Posted on 10/30/2006 5:46:15 AM PST by paltz
(CBS4) FT. LAUDERDALE An art teacher at a Fort Lauderdale charter school is facing indefinite suspension after showing a self-made documentary on ‘good and evil’ to a group of 10 and 11 year old students, featuring gory abortion scenes. Some students and parents complained, and the school objected, but teacher Marc Greenblum says he has no regrets in showing the graphic video.
The film was shown approximately two weeks ago in Greenblum’s art class at the Downtown Academy of Technology and Arts, a charter school funded with tax dollars and under the oversight of the Broward County School Board.
The video, as described by parents who saw it with school officials, included graphic images of the Holocaust, 9/11, and the Ku Klux Klan, among others, and juxtaposed them with extremely graphic images which were allegedly from abortions.
School officials declined to allow CBS4 to view the video, saying they wanted it first to be viewed by Broward County School District administrators, but one student shared his memories of the presentation.
“It was very gory, and all red all over the place,” said one 11-year-old student whose identity is being withheld by cbs4.com at the request of his parents.
“I don’t have any regrets for having shown it and presented it,” teacher Greenblum said Thursday, admitting that even he found the abortion video in the documentary disturbing enough to make him cry. Some of his students said the video was upsetting.
“There was this disturbing picture of a baby’s hand reaching out from the Mom’s stomach and grabbing the doctor’s finger, and there was a baby in a bucket,” the boy said, describing the film played to his art class by Greenblum.
“It’s just so graphic, and I broke down in tears,” said parent Joan Daniel, whose son attends the school and viewed the documentary. Daniel said she viewed the video for the first time Thursday, after her son complained to her, and she complained to the school.
The film was made with the knowledge of the school, and even featured an interview with the school’s principal, according to parents who viewed the video. However, school officials say they were unaware of the full content of the final product and had not authorized its presentation to students.
“He should not have shown this,” said principal Jim DiSebastian, who suspended Greenblum Thursday after CBS4 News began investigating reports of the video’s classroom presentation.
Daniel said she was upset it took two weeks for the school to show her and another parent the video after they complained, and in that time, other parents were not notified the film had been shown, and teacher Greenblum continued to meet with students. When they viewed the video Thursday, the school has yet to take action against Greenblum, and she was at a loss to understand why.
“Someone that’s an educator should know that this is not acceptable, should already know what’s acceptable and what’s not acceptable, and this is way over the line,” Daniel told CBS4’s Evan Bacon in an exclusive interview.
“There are consequences,” said DiSebastian, “and he didn’t think, and it can’t ever happen again.”
But despite the objection of his employers, Greenblum remains unapologetic for showing his young students the graphic and bloody images without the permission of the school or their parents.
“I regret maybe showing it a little prematurely,” Greenblum said, “but having done it, no, and having shown it and educating them and maybe it will change their lives, and they’ll say ‘hey, I saw that' and they’ll talk with someone why may be considering it, and then they can actually touch other lives that way, no, how could you say I would regret that, no.”
Not all parents objected to the video. Some gathered at the school Thursday and spoke in defense of Greenblum, saying they believe students need to know about ‘evil’ in the world.
“Instead of keeping them in the dark”, said one parent, “Might as well they be exposed to everything. That’s my opinion. I have no regret.”
The film was turned over to the Broward County School Board, which controls the charter under which the Downtown Academy of Technology and Arts operates. The Academy receives tax dollars for every student enrolled, and most follow all state laws and meet state and county requirements to keep its charter.
Thursday, school officials said they were looking into the situation but had no immediate reaction.
At least one parent was reported to have withdrawn her child from the school over the incident.
Once again, very true.
I wonder if that particular parent's native language is English.
"Might as well they be exposed to everything" is quite the odd grammatical construction.
Look, we've been over this a zillion times. You know what I think, I know what you think. It ain't never gonna change.
Let me translate that for our listening audience... Hildy: "My mind is closed and there is no way I will listen to the evidence!"
Let me translate: EV: "My mind is closed and there is no way I will listen to the evidence!" That's my point. We're the the opposite sides of the same coin. Let's let it go.
http://www.voteyesforlife.com/docs/Task_Force_Report.pdf
Do you have the guts to read the truth about how abortion destroys not only American children, our posterity, but the women who are deceived into becoming victims of the abortion industry?
I. INTRODUCTION
During the 2005 legislative session an overwhelming majority of the Legislature voted to create the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion. The Act, House Bill 1233, passed by a vote of 63 to 4 in the House and 28 to 6 in the Senate, and was signed into law by Governor Michael Rounds on March 22, 2005.
A. The Legislative History And The Reasons For The Creation Of The Task Force
The State Affairs Committee of the South Dakota House of Representatives held a public hearing in February, 2005, concerning House Bill 1233. The Committee heard testimony and took evidence relating to the bill and its companion bill, House Bill 1166.
HB 1166, which was also passed by large majorities in both chambers, and also signed into law on March 22, 2005,
provided for significant amendments to South Dakota's Abortion Informed Consent Statute.
The State Affairs Committee of the South Dakota Senate held a single hearing on both bills.
The committees in both the House and Senate heard evidence concerning the magnitude of the interests and rights of pregnant mothers who were adversely affected by abortion. They heard testimony from a number of women who had undergone abortions and who testified how they became depressed and were haunted by suicidal ideation. In every instance they testified about the magnitude of their loss and how that loss adversely affected their lives once they understood that the procedure terminated the life of their existing offspring.
Those who had counseled a large number of women before and after abortions corroborated the testimony of these women. The picture that emerged from the record before both the House and Senate committees was that it was common for women to sign consents for abortion without being truly informed. Many women reported that they were pressured into having an abortion, often by the father of their child, but by others as well. They typically did not understand that the procedure would terminate the life of a human being, and this lack of understanding was further complicated by the fact that abortion providers had misled them at the time of the abortion. The providers told them that there was "nothing but tissue" inside of them.
Many of the women testified or reported to post-abortion counselors that if they had been given accurate information, they would not have submitted to the abortion.
Their feeling that abortion providers had misled them compounded their sense of loss, adding to their depression, which often followed the mothers' realization that they were implicated in the death of their own child.
One woman testified before the Legislature that by withholding the truth that her abortion terminated the life of a human being: "the policy underlying abortion is a lie. First and foremost, because it denies the essential benefit of motherhood. It tells us that we are not forfeiting anything of value for ourselves. We are told we lost nothing, nothing of value. The truth is that the loss is massive. Massive and life altering.
Your House Bill 1166 provides an important and essential message that the pregnant mother does have a great
benefit, that her child already exists and that she has this existing relationship with her child, and that she has a great fundamental and constitutional right to that relationship, all of which she is giving up, all of which is lost as a result of the abortion...If I had been given this information, I would never had had an abortion."
In passing HB 1166 and the companion bill, HB 1233, which created the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion, the Legislature made certain findings that are contained in
HB 1166.
The Legislature found that as a matter of scientific fact an abortion terminates the life of a whole separate unique living human being.
In addition, the Legislature, in explaining the reasons for adopting HB 1166 (reasons which also formed the basis and inspiration for the creation of the Task Force), found:
Section 3. The Legislature finds that pregnant women contemplating the termination of their right to their relationship with their unborn children, including women contemplating such termination by an abortion procedure, are faced with making a profound decision most often under stress and pressures from circumstances and from other persons, and that there exists a need for special protection of the rights of such pregnant women, and that the State of South Dakota has a compelling interest in providing such protection.
Moved by the testimony that evidenced a need for the Legislature to act to protect the rights, interests, and health of pregnant mothers in South Dakota, the Legislature enacted HB 1233 and created the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion.
B. The Nature And Scope Of The Mandate Of House Bill 1233
The Act creating the Task Force specifically set out the scope of the inquiry to be conducted by the Task Force. It directed the Task Force to study:
A. the practice of abortion since its legalization,
B. the body of knowledge concerning the development and behavior of the unborn child which has developed because of technological advances and medical experience since
the legalization of abortion,
C. the societal, economic, and ethical impact and effects of legalized abortion,
D. the degree to which decisions to undergo abortions are voluntary and informed,
E. the effect and health risks that undergoing abortions has on the women, including the effects on the women's physical and mental health, including the delayed onset of cancer, and her subsequent life and socioeconomic experiences,
F. the nature of the relationship between a pregnant woman and her unborn child,
G. whether abortion is a workable method for the pregnant woman to waive her rights to a relationship with the child,
H. whether the unborn child is capable of experiencing physical pain,
I. whether the need exists for additional protections of the rights of pregnant women contemplating abortion, and
J. whether there is any interest of the state or the mother or the child which would justify changing the laws relative to abortion.
The Act stated that the Task Force shall prepare a report detailing its findings, which shall include any proposals for additional legislation that the Task Force deemed advisable.
Pursuant to the Act, Governor Michael Rounds appointed Dr. Marty Allison, Dr. Maria Bell, Mr. Travis Benson, J.D., Dr. Allen Unruh, and Dr. David Wachs to the Task Force;
Representative Matt Michels, Speaker of the House, appointed Mr. David Day, J.D., Ms. Linda Holcomb, Representative Roger Hunt, Representative Elizabeth Kraus, Ms. Kate Looby, and Representative Kathy Miles; and Senator Lee Schoenbeck, President Pro Tempore of the Senate, appointed Senator Stanford Adelstein, Senator Julie Bartling, Senator Jay Duenwald, Senator Brock Greenfield, Dr. John Stransky, and Senator Theresa Two Bulls.
C. Task Force Hearings And Information Gathering
The South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion (the "Task Force") initially met on August 1, 2005.
On that date the Task Force heard a number of presentations and set protocol for scheduling witnesses, receiving written testimony and documents, and scheduling subsequent hearing dates.
Thereafter, the Task Force held four full days of hearings on September 21 and 22, 2005 and October 20 and 21, 2005.
The Task Force heard live testimony of approximately fifty-five witnesses, including thirty-two experts, and considered the written reports and testimony from
another fifteen experts.
In order to achieve a balanced viewpoint and obtain as much information from diverse points of view as possible, live testimony was divided almost equally between....
*snip*
I wouldn't show an entire film, but portions of....say Saving Private Ryan...to help get the feel for the history.
It would be lazy teaching to rely on movies to teach the history.
Yep. My daughters are almost 10, and I would pull them out of the school.
I pulled my daughters out of public school because I thought the environment was too harsh.
I like my daughters being innocent for awhile.
My almost 10 year old girls do not know what abortion is. Why should they?
They barely understand reproduction. We've talked a little bit about it, but not much.
Education ping.
Let McVey, JamesP81, or me know if you want on or off this education ping list.
Also, I think parents should be told beforehand and it should only be shown to kids whose parents want them to see it.
I believe in parental rights.
Abortion can certainly wait as a topic until much later, but you might want to step up the other part. We had Disney-type movies in school to explain reproduction when I was ten, and my period started about a week later! I naturally thought it was cause-and-effect; you couldn't get your period until you had seen the movie.
We don't allow my middle school son to see R-rated materials. My brothers and I weren't allowed to see R-rated until we were 17.
I don't think R-rated materials should be shown to kids in school period. College is a different matter.
My 12 year old son is in public school, and he is not sexualized. He barely talks to girls, and he is much more interested in his computer games.
(He also does not cuss, he goes to a Christian club during lunch, and he is active in his church group.)
I wouldn't want my kids seeing open-heart surgery either. 10 and 11 is too young for this sort of material, especially without parental consent.
I would not show Saving Private Ryan to a high school class.
My mom cannot handle movies with graphic violence. Some people cannot handle movies like that. You shouldn't force it on them.
Two wrongs don't make a right.
They barely understand reproduction. We've talked a little bit about it, but not much.
How will you react when their school tries to make them get STD shots in a year or two?
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