Sunday 5 December 2004

Right and left

Thanks to Steve Coombes for this one. A Highland teacher has run into trouble over his firearms licence. He is also in trouble with his employers:
He was accused of making controversial comments in class on subjects like race, slavery and firearms and said that positive discrimination in favour of the disabled and ethnic minorities had gone too far.

John Bruce, a senior education officer with Highland Council, told the court: "What struck me about the whole affair was the number of views that resided in one corner of the political spectrum and their relentlessness.

"Never in my professional life have I come across such blatant propaganda and indoctrination. I was alarmed and shocked by the extent of it."

A large number of employees of Scotland's local councils, including teachers, are firmly in the left corner of the political spectrum. Does that concern Mr Bruce?

The solution of course is to privatise education and let parents decide what kind of schools they wish to patronise.

2 comments:

David Farrer said...

Comments made on previous template:

Stuart
No, I did not say that the right-wing indoctrination per se would result in death. Northern Constabulary was of the strong opinion that this particular individual was likely to cause death, irrespective of how effective or useless his right-wing indoctrination may have been. From the original BBC report cited by David: 
 
-"A police lawyer suggested to Stewart Nicoll in court that he could be provoked into causing a bloodbath."

13 December 2004, 20:40:24 GMT
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Squander Two
> It was Neil who compared an example of left-wing indoctrination (green ideas) with right-wing indoctrination by the Highland teacher.  
 
Yes, and it was you who implied that the result of one was indoctrination while the result of the other was death.

13 December 2004, 16:11:09 GMT
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Stuart
Laban 
 
-"were entrusted to people owning a collection of guns" 
 
Those guns were owned and controlled by all of us, collectively, via the democratic state. 
 
Not the same thing at all as a private arsenal.

11 December 2004, 22:00:21 GMT
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Laban Tall
Funny, Stuart. Sixty years ago all our children - and everyone else - and everything else - were entrusted to people owning a collection of guns - the Army, Navy and Air Force. 
 
They looked after us pretty well.

11 December 2004, 20:57:45 GMT
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Stuart
If by foreign foes you mean terrorists then I think you will find that most terrorists of foreign nationality have the proper paperwork (whether legit or forged) and hence use airports, cars or ferries like the rest of us. Many terrorists are not foreign: remember Timothy McVeigh or the IRA? 
 
The people who come in on the backs of lorries may be non-EU or non-US migrant workers (it is not clear whether Verity is referring to the UK or US). We need their input to the economy and I would prefer to see restrictions on labour movement liberalised. However, I do not condone illegal migrants. 
 
But I take Verity's comment to be an attack on vulnerable refugees in need of asylum; people who are primarily non-white. Others, like Simon Jester, disagree with my interpretation. I stick by it, and I think many people would consider her comment racist. 
 
It was Neil who compared an example of left-wing indoctrination (green ideas) with right-wing indoctrination by the Highland teacher. I did not think his comparison was fair because the left-wing indoctrinators do not have a private stash of guns at home to back up their ideology. 
 
I would far prefer my children be in the care of left-wing nannies than right-wing bullies. We can counter the lefty nonsense in our own good time in the home. I would never knowingly entrust my child to the care of someone who owned a collection of guns. 
 
He did not kill anybody, but clearly the court thought that there was a real chance he would attempt to do so. 
 
The BBC report is not very clear, but I understand that originally his licence was withdrawn for a breach of the firearms laws. 
 
Italics apology unecessary.

10 December 2004, 15:40:34 GMT
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Squander Two
I must apologise for screwing up my italics. Sorry.

10 December 2004, 15:06:58 GMT
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David Farrer said...






Squander Two
> "The only foreign foes are the ones who come in on the backs of lorries and claim 'asylum'." 
 
Stuart, that is in fact the route taken into this country by foreign foes. Unless you seriously think that some of our foes might choose to mount a conventional invasion, it's their only probable course of action against us. And foes who don't get into the country aren't foes worth the name. 
 
> Green indoctrination is easily reversed with a little enlightened study. Death is irreversible. 
 
Where on Earth did that comparison come from? Are you saying that this teacher killed his students? You'd think the report might have mentioned that.

10 December 2004, 15:06:24 GMT
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rebbiker
Dickson has the answer!Emulate him by being an auto-didact with a Bozo as your teacher.

7 December 2004, 12:44:14 GMT
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Stuart
David 
 
-"The solution of course is to privatise education and let parents decide what kind of schools they wish to patronise." 
 
I am pleased that you acknowledge that there is a problem here that requires a solution. 
 
However, like all "libertarians", you are an extremist. Your solution to a short-term acute problem is to propose something that will take decades to achieve. 
 
Be more pragmatic: in the immediate absence of private education what solution would you propose to this problem?

7 December 2004, 08:59:13 GMT
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Stuart
On 24 Nov 04 at strand "My Career as a Programmer" Verity said: 
 
-"The only foreign foes are the ones who come in on the backs of lorries and claim 'asylum'." 
 
I do not have to justify anything to idiots like you. You are a most facile and offensive creep.

7 December 2004, 08:49:48 GMT
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Stewfart
Stuart: "Death is irreversible." 
 
A most perceptive comment[3], with which I entirely agree. It is also worth pointing out, death is inevitable and unavoidable. 
 
Verity: "Justify this facile comment, please." 
 
Look out Stewart, she comming for you.

6 December 2004, 23:05:07 GMT
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Verity
If you are a political conservative and you own a gun, this makes you a 'gun nut'? 
 
Justify this facile comment, please.

6 December 2004, 20:57:30 GMT
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Stuart
Neil 
 
Impregnating children's brains with pro-green propaganda seems slightly less worrying for your average parent than handing them into the custody of a far-right gun-nut. 
 
Green indoctrination is easily reversed with a little enlightened study. Death is irreversible.

6 December 2004, 09:40:13 GMT
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rebbiker
When young Whites are victims of racial preferences they are todays version of the Kulaks.Even if they themselves have never oppressed anyone, they 'belong to the race that is guilty of everything'.In communist Russia party members signed death warrants for 'enemies of the people' knowing that the accused were innocent, but believing in the political correctness of the charges.PC's Marxist antecedents should be obvious to everyone capable of independent thought, itself a semi- atrophied faculty which socialist governments like that of UK abhor.

5 December 2004, 21:26:16 GMT
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Neil Craig
"Never in my professional life have I come across such blatant propaganda and indoctrination. I was alarmed and shocked by the extent of it." 
 
I have. Some months ago (I have searched for it & am afraid I can't find it) Scotland on Sunday published a letter spontaneously produced by a junior class (it may have been in Cumbernauld) in which they all agreed windmills were "economical superheros" or some such. 
 
I wrote to the paper to compare this, not favourably, with the Soviet era practice of teaching children to sing about the joys of the 5 year plan (the 5 years plans at least worked if not efficiently). Not all my letters get published & this one didn't.

5 December 2004, 21:23:06 GMT