Once again The York Regional District School Board is coming under fire for remarks allegedly posted on one of it's teachers Facebook pages.That's two times in as many days.
This time around the concern is about remarks which are alleged to be Islamophobic. Just a few short minutes ago I tried to view the page in question,to read the full account of those statements.However,they were nowhere in evidence on that particular page.Accordingly,I have no choice to reserve judgement on whether I share the concerns of others regarding teacher conduct in this incident.
Again,the school board in question is promising a full investigation,according to the protocols they have in place,and which you would expect any responsible school board to have in place.For the time being we have to put our trust in that process. What exactly was said will very much come into play here.Perhaps the comments made were truly racist.Or it may be that they indicate a real and legitimate concern about immigration policy from a public safety point of view.Only time will tell,but,assuming the later is true,I'm going to come down on the side of this teacher to speak her mind while still insisting that what teachers do both publicly and privately should be open to public scrutiny.
There is,I believe a real danger here in reacting to hastily to remarks that were made by this teacher,whatever those remarks may have been.That danger has to do with drawing proper distinctions between Islam,the religion and Islamicism,the political,terrorist movement.We are,to the best of my understanding still at war with terrorists.We are not,and never have been at war in any legitimate sense with Islam.
Air strikes,embargoes and hand to hand fighting,indeed military or political sanctions of any sort alone are never going to win this war.A vital strategy in this regard will be encouraging debate with and among Muslims here and abroad,particularly liberal Muslims.So,I'm hesitant to shut this teachers opinions down simply because they may be controversial,as she would seem the be the voice of liberal Islam.She seems to be identifying herself as a Muslim who wishes to live in peace,but at the same time be vigilant to the possibility of terrorist threat.And there is nothing wrong with trying to strike that particular balance.
What would be wrong is to single any particular group out for hatred or differential treatment based on any of the excluded categories in current civil rights legislation.And again,to be clear,we are not yet certain that this is what has happened here.What is imperative is that we know what was said,and that it be held to a sufficiently high standard of academic discourse,and be presented in the appropriate arena for debate.If that's what has happened,I will commend this teacher for being an effective agent in the War on Terror.
Without hesitation,though,I will call on the York Regional District School Board to get it's house in order.This is the second incident involving teacher conduct in less than a week,so it's time to set some standards regarding professional conduct for it's staff.There may well already be standards in place,but I think it would be helpful to be much more public and transparent as to what those standards are.It would also help the board staff comply with expected standards of behavior regarding private statements.Because it would seem,at this moment that there may be a corporate culture that encourages misunderstanding of expected behavior among teaching professionals.
I reiterate what I said in my last column.Some professions need to be held to higher standards than others.It goes with being role models.We may have particular expectations,for example of construction workers,when a female passes by the construction site.Those expectations are,however totally incongruous with many other professions including teaching.Once we know definitively what those standards are,we can decide what particular actions must be condemned,and which can and should be supported
blyndpapaya
No comments:
Post a Comment