Posted on 05/20/2004 12:49:27 PM PDT by TaxRelief
MOUNT AIRY, N.C. -- A local high school teacher who watched the beheading of Nicholas Berg in class with some of his students was suspended for two days.
Mack Hodges teaches social studies at Mount Airy High School and also coaches baseball and football. Hodges recently told his class that he could not find the Web site carrying the video of the beheading, a school official said.
In the video, Nicholas Berg is seated on the ground while five armed men disguised by head scarves and masks stand behind him. A man in the middle identified as terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi decapitates Berg. It is unclear when and how Berg, a self-employed telecommunications businessman, was captured. The video has not been shown on U.S. television but has been available on the Internet.
On Tuesday, one of Hodges' students came in before class started, entered search information onto Hodges' computer and brought up the video, Superintendent Bill Church said. Hodges, the student, and five or six other students all viewed the video, Church said.
This video still, obtained from an Islamist website, shows five hooded gunmen standing behind Nicholas Berg.
"The kids who did see it were those who chose to stand there and watch," he said. "It was not a captive audience. Even still, I do not see it as part of our curriculum or responsibility to show that. If parents want to show that, it is different. To discuss it and its implications is a matter of current events, but now to show the gruesome actions."
Hodges was later suspended for two days and was not available for comment late Tuesday.
Teachers in Nebraska, California, Arkansas and Texas all have been suspended or placed on leave in the past couple of weeks for allowing students to view the video in class.
Principal Sandy George will determine what, if any, disciplinary action the student involved will face.
Liberal mission: Keep all students immature and ignorant.
(Perhaps Hodges needs a little bit of cash to help him with the 2 days loss of pay.)
Yeah, he should have just shown explicit sex-ed materials and he never would have gotten into trouble.
oh, but it's okay to have people come in to teach your HS students about gay lifestyles and their "lifestyle" options AND about how tolerance for anything and everything is a GOOD thing, but THIS isn't??? ugh, i'm disgusted. If I was a parent of a student there, I would sue the school because THEIR rights were trampled on!!
I didn't see the video and yet had trouble sleeping just from thinking about what those monsters did to Nick Berg. I hope the kids who watched it don't have horrific nightmares.
Hmm. Interesting idea. I wonder if any FReepers know any HS parents in Andy Griffiths "home town"?
All teachers who knowingly allowed students to watch that video should be fired! I'm tired of seeing the recent Caligula-like fascination with death on the part of a bunch of civilians and REMFs.
Death simply stinks, and the dead are no more than objects.
Most people in our nation (especially conservatives) have no passionate fascination with torture or death. We are better than that. ...any teacher allows my kids to watch that video, he/she will be fired.
Why wasn't this teacher FIRED?
Tenure stopped this?
Is tenure a shield against being responsible?
If the students are kept ignorant, they won't know how serious the fight against fanatic islamites really is.
I've personnally chosen not to view it, as I can imagine vividly enough on my own.
"Yeah, he should have just shown explicit sex-ed materials and he never would have gotten into trouble."
I agree that that those materials shouldn't be shown in schools, either. But on extreme violence, our grandparents were far better than our dope ingesting, Faces of Death leering Baby Boomer generation.
Our soldiers who aren't unduly fascinated with violence (or perverted sex, for that matter) are beating the hell out of an enemy that is, right now. Our soldiers enjoy killing, but they do a much better job of when necessary, with neutral, calm minds on the matter--not sadistic fascination.
The good will defeat the cruel, sooner or later, in any fight.
"Is tenure a shield against being responsible?"
...good question! All of our education in the USA should be privatized, and the practice of tenure should be stopped.
What rule did the teacher violate by showing the video? Is there a regulation prohibiting teachers from showing beheadings? Would any teachers be suspended for showing the Vietnam War pic of the naked, crying girl running down the road?
In the old days, we had public hangings in this country, and children watched. I think showing that video can be justified on the grounds that we need to know who we are fighting.
Fine. All of you make the decisions for YOUR kids, not everybody else's kids.
I would be all over that teacher and that school.
The video that launched Michael S. Berg's political career.
Nothing wrong with showing it. I think it could reasonably shows to high school students, with parents' permission. This wasn't a planned occurrence, so I think two days' suspension is more than enough.
High school is certainly old enough to start coming to grips with man's inhumanity to man.
If you ever pull your head out of the ground, be sure to clean the sand out of your ears.
Viewing that video has nothing to do with fascination. It has everything to do with facing up to the gut wrenching reality of the war we are in and the depravity of out enemy. Images of people jumping out of the Trade Center, charred bodies hung from bridges or the head of an American being sawed off with a dull knife may offend your delicate sensibilities, but they should be burned into the brains of every citizen of the U.S. because that is what our enemies intend for us.
We are in a war. A war that will last for many years to come and that will require the commitment of our young people to execute successfully. Our enemy starts forging their hatred in the hearts and minds of their youth, small children in fact. If we are to stand against this enemy our youth must know and understand the reality of the world they will face if they are not strong and resolute in the face of that enemy.
9/11 was the most horrific event that has ever occurred in my 50+ years of lifetime. Every day I encounter people for whom that day has become a mere symbol which pales in comparison to their daily worries. These are the people who viewed 9/11 (The Sanitary Version). They saw clouds of smoke, lifeless building crumbling, people crying, speeches and stately funerals. The people I run into who saw video of the bodies falling, heard the sound of them hitting the ground, saw images of the body parts recovered and other gruesome images that are deemed to "gross" for general consumption understand the intensity of the war and there is nothing more important to them than winning that war.
So go ahead and hide your head in the sand, but you had better hope there are enough of your fellow citizens, including our youth, who understand what is going on and are able to face up to it. They are the only thing standing between you and a "Real Experience" of reality.
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