Let’s Play “Spot the Ten Outrages!” (Public School Version)

[amigocabal]

Let’s Play “Spot the Ten Outrages!” (Public School Version)

Here we have a video, taken with a North Carolina high school (North Rowan High School) student’s cell phone during class. (yes, it just points at the ceiling. It’s the audio that matters):

OUTRAGE 1: Does this sound like a class in session to you? Students are laughing and joking, barely paying attention. What kind of learning can occur in such a a chaotic environment? Do parents realize this is what school is like today?

Is the fact that a student is recording the class without the teacher’s consent an ethical breach? Once I would be tempted to answer yes: recording without permission is always unfair and a Golden Rule violation unless there are special circumstances. However, special circumstances were present, and may be present in more classrooms than our fragile sanity will permit us to accept. I now think perhaps all public school classrooms should be videotaped, all the time.Then we would quickly know the extent of our education catastrophe, as horrifying as that would be.

Continue reading...
I would believe this to be a hoax, except that the school district did not deny the incident happened.

Thanas writes in his sig, "Whoever says "education does not matter" can try ignorance" Sadly, too many students at too many schools get ignorance.

I do agree with Marshall claiming that all public school classrooms should be videotaped. If nothing else, those who pay the taxes have a right to know.

[Sea Skimmer]

Some public schools in the US already do tape all classes, but for security/got sued for stuff already reasons.

[Mr Bean]

Okay I read the piece, methinks someone doth protest to much. Outrages is a little high on my scale of words to use, issues or problems or some other word other than outrages which none of this stuff really qualifies

The ten "outrages" in order

1. The class room is very lively and lots of side conversations are going on
Yes that's an issue, not an outrage but a mark that the teacher does not have good classroom control skills, if you can't win silence by respect then you can at least win it by punishment. Teachers have lots of options for making examples of people. But outrage? Again way to strong a word

2. A social studies teacher talks about a current story of the day
This is not a outrage in any way shape or form as the piece was well sourced and reviewed by multiple media sources.
This is not in any way shape or form an outrage of any kind as this is a social studies class
Had this been math class or chemistry there would be a good point to be made

3. The Teacher fails at using the story in any kind of civics lesson
Outrage? No, the Teacher is bad at her job, had she been good at her job she could explain that at the time Obama was not yet even ten and pushed a girl down in the playground while Mittens got a gang together to assault a student because he was wearing a feminine hairstyle and because he was gay.

That would have been an excellent comparison but the teacher utterly failed to make it

4. A repeat of 3 but saying that the teacher presented the story just to make a personal political point rather than using it to teach anything
I'd agree with that only because the teacher was again terrible at drawing any comparisons between the two.

5. The teacher says you will not disrespect the president of the United States
Again not an outrage and if this was a ROTC class or active duty services members that's the law. These kids? It again proves she wanted to bring up a political point without trying to teach anything from it. Again not an out-rage just another demonstration she's bad at her job.

6. This is a repeat of "outrage 5"
This is a repeat of outrage 5 with different words

7. This is a repeat of outrage 5 and 6
This is a repeat of outrage 5 and 6 with different words


I have to quote 8 to provide context

Then, in a spectacular finish, the teacher goes into a full-fledged rant, telling her students that those who criticized President Bush were arrested for saying derogatory things about President Bush:

“Do you realize that people were arrested for saying things bad about Bush? Do you realize you are not supposed to slander the president?”

Well, no, now that you mention it, I don’t realize that, and neither does anyone who has studied civics or the Constitution, because it isn’t just untrue, it is spectacularly untrue. Now the teacher is lying outright, or displaying such ignorance that the students would be justified in stampeding toward the exits lest she rot their developing brains further. But our Ethics Hero stands his ground, and replies,quite correctly,

“You would have to say some pretty fucked up crap about him to be arrested. They cannot take away your right to have your opinion. … They can’t take that away unless you threaten the President.” Whereupon the teacher should have taken a seat at a students’ desk, and they should have commenced teaching her. OUTRAGE 8.

This is incorrect people were arrested on drummed up charges ahead of several conferences so they could not protest because they had said bad things about the President. In fact it's a practice Obama continues to this day, we have a news story about it today about prevent arrest before the G8 summit this very day. The arrests are for things like threats and terrorism but do not be surprised in two weeks long after the G8 has come and gone when the charges will be dropped.

So Outrage 8 is simply factually incorrect.

9. Outrage 9 is just the writer of the OP insulting the teacher for being bad at her job
I agree the Teacher is bad at her job, it's not an outrage

10. Nothing has been done despite the teacher being bad at her job
This is the closest thing that comes close to an outrage but considering the rest of the piece I question it's truthfulness, I have to wonder if really nothing has happened to this teacher. I'd expect at least a talking to, at most a disciplinary hearing and some remedial time.

So to review 9 outrages are not outrageous and the Social studies teacher had a political axe to grind and was shitty at doing so.

[Simon_Jester]

I just saw a classroom like this three days ago. Okay, four.

Okay I read the piece, methinks someone doth protest to much. Outrages is a little high on my scale of words to use, issues or problems or some other word other than outrages which none of this stuff really qualifies

The ten "outrages" in order

1. The class room is very lively and lots of side conversations are going on
Yes that's an issue, not an outrage but a mark that the teacher does not have good classroom control skills, if you can't win silence by respect then you can at least win it by punishment. Teachers have lots of options for making examples of people. But outrage? Again way to strong a word

Winning silence by punishment is actually kind of difficult unless someone else did the job of conditioning students to fear their teacher's displeasure enough to sit still and be quiet. The problem is that if you're talking to one person, unless your showmanship is good, you're not drawing any attention from the other twenty-nine people in the room... and since you took the time out from actually teaching them anything, they have nothing to do but side conversations. Keep it up long enough and they stop paying attention altogether, because they think of you as a blowhard who wastes their time picking on random people.

Just the attitude "I will punish you for talking in class" is so very, very much not enough to ensure a reasonable degree of silence in class.

[PeZook]

Pffft. My maths teacher simply did a flash quiz if the class wouldn't calm the fuck down.

Eventually we all became perfectly orderly students

[Simon_Jester]

Oh, it's perfectly doable- you just have to be able to think about the problem beyond the reflex level, and/or have students who already sort of give a shit and are just clowning around because they think they can get away with it. Neither of those conditions is a given in certain classrooms.

[aerius]

Sounds like one of my high school classes when we had a supply teacher.
The class just tries to kill time and make life hard for the teacher, and if she can't handle it then things get really fun.

[Alyeska]

Sounds like one of my high school classes when we had a supply teacher.
The class just tries to kill time and make life hard for the teacher, and if she can't handle it then things get really fun.

We called it Sink the Sub.

When I was a substitute teacher I treated them like children. Teenagers need a baby sitter because they can do really stupid things. I didn't treat the, poorly. No, I kept the, engaged. If I couldn't follow a lesson plan I winged it and gave them things to work on. One class I was teaching for 2 weeks I made a promise to one class. If they cold get through two chapters we got to watch a movie of their choice for the last two days. They plowed through those chapters and did the math problems.

Students would come up and say hi when we crossed paths out of school. I would like to think I was a good substitute teacher. I kept them under control and they usually learned something.

[Max]

Well apparently the writer of the "10 Outrages" has seen PeZook's post...and is now outraged about that.

We live in such a pussified society where people are now Outraged™ over the most absurd things. I guess I'd be more Outraged™ if this was, say, a Biology class and not a Social Studies class...

Perspective, Mr. Marshall.

[WmLambert]

Simon_Jester posted some common sense things - but one needs clarification. I guess he was looking for rationalizations for zingers against Romney and amelioration and face-saving the bad teacher. The truth is there is often vetting of bad characters by the Secret Service before appearances of officials seen to be in the cross-hairs. What the teacher was referring to was free speech not being free. Rush Limbaugh or Mark Levin or others can and do truthfully list many things that are denigrating to the President. I can list many such things about any President or world leader. What the teacher was demanding was that truth was forbidden - not a curb on disrespect.

It is disrespectful for a President to lie, It is also disrespectful to truth, not to comment upon it. In Obama's autobiography he admitted many things, including his final two years in high school as a virtual drop out who had bad grades, a drug and booze habit, and a negative world view. In spite of that, Valerie Jerritt got him into college and then into Harvard with no grades ever disclosed to show anything was earned. Even though he pledged total transparency, we have no transcripts from any of his schools, no thesis papers, no writings of any kind - even as the appointed editor of the Law Review. We have no medical reports saying he is off drugs, or even his attendance record in the Illinois legistalture. In his book we have his statement that he sought out the socialist left-wing professors yet have no definitive idea of just what he studied. His record was never vetted by the media as all other presidents always were, so the media as well bear fault.

The girl he dissed in his book was not really bullied - so much as thrown under the bus when his friends teased him about her being his girlfriend. Such things actually do set the precedent for his later life, where he found it easy to throw his family and mentors under the bus, also. As a kid, Romney had stupid growing-up issues, but he seems to have matured into a caring man. The comparison with Obama still holding his bullying, disrespectful ways may be very apt.

[amigocabal]

Well apparently the writer of the "10 Outrages" has seen PeZook's post...and is now outraged about that.

We live in such a pussified society where people are now Outraged™ over the most absurd things. I guess I'd be more Outraged™ if this was, say, a Biology class and not a Social Studies class...

Perspective, Mr. Marshall.

Mr. Marshall is free to register and respond, if he so chooses.

Outrage? No, the Teacher is bad at her job, had she been good at her job she could explain that at the time Obama was not yet even ten and pushed a girl down in the playground while Mittens got a gang together to assault a student because he was wearing a feminine hairstyle and because he was gay.

This could have led to a discussion of how younger people are presumed to be less culpable for their actions than older people.

Saldy, this teacher was not the one to lead such a discussion.

[phred]

Sounds like one of my high school classes when we had a supply teacher.
The class just tries to kill time and make life hard for the teacher, and if she can't handle it then things get really fun.

We called it Sink the Sub.

Part of it depends on the regular teacher too though. I remember one teacher that was universally hated, and when he was out for a week, we managed to give the first sub a nervous breakdown. Over half the class wound up in detention that week.

[Mr Bean]

This could have led to a discussion of how younger people are presumed to be less culpable for their actions than older people.

Saldy, this teacher was not the one to lead such a discussion.

It could have been, as I noted... eight.. nine times? This teacher is a terrible social studies teacher as she started with a good opening for debate then basically dropped the "because I said so" line on her students rather than providing any perspective or moderating of discussion.

And amigocabal the age of Obama when this happened I have to correct he was actually 12-13 not 8-10 as I said originally and Romney was not 19 but 18. Still only one of them could have been tried as an adult or had any premeditation. A 13 year old pushing a kid down in the school yard is bad but not serious if that's as far as it got, words and a shove then the incident is nothing and still Obama expressed remorse and wrote about it.

Meanwhile as noted, everyone BUT Romney remembers his incident in vivid detail and either feel guilty about not stopping it or for doing it themselves (Since some of the people who held the kid down so Romney could cut his hair are part of the people who came forward)

[Terralthra]

It is disrespectful for a President to lie, It is also disrespectful to truth, not to comment upon it. In Obama's autobiography he admitted many things, including his final two years in high school as a virtual drop out who had bad grades, a drug and booze habit, and a negative world view. In spite of that, Valerie Jerritt got him into college and then into Harvard with no grades ever disclosed to show anything was earned.

It must be quite a trick for Valerie Jerritt to get him into both college and law school before she ever met him. Valerie Jerritt met Barack Obama in 1991, as a result of having interview Michelle Robinson, Barack's fiancée, for a job. Michelle and Barack met in 1989, while Barack was a summer associate at a law firm after his first year of law school.

Even though he pledged total transparency, we have no transcripts from any of his schools, no thesis papers, no writings of any kind - even as the appointed editor of the Law Review.

Don't be a moron.

We have no medical reports saying he is off drugs

Don't be a moron.

or even his attendance record in the Illinois legistalture.

Don't be a moron.

In his book we have his statement that he sought out the socialist left-wing professors yet have no definitive idea of just what he studied. His record was never vetted by the media as all other presidents always were, so the media as well bear fault.

Google search for "New York Times Obama": 58 million results. Washington Post: 50 million. CNN: 105 million. Record never vetted by the media? Don't be a moron.

[WmLambert]

Columbia confirmed Obama graduated in 1983 with a degree in political science, but without honors. To get into Harvard one needs a good GPA and a lot of money. He refused all requests that Harvard and Columbia open up his records for examination. His campaign only says he just paid off his student loans with proceeds from his books. His books were remaindered and did not bring in money until after he was famous. It is believed Khalid Al-Mansour may have paid his way, but nothing can be proved one way or the other. Percy Sutton, the former borough president of Manhattan confirmed he was introduced to Obama by Dr. Khalid al-Mansour, who was raising money for him. Al-Monsour has never denied his part in getting Obama into Harvard. He said he met Obama while lecturing at Columbia.

There are also claims that Affirmative-Action programs may have helped, but Obama is Arab-American - not African-American, and does not meet the threshhold 12.5% of the racial component. His mother was white and his father was Arab with a great-great grandmother who was Black. His father could claim the 12.5% number, but Barack is 6.25% African. He is the first Arab-American President - we are still waiting for the first Black President. Other programs or grants may have helped him, but none have been admitted to.

Valerie Jarrett is another undocumented asset. While she is officially supposed to have first met him through Michelle in 1991, Her father-in-law, Vernon Jarrett, was a close friend of Frank Marshall Davis, Obama's long-time stand-in father and mentor. Obama was not a stranger to either of them. Obama said Harold Washington, Chicago's first Black mayor in 1983 inspired him to move to Chicago in July, 1986, working for the Alinsky group Developing Communities Project, Project Vote, and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN).

Valerie Jarrett became Mayor Daley's deputy Chief of Staff and was a big-time player in the Daley machine. Michelle's father was also a bit player in the Daley machine, which made Michelle a legacy project. As a slumlord, Valerie Jarrett had over 100 deals cut with Tony Rezko, and took part in the quid-pro-quos of government funding from the young State Senator Obama who was handed Alice Palmer's old seat at William Ayer's fundraiser. Her apartment complex, Grove Parc, made her the recipient of real estate grants sponsored by Obama, but her properties never made code and was never renovated. It was also the primary land targeted for the Olympic stadium in Chicago that Obama tried to get. In a quid-pro-quo, she landed a seat on the hospital BOD and invented a "stay at home" job for Michelle after receiving the Real Estate funding.

Face it, a lovely little group of insiders feeding off one another and refusing all attempts of transparency. It is thought that Vernon Jarrett was instrumental in getting Obama to al-Mansour and perhaps Valerie was only on the penumbra of the shadowy world that supported Obama, but she is now his number one advisor.

If you think the first time she met him was at Michelle's dinner then you must have very convenient blinders. It is quite possible that nothing sinister happened, but if so, why wouldn't Obama release all the data to prove his independence and follow his campaign promises of transparency?

BTW, the 256 word press release was not his comprehensive medical records.

There are still no papers or articles from his time in college or at the Law Review.

His votes (too many "presents" and no votes) are recorded, but his attendance record is still questioned.

The number of Google hits that Obama scored from major media does not show any vetting, does it? He was not vetted. No Occidental college records. No Columbia college records. No Columbia thesis paper. No Harvard college records. No Selective Service records. No medical records - just a puff piece. No Illinois State Senate records, except for votes. Did he sit on any commissions or committees? Was he really absent from all of them? No law practice client list that he released, a few have been found through searching individual cases. No certified copy of an original embossed, signed paper birth certificate. (The .pdf provided can be done ex post facto and does not bear legal scrutiny. No record of baptism. No papers published as editor of the Law Review with his name on them. No papers written by him while at the University of Chicago as a lecturer. Your "Don't be a moron" links support these statements. None of them prove anything different.

[Thanas]

Lambert, have you got anything of substance to provide here except copy/paste from conspiracy.com? You know, like any respectable media report backing your case?

[Thanas]

Mr. Marshall is free to register and respond, if he so chooses. .

So I wrote a post to that guy on his blog and told him that registration was free, quite easy to manage and that intellectual cowardice is a lot to yammer on about when he is the one who snipes at us from the safety of his blog.

Not surprisingly, that reply "somehow" vanished. Great going there, Marshall. One can see how interested you are in discussion.


I find it hilarious that the guy on "ethicalarms" apparently is unable to debate honestly or to handle criticism.

[Simon_Jester]

Lambert... what, he's supposed to be the Manchurian Candidate?

I don't get it. What's the point of all this?

[madd0ct0r]

Thanas, if your post started with DARLING then it's up now.

I just added this to the blog. We'll see if it get's through moderation.

ok darling, would you like us to continue the discussion here? It’s not difficult either way.

You do clearly have an issue with hyperbole: ‘obnoxious’? really? Can you defend that choice of word? Are you arguing the poster was purely motivated by discrediting Bush, and by extension your post, or do you simply dislike dissenting opinions (much like the outrageous teacher?)

And as for being unlikely to see it, well, you did. And rather then commenting there (even inviting people to continue the discussion on your site you complained about cowardly snipers, from the safety of your blog. I’m not much of a metalworker, but I know irony when I see it. Especially since by the same logic you should have written your post on a billboard opposite the teacher’s classroom, where she is ‘likely to see it’.
Double standards? Outrageous!

As for here:

stuff...
Face it, a lovely little group of insiders feeding off one another and refusing all attempts of transparency.
and more stuff...

That's a whole lot of positive claims there, Wmciggs. Can you provide evidence to any?
1. Obama's father is an arab. can you show this?
2. Valerie Jarrett is obama's number one advisor. can you show this?
3. Al-Monsour has never denied his part in getting Obama into Harvard - can you show him being asked?
4. Valerie Jarrett invented a "stay at home" job for Michelle. can you show this?
5. 'his attendance record is still questioned' - so is his birthplace, by idiots. Can you show us a reason to seriously question his attendance?
6. No certified copy of an original embossed, signed paper birth certificate. - oh wait. you ARE an idiot.
7. No papers published as editor of the Law Review with his name on them. No papers written by him while at the University of Chicago as a lecturer.

OK- i'm not going to ask you to prove a negative, but i will ask you if you've actually looked for any of the last two items yourself?

[Simon_Jester]

Although 7 is a negative, it could be proved- Obama's curriculum vitae really should be a matter of public record, and you could certainly go through the publication records of one journal to see if any papers were published by B. Obama during the years 198X through 199Y or whatever.

I'm not sure I'd see the relevance; there are such things as lecturers who publish little or nothing, depending on what kind of lectures they're expected to provide. Likewise, publishing papers in a journal you edit- is that somehow extra-double-plus suspicious?

[madd0ct0r]

Statement Regarding Barack Obama

The Law School has received many media requests about Barack Obama, especially about his status as "Senior Lecturer."

From 1992 until his election to the U.S. Senate in 2004, Barack Obama served as a professor in the Law School. He was a Lecturer from 1992 to 1996. He was a Senior Lecturer from 1996 to 2004, during which time he taught three courses per year. Senior Lecturers are considered to be members of the Law School faculty and are regarded as professors, although not full-time or tenure-track. The title of Senior Lecturer is distinct from the title of Lecturer, which signifies adjunct status. Like Obama, each of the Law School's Senior Lecturers has high-demand careers in politics or public service, which prevent full-time teaching. Several times during his 12 years as a professor in the Law School, Obama was invited to join the faculty in a full-time tenure-track position, but he declined.

http://www.law.uchicago.edu/media

2min 40 seconds from google page. fucks sake, why do people bother?

Conclusion - he wasn't a professor, he just taught there part time. Same as my current boss at Tel Aviv. whoop de doo.

[Simon_Jester]

Yep. There you go- adjunct professorship, like I thought. No one fires you from an adjunct lecturer position for not publishing papers; you're there to (surprise!) give lectures, not to do research. Hence being called a "lecturer."

[PeZook]

Well apparently the writer of the "10 Outrages" has seen PeZook's post...and is now outraged about that.

Wait, what? He's outraged about me mentioning my maths teacher? Huh?

[Thanas]

Thanas, if your post started with DARLING then it's up now.

No, I was perfectly civil.

[Max]

Well apparently the writer of the "10 Outrages" has seen PeZook's post...and is now outraged about that.

Wait, what? He's outraged about me mentioning my maths teacher? Huh?

I had you and Mr. Bean's post on the brain for some reason. I recall actually typing Mr. PaZook before deleting the Mr. and just going with PaZook. I'll be more detail oriented next time, my apologies for the confusion.