Kill the witch (and everything will be all right)
Hey Folks,
Here are some things people have believed in the past; some people still believe it:
Cows die and crops fail because of witch’s spells.
A curse or blessing really works and once uttered cannot be called back.
Taking someone’s picture captures his soul which is then trapped inside the picture.
The mentally deranged are inhabited by evil spirits.
The earth is flat.
Kings are chosen by God.
It is the white man’s “burden” to “civilize” the black and brown peoples of the world.
The rich are rich because God blesses them; the poor are poor because they are sinful.
The South won the Civil War.
Women aren’t fit to vote.
WW I was fought to make the world safe for Democracy.
Poking needles in a voodoo doll can harm an individual if a bit of his fingernail or hair has been placed in the doll’s “mojo” bag.
Japan committed no atrocities in WW II.
The Holocaust never happened.
It was good to drop the bomb on Japan.
There is no global warming.
Saddam is in league with Al Kaida
And these same folks believe that Cuba is a terrible threat to our beloved democracy, our capitalism, our religion, and our domestic cigar industry - not to mention professional baseball's farm-team system. It is their belief that Cuba must be subjugated at all costs; we can’t even let on that Cuban children might smile every now and then
-Uke Man
ACLU sues Fla. schools over Cuba book ban
By LAURA WIDES-MUNOZ, Associated Press Writer
MIAMI -
The American Civil Liberties Union asked a federal judge to stop the Miami-Dade County school district from removing a series of children's books from its libraries, including a volume about Cuba which depicts smiling kids in communist uniforms.
The ACLU and the Miami-Dade County Student Government Association argued in a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Miami on Wednesday that the school board should add materials with alternate viewpoints rather than remove books that could be offensive.
Last week, the board voted 6-3 to remove "Vamos a Cuba" and its English-language version, "A Visit to Cuba" from 33 schools, stating the books were inappropriate for young readers because of inaccuracies and omissions about life in the communist nation.
The book, by Alta Schreier, targets students ages 5 to 7 and contains images of smiling children wearing uniforms of Cuba's communist youth group and a carnival celebrating the 1959 Cuban revolution. The district owns 49 copies of the book in Spanish and English.
The school board also decided to remove 24 other books in the series, including ones on Greece, Mexico and Vietnam, "despite not having received a complaint about those books and without having reviewed the books in its administrative process," the suit said.
The ACLU noted the books have received favorable reviews in nationally recognized publications including Publishers Weekly and the School Library Journal. The suit also cites staff recommendations to keep the books.
"The Miami-Dade School Board's decision to defy U.S. law prohibiting censorship and ignore the recommendation of their own superintendent and two committees is a slap in the face to our tradition of free speech and the school board's own standards of due process," said JoNel Newman, an attorney working with the ACLU.
School district spokesman Joseph Garcia said the district will go to court to defend the board's decision.
The controversy began in April when a parent who said he had been a political prisoner in Cuba complained about the books' depiction of life under communist rule.
The lawsuit alleges the books' removal violates students' rights to a free press and that the volumes were removed without due process.
Here are some things people have believed in the past; some people still believe it:
Cows die and crops fail because of witch’s spells.
A curse or blessing really works and once uttered cannot be called back.
Taking someone’s picture captures his soul which is then trapped inside the picture.
The mentally deranged are inhabited by evil spirits.
The earth is flat.
Kings are chosen by God.
It is the white man’s “burden” to “civilize” the black and brown peoples of the world.
The rich are rich because God blesses them; the poor are poor because they are sinful.
The South won the Civil War.
Women aren’t fit to vote.
WW I was fought to make the world safe for Democracy.
Poking needles in a voodoo doll can harm an individual if a bit of his fingernail or hair has been placed in the doll’s “mojo” bag.
Japan committed no atrocities in WW II.
The Holocaust never happened.
It was good to drop the bomb on Japan.
There is no global warming.
Saddam is in league with Al Kaida
And these same folks believe that Cuba is a terrible threat to our beloved democracy, our capitalism, our religion, and our domestic cigar industry - not to mention professional baseball's farm-team system. It is their belief that Cuba must be subjugated at all costs; we can’t even let on that Cuban children might smile every now and then
-Uke Man
ACLU sues Fla. schools over Cuba book ban
By LAURA WIDES-MUNOZ, Associated Press Writer
MIAMI -
The American Civil Liberties Union asked a federal judge to stop the Miami-Dade County school district from removing a series of children's books from its libraries, including a volume about Cuba which depicts smiling kids in communist uniforms.
The ACLU and the Miami-Dade County Student Government Association argued in a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Miami on Wednesday that the school board should add materials with alternate viewpoints rather than remove books that could be offensive.
Last week, the board voted 6-3 to remove "Vamos a Cuba" and its English-language version, "A Visit to Cuba" from 33 schools, stating the books were inappropriate for young readers because of inaccuracies and omissions about life in the communist nation.
The book, by Alta Schreier, targets students ages 5 to 7 and contains images of smiling children wearing uniforms of Cuba's communist youth group and a carnival celebrating the 1959 Cuban revolution. The district owns 49 copies of the book in Spanish and English.
The school board also decided to remove 24 other books in the series, including ones on Greece, Mexico and Vietnam, "despite not having received a complaint about those books and without having reviewed the books in its administrative process," the suit said.
The ACLU noted the books have received favorable reviews in nationally recognized publications including Publishers Weekly and the School Library Journal. The suit also cites staff recommendations to keep the books.
"The Miami-Dade School Board's decision to defy U.S. law prohibiting censorship and ignore the recommendation of their own superintendent and two committees is a slap in the face to our tradition of free speech and the school board's own standards of due process," said JoNel Newman, an attorney working with the ACLU.
School district spokesman Joseph Garcia said the district will go to court to defend the board's decision.
The controversy began in April when a parent who said he had been a political prisoner in Cuba complained about the books' depiction of life under communist rule.
The lawsuit alleges the books' removal violates students' rights to a free press and that the volumes were removed without due process.
1 Comments:
Hi Tom,
Heaven forbid that there might be smiling children in Cuba. There wouldn't be many smiling children here if they knew what was being done to destroy their future in this country. Sondra
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