School's Stage Was Set For A Stark Lesson (High School Anti-War Protest)

School's stage was set for a stark lesson

By SUSAN PAYNTER
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST
March 16, 2005


Three invited pro-military speakers were shocked last Friday when they arrived for a West Seattle High student assembly to confront a theater stage strewn with figures costumed as Iraqi men, women and children splashed with blood.

It was a warm-up for the "Iraq Awareness Assembly" so no students except the actual actors saw the skit before the military guests complained to principal Susan Derse and she put a stop to it. And here comes the crucial part: no teachers or advisers were on hand or evidently even aware of the content although that part is one of several things still under investigation.

What happened at West Seattle High was troubling and messy, to be sure. But it also was educational, if you don't mind learning the hard way. Lessons don't all come neatly packaged. Sometimes they come laced with pain, anger, regret and conflicting passions.

In the aftermath of the assembly, students, administrators and staff are learning, among other things, just how deep run the emotional divisions behind the bumper stickers they may encounter in the school parking lot.

"War is terrorism!," "No Iraq War!" and "Not in My Name!" some slogans say. "Land of the Free Because of the Brave!," "My Daughter Is Serving in Iraq" and "Proud American, Embarrassed Washingtonian (with photos of Sen. Patty Murray and Rep. Jim McDermott)" others declare.

For Nadine Gulit of Operation Support Our Troops, the spectacle was sickening.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/paynter/216092_paynter16.html

From the article:
"The initial understanding, the point of the assembly, was for it to be completely thorough and balanced -- three speakers to support the troops, three who were anti-war. And the drama or enactment was supposed to be the same."

Does "thorough and balanced" really mean "hide the truth"?

The anti-war students were trying to inject a little reality into the mix. Too bad their efforts were sanitized. Can't let students have an inkling of what's going on over there, can they?

The students told the truth about war?

Unforgivable.

as it did in the sixties.

What happened at West Seattle High was troubling and messy, to be sure. But it also was educational, if you don't mind learning the hard way...

"War is terrorism!," "No Iraq War!" and "Not in My Name!" some slogans say. "Land of the Free Because of the Brave!," "My Daughter Is Serving in Iraq" and "Proud American, Embarrassed Washingtonian (with photos of Sen. Patty Murray and Rep. Jim McDermott)" others declare.

Nadine Gulit of Operation Support Our Troops...had been asked by student organizers to provide three speakers and she delivered. "I was told there would be three on each side. No debates. No rebuttal," she said in the e-mail she fired off to members of the Seattle School Board...

What's the problem here? Regardless of whose side you're on, war is war, and that's all the students were trying to point out. Why should they be penalized for being smart enough to realize that they would have been stopped if the teachers had known about the play? I'd be proud if I were the parent of one of these kids.

:headbang:
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