Question for the Teacher

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The FEAR Chronicles: Fear & Hope in The 9-11 Art of Children

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Just a 'little' question on what seemed a jarring note among all those pics...

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Dec 23, 07 By: roscoau

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Posted Dec 24, 07 by LVbianSynic
Ross, there were so many unsettling images in those drawings that made me wonder what it was our children are thinking and feeling about their country...the one you point out here moved me the most and here is why:

I have a deep fear, myself, that the more...U.S. is indeed a country whose citizens have abandoned the notion of democracy on a subconscious level. We see the government now as something oppositional to our own needs and so we either complain and rant, or we remain altogether complacent as a result of feeling alienated and cut off from any real avenue of change- or we're just plain tired and spent having to break our backs to make something close to a living.

Some of us stand up and do what we can (those are the brave ones who do it regardless), but it seems fruitless when our own representatives seem bought and paid for by interests outside of re-building the middle class (no middle class=no democracy)

What my fellow citizens have forgotten is that those idiots and tyrants who feign leadership are NOT the government- WE are, and my fear eminates from their lack of knowledge around civic duty and history- we are now living in Orwell's America. That's what that picture evokes in me. All that. The rest of the world, I believe, sees us as deserving of whatever our fate is at this point for our being such fools (and not just for whom we've elected, but for our materialistic, greedy, non-caring, arrogant, and wasteful culture.)

So, in answer to your question, is this what children are taught in the U.S.- that their country stands alone? It depends on what their parents are teaching them (and it doesn't have to be spoken, of course, to be taught). It depends on what media they're exposed to (Rupert Murdoch's Fox News is notorious for making Bush and his cronies out to be a band of heroes fighting against all the evil forces of the world). It depends on whether or not teachers are actually brave enough to address their questions and do so in a critically-sound way. It's hard for teachers to approach anything having to do with politics or religion because their own ideas are often undeveloped and there's a lot of misunderstanding about what can and cannot be addressed in the classroom, unfortunately.

This, of course, is not a clear answer to your question. I don't think, in asking it, you really expected one anyway. ;-)

Thanks for asking it, though, and giving me this moment to think on it. And thanks for the video resp less