[noemon]

What we actually find out about Cambridge is not that it involved "students [who] sought to redefine the terms "respect", "safety" & "welfare" in an attempt to cancel out various opinions", but that it was the university leadership (apparently with input from student unions) deciding that people in the university ought to show "respect" for others, and their opinions. Oh no, the horror! And the end result was they should show "tolerance" for people and opinions, instead.

I ask you, is that really what our collective political energies should be focused on?

As for the Eton teacher and whether his video contained anything sexist - an analysis in The Spectator (also paywalled after a couple of views):

Seems pretty damn sexist to me. And so full of shit that you really have to worry about the standard of education he was capable of giving. High fees deserve high standards.

Yeah, one high school took it off the English curriculum. Fair enough; it's not an original work in English, and there's limited time. It's a bit of fantasy about a guy who took 10 years to get home, because he spent 8 of them screwing a couple of supernatural broads. And then wreaks terrible revenge on the men who assumed he was dead, and his wife a widow whom they could try and marry, and thus take the power Odysseus felt was his by right. It's well known in literature, but that doesn't mean it must be studied. There are more moral arguments relevant to the modern world in Spiderman or Captain America than the Odyssey.

Where is the line in the sand PC? That is the fundamental question, isn't it. So you don't like the Odyssey, you disagree with its message of constant struggle, of arrogance costs you your life and of all the valuable lessons that have been taught to western leaders for generations and have raised heroes, thinkers, philosophers and scientists. You believe Spiderman teaches you better lessons, but I don't, so what now? Where do we draw the line that satisfies both me and you?

In addition, I do not like to molly-cuddle my children and I do not like the teachers to molly-cuddle them either. 50 years ago we were killing each other in Europe, in a huge part of the world, children need to steal or even kill to survive. In our parts, they 're scared of spiders and to not offend other people. I am 36 years old I was raised among people who were racist, sexist, violent, my parents were quite modern and very liberal but my neighbourhood or village wasn't. Still I grew up to weigh things on my own and to take away what I thought best.

All your exaggerations seem designed to heighten the feeling that "cancel culture" and "identity politics" are a major problem.

My OP is simply copy/pasting all the articles linked in the OP, verbatim if you hadn't noticed. You find offence because you want to be offended.

It's clear from the beginning that you are trying to create a climate of us vs them. You "good people" vs "us Trumpards" and other delinquents. Now you will say anything to justify your own prejudice.

These are not exaggerations, they are EXACTLY as reported VERBATIM, but at this point any conversation with you is a conversation with a person that is wearing a battle helmet and only sees enemies. It's a lost cause.

[Prosthetic Conscience]

Where is the line in the sand PC? That is the fundamental question, isn't it. So you don't like the Odyssey, you disagree with its message of constant struggle, of arrogance costs you your life and of all the valuable lessons that have been taught to western leaders for generations and have raised heroes, thinkers, philosophers and scientists. You believe Spiderman teaches you better lessons, but I don't, so what now? Where do we draw the line that satisfies both me and you?

We could draw it at "teachers in schools get to decide their own English curriculum, rather than pretending that one school dropping The Odyssey is a cultural disaster".

In addition, I do not like to molly-cuddle my children and I do not like the teachers to molly-cuddle them either. 50 years ago we were killing each other in Europe, in a huge part of the world, children need to steal or even kill to survive. In our parts, they 're scared of spiders and to not offend other people. I am 36 years old I was raised among people who were racist, sexist, violent, my parents were quite modern and very liberal but my neighbourhood or village wasn't. Still I grew up to weigh things on my own and to take away what I thought best.

You make it sound as if exposing them to The Odyssey is a necessary ordeal that will toughen them up. The 2 teachers concerned just agreed it is "trash".

All your exaggerations seem designed to heighten the feeling that "cancel culture" and "identity politics" are a major problem.

My OP is simply copy/pasting all the articles linked in the OP, verbatim if you hadn't noticed.

No, I hadn't noticed it was "verbatim". Because it's not. Your own opinions, without anything like them in the articles, are:
"the teacher's portrayal of traditional sexual norms"
"students sought to redefine the terms "respect", "safety" & "welfare" in an attempt to cancel out various opinions"
"Some universities in the US have now cancelled Homer's Odyssey"
"he then decided to press charges on them. He won and was awarded £15000 in compensation by the university"

You find offence because you want to be offended.

I'm not offended. I'm disappointed in you.

It's clear from the beginning that you are trying to create a climate of us vs them. You "good people" vs "us Trumpards" and other delinquents. Now you will say anything to justify your own prejudice.

The odd thing is that that is just what I think of your OP. You're coming up with reactionary cliches about "cancel culture" and "identity politics", and exaggerating what has happened. You call it a "battleground"; I call it a distraction. It's battlegrounds that have "us vs. them".

These are not exaggerations, they are EXACTLY as reported VERBATIM

Except it's plain your OP is not "verbatim".

, but at this point any conversation with you is a conversation with a person that is wearing a battle helmet and only sees enemies. It's a lost cause.

Again, you declared it a "battleground". It's too rich for you to accuse others of seeing enemies.

[noemon]

Let's see your claims one by one:

I find your OP is unhelpful. It seems designed to get more attention for the silly spats in universities. You describe a pretty sexist video as "the teacher's portrayal of traditional sexual norms";

Is there a difference? Even the BBC itself does not use the term sexist. It used the term "masculinity row". I used the term "traditional sexual norms". Are you saying my term is misleading and malicious and if yes, why?

claim " students sought to redefine the terms "respect", "safety" & "welfare" in an attempt to cancel out various opinions" when it seems to have been about the university calling for "respect" rather than "tolerance";

That is what the article is describing verbatim. You are not arguing otherwise either and your sentence does not contain a point. You are reducing the argument to nothing when the argument is far more nuanced than that. I tried to describe something in one sentence that was the best I could do, I linked the article for people to read and make their own conclusions. There is nothing wrong or misleading in my sentence.

claimed that some universities have "cancelled" the Odyssey, when in reality one high school took it off their curriculum (and it boils down to 2 women agreeing it's "trash");

That is what I understood, if I made a mistake and confused a school for a university I apologise, it was not intentional.

and described a student demanding his year's fees back after mistreatment by his fellow students as "pressing charges". He never "pressed charges", whatever you wanted that to mean; he did get his money back (that year, the fee for a Master's in International Studies and Diplomacy was £21,725, so £15,000 is in the region of what he may have paid before he left). All your exaggerations seem designed to heighten the feeling that "cancel culture" and "identity politics" are a major problem.

The article I was reading stated the bold, I would think Lawyers only get involved in legal cases. I said "he got his fees back in compensation for leaving University" on his own will and accord which is exactly what happened. You also believe that this person was "mistreated" but that again is your own opinion. I did not even express one, and you took issue because I did not express yours. Should we seek compensation from you trying to call everyone in here a Trumpard? And would I be liable to compensate others for your characterisation of other users? Some people may feel that you have mistreated them and that I did little to protect them.

He only received compensation after the Lawyers for the State of Israel got involved.

According to UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI), which provided legal assistance to Lewis, the student lodged a formal complaint in May 2019. He said the stress and extreme discomfort caused by the “toxic antisemitic environment” had exacerbated his anxiety and mental health issues. He felt he had no alternative but to leave the university and return to Canada, and demanded his tuition and related fees be refunded.

I just googled more about this case straight from UKLFI: https://www.uklfi.com/appeal-panel-reco ... nt-at-soas

You should read it.

SOAS has now reached a settlement with Mr Lewis, paying him £15,000 compensation.

Mr Lewis’ complaints about the toxic atmosphere during his time at SOAS from 2018 to 2019 included the following examples:

On 01/03/2019 an email was sent from the Student Union (SU) to all students stating that “yesterday there were a group of external individuals, … apparently filming a piece on how SOAS is an antisemitic institution.”

The email continued:

“We are sending round this statement to reaffirm our commitment as a Students’ Union to our Boycott, Divest and Sanction Israel Policy (BDS), which passed in March 2015. SOAS SU was the first UK Students’ Union to vote for and support the BDS campaign launched in 2005.” Mr Lewis said that this was an abuse of the SU’s power and was intended to make a political statement at the expense of Jews and Israel.

Those who are Jewish or pro-Israel on campus are labelled and referred to as ‘Zionists’. The term is used as an offensive, antisemitic blanket term to label anyone with a Jewish connection who advocates a position that might be to Israel’s benefit; to them Zionism in general is akin to fascism and racism.

Antisemitic graffiti can be found on campus lockers, antisemitic symbols and statements can be found scribbled or scratched into desks in the library and on the walls of bathroom stalls.

There is a large sign in the window by the door of the main SOAS building proclaiming SOAS’s support for BDS.

For this Jewish student, the student union and the university should have removed their official support for the Palestinian people via the BDS to accommodate him and since they didn't, that was "antisemitic mistreatment".

We could draw it at "teachers in schools get to decide their own English curriculum, rather than pretending that one school dropping The Odyssey is a cultural disaster"

We could also not create strawmen, but clearly that would be a tall order.

This issues of free speech, censorship, identity politics is the next political battleground. I am not saying that to animate you, I' saying it cause it's true, you can see that with twitter, facebook, Trump, these issues, they are all part of the same series. This conversation is already happening and is set to become more central in politics in the short-term.

[Pants-of-dog]

Please note that the high school never took The Odyssey off the curriculum. The one teacher removed it from her course. There was no policy change, and any other teacher in the district, school, or even another teacher teaching the same class could easily teach The Odyssey.

The teacher in question has explained this clearly, but people are intent on painting it as censorship or book banning.

[Ganeshas Rat]

The cultural disaster is that one school drops the Odyssey and instead of stoning the responsible ones to death immediately there are people who defend it. As Borges said there are only four plots (with all others being variations on them): a war between two factions, returning home, a quest for some artifact and the suicide of god. It's notable that two of them origin in Homer and three of four are Greek. One must know Greek mythology of course starting with its biggest jewels because it's the only way to understand what Greeks write about. And they need to read Greeks because it's the only way to understand what Aristotle writes about it. And they need to read Aristotle because he is a father of thought. A person who doesn't know Aristotle's texts is intellectually dead, there is nothing to discuss with them, they can read whatever else and still be non-existing: it's like having a lock and no key. Just eternal wandering through shadows without ability to realize what is reflection and what is not, the same as having no eyes. That's what the Odyssey means. Well, maybe not death. But just the idea of replacing it with some fashionable bullshit proves that a teacher who did it is professionally unfit to take their post. It's a blind who gouges children' eyes. Out of best wishes: light is harmful, it burns and produces inequality and unjustice. Everything should be just, everything should be normalized, stretch the short ones, chop the tall. For diversity! For no censorship!

[Prosthetic Conscience]

I find your OP is unhelpful. It seems designed to get more attention for the silly spats in universities. You describe a pretty sexist video as "the teacher's portrayal of traditional sexual norms";

Is there a difference? Even the BBC itself does not use the term sexist. It used the term "masculinity row". I used the term "traditional sexual norms". Are you saying my term is misleading and if yes, why?

Yes, I think the description of the video as a "portrayal of traditional sexual norms" is misleading. See the Spectator article for critcitism.

claim " students sought to redefine the terms "respect", "safety" & "welfare" in an attempt to cancel out various opinions" when it seems to have been about the university calling for "respect" rather than "tolerance";

That is what the article is describing verbatim. You are not arguing otherwise either

No, I am arguing otherwise. I have more than once pointed out it's about the use of the word 'respect', not "redefining" it at all. "Safety" is not mentioned at all; the only time "welfare" comes up is a complaint by the opinion writer that they didn't define it. If you don't give a special definition of a word, then the normal one is assumed.

claimed that some universities have "cancelled" the Odyssey, when in reality one high school took it off their curriculum (and it boils down to 2 women agreeing it's "trash");

That is what I understood, if I made a mistake and confused a school for a university I apologise, it was not intentional.

Thank you.

and described a student demanding his year's fees back after mistreatment by his fellow students as "pressing charges". He never "pressed charges", whatever you wanted that to mean; he did get his money back (that year, the fee for a Master's in International Studies and Diplomacy was £21,725, so £15,000 is in the region of what he may have paid before he left). All your exaggerations seem designed to heighten the feeling that "cancel culture" and "identity politics" are a major problem.

The article I was reading stated the bold, I would think Lawyers only get involved in legal cases.

The law is concerned with a lot more than "charges". "Pressing charges" is a phrase used for bringing criminal charges.

I said "he got his fees back in compensation for leaving University" on his own will and accord which is exactly what happened. You also believe that this person was "mistreated" but that again is your own opinion.

My opinion, but given that he was at first offered some small compensation, and then later something along the lines of a full refund of a year's fees, it's also the opinion of SOAS's appeal panel. For instance, as a Jew he was accused of covering up Israeli war crimes and called a "white supremacist Nazi". That's pretty offensive to him.

Should we seek compensation from you trying to call everyone in here a Trumpard? And would I be liable to compensate others for your characterisation of other users? Some people may feel that you have mistreated them and that I did little to protect them.

Wow, now that's what I call a strawman. I haven't remotely tried "to call everyone in here a Trumpard". And the fees for PoFo are, of course, zero.

He only received compensation after the Lawyers for the State of Israel got involved.

They aren't "the Lawyers for the State of Israel"; they are lawyers who support Israel.

We could draw it at "teachers in schools get to decide their own English curriculum, rather than pretending that one school dropping The Odyssey is a cultural disaster"

We could also not create strawmen, but clearly that would be a tall order.

OK:

The examples I gave above are quite real issues that affect our fundamental freedoms in very profound ways.

This conversation will unravel and come into a head in the next few years. It is inevitable.

Totalitarian regimes love to destroy people's ability to communicate (in this case in the form of ostracism) because uprising against tyranny is exactly one of these things that require communication.

I still see the current divisions as being more like McCarthyism

Another analogy worth looking at would be our slide towards Civil War.
...
Shortly after the courts struck down broadcast standards, we got Rush Limbaugh, and the era of propaganda, which has morphed into an era of brainwashing.

Democracy cannot survive this toxic atmosphere indefinitely. I would think recent events demonstrated that.

We need an effective way to combat toxic lies.

Or else.

That people know the root of the literature is pretty important because without it people can't correctly understand everything that builds upon that (90% of culture literally). Rooting it out is somewhat like gouging a man's eyes for their own good. Or rather cutting out their tongue.
...
No, the people in cancel culture are people who fear to make even a step without direct order, who are driven by monkey pack instincts and even then are able to do what they do only with full support of all estates: administration, corporations, medias.

Book burners think they are the heroes. What a world we live in.

I think these quotes show a lot of PoFoers, including you, wringing your hands about a "cultural disaster". And Geneshas Rat has now said they do indeed see it as a cultural disaster.

[noemon]

I find your OP is unhelpful. It seems designed to get more attention for the silly spats in universities. You describe a pretty sexist video as "the teacher's portrayal of traditional sexual norms";

I did and I stand by it, I do not see a difference.

I find your attempts to shoot the messenger as prejudice. I did not read the Spectator before I posted a single sentence to describe the case as best as I could. My description is not any different than the BBC's. And you have not made a single argument as to why it is "unhelpful" or "misleading". I used the term "traditional sexual norms" and you are demanding that I should have used the term "sexist". I find this ridiculous.

In related news:

The teacher never made the lecture to the students and the video was removed from the school's intranet after one of the other teachers complained and the Headmaster agreed. It was uploaded on his personal and private youtube channel, he was ordered to remove it and refused. His lecture, titled “The Patriarchy Paradox” was part of the Perspectives course which is taken by older students to encourage them to think critically about subjects of public debate. He explained that he does not agree with the views expressed and this was intended as a critical exercise for students to rip it apart.

The person was cancelled for no valid reason.

claim " students sought to redefine the terms "respect", "safety" & "welfare" in an attempt to cancel out various opinions" when it seems to have been about the university calling for "respect" rather than "tolerance";

That is absolutely false. See Telegraph article for criticism.

claimed that some universities have "cancelled" the Odyssey, when in reality one high school took it off their curriculum (and it boils down to 2 women agreeing it's "trash");

The person who started the campaign to cancel Homer is telling you: "This is not sprint but a marathon". Are you saying that if this group gets more schools and universities to cancel Homer, you will then change your attitude and if yes where is the threshold? The whole of a US state, the whole of the US, the whole of Europe?

and described a student demanding his year's fees back after mistreatment by his fellow students as "pressing charges". He never "pressed charges", whatever you wanted that to mean; he did get his money back (that year, the fee for a Master's in International Studies and Diplomacy was £21,725, so £15,000 is in the region of what he may have paid before he left). All your exaggerations seem designed to heighten the feeling that "cancel culture" and "identity politics" are a major problem.

What exaggeration do you speak of? The use of the term "press charges"? That is what I understood from the fact that 'The Lawyers for the state of Israel' were involved and the fact that this person received "compensation to settle". Full stop, the rest are your assumptions which I also stated myself.

My opinion, but given that he was at first offered some small compensation, and then later something along the lines of a full refund of a year's fees, it's also the opinion of SOAS's appeal panel.

That was not their opinion until the 'Lawyers for the State of Israel' got involved.

For instance, as a Jew he was accused of covering up Israeli war crimes and called a "white supremacist Nazi". That's pretty offensive to him.

So? where is the line that students should use when discussing politics of a state that is brutally occupying another nation for 50 years now and why is the uni liable for the political opinions of students?

What on earth are you saying? That unis should go around checking student views on political matters around the world and tell them what to think of them? That uni should interfere in the student union decision to endorse the BDS?

Calling China fascist is offensive to numerous Chinese apologists but it is true nevertheless.

Wow, now that's what I call a strawman. I haven't remotely tried "to call everyone in here a Trumpard".

You have done exactly what this person accused the uni of, you have tried to create an environment under which anyone who is talking about this matter in a way you disagree with is a "Trumpard".

You have entirely ignored the cited examples provided by the UKLFI that in their view amount to "toxic antisemitism". Do you believe that these examples cited are 'mistreatment' in any way, shape or form? Do you believe that SOAS and its Student Union must be required to remove their endorsement for the BDS? and that their refusal to do so amounts to 'toxic antisemitism' that warrants compensation?

And the fees for PoFo are, of course, zero.

Of course, its great you said that, what if there were and we were at that uni, it's obviously an analogy. But clearly you do not like it at all when the shoe is on your foot.

We could draw it at "teachers in schools get to decide their own English curriculum, rather than pretending that one school dropping The Odyssey is a cultural disaster"

The cultural disaster is seemingly logical people trying to defend this.

[Pants-of-dog]

Earlier today, I learned that my name was included in a WSJ article. This article included me without my knowledge or consent; I was not interviewed by the author, and the article includes severe misrepresentations of my words. To be clear: I am 100% against the banning of any books, and my school did not ban any texts, to my knowledge. That is an assumption the author of the article made, and it is factually incorrect. It was simply our 9th grade ELA team’s decision last year to reimagine many of the units in our curriculum to best meet the needs of our students.

One of the units we decided not to use moving forward included Homer’s Odyssey. It was not a blanket school- or district-wide decision and any teacher, including myself, would still be more than welcome to teach from the text.

As you can imagine, this year almost all of our curriculum needed to be reshaped even after the initial planning we did in May once we realized virtual learning would continue. But what I most strongly want to reiterate is that no books were or will be banned from my school or classroom.

The many hateful messages I have received from complete strangers as a result of this misrepresentation have left me feeling quite sad, vulnerable, and frustrated. Thank you to everyone who takes the time to read this and understand the truth.

[Unthinking Majority]

I think these quotes show a lot of PoFoers, including you, wringing your hands about a "cultural disaster". And Geneshas Rat has now said they do indeed see it as a cultural disaster.

These book burners are stupid and intolerant bigots lacking in the empathy they claim they have. They're judging an author from ancient Greece who wrote a book 2800 years ago with the morals of 2021. Their solution to everything is censorship.

We're cowards for even entertaining some of their stupid ideas. We're raising generations of intellectual and emotional weaklings and losers.

[Unthinking Majority]

Earlier today, I learned that my name was included in a WSJ article. This article included me without my knowledge or consent; I was not interviewed by the author, and the article includes severe misrepresentations of my words. To be clear: I am 100% against the banning of any books, and my school did not ban any texts, to my knowledge. That is an assumption the author of the article made, and it is factually incorrect. It was simply our 9th grade ELA team’s decision last year to reimagine many of the units in our curriculum to best meet the needs of our students.

I call BS. So Ms. Levine never said "Very proud to say we got the Odyssey removed from the curriculum this year!”? What exactly does she mean by "reimagine many of the units in our curriculum to best meet the needs of our students"?

Seems like she's saying "I made tweets that are public and they were used in a WSJ article and I was called on my BS so i'm upset". When you tweet you tweet to the world. Does she assume some kind of expectation of privacy when you publish something everyone in the world can freely see?

If her words were misquoted or twisted she needs to explain specifically why and how. The quote doesn't sound like Homer was removed because of COVID restrictions.

The alleged twitter exchange per WSJ: “Be like Odysseus and embrace the long haul to liberation (and then take the Odyssey out of your curriculum because it’s trash),” tweeted Shea Martin in June, to which Heather Levine, an English teacher at Lawrence [Massachusetts] High School replied, “Haha. Very proud to say we got the Odyssey removed from the curriculum this year!”

[noemon]

And the tweet itself:



When she was approached for comment by the WSJ, she told that them it was "invasive" to make such a request.

[Unthinking Majority]

Now that I think of it, it's weird that I read The Odyssey in my high school English class, it's not even an English text it's Greek.

[Pants-of-dog]

I call BS. So Ms. Levine never said "Very proud to say we got the Odyssey removed from the curriculum this year!”?

Yes, she did.

And she was correct. She removed the book from the curriculum for her own class that she teaches.

What exactly does she mean by "reimagine many of the units in our curriculum to best meet the needs of our students"?

Does it matter? It could mean many possible things, including using a diverse set of authors who can provide the students a diverse set of outlooks beyond dead European men.

If you want to argue that she (secretly) means book burning and censorship, please provide evidence that she is lying and has a secret plan to do so.

Seems like she's saying "I made tweets that are public and they were used in a WSJ article and I was called on my BS so i'm upset". When you tweet you tweet to the world. Does she assume some kind of expectation of privacy when you publish something everyone in the world can freely see?

If her words were misquoted or twisted she needs to explain specifically why and how.

She did explain specifically why and how her words were misquoted or twisted.

I quoted it.

You replied to the post, and even quoted the text.

The quote doesn't sound like Homer was removed because of COVID restrictions.

The alleged twitter exchange per WSJ: “Be like Odysseus and embrace the long haul to liberation (and then take the Odyssey out of your curriculum because it’s trash),” tweeted Shea Martin in June, to which Heather Levine, an English teacher at Lawrence [Massachusetts] High School replied, “Haha. Very proud to say we got the Odyssey removed from the curriculum this year!”

Yes, I read it the five or six times you folks have already quoted it, as well as from the original editorial that spawned it.

And then I posted her clarification of those words. You now seem to be claiming that she is lying and your original interpretation is her actual true secret plan.

[ThirdTerm]

Shea Martin is a 9th grade ELA teacher. I remember reading Homer's Odyssey in college and the original text may be too difficult for 9th graders. I had to cancel my American accent in the English class because the lecturer said I sounded like a VOA broadcaster. But I'm now convinced that this is the right way to speak English as a qualified translator.

[noemon]

She made a tweet, the tweet was copied verbatim in the WSJ and not misrepresented in any way as she falsely claims.

She was approached for comment and refused to clarify, the School refused to reply to the emails sent by the WSJ.

Now she got the backlash, she is suddenly all for "clarifying" by trying to muddy the waters and not in a smart way anyway. She could have said all that to the WSJ but her intent was to pretend that she made a massive change in the school curriculum, she wanted to get brownie points for her "achievement" and extend the cancellation just like the person who started it.

The person responsible for cancelling Homer is telling us that this is only the beginning, by saying that "this is not a sprint but a marathon".

The saddest part in all that is that our own users in here said: "So what? Spiderman is better than the Odyssey anyway", thus exposing themselves the reality that so many people are worried about. That unless people speak up against this book burning otherwise logical people would simply go along with it and justify it.

That is the cultural disaster, if this person had received no backlash, she would not be apologising now.

[wat0n]

I'm curious, what did she replace The Odyssey with?

[Unthinking Majority]

...

[Unthinking Majority]

Yes, she did.

And she was correct. She removed the book from the curriculum for her own class that she teaches.

This is what she said: "I am 100% against the banning of any books, and my school did not ban any texts, to my knowledge. That is an assumption the author of the article made, and it is factually incorrect. It was simply our 9th grade ELA team’s decision last year to reimagine many of the units in our curriculum to best meet the needs of our students."

Ok, so the 9th grade ELA team removed it from the curriculum for some kind of political identity politics reasons. It sounds like it was removed from all grade 9 ELA classrooms by an agreement between all the teachers. So her and the "ELA team" just proudly banned it from the 9th grade curriculum lol. What's is the difference exactly?

Does it matter? It could mean many possible things, including using a diverse set of authors who can provide the students a diverse set of outlooks beyond dead European men.

Yes it does matter, it matters a lot. If it was removed to add more of a variety of authors ok that's understandable. If it was removed because it was "offensive" and "not PC" that's disgusting censorship nonsense.

ELA = English Language Arts. If you're teaching English language arts there's going to be a lot of studying of dead European men. I have no problem including women authors and whatnot in the curriculum, but they also shouldn't be re-writing or censoring history. It's not Shakespeare's fault there weren't a lot of non-white women writing English plays back in his day.

Ms. Levine says her ELA class is 90% Latinx students. So I assume she probably wants more diverse set of authors. Ok that's fine. But why would you be "very proud" to remove The Odyssey specifically from the curriculum if not for censorship reasons? Levine is full of BS, yes I think she's lying and being deceitful to cover her butt.

If you want to argue that she (secretly) means book burning and censorship, please provide evidence that she is lying and has a secret plan to do so.

She said she was "very proud" to remove the book from the curriculum. That's disgusting.

She said "I don't believe in banning books" and yet it she was "very proud" to remove a book from her curriculum. Sounds like she's a book censor to me. #BookBurner. If it was up to her who knows she might even want to remove it from her entire school's curriculum if she had the power. As I said, she's full of BS.

She's saying 2 different things at the same time. How do you ban books from your own curriculum and not believe in banning books at the same time? Her plan isn't "secret", she "very proudly" told us her plan in her tweet and now she's backpeddling & double-talking because people are mad at her.

[noemon]

This is what she said: "I am 100% against the banning of any books, and my school did not ban any texts, to my knowledge. That is an assumption the author of the article made, and it is factually incorrect. It was simply our 9th grade ELA team’s decision last year to reimagine many of the units in our curriculum to best meet the needs of our students."

Ok, so the 9th grade ELA team removed it from the curriculum for some kind of political identity politics reasons. It sounds like it was removed from all grade 9 ELA classrooms by an agreement between all the teachers. So her and the "ELA team" just proudly banned it from the 9th grade curriculum lol. What's is the difference exactly?

Well spotted, and the 9th grade is probably the only grade in the whole school to teach Homer(even in Greece that was the case in my time, we were taught Homer at a single grade and our classical texts changed every year), which effectively would mean that she successfully managed to ban Homer from the whole school, hence her refusal to comment as well as the school's refusal to clarify. The WSJ journalist would have asked them difficult questions.

[Unthinking Majority]

The saddest part in all that is that our own users in here said: "So what? Spiderman is better than the Odyssey anyway", thus exposing themselves the reality that so many people are worried about. That unless people speak up against this book burning otherwise logical people would simply go along with it and justify it.

Well Disney did turf white Peter Parker Spider-Man and replaced him with black Miles Morales Spider-Man for all the kids.

Don't forget all the new Disney Star Wars TV shows and movies where there's isn't one new good guy main character that's a white male. But of course most of the bad guys are white men. Oh and for the The Force Awakens poster in China, Disney made the black main character Finn a lot smaller on the poster because the Chinese are racist against blacks & don't like them. Oh and then in The Last Jedi they made all the good guy leaders women and spent the movie showing them boss the men around. No identity politics here!

That is the cultural disaster, if this person had received no backlash, she would not be apologising now.

I agree 100%. She doesn't seem so "very proud" of it anymore.