Is Hate Taught In the US School System?

Randi Rhodes had a long rant/discussion about it this afternoon. I, at first, thought that she was right on with saying that US schools do not teach hate in the classroom, but have been pondering it since then, and am now not so certain.

Of course, (maybe), no teacher wakes up, puts on his/her clothes for the day and goes out to teach hatred of Muslims in the classroom.

But.....

Is hatred for others, different colors, different economic classes, etc., being taught in various ways?

Did Randi miss the point?

Unless you count U.S. history which is unapologetic for social stratification and its caste system.

teaches us to hate on cue.

It also does good things, but there is definitely a sick underside to that cultural artifact.

and I don't know of anyone it HAS taught to hate...hell, I learned a lot more about cooperation, competition, sportmanship and leadership than anything else...can't really recall where the hate comes in...care to share???

theProdigal

athletic competition, particularly football, teaches aggressiveness to the extreme. That was what I was thinking of when I responded.

Track and field, tennis, and others are not so bloodthirsty in their competition, but the underlying idea/emotion is there. Any time one takes the field, for whatever athletic endeavour, one must be ready to vanquish the enemy by whatever means possible. Football just causes it to be more at the surface.

You are right about learning leadership and cooperation and sportsmanship among team members. But, what about the other team? There are pep rallys with the sole purpose of telling all the members of the school to get behind the team to smash the other team.

Push'em back! Push'em back! WWWWAAAAAYYYYY back!

no hate there either. Competition and hate are not the same thing. Yes, there are definitely some that could use hate to motivate...but that is a tough thing to do. Hate usually requires knowledge of the person or thing you are hating...and competition doesn't give that.

I played several sports for many years and never saw hate used by any of the coaching staff to motivate...in most cases, expressions of violence related to hate and/or outside the bounds of the rules of the game most often resulted in the team-member being excused from the game if not the team itself...football actually helped teach me to control my anger.

I am sorry that you feel this way and have experienced sport in this vein. Hate is not what competition is about and physical displays of force do not mean that you hate...what would you say of the martial arts and the competitions there?

theProdigal

I also experienced HS sports as a positive experience, but......

I guess I may be, not generalizing, but trying to get an overview. No, we did not hate the opposing linebacker. We did not want to kill the running back, but the force of the energy that was pushed on us, with the pressure to perform, doesn't differ much from those that a year later find themselves halfway around the world fighting a foe they know nothing about other than the name they have been given and the questionable reason why they should have the shit kicked out of them.

"Hate is not what competition is about"

You are absolutely right!

against the big rival?

It's a pure "us versus them" experience.

I didn't say it "was" hate. I said it taught us to hate on cue. Big difference.

Many people never get over that visceral belief that our team is the good guys and the other team is the bad guys. That's why war is so persistent and so easy to market to the masses.

I also said it accomplishes good things too.

FWIW I was a three-letter athlete in high school and competed in two sports in college. The sport is not the problem (although football is too violent); the culture is.

but...you said 'hate' and hate has a definition and I went with that. Sports, done properly, teaches values that can be very useful later in life. And while, yes, there is a winner and a loser in most sporting events, after the event is over, you go back to being what you were before...if not a little closer. God knows, I made more than my share of friends through sports that require physical contact.

By the way, I am VERY impressed that you were a two sport athlete in college!!! I had a difficult time keeping up with baseball at my Division I school...thank God for baseball...I would have dropped out for sure without it!

theProdigal

and two different years of another (volleyball)

I never could have done two in the same year.

and your superior abilities (well, now I'll just sort of incline my head). I had a friend at university who played baseball and football. I never understood how he did it! He was a machine...and he kept over a 3.8 and graduated with honors and a degree in biology...no slouch he.

theProdigal

because it would have cut into my music playing and partying time!

B-)

My college track coach didn't understand that my competiveness was based on something different than crushing my opponent. I did not run to crush my opponent. I ran to gain, prove respect as a runner. I had a great deal of respect for better athletes and I wished to get to that level as other athletes wanted to get to my level. High school track in my home area was like that.

and other sports.

One doesn't directly compete against another (remember, I said directly). The competition is basically against the clock. Sure, there are others, but one doesn't push or trip the others off the track in order to gain an advantage. It's more "civilized."

and never developed any hate. The only thing I hated was practice in August and playing too many snaps without a sub giving me a break (it's easier to get injured when you're out there exausted).

about how history is taught and I bet they'd say hate was taught in the US school system implicitly in the glorification of Columbus.

was a strong movement to include history from the viewpoint of Native Americans in the schools, but I guess that has gone away along with true science and art and music and..................

How about a recap or link?

My thoughts are that intolerance is definitely taught in schools. Expulsion is an extreme case of its teaching. Expulsion for gays happened to a person I know years ago, when there was no explicit rule against it.

Look at all the fundamental skeptics around here. Where'd they learn that contempt for others?

http://randirhodes.com/

I'm not sure, but it may be archived there. If not, look in Air America.


Randi was discussing how in Saudi Arabia, children are taught from the get go that all others with differing beliefs are to be hated because they are less than them (that's what I heard, anyway), and said that, vehemently I might add, hatred is not taught in the US school system. She was pretty hard on some callers, as usual, and the more I think about it, a little unreasonable.

Good luck finding it, because it was entertaining!

one that we receive. Mountains are in the way. Must be low-power stations they're using.

I took your suggestion and looked at her site, and Air America's, but couldn't find it.

Thanks for the short summary.

Whether it is officially endorsed by the government or not.

Rarely a day goes by without some news story or personal testimony about some bigotted teacher or administrator in the school system.

Have you missed Ulysses threads?

No wonder I'm so screwed up. I was taught to hate tests and stuff also. :silly:

:hi:

I think I like you, but I have a very, very angry response to that waving hand. I think I might even hate it!

(just kidding)

:hi:

B-)

"survival" in a world of "big picture darwinism" is more like it.

Big picture darwinism according to the film "igby goes down" is where
less evolved people like republicans take over because they are
inherently less endowed... but in a society that destroys exceptional
people, the mediocre people are gifted a free pass... hence the GOP
and the frat boy asshole in the WH.

I learned that there are no friends, and no family from american
schools. That real life is that you're on your own and ever person
you meet will likely try to fuck you over, even freepers reading
this very note... looking for some evidence they can use to destroy
a life.

I learned in school, that schools in ethnically "rich" areas like
morningside los angeles are deprived because they are black. It
was not hate, but "respect" for the deprived who could kill the
white kids on the school bus visiting the black neighborhood if they
were not polite... and had burned school busses of whites before...
so keep your head down"...

I learned all about racism in american schools. It is a speciality
that really is worthy of post-doctorate thesis work in retrospect.

divided up the class on the basis of eye color, and pretty soon those with the "superior" eye color were acting terribly towards the ones with the "inferior" eye color. The problem is the us/them dichotomy, and putting people on teams. In order to recognize, in the heat of a game, who is on your team and who is on the other team, teams need to have different uniforms. That's EXACTLY what patriarchy does in assigning gender roles based on sex. Every infant is dressed in pink or in blue. That people ever manage to relate to those of the "opposite" sex as people, despite having grown up on opposite teams, is the miracle of love--and extremely rare. Although schools may not specifically teach hate, they do require conformance to gender roles, thus fostering the us/them mentality which is necessary for hate. Once you can think of any other group of people, without getting to know them, as "them," you are cannon fodder and need only be processed.

cultivated. It keeps the masses complacent and suspicious at the same time. Like small children their suspicions can be manipulated to any ends. "Book" knowledge is a world apart from "Practical" knowledge, the later developing only by truly interacting with all peoples and coming to the realization that we have countless more similarities than differences.

Our schools have been moving towards becoming skill factories rather than educational facilities. What is sorely lacking is the ability to think critically.

a much more succinct statement.

So yes.

For a little perspective, please read the article at the link.

http://www.newswithviews.com/BeritKjos/kjos5.htm

"A Saudi Arabian textbook tells high school students, "It is compulsory for the Muslims to be loyal to each other and to consider the infidels their enemy." <6>

"If you receive the curriculum in Saudi Arabia, you would see that it promotes any kind of extremist views of Islam, in the eyes of very devout Muslims," said Abdul Khadir Tash.... This extremism, born of the local, puritanical www.crossroad.to\glossary\Islam.htm Wahabi brand of Islam, constrains life here, shaping the way people live...." <7>

Osama bin Laden recruits disciples through these radical schools. Called Madrasa, they "can mold the imperfectly formed religious creed of young, easily influenced men, convincing them that their faith condones violence against non-Muslims." <8>"



The location is Pakistan, but the form of "study" is the same.

http://www.fisiusa.org/fisi_News_items/news28.htm

"Very few of the students at the Haqqania madrasa study anything but Islamic subjects. There are no world history courses, or math courses, or computer rooms or science labs at the madrasa.

The Haqqania madrasa is, in fact, a jihad factory."

"I began by saying that bin Laden's program violates a basic tenet of Islam, which holds that even in a jihad the lives of innocent people must be spared. A jihad is a war against combatants, not women and children. I read to them an appropriate saying of the Prophet Muhammad (I came armed with the Hadith): "It is narrated by Ibn Umar that a woman was found killed in one of these battles, so the Messenger of Allah, may peace be upon him, forbade the killing of women and children."

They did not like the idea of me quoting the Prophet to them, and they began chanting, "Osama, Osama, Osama."



Do you see a difference between the religious madrasas and a typical American public school?

When I was in school, they taught us about the end of slavery & the civil rights movement ....

but, we didn't have any African American students in the classroom in middle-class White suburbia.

...and that can certainly create hate.

on teachers. I had some really great ones and a few lousy ones in this regard. Fortunately most teachers don't hate or coutenace hate. But somewhere along the line if hate is what you want you can find it.