Mental Health: a Friend's Responsibility

What follows is an email exchange (the bulk of it) between me and Chris Marshall (Consumer Affairs Specialist for Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Association). It began with a late-night (half drunk) viewing of this commerical: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYBwr7pGdPE. Start at the bottom: the top email is my response to Chris's (on the bottom). Despite being so originally "happy to discuss these issues further", his response to my response to his response (got it?) was less than inviting! I urge you all to watch the video, read our conversation, and judge for yourself.


Hi Chris,

Thanks for your response. I'll apologize in advance if some of my points in this email piggy back on or repeat some of the points in my second email to Kathryn (I'm not sure if you saw both my first and second email to her, or just the first).

I want to make clear that I'm quite impressed with your organization's mission here. Eliminating stigmas related to mental health/illness is a worthwhile cause, and your synopsis of the extensive research and work the organization undertook prior to its ad campaign sounds as impressive and extensive as I had hoped it would be. Kudos to you and your team on both your purpose and thoroughness.

The issue I attempted to communicate in my previous emails is the approach taken towards the ends you seek, particularly in the commercial I referenced in those emails (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYBwr7pGdPE). The commercial's "What if you knew your friendship was the key to [a mentally ill person's] recovery?" line is particularly disturbing to me. It attempts to communicate its point using fear and pressure tactics. To me, that is reprehensible--especially in an ad targetting young (and impressionable) people, and even more especially when those young people probably already feel a sense of guilt, confusion and vulnerability regarding their treatment of and friendship to people with mental health issues. Perpetuating those feelings does not serve a purpose of awareness and education.

Rarely is a friend reaching out ever the "key to recovery". Is it, as Kathryn stated, "a possible action that would be appreciated by individuals with mental illnesses"? Absolutely! It's value cannot be underestimated, especially in the early stages of a process of this nature. However, the implication that a mentally ill person's fate can hang on the actions of his/her friends is disingenuous. Mental illness is too serious of an issue to think that a friend reaching out can do more than "be appreciated" by the mentally ill person. It certainly cannot save the mentally ill person, and friends should not be made to feel that they have that ability. It saddles them with responsibility, fear, and pressure that they should not have in a situation like this and sets them up for a extreme amounts of guilt should they fail to (literally or metaphorically) "answer the door" (to borrow an image from the commercial).

Again, I'm not discrediting the influence of friends in a situation like this by any means; friends are often the first step towards the professional assistance that is infinitely more important for a mental ill person to receive. I'm simply making the point that this particular ad (I'm not well-versed enough in your entire ad campaign to comment any further), to me, offers a misleading implication about the role a person plays in his/her friend's mental health recovery. It seemed to me that this ad was more interested in shock value than sound educative practice.

Regards,
Tony D

***

Dear Mr. D:

Ms. Power forwarded your email to me for a response. I am the federal project officer for the National Anti-Stigma Campaign which produced the “What a Difference a Friend Makes” campaign.

The marketing strategy for the campaign was developed after months of preliminary research that involved a review of the scientific literature on effective public education methods for reducing stigma and other effective campaigns: an expert symposium of leading researchers, policymakers, media specialists, providers, family members, persons with mental illnesses, and more; multiple rounds of focus group testing with the target audience and the general public; and additional focus group testing called communication checks to determine what messaging language is effective. This effort was taken in partnership with the Advertising Council and Grey Worldwide Advertising both international and national leaders in the development of public service announcements.

What we found in our research was that by a wide margin, people with mental health problems make their initial contact with friends and family. We also found that this age group has the highest incidence of mental health problems but is the age group least likely to seek help. Also, our focus group testing showed that the social acceptance of peers is very important to young adults and a strong motivating factor for their behavior. And, we found that young adults and others often found it difficult to communicate with a friend or family member who discloses that they have a mental health problem, that the peers feel very awkward because they don’t know what to say. This is a condensed version of our findings, but we also wanted to develop a recovery-oriented, strengths-based approach that highlighted interpersonal contact, again also known to be effective in reducing stigma. In addition, research tells us that supportive relationships have a positive impact on recovery from mental health issues.

So building on all of this information, we attempted to develop a message to help stop stigma where it may start and have the most impact, when someone first discloses that they have a mental health problem. We also wanted to encourage young adults to step up and be supportive of a friend to not only reduce the stigma associated with mental illnesses, but to help friends find ways to communicate on these issues and support them in their recovery. And in building better communication and social acceptance, we are hoping that stigma will be reduced and friends will be more likely to seek help.

Those are our only intentions for the Campaign and we did not address the issue of suicide. The Campaign Web site and brochure have many examples of how a friend could be supportive. I would be happy to discuss these issues further if you have more questions.


Chris Marshall
Consumer Affairs Specialist
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration
1 Choke Cherry Road, 6-1071
Rockville, MD 20857
T: 240-276-1947
F: 240-276-1340

what are we waiting for?

we're in the middle of the most unpopular, ineffective, disastrous military conflict since vietnam (can that point really even be argued anymore?), and yet the outpouring of public dissent has not nearly reached the level of vietnam dissension. why? have we become this apathetic? are we this content to let our "elected officials" run things for us? are we so dangerously willing to allow our voices to be replaced by those of our government? have we become so fat and entertained by mindless forms of circus that we have lost sight of what's important?

every day--every single day--americans can open the paper or turn on the news and (once we get beyond the "brittney spears" headlines) learn about more soliders dying in iraq. the blood continues to flow, nearly as fast as the stream of soldiers we keep sending into this poorly-planned, never-ending conflict.

well, it's time to stop it in the good old american way: rebellion, protest, civil disobedience. it's time to hang W by the white house flagpole and whip him until he pulls every single troop out of iraq. then he should just be plain hanged for his and his administration's lies, criminal behavior, and murder. yes, murder. the blood of our fallen troops is on the hands of our government. sending them to slaughter is no different then slaughtering them here. funny how much the crimes of those we condemn resemble the crimes of those we elect.

DECLARE PEACE. it's time to storm the white house. it's time to protest. it's time to say "fuck you" to our government and its idiotic, criminal, unconstitutional, inhumane behavior. it's time. right now.

so...on the weekend of march 30th, there will be a protest on the white house lawn. no, we're not joining one, we're STARTING one. we're going to drive down to DC with guitars, bullhorns, signs and as much energy as we can muster and change the world. that's the task at hand, make no mistake about it. american policy has a huge impact on the world, and so too will our impact on american policy. the mid-20s to mid-30s generations more power and influence than any other. it's time to exercise it.

who's coming with me...

random rumblings...

-why, at a time when humans are living longer than ever, are we in a hurry to do everything?

-why do we so quickly diagnose senior citizens with "chronic complain-itis" whenever they start a sentence with "i remember when..." or "in the old days..."? maybe it's time we start listening to them...minus the racial, ethnic, and gender bigotry!

-can anybody remember the last well-spoken president we had? i can: bill clinton. so, why does it seem like so long ago that he was in office? oh, right, because we've had 6 years of bush's idiocy. (www.dubyaspeak.com)

-when are people going to learn to separate what's expected of them from what they desire?

-why do we so easily give in to the idea that kids should be in a formal schooling environment from age 5-18?

-why do we assume that if someone is unmarried by age 35, it's not by choice?

-why, in this "age of communication" are we so unable to acheive diplomacy and peace?

-when will we start to realize the social consequences of these new methods of communication: myspace, instant messenger, email, text messaging, and all the others that render face to face contact unecessary and antiquated?

-when did the "american dream" turn into "how can i make the most amount of money with the least amount of work?"

-if we want every kid to become a doctor, lawyer, business person, or any other white-collar profession (and attempt to train them for such a job in school), who's left to fill the blue-collar jobs? oh, right...the vanishing "working/middle class". good thing this country didn't prosper because of it's blue-collar work ethic. walt whitman wrote about doctors and lawers and business people in "i hear america singing" right?

-good thing the division between the classes isn't getting any bigger (insert jerry seinfeld eye roll here).

-schools make the mistake of assuming every kid is capable of higher education and a white-collar job. that's no more true than saying every kid is capable of being a professional athlete.

-i find this irony striking: we're attempting to spread democracy and freedom to other parts of the world. shouldn't we establish a democracy before we spread it to other countries?

-when is someone going to "declare peace" instead?

-why aren't hundreds of thousands of americans in washington protesting the most unpopular war since vietnam?

-public transportation riders: take off the ipod, shut off the cell phone and TALK TO ONE ANOTHER. there is no form of entertainment better than people.

-want to find some commonality between humans? want to know what cuts across all religious, racial, ethnic, gender, sexuality, and other divides? DEATH. we're all gonna die. how's that for equality? (thank you, william cullen bryant. "it all comes back to 'thanatopsis'".)

-making the conclusion that a person who drinks to excess is an alcoholic is no more accurate than saying a person who blows his head off is depressed.

-the world would be an infinitely happier place if more people drank and fucked.

-our brain-washing, spin-doctoring media is the third biggest enemy in the world...right behind religion and government.

-couldn't we all use a little more truth and honesty in our lives?

-if we asked before we assumed, our perceptions of reality would be much different.

-is anyone else tired of artists (seems to be musicians in particular) who sell their art to commercials? the latest? jimi hendrix's "fire" being used in a cell phone commercial. the most blatant? the beatles "revolution" being used in the old nike ads. come on.

-why are peace advocates like martin luther king, jr and john lennon dead? because people weren't ready for their message. when we are, we'll have peace (and freedom!).

re-establishing an intellectual underground

i recently spent two weeks in LA--a city that i seemingly have a love/hate relationship with. everytime i visit, i feel the energy of a revolutionary culture--a culture that existed in the 60s and 70s when anti-war protests, shocking new music and other art, and some of the best free-thinking, non-conformist, beatnik minds of the 20th century ruled the day. that energy always draws me to sunset boulevard, a place where jim morrison and other musicians, film-makers, actors and writers once roamed (or stumbled) from bar to bar, scene to scene, engaging in conversations of a magnitude that today's generation would neither partake in nor understand. i'm talking about life, art, the world, the future. this was an off-the-path intellectual movement. these people had something to say, and LA was their mecca. it stood as a place where new ideas could be formed and shared and where their potential reality could be felt. it was, for a short time, the "new" new england (minus the religous fervor), after the original version had grown bureaucratic and complacent and lost the spirit on which it was founded--a revolutionary spirit.

yet, what depresses me is how fleeting this energy seems to be in the 21st century. what was once a city teeming with ideas, change, and rebellion has become a parody of itself and, even more sadly, a typical US city--full of far-too-many people in fancy clothes, drinking ten dollar drinks at fancy, up-scale bars and restaurants and talking about their materialistic pursuits, all the while seemingly ignorant of the poverty just beyond the city lines.

this once powerful intellectual underground appears all but dead, not only in LA, but everywhere. and the reason is simple: we're fat, we're entertained, and we're safe (or so the government promises us). the need for revolution has rarely been greater--this government, our whole way of life from politics to education, needs to be overthrown. the institutionalization of this country needs to be reversed. but those of us with a voice are, again, fat, entertained, and safe (if you believe the government). those conditions--provided mostly by our government--are sure-fire preventors of a revolution. the roman empire knew how to keep its citizens happy and loyal--provide them with "bread and circus"--and the american empire knows it too.

so how do we overcome this lethargy, this complacency? how do we re-establish a radically intellectual and rebellious current?

in schools? impossible. the free exchange of ideas outside those pushed into our heads by the people in charge (of both schools and the country in general--or any institution with power, really) doesn't happen nearly enough, if at all, in schools. radical, revolutionary ideas are not born inside school or classroom walls. quite the opposite: they are destroyed, squelched, drowned out by "traditional thought". in fact, schools, among many other places in society, are no friend to any form of intellectualism (read richard hofstadter's anti-intellctualism in american life if you want to explore this idea further, and excuse my brevity here; this will likely become an entire post unto itself in the near future, after i, myself, finish hofstadter's book.)

in the home? unlikely. rare is the parent who encourages rebellious, non-traditional, non-conformist, free-thinking behavior from a child.

my suggestion? the underground. bars, coffee shops (not named starbucks), used bookstores. in those places where there are no restrictions placed on our rebellious spirit. in those places where people can come together for the free-exchange of thoughts and ideas, where levels of consciousness and awarness can soar. never again should i have to sit in a bar on sunset boulevard and hear people talking about the music they've uploaded to their "myspace" accounts. that should be replaced by conversations revolving around nietzche or hemingway or hesse or camus or the existential realities of life and death or the problems of our world or the nightmare that our current administration has lulled us into. it should be replaced by conversations aimed at revolutionizing our way of life and our thinking and, in turn, our world. don't think these things need revolutionizing? look beyond your backyard. or, look in your backyard, depending on where you live. the pretty picture some of us see and live in is not universal.

instead, though, these underground venues are often retreats where we attempt to avoid or escape the problems of the world. they should be safe havens for us--the people who are supposed to rule this democracy--to confront them head on and lay the seeds for change, for action.

bartenders everywhere should remove the TVs from their bars and replace them with bookshelves full of books--novels, philosophy books, religous books, sociological studies, poetry, political issues--and newspapers. imagine if we soaked up and honestly and intelligently discussed and debated those things half as much as we do "reality TV" and sports? oh, the places we could go.

but "could" is as far as we go. the potential is there, but the action and spirit are not. we remain too distracted--pick one of a million distractions: TV and other forms of entertainment, the high life in our gated communities, the drama of our friends and family, our jobs, our kids, our hobbies, etc.--from the nightmare we're living in to do anything about it. thousands are dead from our "freedom" war in iraq; we spend obsence amounts of money on the military; our public education system is in flames and we try to dose it with reactionary theories on teaching and learning and amounts of money that pale in comparison to our might military budget; the division between the rich and the poor--the financial division and the ideological division--is growing out of control; our government cannot be trusted and is too frequently feared by its citizens; the freedom we claim to fight for in other parts of the world is being taken from us in our own country, by our own leaders.

this is nothing new; you've heard these things before. you may have even caught a glimpse of them on the news. perhaps you even paused for a minute and thought "that's a shame" before surfing to a more entertaining, less upsetting channel or program or other activity (see the list of distractions above--the distractions that the government should be very grateful for because it takes the spotlight off their injustices and poor leadership). your actions are understandable; afterall, it's at that moment of awareness that we feel most helpless, most useless against these problems and injustices. and, in this increasingly individualistic (and capitalistic--yes, there's a connection) society we may even feel a lack concern over these injustices, until and unless they directly impact our lives. but remember this: the only people in the world that can correct this country's ills are its own people. you, me, everybody. together, against traditional thinking. together, arm in arm, starting a revolution that frees us from the long arm of traditional thinking, rules, the norm, and the forces that seek to stifle our spirit. it starts in the underground--the only place where intellectualism can reign and the only place in which the next great group of intellectuals can be born. it's that group of intellectuals that needs to lead us into the next decades*.



*yes, there's a problem here. if these intellectuals are primarly born in the underground, what type of "formal schooling" will they have. i see two possible answers: 1. as much as they desire, except their formal schooling will be supplemented by this underground intellectualism and exploration--actually, it will likely/should be the other way around. 2. none, beyond what their parents/the government forces on them (k-12 in this country). if this is the case, their chance of rising into the powerful ranks in this country is slim to none. afterall, a large degree of a persons' success is tied, not to the quality of their education, necessarily, but to its length. that's why we need to take a serious look at deschooling society. allow this, for now, to remain a footnote. i expect it will become a full post in the future. in the meantime, consider ivan illich's deschooling society.

terror plot foiled

on the heels of the latest airplane terror plot that has been foiled, allow me to spin an increasingly credible conspiracy theory. i'll preface it by saying that i may have watched V for Vendetta and/or read 1984 one too many times recently. but, something is starting to feel suspicous to me. let me explain...

i'm wondering why these terrorists insist on predominantly plotting to attack with airplanes. granted, they are a great target for a couple reasons: 1. you can take out several people and, as we've seen, landmarks with them. 2. airport/plane security, while visibley beefed up, is clearly penetrable (due largely to the incompetent airport security personnel--after all, increased security measures and personnel are usless when the personnel are idiots. look around an airport, you'll know what i mean). but, there has not been a successful hijack or attack with or on an airplane in 5 years (and only a handful in the years prior to 9/11). in other words, "terrorists" are 0 for the last five years (with only a slighly better, though still poor, rate of success prior to the last five years), during which i'm guessing there have been about half a dozen attempts/plots "foiled" by national security agencies in the US and Britain in particular.

now consider this: how much easier would it be for terrorists to attack train/subway systems? i lived in fairfield, ct for about 7 years, and, on countless occasions, jumped on a train heading for NYC, often with carry-on baggage or other items. not once, during all those trips, was my carry-on baggage inspected. not once, during all those trips, did i encounter any security as i boarded the train. consider your own experiences with trains, and compare them to your experiences on planes. fully-loaded trains, heading into major cities every hour, no significant security. it has disaster written all over it.

here's why: without sacraficing effectiveness--in fact without sacraficing anything more than extra explosives and, perhaps, more manpower--attacking trains/subways allows terrorists to kill large numbers and, if done properly, cause major chaos in large cities and major destruction to a large city's infrastructure. here's how: take the 3-4 terrorists (or more) off an airplane and spread them throughout a train going into grand central terminal, for example, during high-traffic. seconds after arriving in the terminal, each terrorists simultaneously detonates his bomb, ripping apart the train and passengers as well as causing major damage (and more deaths) within grand central station as a whole. consider the death toll, destruction, and chaos that would cause. also consider all the variations on this plan that could be as "effective"--in subway tunnels or train stations of major cities.

and, yet, the madrid bombings of 2004 and the london bombings of 2005 serve as the only (if we go by what's reported to us) train/subway attacks connected to current (legitimate) terrorist groups. the other 2 or 3 "intercepted" train plots reported to us since 9/11 have--again, as they've been reported to us--been in their very early, rough planning stages and lacked the sophistication and immediacy that the much-more-frequent airplane plots seemingly possess. in other words, the number of train/subway plots has apparently been much smaller than the plots involving airplanes. why, when the success rate with trains and subways is much higher than with planes since 9/11? this doesn't add up. here's an article from the BBC from 2005 listing 10 supposedly foiled terror plots post 9/11, reported by the white house: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4319714.stm
notice that of those 10, NONE involve trains/subways and THREE involve airplanes (the remaining seven are "traditional" blow-up-a-building plots).

here's my conspiracy answer: playing off the still-present airplane fear that resulted from 9/11, these "airplane plots" are government inventions designed to keep us fearful and "in need" of the "protection" the government provides to combat them.

they have chosen to invent threats to airports/planes because these "airplane plots" are much easier to "protect" against than train plots (if my above argument, and/or the consideration of your own experiences with both means of travel, didn't convince you of this, just consider the numbers again since 9/11: 2 successful train/subway attacks out of 4 or 5 world-wide; 0 successful airplane/port attacks out of 6 or 7 world-wide). again, the reason is that a government can't possibly secure every train station that has trains heading inbound to major cities. it's impossible; imagine going through at your local train station what you are forced to go through at your nearest aiport. but, what they can do is "secure" (or atleast show visible "improvements" to security in) major airports--extra personnel, extra restrictions, extra screening processes. so, since that's the only place where the government can show its "protection muscle", then that's where they'll create the threats.

let me be as direct as i can: our government (and others) can secure (or give the illusion of security in) airports to a much larger degree than it can train/subway stations or, really, anywhere else. so, it invents stories of plots being foiled by intelligence and increased protection measures in airports. the result: the illusion that the government is doing its job and protecting us against 9/11-type threats. the reality: these plots don't exist anywhere but in the imaginations of the same people foiling them. the result: every time we read in the paper about an airplane/port threat that has been thwarted by our intelligence and security agencies, we all feel a little more confident in the current administration's ability to fulfill its promise of keeping our homeland safe from further attacks. this keeps us quietly on board with the advancing political agenda of our current administation: control of its own citizens and imperialistic reign over other regions of the world. after all, no one seems capable of stopping our government from imperialistic take-over. no one, that is, except its own citizens. it's no wonder they work so hard to keep us so "safe", and so fat and so entertained. bread and circus and safety, that's all it takes.

***

yet, despite this falsely created feeling of "security", we are never allowed to feel completely at ease. every article, every newscast surrounding these plots is sure to remind us that the threat is still as great as its ever been. in other words, one threat thwarted, another sure to be in the works. we are kept in fear, and because of it, we are kept "needing" our government, "supporting" our government, buying into the bullshit, and giving up freedoms in the name of threats that may not even exist outside the imaginations of our own government.

fear, fear, fear. this government thrives on it: creating it, spinning it, and then "protecting" us from it in the only major venue they can appear to protect us from it: airports. we get no real answers or explanations regarding these terror plots. all we hear is that they have been foiled. we don't, for the most part, know how close to reality they were, how involved they were, or who is definitely behind them because, as the BBC points out, "...the sketchy details provided by the White House make it hard to assess how serious or advanced the plans were." we know nothing other than this: there was a threat, the government saved us from it, and there are surely more around the corner. as a result we have to continue waging war in other parts of the world to "defend our way of life", even as that way of life becomes more and more unrecognizable.

consider this article to prove my point (again from the BBC): http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4783141.stm

here's the fear: "UK police said the explosions could have caused 'mass murder on an unimaginable scale'."
here's the spin: 1."The Home Office has refused to confirm reports that Thursday's anti-terror operation in the UK was triggered by the interception of a decoded message sent by a suspect in Pakistan, which gave the go-ahead for the attack to take place." 2. "...the FBI in America say they are following 'new leads' in their investigation into the suspected plot and are working on 'a fresh new wave' of material provided by UK police and secret services."
here's the continuation of fear: "Our security services need to be lucky all the time, the terrorists only need to be lucky once."
here's the sacrafice: "...airports throughout the UK issued strict new security measures. Armed police have been deployed in many airports and passengers are no longer allowed to take their hand luggage into the cabin."

how about this one, also from the BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4781185.stm
here's the fear: "Mr Bush said it showed 'Islamic fascists... will use any means to destroy those of us who love freedom'. He said the US was more secure now than before the attacks of 11 September 2001, but was not 'completely safe'."
here's the spin: 1. "US officials said the foiled plot involved detonating liquid explosives on board multiple commercial aircraft." 2. "Unnamed US officials said the airlines targeted were United, American and Continental, and involved flights to New York, Washington and California."
here's the continuation of fear and needed government "protection": "Speaking in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Mr Bush said that despite increased security measures since 2001, it would be a 'mistake to believe there was no threat to the US'. 'The American people need to know we live in a dangerous world, but our government will do everything we can to protect our people from those dangers,' he added."
here's the sacrafice: "Extra sky marshals are being deployed on flights between the US and UK, and passengers have been banned from carrying any liquids and gels on to planes. "

more freedom down the drain in the name of safety. yet, i can carry anything i want onto a train, a train that has the potential to equal the damage done by a plane. this makes no sense to me. then again, what does make sense in this post-9/11 world when the fear is born from terror threats and our own government's "handling" of them.

jay bennish

recently--in march of 06--a teacher in colorado named jay bennish was chastised publicy after a tape-recorder-toting student got bennish on tape comparing george bush to adolf hitler and making other comments critical of the US. thankfully, he didn't find his way into one of "creedy's black bags" (see V for Vendetta if you don't get that allusion). what he did find his way into was the front page of the papers for quite a while. controversy raged (again) over W's america, over what teachers should and shouldn't do in classrooms, and other issues conservatives and liberals like to fight over.

missing from all the firestorms surrounding the bennish situation (and missing from this country--world??-- in general) was rational, reasonable discussion of the issues at hand. that's what i aim to do here.

what follows is a previously written email to michelle malkin, a syndicated collumnist. who she writes for is a mystery to me, but feel free to check out her website: http://michellemalkin.com/. i've reserved judgement on her because, aside from this instance, i know nothing about her. incidentally, the article is no longer on her site. i like to think i had something to do with it, in the same way jon stewart had something to do with "cross-fire" being cancelled.


Ms. Malkin,

I just finished reading your transcript of Jay Bennish's geography classroom "rant" (as you called it). Let me say, first, that I was happy to find a full transcript with audio (even if the transcript is not perfect in its accuracy).

Unfortunately, your comments--like your description of this "screeching diatribe" and the presence of "an unidentified brain-washed student"--lack any sign of analysis or depth of thinking regarding the issue at hand. You seem to have chosen the easy and popular opinion on this matter and refused to see any worth to Mr. Bennish's class.

You have also chosen to ignore the fact that 1) this is only 20 minutes of a 50 minute class, and 2) he offers several reminders that the students "got to figure this stuff out for [themselves]" and that he only "[wants students] to think about these things". He emphasizes that he's not "implying that [students] should agree with [him]", but he wants them to "not just take things from the surface".

Any good teacher should challenge students to think about things that are uncomfortable for students (and people in general) to think about. Why should students be sheltered from the reality of things like the faults of capitalism, the dark side of our nation's history, the injustices that we perpetuate every day, etc.? Our students need a dose of reality regarding our nation's past and current behavior so that they can help get us back on track for our future. Education is not meant to be sugar-coated; it's meant to propose thought-provoking questions and issues that need and deserve consideration and discussion. Mr. Bennesh proposes such topics in this class.

Now, is his teaching style perfect? No. Too often he is delivering a monologue rather than engaging students in discussion and eliciting other opinions to promote critical thinking. But, the content of his classroom--while delivered in a less-than-educative manner--is worthy of consideration: we DO live in the most violent country in the world; Capitalism IS at odds with human rights; America DID pre-emptively strike a nation that never posed any real threat to us while ignoring other, more-threatening nations; Bush and his administration DO have very dangerous, Hitleresque imperialist desires and dictatorial tendencies; America IS sending the world a distorted view of democracy; we ARE dangerously driven by money; our country HAS killed countless innocent people in its quest to depose threatening rulers and to spread freedom and democracy; our country IS worried about threats to our supremacy; Bush HAS taken a cowboy-mentality in his approach to the war in Iraq (remember his tough talk about "smoking [terrorists] out of their holes" and wanting terrorists "dead or alive"? i guess war to make peace is ok, right?); and this country DOES need people (young people especially) to consider these things.

The person who does not consider these things, who instead chooses to see the world through the rose-colored glasses our media and government try to provide us with is the REAL brainwashed person.

While I question his methods and tactics (and even some of his "facts") for presenting these discussion pieces, I applaud Mr. Bennesh for having the guts to raise them at all. Far too many teachers are content to avoid challenging their students for fear of offending someone. Good education requires us to "offend", in the sense of pushing students to think about things they haven't previously considered--even if it is uncomfortable.

The real issue here is Sean Allen's behavior. No mention has been made of him clearly egging Mr. Bennesh on with questions like "So, you're saying the United States has intentions to kill innocent people?" It is obvious--from what we have on this tape--that he intentionally tried to drive Mr. Bennesh further along in his monologue so that he could gather good material for his audio tape (which I suspect he intended to make very public right from the start). And, as today's typical teenager does, he ran right back to Mommy and Daddy because a teacher dared to challenge his beliefs and push him out of the nice little, naive comfort zones Americans like to live in.

Wake up to reality. It's time to take the sugar-coating off education and present the hard, ugly issues to students. Mr. Bennesh--though, again, he didn't do it in the best, most educative way--was willing to do it. He is being chastised for not presenting "balanced viewpoints in the classroom"; you and other media types deserve harsher chastisement for your own inability to see both sides of this situation. The easy thing to do is hang Mr. Bennesh out to dry and make statements like "I think he needs medical help" because he presents issues we don't like to face. And that's what we do in this country: take the easy way out, avoid really handling the hard-hitting, ugly issues. That way, no one has to face reality or risk offending anyone else. Thank you for contributing to the on-going "vanillification" of America.

lament for the death of the true bartender

A bartender is now just a guy or girl who serves your drinks and a good one is measured by speed and drink-making ability. What happened to the bartender as psychologist? The one who measured the psychological and emotional state of his patrons with the same precision used to measure the contents of a drink? Gone are the bars and bartenders who offer a refuge from the 'nada' that Hemingway so eloquently described in "A Clean Well-Lighted Place". It disgusts me.

welcome

i've been asked a few times why i'm starting a blog. i don't know why, but i am. and you have three options: read it and move on; skip it all together; or read it and engage with me. i don't care which you choose, but if you're going to engage me, be intelligent. if you're a venom-spewing idiot who takes debating tips from shows like crossfire and hardball, leave. the

"loudest" argument is not the "best" argument. nor is the one that uses the most swear words or insults. on the flip side of that is this: i'm not interested in moral or intellectual relativism either.