Question/challenge

In August, if all goes as planned, I will be stepping into a classroom full of high school students (and then four more) and teaching them about the history of the world and of the United States. To that end, I’ve started working on mapping out a curriculum and brainstorming for lesson plans.

I do not want to teach them white male history. I will never forget how disappointed I was in my world history class in high school to learn that we would spend two weeks on Africa and China (and nothing at all on South or Central America, the rest of Asia, or Australia) at the end of class, after we spent a week and a half on the French Revolution alone. I do NOT want my students to go through that.

But I also realize that, despite my attempts to remedy these gaps in college, I will probably leave some important world events out, especially as the offering of classes was somewhat limited. For example, I know Philippine, Chinese and Japanese history fairly well, but know very little about the history of South Asia, Korea, Vietnam, and so on. I know next to nothing about African or Australian history. What I know of Russian history is heavily focused on western (European) Russia. I want to make sure that I am doing this right, and not just focusing on the areas I’m interested in.

So my questions to you all:
1. If you were in a high school world history class, what events would you want the teacher to cover? I’m not looking for a history lesson — I can research on my own. I just don’t want to miss anything vital but relatively unknown in the U.S. My only limitations are time and the required curriculum. Well, and parents who get upset that little Madison or little Hunter might actually have to learn something.

I think I have the U.S. covered fairly well, but I’m willing to take suggestions there as well. I’m always happy to learn something new! (And terrified I’ll forget something important.)

Now this is just fucking ridiculous

To anyone who says that the justice system in the U.S. is not horribly fucked up, let’s recap.

In New York, you can fire 50 shots at an unarmed man and kill him, but you won’t go to jail, as long as you have a shiny piece of metal that says NYPD on it.

In Los Angeles, if you fail to move your truck-based eatery every hour, then you may face a $1,000 fine and jail time. [Source]

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS COUNTRY!?

Insensitivity and injustice

I’m angry and upset, but hardly surprised, that the cops involved in Sean Bell’s wedding-day murder were acquitted. And I’m also unsurprised that, at least according to media coverages, only one of them had the balls to apologize, and it was a fairly empty and hurtful apology.

“I’d like to, uh,” he said, and then stopped. Seconds ticked by. His hands nervously worked the sides of the lectern, back and forth, back and forth, before he raised his head and picked up midstream, “say sorry to the Bell family for the tragedy,” he said. “I’d like to thank the Lord, my savior, for today. This is the start of my life back.” [Source]

Sorry I killed your son, but boy am I glad I got off!

“But they attacked the police with a car!” my coworker argued yesterday. I’d challenge anyone to hit the brakes when a cop jumps in front of you and shoots you 50 times. Kind of hard to stop a moving vehicle when you’re dead.

Honestly, I can almost understand the acquittal of Cooper — if I were a cop and heard one of my coworkers yelling for backup and lots of gunfire, instinct might take over. They still ought to have gotten some sort of punishment for running on instinct instead of brains, if not jail time necessarily, but I can at least see the judge’s reasoning there.

But Isnora definitely should have been given prison time. He was supposedly undercover investigating prostitution at this club, yes? So why the fuck was he following Sean Bell and his friends in the first place, who by all accounts had not tried to hire a prostitute? He abandoned his assigned job to follow and harass a bachelor party, and then opened fire on them? And Oliver, who emptied an entire clip and stopped to reload also should have been nailed. He had to know by that time that no one was firing back. How incredibly cold-blooded and calculated.

The point is, not one of them got so much as a slap on the wrist for dereliction of duty, murder of one man, and assault of another two. I cannot imagine the pain and anger and sense of betrayal Sean Bell’s family and fiancee must feel right now.

And while I’m not surprised at the verdict, I am surprised and disturbed at the number of people who choose to sympathize with the police officers and refuse to even consider how they might feel or what they might do if their son’s or fiancee’s murderers walked out of court free men.

If you’re in New York, there are some actions planned. More details at Angry Brown Butch. I’ll add more as I find them.