School Sued Over Racial Epithet In Book

Detroit Free Press:

A Macomb County family is suing its school district for discrimination over a classroom reading of a racial epithet in a book depicting slavery.

Read the whole story: Detroit Free Press

Comments

[RobertFromMN]

05:12 AM on 11/17/2010

It's an absurd complaint from someone who sees a potential opportunity for some easy money.

[anotherwomanfromva]

09:46 AM on 11/15/2010

To all these posters, claiming that 5th graders should know the horrors of slavery by having their teacher say the N word. Why don't you advocate that the teachers tell the white kids the real story? How about they tell those little 5th graders that their ancestors were r.apists and m.urders? Making sure they use real words and not sugar coating it when talking about slavery. Tell them how their ancestors use to sneak into slave shacks making sure you call them what they were r.apists. I'm sure these little kids have heard the term r.ape before after all they watch South Park and listen to Eminem. That way other little kids can harass them and call them the r word. See if the parents of these little kids will agree that 5th graders should know every single horrible detail about slavery.

The fact is there is no way a elementary school kids can possible comprehend it all. And frankly there is no need for them to, white or black. Teach about American History just leave the slurs out of the classroom.

[bkrider9]

01:08 PM on 11/15/2010

x2

[denier denier]

07:59 AM on 11/16/2010

The vast majority of white people never owned slaves in pre-civil war times. And most white people's ancestors didn't arrive here until after the civil war. Labeling white people as rapists etc... qualifies you as the worst form of racist along the lines of N@zi Germany or Rwanda.

[anotherwomanfromva]

09:25 AM on 11/16/2010

So let me see if I get what you are saying straight. Because I say that whites who owned slaves were r.apists puts me on the same level and a N@zis? Really? I'm on the same line as people who k.illed millions of jews?

Perhaps you should reread my post because I said that there were whites who owned slaves and r.aped them. I wasn't talking about all whites, I was talking about the slave owners.

I do find it so funny that you are so offended but you want my black child do sit in a 5th grade classroom and listen to her teacher use the N-word and not be offended because it's just history.

[bkrider9]

09:11 AM on 11/15/2010

Racism is a strange illness. Rarely if ever do you actually witness a racist admitting to his racism. I suppose it is like alcoholism. You can't start to heal until you admit you are ill. So here's an invitation to all those who are proud racists on this thread: Just give a shout out and let us know who you are.

[Schweik]

02:18 PM on 11/15/2010

Racism is an illness of all races.
Neither blacks nor whites, yellows, browns and reds are immune to it.

[bkrider9]

04:58 PM on 11/15/2010

Prejudices are found in every society, true.

But "racism" is a different kettle of fish. It involves, typically, the creation and strict enforcement of laws that separate and oppress a minority group. Most nations in the world have not created such laws.

The US and South Africa are conspicuous for the fanatical - nay, maniacal - violence with which they pursued the oppression of people of African descent. No African, Native American, or Asian country (other than India) has established such racist laws and enforced them in this manner.

The difference between common prejudices and full-blown racism is like the difference between the common cold and the plague. I gather you have not read much in the history of racism?

[AdamantEve]

04:21 AM on 11/15/2010

"The girl left the district and has to repeat fifth grade.
"This is material not appropriate for a 15-year-old," he said."

Okay, first of all, the phrasing suggests that the girl is 15 years old and is still in fifth grade. Even if that's not the case, I doubt that the girl was so horrified by a racial epithet read to her in a class that she had to repeat the entire grade. It seems to me like the parents are ashamed for raising a dumb kid and are trying to shift the blame onto someone else.

[Uproar]

06:51 PM on 11/16/2010

And what are they teaching their daughter-- that suing is the best way to resolve a problem and get rich quick.

[Titanshanks]

03:49 AM on 11/15/2010

One fundamental problem with the way slavery and racial issues are often taught in American schools is that they seem to be taught by whites to whites about blacks. Not always, by any means, but I've noticed it.

[davcrock]

05:04 AM on 11/15/2010

The facts is the facts.  What, a white person can't know the facts?

[bkrider9]

09:06 AM on 11/15/2010

Of course a white person can know the facts. Many whites marched with Martin Luther King and got beaten up, and more than a handful were murdered in the defense of civil rights for all citizens. They knew not only the facts but also the truth.

[Titanshanks]

03:16 PM on 11/15/2010

Not what I meant to imply, rather that a black student in a classroom discussion on racism can often feel talked-about. A typical study of slavery and civil rights (which I exaggerate to make a point) might proceed something like: Whites brought Africans to America, enslaved them, dominated them, treated them terribly- some whites fought to save blacks- whites in the North fought the Civil War to free the slaves- whites gave blacks the right to vote- whites gradually gave blacks more rights and freedoms, and after Martin Luther King Jr, whites accepted blacks to a much greater degree, but there's still more whites need to understand.

Compare that to a curriculum I had a small part in creating last summer, for elementary and jr high school students in a mostly black district. We focused on the thousands of slave escapes, slave rebellions, and slaves organizing and teaching each other to read. Later, the curriculum will emphasize the massive efforts of black Americans and like-minded white Americans across the country, in addition to the better-known leaders, and portray the increasing freedoms African Americans made as gains they achieved, rather than wishes they were granted.

It's an approach I hadn't seen before, and I was very impressed.

[bkrider9]

09:05 AM on 11/15/2010

Very well said. Fanned and faved.

[peegan]

02:46 AM on 11/15/2010

It's hard to judge without knowing the passage in the book that was offensive. And was this child 10 (5th grade) or 15, as the lawyer indicated? How did the teacher present it? Did she blow off the reference or use it to help students understand the ugliness of the times?
Maybe the answer is not to abolish any book with this type of reference automatically, but to alert the parents ahead of time to discuss any concerns.

[bkrider9]

10:55 PM on 11/14/2010

For those seeking an escape through the "Africans practice slavery too" argument, please remember this: 1. Racism is a disease, not a tennis ball to be hit into another court. If you've got the plague there's no point in saying that folks across the ocean also have it. 2. You've got to get yourself cured, quick, no matter how many other people are ill. 3. Your criticism of others brings you no closer to recovery.

[Titanshanks]

03:33 AM on 11/15/2010

Are you telling me those arguments are lurking further down the page? My god.

[Samuel Perry]

05:04 PM on 11/15/2010

lurking in the minds of millions even. And stupid people are breeding.

[TOS100]

09:16 PM on 11/14/2010

That poor, poor thing, damaged to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars over a word.

Oh my! The shame.

If we're going to teach about slavery in school, then we have to acknowledge the horrors of the day. I will bet this poor hurt soul that the slaves back then were upset about more than a word.

Maybe he should also sue the makers of EVERY SINGLE BIBLE in the world, because it's full of slavery, discrimination, rape, polygamy, child murder, genocide, and outright lies.

But no, he's butt-hurt over a WORD. A word. One word.

There are more important things in this world.

Maybe this person should shelter his children until he dies. Then they won't know how to fend for themselves, and they can become adult wards of the state. Who knows. This guy's lawsuit is unacceptable.

He should be charged with filing a frivolous lawsuit with intent of personal gain, and then be fined for all the court costs involved.

A word. Sheesh. Grow up, man!

[Imhotep40]

11:04 PM on 11/14/2010

It's always enlightening to hear people of the majority race tell a minority race what's good for them and then . . . . what it takes to be a "man!"

Merits of the lawsuit aside, this says more about you than the plaintiffs . . . .

[bkrider9]

09:09 AM on 11/15/2010

Fanned and faved.

[Samuel Perry]

05:10 PM on 11/15/2010

What if the student is a little white girl who is suddenly emotionally stressed to hear that little girls her age were once tied up and beaten and sold and raped and God knows what else? The county is 98% white so that's just as likely. I don't see someone black as being surprised or blindsided by the subject matter, particularly to the point that one would hire a lawyer to sue.

[davcrock]

07:28 PM on 11/14/2010

No appropriate for a 15 year old?  Really sheltered 15 year old apparently.  It's history, something we don't teach enough of or particularly well.  Many bad things happened in history.  When would it be appropriate for finding this out?  

[snowballinhell]

10:56 PM on 11/14/2010

Completely agree, dav. Is that Katrina hitting the Gulf Coast as your photo?

[davcrock]

12:39 AM on 11/15/2010

Yep, Katrina.  The low-water mark of Bush2's Administration.

[bkrider9]

01:09 PM on 11/15/2010

Crock indeed.

[davcrock]

07:43 PM on 11/15/2010

Another insult?  Don't you have any logic or imagination?  Like you're the first person to come up with that lame insult/joke.  Go ride your bike.

[sakredkow]

07:22 PM on 11/14/2010

The article that Huff Po links to doesn't have enough information to form a judgment. It's not clear what the epithet was for instance. The article is very uninformative.

[dct1999]

06:03 PM on 11/14/2010

It's funny that some people think if this little girl heard the n-word before that her parents shouldn't be concerned about the way it was used by her teacher, in her school.

What a nonsensical argument.

[StillIRise]

06:18 PM on 11/14/2010

I so very much agree with you ...
 
Some of these arguments, including the one that you've cited, are absolutely unbelievably utterly ridiculous.    One poster even suggested that it's "inconsistent" to teach historical slave literature (fiction or non-fiction) in which the N-word is used, because if it was acceptable to use it then, it should be acceptable now; and since it's not acceptable now, we give our children a mixed message when we teach Julius Lester's slave narratives or TKAM or other literature in which the N-word is used ...
 
In fact, I'm getting confused just trying to recapture this argument!!!

[dct1999]

06:22 PM on 11/14/2010

Round and round they go, where they'll stop nobody knows.

[bkrider9]

05:36 PM on 11/14/2010

In 1995 a white University of Maryland student turned his skin dark using medication and traveled as a black youth in the south. He planned to travel for 30 days, but gave up after only 2. He called his parents in tears, and said the only cure for what pained him was "a dose of white skin." His name is Joshua Solomon and his story was published in the Washington Post.

http://www.wvu.edu/~lawfac/jscully/Race/documents/solomon.skindeep.pdf

Many folks on this thread think they know about racism. Perhaps you know far less than you think. But I'm an optimist, and I believe we all can know much more, from both the heart and the head.

[bkrider9]

05:40 PM on 11/14/2010

I'll try to correct the link here:

http://www.wvu.edu/~lawfac/jscully/Race/documents/solomon.skindeep.pdf

[davcrock]

07:29 PM on 11/14/2010

Never heard of the book BLACK LIKE ME?

[bkrider9]

10:35 PM on 11/14/2010

Read it several years ago. A classic of course. And then there's also the newspaper article series by a man named Ray Sprigle who did the same thing but way back in 1947. Both Griffin and Sprigle had the same experience as Solomon: an almost immediate change of inner identity from a white self to a black self, one that completely forgot any identity with whiteness. Fascinating.
I cite the Joshua Solomon story because it is very recent, and therefore impossible to dismiss with that tired old argument: "Oh but that was umpteen years ago." 1995 was very recent indeed.

[bkrider9]

05:31 PM on 11/14/2010

Recall the incident earlier this year of a teacher in Georgia who taught about slavery and racism by having her white junior high students dress up in KKK outfits - without telling the African American students in the school.

Sensitivity training, anyone?

[jojo1983]

01:29 AM on 11/15/2010

Well that teacher should obviously be fired.

[bkrider9]

05:12 PM on 11/14/2010

1. In the classroom why focus on the n-word and the slaves? Racism and slavery in the US were not created by the Africans but by the Europeans. They came from European minds and institutions. That's like teaching about the holocaust by explaining how Jews were called rats and other dehumanizing names. The kids learn how hated the Jews were, but nothing about the hate criminals themselves.

2. Stop using the passive voice, saying “They were called the n-word. They were made slaves.” Use the active voice and be honest: “Europeans enslaved them, even though they knew it was a crime against Christian teachings to do so.”

3. Stop throwing into classrooms full of sensitive children the n-word and other slurs and claiming, "Well that's the historical reality." That's a red herring defense whites use to escape from the real issue. That’s a powerful socializing tool to get white children to understand their superiority and children of color to accept their inferiority, officially defined by the teachers themselves.

4. So what is the real issue? It is the criminality and immorality of Europeans who claimed the right to be violently greedy on the basis of a supposed superiority.

5. If you want to study the history of slavery and racism, you need to study the history of white behavior in the US. Get that approved by the school boards and I’ll be all for it.

6. It's not about teaching hatred for whites. It's about learning the mistakes humanity has made in the past so that we can correct them and never make them again. It's about being honest with ourselves, instead of in a denial that perpetuates the crimes of racism to this very day.

[dct1999]

05:24 PM on 11/14/2010

extremely well said

[lisakaz2]

05:43 PM on 11/14/2010

I would like to see your proof that racism was invented by Europeans because it likely predates them to antiquity. The issue is how racism is articulated and theorized and this changes over time.

[bkrider9]

05:55 PM on 11/14/2010

1. I did not claim that Europeans invented racism. I said, "racism and slavery in the US were not created by the Africans but by Europeans." This is a historical fact that cannot be denied.
2. A great place to start in learning about racism and slavery in the US is Genovese's Roll Jordan Roll.

[bkrider9]

06:04 PM on 11/14/2010

Regarding antiquity, Frank Snowden's work (Before Color Prejudice (Harvard U. Press)) clearly shows that although the Greeks and Romans practiced slavery they had no belief system equivalent to modern racism.

We also know that slavery in most of Islam was likewise a much more open system, enabling slaves to rise to the highest ranks of society, including the post of vizeer and even sultan. A slave in the Islamic world was typically a member of his master's family and could even marry his master's daughter.

All this throws a stark light on the great differences between American slavery and its predecessors.

[Rus Viking]

05:11 PM on 11/14/2010

dct1999 1 hour ago (3:33 PM)
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This is exactly why I would never ever send my children to a predominately white institution. There is frequently a complete lack of understanding and sensitivity when it comes to these types of issues.
-----------------------------------------

Isn't America a "predominately white institution." ?

[dct1999]

05:16 PM on 11/14/2010

Not for long.

[bkrider9]

05:24 PM on 11/14/2010

x2. I believe I can see the tipping point just dawning over the horizon now.

[Rus Viking]

05:28 PM on 11/14/2010

Good for you!

But in the meantime, what about your children?