Question for school students.

[johnny]

After reading this article:

PM gonged as Costello targets anti-US teachers
August 21, 2005 - 4:31PM
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/pm-gonged-as-costello-targets-antius-teachers/2005/08/21/1124562742412.html
..............................................

The award came as Mr Costello warned of the dangers of anti-Americanism taking hold in Australia.

The Treasurer, who last night delivered a speech to the Australian-American Leadership Dialogue dinner, said allowing the spread of anti-American sentiment could bolster terrorism.

"There's no doubt in my mind that anti-Americanism can easily morph into anti-Westernism, particularly we've seen that with terrorists," Mr Costello told the Nine Network today.

"They don't really draw distinctions between Americans or Britons or Australians, they just like to hit anybody who they consider to be a part of the West.

"And that's why I think we've all got an interest in working to explain the aims and objectives of our policies."

Mr Costello said teachers who gained their qualifications in the 1970s were partly to blame for the spread of anti-American attitudes because of their "ideological baggage", which was now filtering through to their students in schools.

"I think in the schools, if your teacher's carrying that bias it tends to get passed on," he said.

"And I think in the schools, the other side of the story ought to be taught.
.................................................. ..

AAP

I wanted to ask whether you have experienced any kind of anti-Americanism in your education. Has the teacher given his/her opinion on the Iraq war/war on terror? Has your teacher ever encouraged you to take part in any demonstrations? Does your teacher even mention America at all?

Do you think Peter Costello is right or wrong for saying this?

[Captain Blake]

I wanted to ask whether you have experienced any kind of anti-Americanism in your education.
Yep, from my old englsih teacher, probably in the right age group aswell. But he's views are always supported.

Has the teacher given his/her opinion on the Iraq war/war on terror?
Same guy, and a few other teachers, but again all have backed up, except this one teacher, who might I add, is a complete moron.

Has your teacher ever encouraged you to take part in any demonstrations?
Nope.

Does your teacher even mention America at all?
Unless i'm in history and it's something to do with the subject, nope.

Do you think Peter Costello is right or wrong for saying this?
I can't see it doing too much harm, I guess it could sway a few peoples views and cause a bit of rasicm to Americans. But I think the government, who is tightly bounded with America is just trying to get people to believe a bit more in what the Americans are doing, and to try and get them to support their views.

[cheese]

Hahahaha Costelo may be onto something. This is something I thought about a while ago, its all brainwashing. Im doing english extension 1, the topic is called "retreat from the global". The global often stems from American culture. So most of the time the global is thought of to be America. I spose it depends on the teachers opinions on how the course is taught but it does seem to be slightly anti-american.

Some of the texts we use are definately anti-american. There was one cartoon of the statue of saddam being pulled down and a maccas 'm' being put up in place.

My teacher doesnt impart her views on us directly, but yeah ide say there are some anti-american sentiments there. The course gives us different viewpoints on the global but they are mostly negative.

Realy though, in the EX1 course you are supposed to be constructing your own viewpoints and ideas on local vs global and you arent alowed to say that "local cultures are good, America and globalisation are bad", they are meant to be taken as 'inextricably linked".

I remember back to geography a few years ago. Globalisation was taught as straight up bad in relation to the environment. This was definately due to the teachers views who is pretty much a greenie (cmon he's a geo teacher).

Its all a big conspiracy involving the BOS and Al Qaeda in a plot to turn Australian kids into an army of terrorists to help over throw the US and take over the world.

One other thing I was wondering about the english course is why are there so many fucking femminist texts!?. Is it because the person who sets the sylabus is a femminist? All of the y12 english staff are females and are femminist oriented. Me and mates have to keep the class and teacher in check by spouting the occasional chauvonist remark or bitching about all the femminist crap we have lumped on us. If they are trying to sway us to be all 'pro femme' they are miserably failing. Ive got nothing against women and im not sexist, but from the constant femminst topics we recieve ive come to think of femminists as constantly whinging, stupid bitches who should be completely ignored, and/or locked to the kitchen (Syliva Plath in particular). One thing I found amusing is that Germain Greer femminist extrordinair published an article called "C**t Power" (this was not taught at school).

[W2ttsy]

did anyone see the article on ACA last week (thurs i think) about the little indian girl who isnt allowed to win a council literary prize because the council sponsoring the event thinks her short story about a suicide bomber is too anti american.

the stupid council motherfucker kept spitting out all this stuff about it being anti american, and bad and shit, instead of praising an 11 yro for writing what sounds like a wonderful piece of writing.

personally, its people like this that really do a detriment to any efforts to stop terrorism, as they are only instilling the terrorist ideals even further.

as for me, i got out of school before all this war on iraq shit started. i thank my lucky stars every day my brother tells me about the shit he had to deal with in class regarding the war.

W2ttsy

[johnny]

This is really interesting, thanks for the replies.

Keep them coming!

[cornflake]

well all our PD teachers are always on about America being the "fat country".....

pointless post but I said it none-the-less :p

[Joel O]

I wanted to ask whether you have experienced any kind of anti-Americanism in your education.yes and no. there was deifnately anti americanism but it wasn't so much targeting america, more so groups or individuals doing specific things and targeting specific policies. there was anti french/soviet/american/south african/indian etc. nuclear testing. anti japanese whaling, contrasting it to cultures which traditionally practice whaling. and other similar issues

Has the teacher given his/her opinion on the Iraq war/war on terror? yes but it was always made clear that it was just his opinion and we'd usually have time to discuss it between ourselves and as a class before we heard his opinion and he always had plenty of material backing it up

Has your teacher ever encouraged you to take part in any demonstrations?no, although he was a bit into that sort of thing so we suggested it as a class excursion, i don't think he understood we weren't serious

Does your teacher even mention America at all?yes, in good and bad ways.

Do you think Peter Costello is right or wrong for saying this?on the right track but i think as long as teachers are teaching facts and providing work that will give the student the chance to think and have their own opinion then its not really a problem.

[demo man]

yeah, my teachers talk about it a bit.

some way more than others, but the good teachers always ask you what you think and then argue against it, regardless of what their personal veiws are. things have calmed down a lot more now, and it's not such a hot topic, but when it was, i knew what almost all of my teachers thought about it.

America in general comes up a lot, especially in one class - Global Wealth.
i was expecting a class on economics but it's not. the teacher there is a very outspoken one, who says a lot of stuff that as a teacher she probably shouldn't. so far all we've done is crappy boring figures about the fact that lots of people die for stuff we don't die for (illnesses and AIDS etc.). i keep saying "i know that hose countries are poor, i didi this class so i could find out why!"

anyway, that teacher says a lot of negative things about the US and other large Westurn cultural landmarks (Wall-mart etc.) - but most of what she says is based on fct, so why shouldn't she say it?

i don't know of one teacher who supports the war, but then i don't know all the teachers, only most of them.

i, nor any of my freinds, have been encouraged to do a demonstartion, but those of us who do get involved in them are supported and get "good on you" and "glad to see you give a shit" comments afterwards.


i think it is definately okay for teachers to talk about america, i think it should be done. anytime one country controls most of the world (indirectly or directly) we should know a fair bit about them, but only if it is presented as a factual study etc. rather than a bitch.
finding out the truth and uncovering whatever consiracies or what-have-you is a good thing to do, as long as we aren't taught that Aus. doesn't have them as well, along with every where else.

as long as the information is given to us and not just the attitude then it's fine.

another problem is defining 'anti-americanism' with simple education about things that happen or that that particular government does...

[I_am]

Yer i have had my history teacher go on about America before. He uses Vietnam as an example sometimes, which i understand but i dont think its is very necasary. I havnt ever had a teacher say go on a demonstration but i have had one teacher say that he supports alot of the demonstrations.

[nickz]

I think it's anti-US history that is the problem here. How about this...Costello bans teaching of Modern History to students in efforts to stem anti-US sentiment.<--Not really but anyway. Why would anyone think that the US is some imperialist bully? Oh, because they were were/are and anyone who chooses to educate themselves will see this. Teachers should put the facts out there if asked (not force opinions), and promote healthy debate among student . Being realistic here, I hardly think that anti-US sentiment can be cultivated into some sort of way to bolster terrorists in Australia, I mean really. Talk about trying to scare people. The solution for anti-US (government) feeling is...Stop pissing people off!

[wtr]

I looked up "terrorism" in the thesaurus and found "Bush thirsts for oil".

It seems to me that 'most' senior history and literature teachers are always opinionated again the 'US' in some way, whether you are yabbering on about the A bomb, Wall St crash, Maccus...they always somehow detour your convo to a "look at america" conclusion.

I missed school...no more free papers to read everyday.:o But I still prefer the life after school.:D

[tu plang]

I think it's anti-US history that is the problem here. How about this...Costello bans teaching of Modern History to students in efforts to stem anti-US sentiment.<--Not really but anyway. Why would anyone think that the US is some imperialist bully? Oh, because they were were/are and anyone who chooses to educate themselves will see this. Teachers should put the facts out there if asked (not force opinions), and promote healthy debate among student . Being realistic here, I hardly think that anti-US sentiment can be cultivated into some sort of way to bolster terrorists in Australia, I mean really. Talk about trying to scare people. The solution for anti-US (government) feeling is...Stop pissing people off!

Hmm this is true, and there is nothing wrong with facts... but as michael moore has shown us, facts can be molested into telling whatever story you want.

I've had a couple of teachers - english and history - over the years that have been very 'open' about their left wing views. When doing a unit on representation of people in newspapers she once commented "Who here really thinks John Howard will be re-elected?" (this was just before the last election - obviously)

[johnny]

Teachers accused of anti-US bias
By John Garnaut and Geesche Jacobsen
August 22, 2005


The federal Treasurer has drawn a rebuke from teachers for warning them against spreading anti-Americanism in schools and suggesting it could mutate into anti-Westernism and terrorist attacks against Australia.

Venturing outside his usual economic territory, Peter Costello said many teachers were carrying left-wing ideological baggage from the 1970s.

"If your teacher's carrying that bias it tends to get passed on," he said yesterday. "…Anti-Americanism can easily morph into anti-Westernism. Particularly you've seen that with terrorists. They don't really draw distinctions between Americans or Britons or Australians; they just like to hit anybody who they consider to be part of the West."

Mr Costello's comments to Channel Nine followed a lengthy critique of the US-Australia relationship at the Australian American Leadership Dialogue on Saturday night.

The NSW Teachers Federation condemned Mr Costello's comments as "absolute nonsense". Its senior vice-president, Angelo Gavrielatos, said: "The constant denegration of teachers isn't good for the country."

In his first public speech on foreign policy since becoming Treasurer almost 10 years ago, Mr Costello acknowledged the existence of problems with American power, such as its success in exporting "distasteful" views on sex and violence through the mass media.

"Unfortunately, America has found it much easier to spread its mass culture than to spread its high principles," he said.

Observers said Mr Costello had used the speech to inject nuance into the Australia-US relationship, and contrasted it with comments made by some cabinet colleagues.

Mr Costello said Australia's regional interests would frequently diverge from America's, as he had made clear in his approaches to international trade, to Indonesia during the Asian economic crisis and more recently to China, when the United States was pushing for it to revalue its currency.

"Australia views this [revaluation] issue through the lens of regional economic stability," he said. "The United States views it in the context of bilateral trade."

Mr Costello also contrasted Australia's tolerance of democratic diversity with the utopian values often associated with neoconservatives in the Bush Administration.

"The United States believes it has a 'manifest destiny' to take its view of human rights to the world," he said.

Allan Gyngell, executive director of the Lowy Institute for International Policy, said Mr Costello had "defined Australian policy in the tradition of British empiricism rather than American idealism".

Mr Costello said problems with American power and differences in policy were far outweighed by benefits.

"If the world is to have a hegemon, the modern United States is the kind of hegemon we would like to have: democratic, respectful of human rights, with strong and genuine belief in individual liberty," he said.

But Sharon Canty, spokeswoman for the Parents and Citizens Federation, suggested Mr Costello was more interested in media and leadership than policy.

"Evidence of successful education in NSW could be a student's ability to recognise a grab for leadership and media time when they see one," she said.

[nickz]

Hmm this is true, and there is nothing wrong with facts... but as michael moore has shown us, facts can be molested into telling whatever story you want.

This is very true, and I'm sure a lot of kids say " Oh I watched Farenheit 911, I know what's going on etc.." which is unfortunate as, like you said, Michael Moore bends facts to fit in with his angle. Healthy debate opens students eyes up to what's going on in the world, and anything promoting them to analyse facts and read between the lines is a good thing. The mechanics of world politics, reasons behind foreign policy decisions, trade pressure etc are issues that *should* interest them, nobody needs to take it to an activist level or anything, but awareness and understanding is great.

[Daver]

I wanted to ask whether you have experienced any kind of anti-Americanism in your education. Has the teacher given his/her opinion on the Iraq war/war on terror? Has your teacher ever encouraged you to take part in any demonstrations? Does your teacher even mention America at all?


I finished last year.

I'd say that most of my teachers wouldn't really give a shit about America, however, the history ones did seem very anti-American. My year 10/11/12 history teacher was pretty in depth about Iraq, and his views are still the most convincing ones i've heard. He blamed America for the cause of the terror, and actually went back to post WW2 with all his sources. He didn't seem to push us to take part in demonstrations (in fact, he always argued that written demonstrations were always going to be more successful). America was only mentioned when it either made a good example (parallel with earlier British and French imperialism and colonialism) as well as it's subsequent decline.

Strangely though, i find the uni lecturers and tutors more anti american than school teachers...