Posted on 09/12/2002 8:28:18 AM PDT by gulfwarvet
School officials fielded anxious phone calls from parents Wednesday, one day after a fight between a Somali student and another teenager broke out at Lewiston High School and turned into an afternoon melee off school grounds.
“What we’re trying to do now is assure parents that we have a very safe school,” said Principal Patrick O’Neill.
Record-setting heat and community friction have caused tensions to rise recently in the 1,250-student high school, officials acknowledged. But, said Superintendent Leon Levesque, “The school has been very calm.”
On Wednesday, disruptions to the school came not from fights but from rampant rumors about weapons and further fights following Tuesday’s brawl near Marcotte Park, in which police arrested two men, neither of whom was a Lewiston High School student.
“It’s completely consumed our day,” said Levesque.
Lewiston police patrolled the area around the high school after school let out Wednesday afternoon. There were no fights.
“Everything was very peaceful and smooth,” said the school system’s Somali community liaison, Mohammed Abdi. He expected similar patrols to continue through the week.
As scheduled, Lewiston High School students will spend this week talking about Sept. 11, its aftermath and effect on Americans’ attitudes toward Muslims and immigrants. No special assemblies or events were planned to address Tuesday’s incident.
According to O’Neill, the confrontation started when a teenager who did not attend Lewiston High School followed a Somali student into the school’s lobby and taunted him. O’Neill said he interceded as the argument became physical and the Somali boy tried to restrain the other teen.
As is school policy, O’Neill suspended the Somali student for three days for his part in the fight. He told the other teenager to leave school property or he would be arrested.
According to police, the high school fight generated a large brawl at 2 p.m. near Marcotte Park. That one involved more than four dozen people.
Levesque said the high school has worked hard to combat rumors and to ease racial tensions there since Somali immigrants began moving into the city a year-and-a-half ago. But friction within the community has begun to cause renewed tension within the school.
While Levesque couldn’t predict whether such friction would lead to more battles at or around Lewiston High School, he hoped to see community leaders identify the issues causing the most contention and come up with resolutions soon.
“I think probably we need to look at this from a community perspective,” he said.
Immigrants usually stick together. 100 years ago, you had towns comprised solely of Lithuanians, Germans, Poles, Italians, etc. The residents of Middletown, CT, or 85% of them, are descended from Italian immigrants, all of whom came from one village in Sicily. This is really nothing new. I can't comment on the specifics of the Lewiston-Auburn situation, since I really don't know anything about what's going on.
So you're advocating resegregation?
Wonder what I mean when I complain about Freeper racism?
Well, here ya go...
One hundred years ago, we weren't paying for the rent and food and medical care and education of Lithuanians, Germans, Poles, Italians, etc. That's the difference. If they pulled their own weight, nobody would give a damn where they moved.
Check out my link above. They picked Lewiston, Maine because that's where they could get the most "free stuff".
School discipline was a topic on a thread a few days ago and the issue of "punish everyone equally" came up. An astute Freeper pointed out how the left has done essentially the same to Israel in the world community. Homicide bombers kill Jews - Israel defends itself - world condemns Israel equally with Palestinian whackos. It's a leftist thing, I don't understand it either.
WRFG's listenership for any program outside of their morning drive blues show (and even those ratings are sinking below their already dismal levels) could probably fit inside a broom closet. It's not enough of an issue to make hay on...
If you want on (or off) of my black conservative ping list, please let me know via FREEPmail. (And no, you don't have to be black to be on the list!)
Extra warning: this is a high-volume ping list.
I would assert that careful investigation would reveal that this is not so much a "racial" problem as a problem related to the lack of assimilation by Muslims into American culture. They do not like us and are here only to reap the benefits of a society that they hate. Until I hear otherwise, I refuse to believe that modern American teens are engaging in racial hatred, it's just very unlikely, especially in Maine for cryin' out loud. The whole story is simply not being reported for fear of backlash against the Muslims, which is myth to start with.
Boortz mentioned it several months ago - it truly didn't even rate a blip locally. The group doing the advertising would have gotten better listenership if they had announced it on a bus during rush hour. The idea is actually being passed around word-of-mouth, primarily in their churches and communities directly.
BWAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! SAPS!
Pretty dismal at best. Overall (outside of the blues show), the station sounds like crap. The blues show actually plays a pretty good selection of more obscure and hard-to-find selections. I'm guessing the host of that show is more of a conniseuer, as opposed to the Socialists who inhabit the rest of the programming day...
Announcements in churches would tend not to have much influence, given that the Somali population is overwhelmingly Muslim.
Supposedly, the rules governing welfare in Lewiston are among the most loosely regulated (i.e., liberal) in the nation. Someone among the local African immigrant population here in Atlanta got wind of this and began spreading the word.
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