New Wingnut of the Week: Helen Cadogan
Logo (improved version*)
Meet Helen Cadogan, this week’s New Wingnut of the Week, who comes to us by way of The American Thinker, that cesspool of pseudo-intellectual racism which gives free rein to lengthy dissertations on the alleged inferiority of the darker-skinned races. As is our normal practice, we’ll first provide a little biographical background on our latest NWOTW and then move on to her award-winning contribution.
Ms. Cadogan currently is a freelance copy-editor from Newport News, Virginia. Free-lance copy editor means, of course, that Helen is unemployed and has plenty of time to sit in her trailer and muse about the various indignities that have been done to her, no doubt all perpetrated by liberals, Negroes, and apparently her former students. She had a brief stint as an English instructor at Thomas Nelson Community College, where her typical rating at RateMyProfessors.com ranged from “unorganized” to “worst instructor I’ve ever had.” Former students called her “very unhelpful,” “rude and inconsiderate,” “horrible,” and “unclear.” She was also accused by several students — why am I not surprised? — of constantly interjecting religion into her English class, one student saying:
She interjects too much religion/biblical analogies in the literary discussions–and does not accept differing opinions when they differ with hers.
So naturally a former instructor at a junior college who was, apparently, universally despised by her students is the perfect person to explain the failings of the American educational system. Naturally, the problem isn’t the schools or the teachers — the problem is … are you ready? (cue drumroll) … all the black students, who are all shiftless and stupid and incapable of learning how to read even if they were given 20 years of 24/7 instruction by Mr. Chips himself.
I was talking to a friend the other day who teaches at an elementary school and has a student whom I shall name Shakir.
Now, Helen couldn’t pull a name like, say, Mike or Josh or Chris from her foundation garments, because then, of course, it wouldn’t be clear that the student was black. We should be thankful, I suppose, that at least she didn’t decide to call the student Barack.
Shakir is ten, and he’s barely literate. My friend’s class is not a large one; she has five to eight students. She also has a teaching assistant, and between them, the kids receive a lot of personal, one-to-one attention. Nevertheless, Shakir still can’t read. The why of this phenomenon is quite important; you see, there are lots of Shakirs in the black community.
So, what do we know about all these Shakirs?
All across America, schools are confronted with Shakirs who either do not show up for school or who attend school but hang out in the hallways, bathrooms, and other hideaways. Even in well disciplined schools, there are Shakirs who go to class and put their heads on the desk. They refuse to work; the same way, their parents refuse to attend parent-teacher meetings. They sleep, they disrupt, curse, fight, and do no work
By now, it’s plain that “Shakirs” is just being used by Helen as a synonym for “n**g*rs.” Reread the passage above, substituting the n-word for “Shakirs,” and you get the true flavor of what Helen means here.
What can the schools do, confronted with thousands of Shakirs all across America?
Helen doesn’t really say, other than to imply, that they should all be expelled, but some of her more lunatic commenters have ideas. Here’s what the exquisitely literate “Louise” would do with all those illliterate little Shakirs:
Social survices need to take that child away when he is very young, and bring back oprhanages, etc. must be better than this ghetto life.
after mom has more kids and cannot take care of them. puther in jail.
Commenter “Randy Ottenwess” adds his own solution:
And to top it all off, Shakir and his ilk are allowed to vote.
So, we can solve the Shakir problem, apparently, by expelling all the Shakirs from school, throwing their mothers in jail, and repealing the Fifteenth Amendment. Any other ideas?
*Cf. the original improvement of the logo, which served as the inspiration for this version, and which, in turn, was suggested in part by commenter g.
Ah, but who could forget this guy for the New, Improved™ American Thinker logo?
Shakir, please!
No, but seriously, that is disgusting. Its post like these that make me wish these racist wingnuts didn’t just hide on backwater blogs attended to only by the like-minded faithful. A little harsh light of public exposure would make people deal with this.
Shakir is ten, and he is are allowed to vote?
I can’t write grammatical sentences, but I get to vote. That’s pretty unfair too.
Why does she hate Shakira?
Her “friend” has a student/teacher ratio of 4:1 or better and yet still can’t teach a kid to read better? I’m guessing “Shakir” is not the problem here.
Why does she hate America?
Gotta go off topic for a sec here–I haven’t been spending much time here lately (blame my evil capitalist overlords), but was there a Seattle SadlyMeet? I was expecting to see a post on it, but maybe it only showed up in the comments and I missed it.
“She interjects too much religion/biblical analogies in the literary discussions–and does not accept differing opinions when they differ with hers.”
First of all, what’s wrong with that? Liberals wanna ban the Bible everywhere, but its the Book that has all the answers. They just don’t like the answers. Second, it’s LIBERALS who do not accept differing opionions. Stop projecting, you are the biased ones with totalitarian mindset when it comes to acceptable topics. A valid topic, like why are blacks so dumn and lazy, is shouted down as unPC.
Good morning class. I’d like you all to say hello to Shakir, our new…nigger.
So Shakir is illiterate, belligerent and completely unwilling and unable to learn?
Sound like his role model is George W. Bush.
The Helens of the educational world don’t seem to grasp what the major underlying problem is.
Most of the little Shakirs in the public school systems go to schools that are decrepit, falling over dumps. At my daughter’s elementary school, we parents had to mount a three year battle with the district to repair the torn carpets (on stairs where students regularly tripped on them), filthy, non-functional bathrooms, cracked asphalt on the playground, and flaking paint. And this was at a school that’s predominantly *Asian*, not Black! The schools in Black neighborhoods were even worse.
Going to schools like that has a psychological effect on young students: “the world doesn’t give a crap about my school, so why should I care?” If every public school in the country was as well-equipped, nicely appointed and cared for as a typical suburban junior college, a lot of the problems with dropout rates and “fuck this” attitudes would be improved dramatically.
A woman I know in the music business (who happens to be Black), who deals with hard-core rappers all the time, calls this the “nice clean house” effect. She’s a neat-freak who keeps her house impeccably clean (she has white furniture and a white carpet fercrissake), and she has noticed that no matter how much of a ghetto gang-banger a rap artist is, when they visit her house they wipe their feet, use coasters on the coffee table, and invariably ask to go wash their hands – all without being asked. She says that when Black folks (she can’t speak for the White folks) are in such a clean, nice place, they modify any slovenly behavior which might be their habit (which they happily indulge in when in a hole-in-the-wall recording studio.) I’ve told her there’s a similar effect on any people, White of Black. When you find yourself in an obviously nice, clean place, you act like it. There would be a similar effect on Black students (and White ones too) if all the public schools were nice, clean places.
But that would mean paying money. Tax money. We can’t have that! Much better to bitch and moan about “Shakirs” and expel them all.
Any other ideas?
Maybe the Shakirs could be put to work on large-scale agricultural projects, in return for some tight pussies, loose shoes, and warm places to shit?
Huh. Seems my son should be named Shakir. He doesn’t want to do his work at school either. And I have a hard time attending parent/teacher conferences because I have to, you know, work for a living as does his father. I can’t imagine being homeless would help his school performance at all. Strangely, the teachers seem to want to go to their homes and families at the end of their workday too and so scheduling these things so they are possible for both parties is somewhat problematic.
Of course, I suspect he may have a touch of dyslexia and ADD, not to mention a healthy helping of lazy, and the school doesn’t have the resources to deal with that–incidentally, neither do we.
But then, Helen isn’t talking about my son because his name is as white bread as you can get. That might be because he is white.
All of this to make the point that there are a lot of “Shakirs” in all communities and our schools aren’t given the resources to do anything with them and it’s getting worse as everyone is looking for tax cuts (see Florida) and the economic situation for working and middle class families get more desperate leaving them without the wherewithal to do for their kids what the schools cannot.
The “nice clean house” effect goes for more than houses.
The Imus incident is an example; they’ve resorted to dog whistles and “Shakirs” because they can no longer spout this idiocy in public the way they used to.
As bad as our Big House is, it’s been cleaned up over the decades.
If this is a public school, a teacher with a class of 4 or 5 students and a full-time aide could only be a Special Education teacher. No public school district in America can afford to pay 2 adults to teach 5 kids full-time unless mandated to do so by IDEA
That means that Shakir has been diagnosed with any of long list of learning difficulties, as have the other students in his class, and these learning disabilities are so severe that they prevent him from being educated in a regular classroom. The law requires the least-restrictive environment available to meet the needs of the child.
That this cretin of a Wingnut would use a child with a disability as the basis of a racist rant is beyond disgusting. Hall of Shame!
I like this suggestion:
This guy isn’t bad either:
And liberals are the ones who like “social engineering…”
Wow, that comment thread over there is quite a treat.
I
didn’tcouldn’t wade through every one of them, but among the ones that caught my attention, Skair a) is just a Nazi Brownshirt in training, courtesy of teh liberal fascists; b) needs to experience some humiliation in order to start learning (yeah, shame is one hell of a motivator); and c) is not really worth the effort, so fuck him.I gotta go hose myself down now. Where’s my wire brush?
Yeah, the 8-10 student classroom with an aide looks a lot like special education classrooms, in which case, as Goober said, fuck that bitch for her horrifying judgment.
I mean, maybe it should raise a few red flags if a child “takes the entire day simply to write his name.”
Alternatively, that could also describe a private school classroom – maybe a religious school? – in which case, why the hell aren’t we blaming the school or the teacher?
Oh right, because a fucking 10-year-old needs to be subjected to the moral judgment of these morons because he
Oh, well then, fuck that kid. Clearly he’s just a big jerk. Let’s all mock him.
I shudder to think what “behavior modification methods” they’re trying out.
Awash in the Drool of their own eliminationist fantasies…
Damb, auggiesback is dumn.
I think she said the student is ….
…..NEARER….
So, this person is basically Mary Grabar by way of Stormfront. Are there any crazy righty teachers who aren’t complete failures at teaching?
Indeed, if “Shakir” is receiving “a lot of one-on-one time” with his teacher, and is still unable to read, there are really only two possibilities: one, “Shakir” has a significant learning disability that’s really hampering his ability to read, or two, “Shakir’s” teacher isn’t very good at her job. Given the class size mentioned, and the fact that it seems to fluctuate (either that, or her friend can’t be bothered to count that high), the former possibility seems most likely. It’s absolutely disgusting and shameful to use the plights of a ten year old boy with serious learning disabilities as a model to explain the perceived deficiencies of an entire race. Again, if “Shakir” is receiving “a lot of one-on-one time” with his teachers, he’s clearly not skipping school, he clearly isn’t hanging out in the bathroom, he clearly isn’t being lazy. Besides, these are all adolescent behaviors, and have a hell of a lot more to do with adolescence than they do with race. Last time I checked, most ten year old boys aren’t even close to being considered adolescents.
I’m done now.
No it doesn’t. There are many questions it does not answer, such as ‘who created God?’
Oddly enough, the same goes for Christians. Which is why much of the Bible is ignored by the Christers when it doesn’t conform to their ideology. Just look at how much of Leviticus they avoid.
That’s always a possibility, given that Liberals are only human. However, modern movement Conservatives have a distinctly authoritarian bent and authoritarians lack, by nature, an openness to opinions.
Sorry, but we just don’t like calling people niggers. This is not totalitarianism, it is common decency.
What data exists to show that Blacks are ‘dumn (sic) and lazy?’ Anecdotal evidence from ideologues such as Cadogan is immediately suspect.
Nitpick of the day: It’s “free rein,” not reign.
[Clif adds: Thanks. It’s fixed. Some of us just refuse to learn and instead sit in class writing “Sadly, No!” over and over for the entire day.]
And to top it all off, Shakir and his ilk are allowed to vote.
Yeah, maybe President McCain can have everyone tested for ideological purity before allowing people to vote. It’s the way the Founding Fathers wanted it!
Are there any crazy righty teachers who aren’t complete failures at teaching?
Let’s hope not.
Liberals should not be allowed to vote. They always vote against our nation’s interests and even their own. Only when they are no longer enthralled by the blacks, the gays, the muslims should we treat them as Americans again. We are at war.
Racist cow.
With any luck these people will spend the Obama presidency barricaded in their homes clutching their guns, too frightened go out and cause trouble.
I dunno if this augie douche is real or not, I do know he’s well beneath engaging.
But I DO hope that the worst of these racist scumbags spew as much hateful bile as they possibly can between now and november.
Seems to me that anybody that agrees with this garbage would never vote for obama anyway, and a bunch of people on the fence are going to end up voting for obama as a reaction to the disgust this kind of mindless, ignorant hatred and bigotry engenders.
All around, another win for the side of hope!
mikey
auggiesback, you mispelled your own name.
In the future when you see a sign that says “WHITEY RE-EDUCATION CENTER,” enter the building. The people there will protect you from teh brown.
Oooppsss….
mikey
I wonder if she has a final solution to the
niggerShakir problem?If a white kid can’t learn, it’s the damned unions forcing schools to keep incompetent teachers. If they’re black, it’s their own fault.
Nice bit of consistency right there.
A bit of truth in Uggie’s last comment: “Only when they are no longer enthralled by the blacks, the gays, the muslims should we treat them as Americans again. We are at war.”
Conservatives are at war with blacks, teh gays and muslims. The have always been at war with blacks, teh gays and muslims.
BTW, I’ve been enthralled by gays since I was about 5.
I had a friend in high school who had some form of undiagnosed learning disability; he could misspell his own name.
He was a much nicer guy than Auggie seems though.
Theys a whole lotta Shakirin’ goin on round here!
A shout out to the exquisitely literate “Louise” who would …take that child away when he is very young, and bring back oprhanages, etc.
Canada tried that in the 19th century with the aboriginal population. Here is the result of that experiment.
I might add that the aboriginal residential school example is a good one because Helen Cadogan is exactly the kind of “teacher” the residential schools hired: a bigoted religious fanatic who scorned and abused the children in her care.
Count me in as another vote for Shakir Is Probably Dyslexic/Has A Learning Disability.
See, my brother was just like little Shakir, only he was eight and couldn’t read. Not because he was stupid, lazy, or the victim of stupid teachers, no — he’s dyslexic and the traditional phonics method made no sense to him. Our grandmother was able to teach him to read, using the Edmark gestalt reading system. (Now he’s a voracious reader who’s always on the lookout for something new and good to read.)
Cadogan’s beyond vile for using one kid who clearly needs some help to paint an entire segment of humanity as worthless.
well yeah birdseatbugs and if she’s going to go after anyone, shouldn’t she start with Bush? He can’t string two sentences together without completely blowing grammar and meaning.
Lesley,
Didn’t the Australians do the same thing?
the Book that has all the answers.
I wish the Bible had a decent index. I can’t find the Biblical stance on Reimann’s conjecture anywhere.
Well, Duh, Herr Clyde. The Bible is unwilling to address Riemann’s Hypothesis because ½ of the Trinity would require dissecting the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit rejected the idea…
mikey
Yes, LA, they did. Canada recently made reparations and formally apologized.
They refuse to work; the same way, their parents refuse to attend parent-teacher meetings. They sleep, they disrupt, curse, fight, and do no work
Copyediting FAIL.
The why of this phenomenon is quite important; you see, there are lots of Shakirs in the black community[…]
Even in well disciplined schools, there are Shakirs who go to class and put their heads on the desk. They refuse to work; the same way, their parents refuse to attend parent-teacher meetings. They sleep, they disrupt, curse, fight, and do no work
She’s got a point, here: I mean, if the parents are sleeping and fighting during parent-teacher meetings, clearly the kids are going to have problems.
What? You think she meant the students sleep, fight, etc.? No, that can’t be, because she clearly shifts the subject from students to parents and even gives the parents an entire independent clause before she uses “they” again. Surely, no college English instructor as skilled and knowledgeable as Helen would make such a common, ninth-grade pronoun reference error like that.
And when she talks about the “why” of this phenomenon, I can only assume that Helen has already determined that poor little Shakir’s home environment has been tested for lead contamination or examined for signs of rats or a cockroach infestation. She is also quite certain that Shakir (and all his peers who can’t seem to stay awake for class) can’t possibly be malnourished, suffering from a sleep disorder, or maybe even, you know, sick or something.
Because clearly someone with her strong background in logic and argumentation would have eliminated all those factors before concluding that the “why” of this phenomenon can only be melanin content.
i’m a special ed teacher on the west side of chicago. i had 17 tmh (iqs between 40 and 55) kids in my class last year. my 2 aides and i taught some of them to read, and all of them to become literate within the limits of their disabilities.
oh, btw… all the kids are black.
so helen? suck on it.
Jim hit it on the head.
5-8 students WITH A TEACHING ASSISTANT?
Cadogan could at least be honest and say she’s talking about a special-ed class, and not a typical classroom.
WTF? The Book that has all the answers? The Bible is Wikipedia?
LA Confidential Pantload said,
Why yes, they did. And like Canada, per Lesley @ 23:10, they have formally apologised.
The Bible is Wikipedia?
Yes, and I just edited Genesis. It now talks about Adam and Steve.
OK, I came here for a little snark, but just reading this post pisses me off, and I have yet again, unwisely post my gut reaction without reading the other 53 posts before me.
But here goes.
My kid attended a predominantly black school for kindergarten, in a predominantly black neighborhood. It was our neighborhood school, because we could only afford to buy a house there. Yes, we were gentrifying this neighborhood, for bad or worse.
Anyway, his school did not have a PTSA association – you know why? Because it COSTS MONEY to join a PTSA, and most of his classmates parents didn’t have enough to spare. His classmates parents didn’t attend parent-teacher meetings much, either, you know why? Because they WORKED during the times when such meetings were held. Sometimes they had TWO JOBS. Or they have other kids they have to care for. Sometimes the kids are tired because they have to spend a lot of time in child care while their parents work – or travel from care to school and to home.
My kids’ school had an excellent kindergarten teacher who taught in that school for 30 years, and I volunteered in class for her. That woman was so compassionate with kids and their parents, and I watched her reach them and help them. My school’s principal held free spaghetti dinners once a month for families – that brought people to the school and helped them build a community without paying dues to the state PTSA association.
There were plenty of people who cared about their kids’ learning – they just didn’t have the luxury of doing the things that are structured for white suburban parents who have cars and 9 – 5 jobs and who can afford nighttime babysitters and PTSA dues.
One of my kid’s classmates was a little girl who, a year before entering kindergarten, had been sitting in the back seat of her mother’s car while her mother drove her and her 8 year old sister in their neighborhood. A car stopped in front of her, and after some time, the mom tapped the horn to see if it would move. The driver turned and opened fire on her car, and the 8 year old fell onto her little sister’s lap and died.
My son’s kindergarten teacher knew how to be compassionate and caring with little “Shakirs” and their mothers who just might have reasons like this that makes it hard for them to concentrate on their studies – unlike this bitch Helen Cadogan.
Liberals wanna ban the Bible everywhere, but its the Book that has all the answers. They just don’t like the answers.
Hmm. The Bible really sucks as a textbook in Molecular Biology and Chem class.
the Book that has all the answers.
I wish the Bible had a decent index. I can’t find the Biblical stance on Reimann’s conjecture anywhere.
Well of course not! Equations are the devil’s sentences.
Well now there’s a surprise: good teachers, like MellowJohn and g’s son’s kindergarten teacher, can actually teach troubled or disadvantaged kids and even care about them! But who wants to bet if Helen’s craptacular friend ever gets fired for sucking and blaming 10-year-old special ed kids for her failings, it’ll magically be because she’s a Christian, or a right-winger, or whatever fake ass poutrage they can muster? THAT’S RIGHT I SAID POUTRAGE!
Oh. My. Fucking. God. I think I just pissed myself reading those RMP reviews. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Credit is due.
It was g’s idea to add a roll of TP that inspired the original logo modification.
http://www.sadlyno.com/archives/7300.html#comment-290346
Thank God this woman can no longer screw up innocent children.
I never heard of this magazine, but it’s hysterical. They have an article from one guy indignantly claiming that when Obama reminds people he’s not Muslim, he’s infringing on the rights of the people who say he is.
Even in well disciplined schools, there are Shakirs who go to class and put their heads on the desk. They refuse to work; the same way, their parents refuse to attend parent-teacher meetings. They sleep, they disrupt, curse, fight, and do no work
As a retired teacher I can guarantee ya that a special ed kid with low self esteem, poor role modeling and emotional problems is gonna be a real toughun to teach.
I live and taught school in Canada and every single one of my former students with these characteristics were white, but there’s no doubt there’s plenty of black kids with similar profiles.
If I ruled the world, the first step I’d take for kids like these would be to walk into their houses and take a sledgehammer to the family TV set, as it was always my experience that the family had the fucking thing on pretty much 24/7 and furthermore allowed the kids to watch all kinds of amazingly inappropriate crapola.
Nice analysis and I’m not saying there are no problems students in the world, but … um … how can I put this?
The Cadogans of the world are known for their ability to exaggerate or just plain make shit up.
WTF? Does her “friend” regularly kill some of her students and send out for replacements? When I went to school (100,000 B.C.) my class sizes were stable.
Christ, someone pry the comma off her keyboard before she kills again!
Also, Shakir as a stereotypical African-American name is Epic Fail. I guess she couldn’t resist trying to invoke the scary black Mooslem.
If I ruled the world, the first step I’d take for kids like these would be to walk into their houses and take a sledgehammer to the family TV set…
Dood, if you could take a few weeks and get that done on about 900 million homes, you might just save civilization.
Unfortunately, you’d be killed for your efforts.
There a lesson in there somewhere…
mikey
Oh. And hey. You’d be a martyr to knowledge, wisdom and hope.
I’d put some flowers on your marker.
Just sayin…
mikey
Liberals wanna ban the Bible everywhere, but its the Book that has all the answers. They just don’t like the answers.
We don’t like the answers because so many of them are wrong — like the answers for what causes disease (“demons”), whether the earth is flat (“it has 4 corners”), and is it OK to sell my teenage daughter into slavery (“yes”). I see no reason to let the moral ideas of a bunch of mostly illiterate nomads, who believed crap like this, dictate my behavior. I see even less to let a functional illiterate like auggiesbutt tell me what to do. The illiterate nomads had an excuse — knowing practically nothing about how the world really works; what’s his?
The Bible is Wikipedia?
Those scribes would have had a lot of fun with a WikiTorah.
— This page contains two contradictory accounts of the Creation. The alternative versions urgently require redaction.
— The account of the Battle of Jericho is disputed.
— Because of repeated anonymous vandalism, this page is locked until further notice.
————————————-
If I ruled the world, the first step I’d take for kids like these would be to walk into their houses and take a sledgehammer to the family TV set…
A Santa for the 21st Century. He knows if you’ve been watching good programs or shite…
Same one. For God’s sakes, don’t tell him where babies come from.
Or the horrible truth about the Easter Bunny.
Cadogan deserves to be deep fried for this crap.
It was g’s idea to add a roll of TP that inspired the original logo modification.
Thank you [curtseys, blushes]. You like me! you really like me!
whether the earth is flat (”it has 4 corners”),
To be fair, I think the original authors of the Bible, or perhaps its translators, were probably intelligent people who understood the concept of metaphor. Something the current cadre of right wing wackos are sadly deficient in.
The Easter Bunny moved carefully, laterally, taking advantage of the late afternoon shadows in the uneven ice. Unhurried, she moved slowly, careful not to draw attention. Eventually she reached the last outcrop before the perimeter of the compound.
With the target zone in sight, she painstakingly began to set up her hide. Claymores deployed to the east and west. Smaller pressure – activated mines to the north, to delay an pursuit after the shot. Finally, the Barrett Fifty. She took the big, heavy rifle out of it’s hard case and attached the twenty power Leupold scope with the BORS computer. Finally, she very carefully loaded five match .50 BMG rounds into the magazine, inserted it into the rifle and pulled back the charging handle.
In her white parka and white fur, she disappeared into the light snowfall as she settled in behind the rifle scope and waited for the shot. Sure, handing baskets of candy to kids was a fun cover, but god help her, this is what she lived for.
An hour passed. Another. Finally, as the sun was approaching the horizon, the door to the large wooden building opened, and a large man appeared. A big man, with a red face, red suit, black boots and a big white beard. The Easter Bunny tightened her grip on the big rifle, snugging the stock into her shoulder, and locking all her focus on the image of the man in the scope. Her breathing slowed, and she entered almost a zen state, the only reality being her physical bond with the rifle, a bone bridge connecting the muzzle of the gun with the ground through her body, and the all – encompassing image of the big man in the red suit in the scope.
But not yet. Wait for it. Confirm the target. Calmly, the Bunny snicked off the safety and took up the pressure on the trigger. Wait for it. Any time now. Just wait for it. Her breathing was almost undetectable.
The big man looked at the sky, rubbed his ruddy face, took off his red had and looked around him at his stark, polar surroundings. And then he drew a deep breath, tilted his head back and gave out a booming “HO, HO, HO” in his signature style.
The Bunny smiled a wan smile. Target confirmed. Fire. Without conscious thought, the trigger broke and the big 655 grain slug raced downrange at three thousand feet per second. Somehow, Santa looked up and seemed to see the muzzle flash before he met his fate.
There can be only one…
mikey
Maybe so, but the film reviews in Deuteronomy are generally excellent.
mikey, you are a fucking genius.
I guarantee that Helen didn’t mean that they should be expelled.
Just relocated to that nice ward–er, school Nurse Ratched runs.
Easter Bunny, huh.
Hassenpfeffer for five, table 3!
Deuteronomy (Greek deuteronomion, ????????????? “second law”) is the fifth book of the Hebrew Bible and of the Old Testament. In form it is a set of three sermons delivered by Moses reviewing the previous forty years of wandering in the wilderness; its central element is a detailed law-code by which the Children of Israel are to live in the Promised Land.
Lists of miscellaneous information should be avoided. (September 2007)
Please relocate any relevant information into appropriate sections or articles.
hell, i want to scream every time i see nutbags representing the seven cities. we’re not all like that, i swear!
also, where does her “friend” teach? i can’t think of an elementary school in the area with class sizes that low, even for special-ed.
do you think Cadogan’s teacher-buddy knows she’s used her story so hideously? i kinda think not.
“The Bible is unwilling to address Riemann’s Hypothesis because ½ of the Trinity would require dissecting the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit rejected the idea…”
Truly the wisdom of Solomon there, Mikey.
It is an Internet tradition that Mikey brings the win.
Actually, Tehanu, the TANAKH was written by literate (duh!) urban dwellers in several old and sophisticated cosmopolitan crossroads (how many miles to Babylon, forsooth!), and was indeed known by its target audience to contain metaphor, simile, hyperbole and all those other good things from Lit Class. There’s quite a mass of meta discussion of this, known broadly as “talmudic scholarship,” going back millennia.
It also has a number of long defenses of scientific observation and naturalistic attitudes towards the world, including the value of doctors and medicine, how G-d gave us reason to understand the world and survive in it, how weather systems are cyclical and dependent on the ocean, etc etc etc.
I recommend that you 1) check out your local synagogue and see if they have any classes you could take, 2) do some googling and maybe, you know, actually read some of it besides random out-of-context quotes, before spouting off like a winger about Teh Liebruls. After all, we’re supposed to be the Reality Based Community, right?
whether the earth is flat (”it has 4 corners”),
To be fair, I think the original authors of the Bible, or perhaps its translators, were probably intelligent people who understood the concept of metaphor. Something the current cadre of right wing wackos are sadly deficient in.
g, ObRef (inevitable)–
“At the round earth’s imagined corners, blow
Your trumpets, angels, and arise, arise
From death, you numberless infinities
Of souls, and to your scattered bodies go…”
I’m reminded of reading somewhere the other day that there are some teachers out there who deliberately teach at poor schools with high minority populations with the express purpose of miseducating them and keeping them down, if you will. Sigh.
annejumps, that sounds like a lot of work and no reward for something that happens anyway.
I found a picture of Shakir.
You can tell he is stupid because he is a Cardinals fan.
Unlike the rest of y’all, I actually know Helen Cadogan. I was her supervisor for a while and had to evaluate her teaching. I found it exemplary. In the classroom, she is both laid back and knowledgeable. The warm rapport she had with (every one of) her students belies the evaluations of the experts at ratemyprofessor (a site for angry students, IME).
Oh.
And she’s black. Carribbean-American, in fact.
Just sayin.
belies the evaluations of the experts at ratemyprofessor (a site for angry students, IME).
My experience is that there is more truth in those evaluations than most profs care to admit.
Two pet peeves of mine—when profs rant about ratemyprofessor and Wikipedia. It’s not like students can’t see right through it.
RateMyProfessors is a mixed bag; some truth, I’m sure, but the comments are so context-free that you often don’t know if there’s a genuine problem there or it’s simply a case of a student being mad for some other reason.
As for Wikipedia, I tell my students that it’s a resource that I myself often use, but that they should corroborate anything they obtain from another credible source if they want to use that material in an assignment. I had a discussion in one of my classes about Wikipedia, where the articles come from, and how they can be ridiculously manipulated (illustrated with examples I took right from Wikipedia) and I think that that really helped the students understand how to use and how not to use Wikipedia.
I use Wikipedia myself, but take it with a truckload of salt. (I once saw a McCain entry that included “after vietnam, mccain was a gay freak [sic].”)
The ratemyprofessor review of another colleague of mine, a woman I know as a brilliant, creative and mentoring professor, would curl your eyebrows.
Well, the eyebrows of y’all who DON’T swallow those reviews without salt. It’s not like anyone with sense can’t see right through them.
Gine said,
Unlike the rest of y’all, I actually know Helen Cadogan. I was her supervisor for a while and had to evaluate her teaching. I found it exemplary. In the classroom, she is both laid back and knowledgeable. The warm rapport she had with (every one of) her students belies the evaluations of the experts at ratemyprofessor (a site for angry students, IME).
First, thanks for joining the thread Helen.
Second, ratemyprofessor–not a site for angry students at all! I’ve earned the smiley face and the hot tamale! Recognize!
*yawn* Whatever, Gine. I have no interest in rehashing the same old tired debate about the validity of Wikipedia. Trust me, you have nothing new to say*.
As for RateMyProfessor, I had no particular interest in the site, despite having been a full time student for the last four years, until a few weeks ago when, on a whim, I looked up a bunch of old instructors on there. The results were surprisingly accurate when compared with my own experiences. Sure there’s the various students with grudges and whatnot, but really it’s better than you’d think, at least from the students’ perspective. I imagine that some profs don’t like having what used to be a campuswide reputation writ large on the Internet like that, but we’re all dealing with issues like that these days.
—
* Just for the record I don’t think Wikipedia is a panacea or anything like that, yes it contains bias and inaccuracies, and I don’t think it’s good to rely on it for anything critical or for primary sources, etc. But I just tend to get peeved when I see teachers lecture their students about it like they are little children who don’t know any better.
Nothing to do with this post but some awesome wingnuttery can be found here:
http://www.gaysdefendmarriage.com/
Best part is if you mock it, you’re almost 100% guaranteed to get a personal (and lengthy) response from the cuckoo bird who runs it–he seems to sit around all day waiting for Google Alerts to notify him of mentions of his name on the internets so he can ‘splain what he really meant. Good fun.
Cadogan could at least be honest and say she’s talking about a special-ed class, and not a typical classroom.
Perhaps Special Ed Instructor does not mean what we think it means?
And she’s black. Carribbean-American, in fact.
The rum and beer ads, and the stories of rent-a-dreads notwithstanding, Caribbean people are quite socially conservative, most consipicuously in their intolerance of gay people. There are interesting historic reasons for this: a Victorian culture that has ebbed away almost entirely leaving almost nothing but the old rigidity of mind about human sexuality, for one thing. Second, in the Caribbean, as in lots of the U.S., it’s the churches (as opposed to interesting urban life and a wide variety of educational, intellectual, and cultural experiences) that are the nearest means of social advancement, cultural assimilation, and respectability. The demographic that looks to get on in this way are disposed to be intolerant and ignorant and hardly need any help in being more so. Nevertheless, they get a lot of help from your fundie churches, which are a huge drag on cultural development in the islands, through their influence on the local churces and through their broadcast infrastructure. When your TV preachers are hustling money for overseas missionary work, that is how they spend it (after looking after themselves of course). La Cadogan is, sadly, typical of the result.
Also I am quite sure Shakir is a figment of her imagination.
I meant conspicuously.
Shit.
Well, she could be Wonder Woman crossed with Mother Teresa in the classroom. On the internet, she comes off as kind of a shitwit.
First, thanks for joining the thread Helen.
No, thank you for showing me what kind of blog this is! (“ZOMG!!! Nobody could possibly defend her but her!!!)
The rum and beer ads, and the stories of rent-a-dreads notwithstanding, Caribbean people are quite socially conservative, most consipicuously in their intolerance of gay people.
Helen and I have argued quite spectacularly over politics. We manage to remain friends and share a mutual respect.
Well, she could be Wonder Woman crossed with Mother Teresa in the classroom. On the internet, she comes off as kind of a shitwit.
I spoke to her ability as a teacher only because of the prominent place ratemyprofessor has in the blog. But, while I don’t agree with her politics, I do, however, agree with her opinion of many of the students we’ve taught.
Also I am quite sure Shakir is a figment of her imagination.
Of course you are. Y’all can believe as y’all will; Helen doesn’t make up students. She teaches them, as best she can.
Of course you are. Y’all can believe as y’all will; Helen doesn’t make up students. She teaches them, as best she can.
Um.
If you’re going to posit that this Shakir is real, that would be the point at which we stop taking you seriously (assuming anyone was taking you seriously to begin with).
If you’re going to posit that this Shakir is real, that would be the point at which we stop taking you seriously (assuming anyone was taking you seriously to begin with).
FTR, I posit only that “Shakir” is a composite of Helen’s experiences. But the fact that any of y’all think I care whether total strangers, with whom I’ve “corresponded” for the first time in life, take me seriously speaks volumes.
Just volumes.
Thank you for your kind attention. ‘sBeen lovely.
FTR, I posit only that “Shakir” is a composite of Helen’s experiences.
IOW, she’s a racist who made up a strawman to back up her bigoted opinions about African-Americans.
But the fact that any of y’all think I care whether total strangers, with whom I’ve “corresponded” for the first time in life, take me seriously speaks volumes.
You keep coming back.
Just sayin’
btw, this is like the trailer park version of when all of Megan McArdle’s yuppie shitstain friends came in here to tell us “what a nice person” she was.
She might be your close personal friend, Gine, but she clearly is a wingnut worthy of this site’s mockery.
Case closed.
But the fact that any of y’all think I care whether total strangers, with whom I’ve “corresponded” for the first time in life, take me seriously speaks volumes.
I can’t imagine why strangers, after reading your multiple comments trying to convince them of something concerning some person you know and they don’t, would infer you care what strangers think.
FTR, I posit only that “Shakir” is a composite of Helen’s experiences.
Did you even read the article? Hint: the first sentence.
bellatrys — I didn’t say the specific authors of the Bible were illiterate; I said that the populace at the time was mostly illiterate. And I certainly wouldn’t disagree with you about their understanding of metaphor and other literary tropes. The problem is people like auggysbum, who probably went to school somewhat more recently than 1,000 B.C., who have no understanding of metaphor or anything else because of their fear of thinking for themselves.
And I still maintain that people who wrote up elaborate rules about when it was OK to sell their children as slaves are not people whose moral ideas strike me as worth paying attention to, let alone reverencing. I don’t think it was “metaphor” when they triumphantly wrote about how God ordered them to slaughter every man, woman and child in the next village over, and punished them when they omitted to slaughter one or two. Oh, and I spent lots of time in shul when I was growing up. I guess the best thing I can say about my distant Hebrew ancestors is, they WERE ahead of most of their neighbors, morally speaking. But unfortunately that’s not saying much.
The one significant item I have found after reading all the comments, dealing with supposed anti-pc or racist, good grief nigger is just a word and can apply to anyone as it has to do with attitude, not race, and perceived persecution, is that the -parents- are the problem. If they do not properly teach and care for their children then how can these children possibly learn to care for others.
Ok folks, some will attempt to start going back generations of “they were not taught, and their parents weren’t taught, and it is all somebody else’s fault”. Can you really believe that all of these people were incapable? The ability is there. If it is not passed to the children do not blame the children.
If the parents have decided that they have no responsibility because they have been somehow “deprived” or “society owes us” as an excuse don’t expect the children to do better unless they recognize the error.
And to top it all off, Shakir and his ilk are allowed to vote.
I think I might have seen his car when we lived in Newport News. Flashy Lincoln Continental, metallic purple paint job, bumper sticker that says, “I’M 10 YEARS OLD AND I VOTE“?