Dearborn Student Controversy

**Detroitej72** · January-06-10, 09:17 PM

I'm surprised nobody has posted this yet:
http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0geusNcQ0...81/detail.html

The students seem a bit out of line to me on this one.

**iheartthed** · January-06-10, 09:26 PM

Very nice that they felt the need to identify the students ethnicity.

**Zacha341** · January-06-10, 09:41 PM

I think the ethnicity "could" have a bearing on the what was meant by the design. Leaving it out would have been odd too. Hard to please everyone with this kind of thing in these times. And it would have come out anyway...

**gnome** · January-06-10, 09:51 PM

yes I thought it was nice too. Thank you for saying so IHD, it shows how much you appreciate fact based journalism. Good point.

**Detroitej72** · January-06-10, 10:01 PM

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Very nice that they felt the need to identify the students ethnicity.

Kind of like how they called the Holocaust Museum shooter, a "German-American"?

**jtf1972** · January-06-10, 10:37 PM

They're lucky they weren't here in NYC. They might not have made it to the office.

**iheartthed** · January-06-10, 10:58 PM

Originally Posted by Detroitej72

Kind of like how they called the Holocaust Museum shooter, a "German-American"?

And that's makes this right how......?

**gnome** · January-06-10, 11:13 PM

Oh, IHD you make me laugh so hard, pretending you don't know about context and its connection to meaning. Oh man, stop it, lol

**detroitsgwenivere** · January-07-10, 12:35 AM

Maybe it's just me, but I think that if these were white students in suburbia somewhere, it wouldn't have been made into this big a deal, hence the discussion about including the students race in the article.

It seems that nowadays, everyone is looking for someway to take offense to something. When I attended Wc3, I wore a shirt proclaiming 9-11 an inside job. Classmates thought it was awesome and my professors congratulated me for exercising my first amendment rights without fear. Some lady said she thinks these kids should be expelled from school, denied their basic right to an education because they chose to display their school spirit in a way that offended a few lightweights. These kids have so few rights in this country that they become fodder for over controlling parents and authority figures looking for any means to make examples of those who step out of line. What the hell is this country coming to when we question whether or not to allow a young person, who is already up against the world to make it without ending up in a prison, an education because we don't agree with something they wore on a sweatshirt?

MichMatters · January-07-10, 12:46 AM

I'm not sure how IHD was wrong in his observation. Journalist are people, and despite whatever they say or try to do, they leave biases revealed like a trail of breadcrumbs like anyone else. The dominate ethnicity of the school obviously wasn't relevant to the "news", and I question whether this should have had the effect it did in the first place. It's obvious to me the students had honest motives [[i.e. we can't be beat) and made a rather stupid choice in symbolism given how irrationally emotional everyone is about the event. Perhaps, I could see the story if they were in some way supporting the disaster, but the shirt and the thought behind it points to quite the contrary. This isn't much of a story that needed anything beyond a blurb, and at the community level, it was something not worthy of what it got: a community forum.

**artds** · January-07-10, 09:24 AM

Originally Posted by detroitsgwenivere

Maybe it's just me, but I think that if these were white students in suburbia somewhere, it wouldn't have been made into this big a deal, hence the discussion about including the students race in the article.

It seems that nowadays, everyone is looking for someway to take offense to something. When I attended Wc3, I wore a shirt proclaiming 9-11 an inside job. Classmates thought it was awesome and my professors congratulated me for exercising my first amendment rights without fear. Some lady said she thinks these kids should be expelled from school, denied their basic right to an education because they chose to display their school spirit in a way that offended a few lightweights. These kids have so few rights in this country that they become fodder for over controlling parents and authority figures looking for any means to make examples of those who step out of line. What the hell is this country coming to when we question whether or not to allow a young person, who is already up against the world to make it without ending up in a prison, an education because we don't agree with something they wore on a sweatshirt?

I think you're grossly overestimating the "rights" of the students [[see, e.g., the Morse v. Frederick supreme court case from 2007) and grossly underestimating the rights and duties of the high school principal, such as their right to determine what is appropriate for a learning environment and their duty to "teach" students that society finds certain things terribly offensive.

The students apparently told the principal that they "didn't mean any harm" by having the T-shirts made, which makes this sound less like a free speech issue and more like a bunch of dumb kids thinking that they were being clever without realizing they went too far.

**iheartthed** · January-07-10, 09:27 AM

Originally Posted by gnome

Oh, IHD you make me laugh so hard, pretending you don't know about context and its connection to meaning. Oh man, stop it, lol

Are you saying that we should judge this differently if white students had made these shirts?

bartock · January-07-10, 09:45 AM

Originally Posted by detroitsgwenivere

Maybe it's just me, but I think that if these were white students in suburbia somewhere, it wouldn't have been made into this big a deal, hence the discussion about including the students race in the article.

It seems that nowadays, everyone is looking for someway to take offense to something. When I attended Wc3, I wore a shirt proclaiming 9-11 an inside job. Classmates thought it was awesome and my professors congratulated me for exercising my first amendment rights without fear. Some lady said she thinks these kids should be expelled from school, denied their basic right to an education because they chose to display their school spirit in a way that offended a few lightweights. These kids have so few rights in this country that they become fodder for over controlling parents and authority figures looking for any means to make examples of those who step out of line. What the hell is this country coming to when we question whether or not to allow a young person, who is already up against the world to make it without ending up in a prison, an education because we don't agree with something they wore on a sweatshirt?

Wow...you can't be serious going THERE. If this were a white person in suburbia it wouldn't have been a big deal? Jesus [[no pun intended.)

**artds** · January-07-10, 09:53 AM

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Are you saying that we should judge this differently if white students had made these shirts?

To use our criminal justice system as a metaphor here, I would argue that if you were the judge, you shouldn't find them guilty and sentence them harshly based on their ethnicity, but you're the police investigator, their ethnicity should cause you to look at this a little more closely than you might have otherwise [[if, say, the perps were Taiwanese) in order to determine what the intent was and whether it might warrant punishment.

The way this translates to the actual context of this incident is that the students' ethnicity should have [[and did) prompt the school to take a closer look at this matter to see what the students' intent was and whether it warrants punishment, but the students' ethnicity should not be a factor in determining that there was ill intent, nor in determining what their punishment should be.

So to answer your question, no, we shouldn't JUDGE this differently or hand out a different punishment if white students had made these shirts and had the same intent as these Arab students, but it is justifiable for the students' ethnicity to have raised a red flag and caused the school to look at the matter more closely to see if there was ill intent that warranted punishment.

**gnome** · January-07-10, 10:02 AM

OK, IHD, can you tell me the difference in the meaning of the following symbols?

Attachment 4689

Attachment 4690

Attachment 4691

**Detroitnerd** · January-07-10, 10:05 AM

You know, I was in New York for 9/11 and I'm not outraged. In fact, I'm a little relieved every time I see people appropriate the event with a wink. Or, put it another way, I'm tired of the way the government, military and right-wing nuts have hogged the event for their own means. Let the kids have some fun with it for all I care.

**iheartthed** · January-07-10, 10:13 AM

Originally Posted by artds

So to answer your question, no, we shouldn't JUDGE this differently or hand out a different punishment if white students had made these shirts and had the same intent as these Arab students, but it is justifiable for the students' ethnicity to have raised a red flag and caused the school to look at the matter more closely to see if there was ill intent that warranted punishment.

Okay, so let me be clear: I am speaking specifically about the media finding it necessary to mention the ethnicity of the students in this story. I've read this article several times, and haven't discovered why the mention of ethnicity was relevant. Would the shirt be less offensive if white or Asian students had made it?

Point blank, it was not necessary for the writers to mention in this article that the students are Arab [[And Arab does not even equal Muslim for goodness sake!). And since it was not necessary, I have to assume that the inclusion of the students ethnicity in the article was to either stoke xenophobic sentiments of the audience, or to appease the xenophobic tendencies of the writer. Or both.

Lets play a game. Let's call the game "Does the story change?"

About 15 students at Edsel Ford High School are in trouble over a class sweatshirt they had made over the holiday break.
The class of 2011 sweatshirt has the number 11 made to look like the World Trade Center Towers. The school's mascot, a Thunderbird, is seen flying toward the number.

Does the paragraph quoted above tell a different story than the one quoted below?

About 15 Arab-American students at Edsel Ford High School are in trouble over a class sweatshirt they had made over the holiday break.
The class of 2011 sweatshirt has the number 11 made to look like the World Trade Center Towers. The school's mascot, a Thunderbird, is seen flying toward the number.

**Danny** · January-07-10, 10:32 AM

It's amazing what the P.A.T.R.I.OT. Act can do to a couple of Arab-American Muslim teens for Dearborn's Edsel Ford High School who wore a 'Class of 2011' sweat shirt which contain a symbol of '11'. That symbol has windows with the eagle mascot coming toward the '11' symbol which represents the World Trade Towers. It seems to me that as we Americans are still living in fear against Islamofacist terrorism, symbols that represent 9/11 is unacceptable just like the J.P. McCarthy 'witch hunt' trials for would be communists who possess the red star with the hammer and the sickle.

We Americans are starting to get more afraid when we look at Arabs from their holy deserts. We Americans start too see Arabs stereotypically from their radical religion containing the scimitar or the world 'Al-Qaeda, Al-Aqsa and Hamas. Islam means jihad for peace not totem war. Even most Muslims around the world are against racial Islam for it denies the truth from the Holy Qu'ran. Islamofacist terrorist organizations rely on radical imans who twist the Holy Qu'ran telling Muslims that you want reward in heaven you must kill all infidels. Their other [[Allah) could be deguised as Satan,The Devil and millions of Muslims are falling for it.The real Allah does not man to kill others because he says so and its written in his commandments. Islamofacist terrorists are not keeping Allah's laws seriously and they will be falling short in the kingdom if they don't repent right away. They are fighting the losing battle just like a preview to revelations for they will be judge by Jesus in the great white throne on judgement day and might be burn up in their own personal Lake of Fire. I urged all Muslims to stop denying the truth of real [[Allah) and worship him and spirit and truth. All Muslims must know they the human civilazation is changing and they deal with the change. Christians and Jews will gladly help your Islamic culture if you help us first.

WORD FROM THE STREET PROPHET

Because we all believe in God even though we go through different paths.

In Memoriam Neda Soltani, a great Muslim liberator for all mankind.

**One Shot** · January-07-10, 12:59 PM

How about if some American's went to school in Iraq and wore a T-shirt showing Sadaam's statue being pulled down with a similar slogan. [[I know most praised his falling but for the sake of an arguement) Do you think they woulda even made it to school that day?
The parents should've know [[if they were aware) that the shirts are controversial and just plain wrong.
I say the students knew what they were doing and were not referring to their graduating class but to their "group". There is obvious tension between ethnicities there according to news reports.
Trying to prove motives is tough though.

**Detroitnerd** · January-07-10, 01:01 PM

How about if a World Trade Center went to school wearing an American student with an image of the Middle East being targeted by George Bush? Do you think that the building would have made it to lower Manhattan? What were that building's parents thinking?

**EastsideAl** · January-07-10, 01:48 PM

Dumb kids, who like a lot of dumb kids [[myself very much included) probably didn't realize when they had gone too far with whatever dumb kid point they were trying to make and had verged into territory that is offensive and hurtful. Let's try to keep in mind that these kids were about 7 or 8 years old when 9/11 happened, and so the event may have a level of abstraction and remoteness to them, and even a somewhat different meaning, than it does to those of us who were adults at the time.

**eno** · January-07-10, 02:02 PM

The lesson for today at Edsel Ford High School is denial of freedom of speech. Those students who had the sweat shirts made up should be free to express their beliefs just as a previous poster was allowed to express his/her belief that 9/11 was an inside job. The students may have to conform to certain restrictions regarding the school principals authority to maintain a learning environment. However, after school is out and the students are off campus, they should be allowed to wear whatever they want and express whatever opinion they choose. That is the American way.

**Detroitnerd** · January-07-10, 02:35 PM

Originally Posted by eno

The lesson for today at Edsel Ford High School is denial of freedom of speech. Those students who had the sweat shirts made up should be free to express their beliefs just as a previous poster was allowed to express his/her belief that 9/11 was an inside job. The students may have to conform to certain restrictions regarding the school principals authority to maintain a learning environment. However, after school is out and the students are off campus, they should be allowed to wear whatever they want and express whatever opinion they choose. That is the American way.

Makes sense, Eno. Gotta say I agree. Sunlight is the best disinfectant. School administrators love to soften up kids so they don't know their real rights. I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend your right to say it. Decorum is the mask of cowardice.

**Patrick** · January-07-10, 06:18 PM

Even if the media hadn't mentioned their ethnicity you can bet your ass that most readers would have been able to put it together pretty quick since it was in Dearborn.

**gazhekwe** · January-07-10, 06:30 PM

I thought the design was quite creative. Too bad it is offensive to so many people, and, because of the ethnic identifier in the article, will serve to inflame already existing prejudices.

I can't tell from the picture if there is anything in the design to identify it as a Class of '11 shirt from Edsel Ford High. If that eagle is clearly their logo, then absolutely, the principle has to take action to separate the design from any official school activity. Otherwise, I would rather have the shirts taken away and leave it at that for the comfort of everyone. It would be a good idea to promote discussion within the student body about this issue.