I am prefacing everything I am about to share and post with why I am choosing to do so. What my ultimate goal is may change over time, but at least for now, my goal is to stay true to my promise to someone recently to “no longer be silent“. An incident occurred at our kids school that is something that has been going on for some time, and is most likely no different this year than in previous years, but has now affected me more deeply than in the past. Most likely this is due to the extremely volatile political environment that currently exists with our upcoming presidential elections. Which is also heightened by the prevalence of “anti” discussions and “ism” behaviors being discussed during political conversations and the way it’s being done. Anti-conservative, anti-liberal, anti-respect? But ultimately because this is a deeply personal topic and conversation that affects my family, my kids, my community and frankly – YOU as well.
And it’s less the topic that is so important but more HOW the discussion happens, the environment in which it’s shared and the things people take away from the conversations. I have so much to say and share but will try and narrow this down and focus so there is an understanding of where I’m coming from.
In May, The Northwest School, where both our kids were students for many years, where we were an active part of the community, which we really love and greatly respect, had their annual Humanities curriculum “teaching” the Israel-Palestine Conflict. Sadly – IMHO – what they are teaching is their perspective on the subject, that highlights their bias (see the definition of bias in my earlier post) and IMHO goes directly against, is contradictory to, and is in conflict with the very values and philosophy the school professes to promote.
As such, it came to our attention which videos were being presented on the topic. While it was no surprise to us there was such a strong bias against Israel, this year it affected us more deeply and so we shared our concerns on Facebook. The conversation that ensued was sad and disturbing while being enlightening at the same time. The next few posts will be an overview of that conversation and what transpired.
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