A 9/11 sensitivity training video shown to teachers in Virginia is sparking outrage from parents who say it is minimizing the severity of September 11th and rewriting history.
The training session is led by a professor from American University who even says the hijackers should not be called terrorists.
Who can blame parents for being angry about this? It’s a sickening outrage.
Adriana Diaz writes at the Daily Mail:
Virginia Department of Education is accused of ‘hijacking history’ over new video urging teachers to call 9/11 killers ‘extremists’ not ‘terrorists’ to avoid IslamophobiaThe Virginia Department of Education have been slammed for a teacher training video which instructs teachers to avoid calling the 9/11 killers ‘terrorists’, and to avoid promoting ‘American exceptionalism’ during lessons about the attacks.The nearly two-hour long video posted on the VDOE’s YouTube channel is intended to promote a ‘culturally responsive and inclusive 9/11 commemoration’ to guide teachers how to broach the sensitive subject ‘in a way that does not cause harm.’But the advice was blasted by some parents as ‘woke-washing the 9/11 attacks’, and ‘hijacking history’.The instructional video shared as part of VDOE’s VA Equity webinar series was lead by American University School of Education professorial lecturer Amaarah DeCuir.DeCuir shared her ‘Webinar In’s & Out’s’ listing ways she deems appropriate or inappropriate to teach about the events surrounding the 9/11 attacks.She claimed that asking students to ‘stand and condemn 9/11’ in a performative way would be ‘highly inappropriate.’She also suggested that teachers use the word ‘extremists’ instead of ‘terrorists’ to further ‘disrupt this false equivalency of Muslims and terrorism.”I choose to use the word extremists and I use this based on the scholarship of other scholars and activists in the community that will also use this word to describe the perpetrators of the crimes associated with 9/11,’ she said.
Unsurprisingly, the Virginia Department of Education has removed the video from their YouTube channel, but you can see parts of it in the local news report below:
FOX News has a statement from the critic who appears at the end of that video:
Asra Nomani, vice president of strategy and investigations at Parents Defending Education, and a Virginia resident, blasted the presentation as “hijacking history” and “sanitizing the truth of the 9/11 attack” in a statement to Fox News.”As an American Muslim parent and journalist who has investigated Islamic terrorism for the past 20 years, it’s offensive, immoral, unethical, manipulative and dangerous,” Nomani said. “The Virginia Department of Education is woke-washing the 9/11 attacks. Speaker Amaarah DeCuir instructs teachers to erase the fact that the 9/11 hijackers were motivated by an extremist interpretation of Islam. Decuir advises teachers to talk about ‘extremists’ behind the 9/11 attacks, without identifying them as Muslim extremists or calling them out as ‘terrorists.’ It would be like teaching about the Holocaust without discussing Nazi Germany.”
This entire affair is so insulting. It should make people’s blood boil.
Who at the Virginia Department of Education thought this was a good idea?
Featured image via YouTube.
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