Tag: political correctness

Portland high school’s choice of new mascot — evergreen trees — could be a problem due to lynching connotations, officials say

The school’s current mascot is the Trojans, but a committee consisting of students, staff, and community members arrived at the evergreens as the new mascot of what’s now called Ida B. Wells-Barnett High School, the Portland Tribune reported.

“Evergreens are characterized by the life-giving force of their foliage, the strength of their massive trunk, and the depth of their roots — in an individual tree and as a forest of trees,” Ellen Whatmore, a teacher at the high school and mascot committee member, read from a resolution, according to the Tribune. “They provide shelter and sustenance. They have histories that preclude us and will continue in perpetuity after we are no more.”

But the outlet said that just prior to last Tuesday’s vote by the Portland Public Schools Board of Education to approve the new mascot, Director Michelle DePass shared community concerns that evergreens could connote lynching — particularly since new namesake Wells-Barnett was a black activist and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who wrote about and spoke against lynching.

“I’m wondering if there was any concern with the imagery there, in using a tree … as our mascot?” DePass asked the renaming and mascot committee, the Tribune noted. “I think everyone comes with blind spots, and I think that might’ve been a really big blind spot.”

School Principal Filip Hristic told the board that “we take this seriously, and I definitely want to follow that commitment to protect, preserve, and promote the legacy of Ida B. Wells,” adding that the committee hadn’t spoken to the Wells-Barnett family specifically about the mascot, the outlet reported.

“The focus and opportunity was really to marry this sentiment that we heard from a lot of our stakeholders during our naming process, which was the desire for a local connection,” Hristic said, according to the Tribune. “Ida B. Wells was somebody who stood strong and stood proud against what Woodrow Wilson and many others promoted.”

Martin Osborne — who is black and is one of the committee members — said the group discussed the potential lynching connection between Wells-Barnett and evergreen trees “but we were looking at the symbolism more as a tree of life than a tree of death. You could certainly take it either way, depending upon your position,” the outlet reported.

Osborne added that the evergreen choice “had nothing to do with the horrible history of lynching in the United States,” the Tribune noted.

“Lynching trees typically are not evergreens,” he also said, according to the outlet.

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Australian School Forces Young Boys To Collectively Apologize To Female Classmates For ‘Sexism’ And ‘Rape’

THE BRAUER COLLEGE SECONDARY SCHOOL IN VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA HAS COME UNDER FIRE THIS WEEK AFTER IT WAS REVEALED THAT 12-YEAR-OLD MALE STUDENTS WERE FORCED TO STAND AND “APOLOGIZE” TO FEMALE CLASSMATES ON BEHALF OF THE ENTIRE MALE GENDER TO ATONE FOR SOCIETAL “SEXISM” AND “RAPE.”

A post ostensibly written on SnapChat by a male student at the school, “Today at Brauer they made every guy stand up and apologise to every girl for rape, sexual assault and so on. Guys are always the ‘bad guys’ in everything these days. I’m not saying girls do not go through s**t. Guys go through as much s**t as girls do.”

The news sparked alarm from parents, and the forced apology was confirmed as real after multiple students came forward to speak about the apology there were forced to perform by the school.

One mother stated that her son “now has this misconception that all boys are now looked at as predators” as a result of the compulsory mass apology.

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UK: Govt Islamophobia Advisor Says Images of Muhammad Should Be as Unacceptable as the N-Word

The UK Government’s Islamophobia advisor has suggested that showing images of Muhammad should be made as socially unacceptable as saying the n-word.

Batley Grammar School in Yorkshire in the north of England faced protests this week from Muslim parents, after one teacher dared to show images of Muhammad during class. The school, which was about to break up for the Easter holidays, had had to switch to remote-learning as a result of the protests. The headteacher “unequivocally apologised” for the actions of the teacher in question, and suspended him, despite the fact that he had received a number of serious death threats from angry Muslims.

However, rather than criticising the actions of the protestors for attacking the free speech of the teacher, Imam Qari Asim MBE, chair of the Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board (MINAB), and the Government’s adviser on Islamophobia, called for a “change in social attitudes” as a result of the protests, and suggested that sharing images of Muhammad should be as socially unacceptable as saying the n-word:

I guess when we talk of a potential curb or limitation on free speech, I think that sets alarm bells ringing, leaving some people [wrongly] thinking that Muslims are asking for restrictions on free speech. But I think what we should try and emphasise is that there’s already a phenomenon in place in that actually there are boundaries to free speech. Like, for instance, people cannot use the ‘n-word’ – and quite rightly so – because this is derogatory and causes deep pain and hurt. I’m not in favour of restriction and curbing or free speech, but I think we already have boundaries based on social norms.

Asim, despite his relations to the government, also is a trustee for the hardcore leftist organisation, Hope not Hate, who regularly engage in attacks on anyone on the right of politics, describing organisations such as Turning Point as being “extreme.”

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Monopoly getting ‘long overdue’ socially conscious makeover, Hasbro says

The board game “Monopoly” will be the next classic entertainment brand to receive a socially conscious makeover, publisher Hasbro announced this week.

Hasbro will change all 16 of Monopoly’s “community chest” cards to remove outdated concepts. The company said the classic versions of the cards, which included prompts referencing beauty contests and holiday funds, were “long overdue for a refresh.”

New community chest cards will focus on topics that emphasize “community.” Hasbro asked the public to vote on potential replacements, with rewards for in-game actions such as rescuing a puppy or shopping local among the options. Other cards would penalize players for forgetting to recycle or blasting music too late at night.

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Reporter: Saying ‘Biological Males’ Is A ‘Serious Anti-Trans Slur’

A reporter urged other journalists Wednesday to stop using the term “biological males,” deeming the scientific term a “serious anti-trans slur” that is hateful to use.

“It’s totally okay to have debate and disagree, but folks in media, the term ‘biological males’ is a serious anti-trans slur,” LGBTQ+ reporter for The 19th Kate Sosin tweeted.

“You should not use it without noting that,” Sosin added.

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From Soft Liberalism to Iron-Fisted Leftism in Today’s U.S. Military

We were instructed that there is a Taliban-like threat in the United States called “domestic terrorism.” These terrorists are characterized in part by “anti-government,” “anti-authority” or “abortion-related” extremism and various “supremacist” ideas. None of these terms are defined. The Marine Corps entrusts the government’s HR department to figure that out.

Reporting requirements are key. Do you suspect someone supports an “extremist ideology?” Alert the chain of command. Have you heard a Marine express “contempt toward officials?” Notify the Naval Criminal Investigative Service. Don’t handle anything on your own. Just rat them out. After all, “service is a privilege” and it’d be a shame to lose that privilege for failing to do your part to stamp out “extremists.” One PowerPoint slide posed this imperative in stark terms: “Do you want to be a Marine or do you want to be part of an organization that sows disunity and hate. You cannot have divided loyalties.”

Where did all this come from? Soft liberalism has taken root in the military over several decades. These alarming trends are already well documented in James Hasson’s book Stand Down: How Social Justice Warriors Are Sabotaging America’s Military. But in the wake of President Joe Biden‘s election—and more precipitously since the January 6 “insurrection”—bureaucratic progressivism has hardened into iron-fisted wokeism.

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Bill de Blasio Seems to Endorse Straight up Fascism, and His Idea Is Absolutely Insane

What’s so scary about the left in this country is that they truly have no lines. Every new authoritarian epiphany sounds better in their ears than the last. There’s no pause to consider how ridiculous what they are suggesting is. It’s just full bore “progress” all the time, unintended (and intended) consequences be damned.

Let’s be frank about what de Blasio is saying he wants to do here. He’s asserting that he wants the police, which he controls, to show up at the doors of people who did something non-criminal but that he deems “hateful” in order to scare the intimidate them. Of course, what qualifies as “hateful” is malleable, and in New York, that can literally mean anything that doesn’t fit left-wing orthodoxy. Call someone by their real pronoun and not one they “prefer?” A cop could show up and lecture on the finer points of “tolerance.”

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