in this quiet university town are sharply divided over what these construction-paper symbols represent: A simple child's depiction of the traditional (if not wholly accurate) tale of two factions setting aside their differences to give thanks over a shared meal? Or a cartoonish stereotype that would never be allowed of other racial, ethnic or religious groups?
"It's demeaning," Michelle Raheja, the mother of a kindergartner at Condit Elementary School, wrote to her daughter's teacher. "I'm sure you can appreciate the inappropriateness of asking children to dress up like slaves (and kind slave masters), or Jews (and friendly Nazis), or members of any other racial minority group who has struggled in our nation's history."
Raheja, whose mother is a Seneca, wrote the letter upon hearing of a four-decade district tradition, where kindergartners at Condit and Mountain View elementary schools take annual turns dressing up and visiting the other school for a Thanksgiving feast. This year, the Mountain View children would have dressed as Native Americans and walked to Condit, whose students would have dressed as Pilgrims.
Raheja, an English professor at UC Riverside who specializes in Native American literature, said she met with teachers and administrators in hopes that the district could hold a public forum to discuss alternatives that celebrate thankfulness without "dehumanizing" her daughter's ancestry.
"There is nothing to be served by dressing up as a racist stereotype," she said.
Last week, rumors began to circulate on both campuses that the district was planning to cancel the event, and infuriated parents argued over the matter at a heated school board meeting Thursday. District Supt. David Cash announced at the end of the meeting that the two schools had tentatively decided to hold the event without the costumes, and sent a memo to parents Friday confirming the decision.
Cash and the principals of Condit and Mountain View did not respond to interview requests.
But many parents, who are convinced the decision was made before the board meeting, accused administrators of bowing to political correctness.
Kathleen Lucas, a Condit parent who is of Choctaw heritage, said her son -- now a first-grader -- still wears the vest and feathered headband he made last year to celebrate the holiday.
"My son was so proud," she said. "In his eyes, he thinks that's what it looks like to be Indian."
Among the costume supporters, there is a vein of suspicion that casts Raheja and others opposed to the costumes as agenda-driven elitists. Of the handful of others who spoke with Raheja against the costumes at the board meeting, one teaches at the University of Redlands, one is an instructor at Riverside Community College, and one is a former Pitzer College professor.
Raheja is "using those children as a political platform for herself and her ideas," Constance Garabedian said as her 5-year-old Mountain View kindergartner happily practiced a song about Native Americans in the background. "I'm not a professor and I'm not a historian, but I can put the dots together."
The debate is far from over. Some parents plan to send their children to school in costume Tuesday -- doubting that administrators will force them to take them off. The following day, some plan to keep their children home, costing the district attendance funds to punish them for modifying the event.
Because, you see, America is a repository for all that is awful and evil, and it's never too early to start indoctrinating young children, disabusing them of any simplistic notions of this nation's history that we are anything but the inheritors of a genocidal campaign against the aboriginal, "real" Americans.
I'm sure you can appreciate the inappropriateness of asking children to dress up like slaves (and kind slave masters), or Jews (and friendly Nazis), or members of any other racial minority group who has struggled in our nation's history."
Jews and Nazis, Pilgrims and Indians, it's all the same to these people.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Posted by Mike Lief at November 25, 2008 07:02 AM
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Comments
Well I AM a historian, and I think it's probably the case that you can't teach six-year-olds much of anything about historic cultures that isn't a caricature (or stereotype, if one prefers).
Heck, it can be hard to teach undergrads without reference to caricatures, and that's because it's impossible to get at the ambiguity involved in that kind of history without reading 43 monographs. And that's just recognizing the ambiguity--if you want to present an accurate picture of the Pilgrims, Indians, and their relationship, you'll have to synthesize all that material and then write the book yourself. Raheja's tale of racism and imperialism is as much a caricature as the alternative. But it tears down American traditions and identity, so I guess it's the preferred narrative now.
Posted by: Dan at November 25, 2008 08:59 AM
does ANY school/legislative/corporate body in america - any one at all - have the nuts/guts to tell a whiny self-proclaimed minority to take their whine somewhere else where someone might care?
why has the phrase "no one cares about your oh-so-tender hurt feelings, pal, so STFU and quit trying to ruin the holiday for everyone else" become so hard to say? it really is a wonderfully useful phrase.... it nips LOTS of problems in the bud.... and no one uses it anymore. *sigh* (exits, muttering) born 100 years too late....
Posted by: the asset at November 25, 2008 10:33 AM
We have officially gone too far. This story also made http://detentionslip.org ! Check it out for all the crazy headlines from our schools.
Posted by: hall monitor at November 25, 2008 05:12 PM