the beads

Three days before my last day of school as a senior in high school I was hauled into the principal's office for an infraction involving orange wine coolers, Bacardi Dark Rum and two teenage girls, who shall remain nameless. The principal, Mr. Bordelon, scolded me for a full ten minutes before saying, "The only reason I am not expelling you right now is because I don't want you back here next year." Fast forward nearly ten years. I walk into a high school Civics class at a girl's Catholic high school where I am the teacher. The third person on my roll sheet is, you guessed it, Mr. Bordelon's daughter. Now, it should be said that I was definitely involved in more than my fair share of expellable offenses while in high school, but that does not prevent me from feeling, to this day, unreasonable vitriol for Principal Bordelon. Obviously my position of authority presented all manner of opportunity to settle the score, as it were, with Principal B. I could, well within the rules if not the spirit of the position, have made his daughter's time in my class uncomfortable, at the very least. I opted not to. I did that not out of any altruism, or even maturity, but because I took my position as a teacher seriously. To me, it meant that I would present my course materials as objectively as possible, with no proselytizing, and no bias. Apparently high school teachers are no longer constrained by such ethical chains, as is evidenced by the case of Sean Allen, and Jay Bennish's high school geography class.

By now you have no doubt heard the tape Sean made. The day after the State of the Union Address Jay Bennish subjected his 1oth grade geography class to a twenty minute screed on the evils of the Bush administration. According to my dictionary, geography is defined as: the physical characteristics, especially the surface features, of an area. I seem to recall, from my college geography class, that some attention was paid to the effects of human activity on the planet, but even that discussion did not rise to the level meted out by Mr. Bennish. He, in succession, compared coca farmers in South America to tobacco farmers in North Carolina, framed capitalism as a system at odds with human compassion and caring, argued that the war in Iraq would have been for profit even if weapons of mass destruction had been found, characterized the United States as the "most violent nation on planet Earth," compared the country of Israel, as a whole, to Hamas, and, in one meorable quote, suggested that President Bush and Adolf Hitler possess "eerie similarities."

Knowing as I do that a great many of the people who read these postings are inclined to favor these views I will not seek to argue the veracity of Bennish's positions. Do not bother to send me what would, in a different technological age, be letters written in crayon. The point of this column is not to refight these particular battles. The point is that high school geography class is not the venue for this rant, for a number of reasons. The main reason is that teachers hold a position of authority. Just as it would have been wrong for me to make the daughter of Mr. Bordelon suffer for his perceived and/or real transgressions. It was wrong for Mr. Bennish to direct his anti-American bombast to, what is in effect, a captive audience.

Tustin Amole, a spokeswoman for the Cherry Creek school district said, "After listening to the tape, it's evident the comments in the class were inappropriate. There were not adequate opportunities for opposing points of view." That is the issue with which I, personally, take umbrage. I served, proudly, in the 7th Infantry Division (Light), in part, so that Mr. Bennish could bluster any bone-headed, outrageous point of view he wishes. The First Amendment specifically protects outrageous speech because mainstream speech needs no such protection. The error here is that suggesting Mr. Bennish's actions constitute free speech. What he did was wrong, partially because he offered no counterpoint, but mainly because he interjected his own opinions into a venue where they have no business. Education is about us finding ourselves through exposure to the facts of the world. Mr. Bennish violated the trust that comes along with the position by offering his viewpoints as the only facts. In a college setting these comments would have been odious, but in a high school setting they become indoctrinal. He became the thing he pretends to decry: a tyrant.

Sadly, all too many people will argue that the things Jay Bennish said are accurate and worthy of public debate. That may have weight, and, in a coffee shop that sells hemp products, he is welcomed to posit any dimwitted, misguided, communistic rhetoric he can cull from the Democratic Party talking points. What he should not do though, is use his position of trust to expound on these themes. What he should not do is violate the sanctity of the teacher-student relationship by offering personal opinion as classroom content. In one portion of his philippic he paused to allow note taking. Any excuse thereafter that this was all to stimulate discussion becomes nothing more than sophistry, and anyone who truly cherishes the right of free speech should recognize the difference.

I truly hope that the Cherry Creek school district fires Mr. Bennish. I do not believe, in these politically charged times, that they will, but I hope they do. He has hired the same attorney who currently defends Ward Churchill, so this will, no doubt, become an issue of political expression, and they will seek to represent Bennish as the victim. Nothing could be further from the truth. Children, and 10th graders are children, deserve the opportunity to develop their own positions and views about the world. Mr. Bennish would, no doubt, disagree because, seemingly, to him, and to all too many like him, free speech means freedom to say whatever you want, provided you agree with him. I wonder what Mr. Bordelon would think about his daughter hearing, in my classroom, twenty minutes of my thoughts on him. Shame on you Jay Bennish, and to you Mr. Bordelon I can only say, wherever you are, that I am grateful for the lesson I learned the day your daughter walked into my class.