Twitter (Part 1)

You’re on about blotting out the word. It’s near on impossible… The Black population in America would want to have a good long look at their own culture before crying about the n word… they use it and spread it more than anyone else. I think education is far better than censorship.

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Fairly hard avoid it. Should be censor music’s films tv shows etc now as well to protect them?

That’s my point… Where do you want your kids to get learning on the subject… from pop culture or an academic environment?

Do you want your kids getting moral guidance from a junior cert English teacher?

Those mediums aren’t brought into the classroom or taught on the curriculum.

Kids invariably get that from home… It’s a separate issue to developing their mind. The two can work together and I’d certainly love if my kid came home asking me about topics discussed in class rather than getting their learning from some home boy rapping.

Yer man has spent the whole day arguing he doesn’t want books banned but they shouldn’t be taught in schools because of a word. Never mind the context. But words are bad. Now not alone is the word in the book doing harm to black kids but traumatizing white kids as well. I give up. He’s only arguing for the sake of it at this point.

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I am obviously very pro BLM but one if the key things that made me think that the character of the protests had changed was the videos I saw of protesters, mostly white people talking to other white people, where ever second was “nigga”.

What has emerged from this conversation today is this:

Black parents and children say that young black kids in Ireland feel uncomfortable in class because of the language and subject matter of a book on the syllabus. These children uniquely feel this because they are black.

The response from a bunch of white lads is to say fuck you. It’s good for you. Toughen up. You’re censoring me what’s going to come next. I know better than a 13 year old black kid what a 13 black kid should feel about this.

It’s an utterly bizarre reaction.

This is the kind of shit trump supporters come out with. “I have absolutely no relevant experience or insight and am entirely unaffected by this issue, but go fuck yourselves black children that feel uncomfortable”.

Utterly psycho stuff.

A normal reaction might be, god I didn’t think that book could be picked up that way but clearly there’s a difference in how a black child might feel about some of the material, maybe that’s something we don’t need to force on kids in a junior cert English class.

I wonder would the reaction have been different if the origin of the conversation hadn’t been a tweet from AOR who some lads decide they have to line up against. Maybe. If so that makes them stupider if anything.

I honestly can’t understand it. Young black children are upset by something, and the response is fuck you black children you’re wrong to be upset.

Fucking mental stuff.

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But like also, on here we have a lot of shite talking about “Paddy doesn’t understand the word advice”, “Paddy loves being told what to do”, Paddy this, Paddy that, Oireland, Oireland, but we’d still say it’s very different if some big British skinhead cunt started at it.

The origin was American, I’ve heard the objections to TKAMB before, it originated as one of the very worst excesses of American PC culture. America is a failed society, a failed culture and the excess PC culture in the colleges is part of that failure. You can debate whether it’s a symptom of the failure or a cause of it (I would argue it’s just a symptom) but either way it’s something that you have to face up to.

I’m not dismissing what those black kid’s say entirely but their only part of the conversation on TKAMB, to be honest that book and the discussion of racism that’s taking place in society generally isn’t really for black people because they know it all already. As Chris Rock rightly observed talk about “America is making progress on race” or “society us making progress on race” really just mean white people are making progress.

The word O’Riordan used wasn’t “offensive” or “distressing”, he used the word “problematic” which is just a gimpish word which emanates from ivory-tower college professors talking to themselves and really means “problematic to our theoretical orthodox bubble”. It’s a word that focuses on ideological purity rather than the kids.

I think teachers need better instructions from the Department on how to read those sections. Like I said it’s a bad teacher issue that would arise in any thorough discussion of racism with those students in any context. I dont accept that racism should only be discussed in biology or history class, as if its only a historical or biological phenomenon, it’s a contemporary cultural phenomenon and students of literature need to understand how literature can relate to those issues. If you just approach racism as biology of history you’d end up with a generation of Labane’s who I think you’ll appreciate Glas I’m not going to tag because this discussion is already insufferable enough.

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No.

The original point was young black children feel uncomfortable in junior cert English class, this book doesn’t need to be on the junior certificate syllabus to cause that.

Just that.

Nothing else.

Your response: fuck off the book stays you may as well get used to it it’s good for you.

An utterly psycho response.

This is one of the worst debates ever on TFK.

Just on a point of note here on this Q you asked (and I don’t even really know what ye are arguing about)

My understanding is the JC syllabus is v fluid. There are suggested texts in early years and teachers can sub in whatever books they want at their discretion

I see the forums jedward are still here shiteing the good shite

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Ye are all nuts lad. This thread should be printed out and put in front of the next NPHET meeting to show them what they are doing to lads.

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I only jumped in at the end here, I’ve no idea of the argument in the other 180 posts prior to mine… I also have no idea who suggested taking the book off the syllabus… All I’ll say is you could throw a dart at any of the English novels and they’d have something controversial in them… Do we remove books that mention fat if fat kids get uncomfortable if …gay kids get uncomfortable with books dealing with heterosexual relationships? … As ever , it’s how you approach these topics and teach them.

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I wouldn’t let my kids read any of the famous five books. "Aunt Fanny " was offensive

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Wasn’t uncle Quentin a raging homosexual?

Not sure but George was heading down the trans road. Timmy the dog was the only one that was any way street wise

Lashings of ginger beer.

In fairness they did edit golliwogs out of Noddy.