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Monkey See. Monkey Do. Oops $12 million.

ArchSas said:
I don't. Firstly, because a teacher isn't "one of the guys," and shouldn't act as such. But more importantly, because a teacher shouldn't be insulting students, even playfully. In today's world that's seen as inappropriate and usually bad for students. Having a good, joking relationship with kids is a good thing, but it's entirely possible to create that kind of relationship without basing it around insulting comparing students to animals. I know that very well firsthand, as it's the only way I was even remotely able to be successful as a camp counselor - I worked best with older kids I could build a joking, but respectful and positive, relationship with. And again, when it came to pictures and things like that, we would always be doing the goofy things with the students and not to them. I don't know if you'll recognize the difference or not, but it's significant.
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I guess in a zoology lesson it is important to point out that humans are definitely not animals. Or primates, of course.
 
Sideroxylon said:
That’s a common trope but its not about guilt for sins of the past. And lets not think our racist past is dead and buried because it is not.

I am never going to use that expression with a black person because I am mindful. There is a whole lot of comedy based around this from Basil Fawlty (not mentioning the war) to David Brent and Larry David. Do you try to move past or draw attention with a fumbling apology? But this case of staging photos and captioning them provided plenty of tine for reflection, didn’t it.
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If being "mindful" means considering race primarily in every thought, word, and deed with which one interacts with another human being how is it functionally different from being "racist"?
 
Distracted1 said:
After decades it seems we have come back to the only workable solution again being "separate but equal".
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Nope. It's more like we've come to the workable solution of "stop making stupid jokes when they can so easily be interpreted as racist."

Seriously, the way some are defending this you'd think that "monkey see monkey do" is the pinnacle of humor. In the best possible execution and interpretation, it's not even worthy of a slight chuckle. It's several levels below the picture of a cat hanging from a branch captioned with "hang in there."
 
Babbylonian said:
it's not even worthy of a slight chuckle.
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We don't know how the class reacts and that's what matters. The whole class might burst out in laughter when they finally get to see the Monkey Do slide. Maybe they Roll On The Floor Laughing Their Asses Off. ROTFLTAO!
 
William Parcher said:
We don't know how the class reacts and that's what matters. The whole class might burst out in laughter when they finally get to see the Monkey Do slide. Maybe they Roll On The Floor Laughing Their Asses Off. ROTFLTAO!
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Which is why the subjects this year are suing the school. Because they found it so hilarious!
 
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Babbylonian said:
Nope. It's more like we've come to the workable solution of "stop making stupid jokes when they can so easily be interpreted as racist."

Seriously, the way some are defending this you'd think that "monkey see monkey do" is the pinnacle of humor. In the best possible execution and interpretation, it's not even worthy of a slight chuckle. It's several levels below the picture of a cat hanging from a branch captioned with "hang in there."
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And about as worthy of taking offense to when used innocently.

One could juxtapose the kittens "hang in there" with an image of a lynching and be extremely, offensively, racist. Without taking that step, however, the argument seems to be that the kitten is racist because that step could be taken. I reject that philosophy.
 
Distracted1 said:
And about as worthy of taking offense to when used innocently.

One could juxtapose the kittens "hang in there" with an image of a lynching and be extremely, offensively, racist. Without taking that step, however, the argument seems to be that the kitten is racist because that step could be taken. I reject that philosophy.
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Yes, you should reject your [straw] philosophy. The step of labeling four black students as monkeys was actually taken.
 
Thermal said:
Do you do so? Do these kids receive that? Does anyone in this generation even do that?
Assuming This teacher is in his 40s or 50s, even his generation didn't do that (in mainstream America, more of a relic from the 50s and 60s).

Debasing the dignity of black people is a serious problem. Monkey see, monkey do is not. That is a colloquialism of mimicry.

Tell me, when people mention monkeys, you say your thought jump to black people? Mine sure don't. I doubt this teacher's did.
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When black people are described as monkeys or linked to monkeys I think immediately of the long history of the meme being used in a racist fashion. Decades, hundreds of years of its use in this fashion. It hasn't disappeared by any means (in fact I see it recently expanding once again as politicians have sought to play to racist groups for support). Do you think that the kids and their parents somehow were unaware of it as a racial insult and had to be told about the problem by someone over 60 years old?

Were you unaware of it and were shocked to learn of the racist connection by this thread?
 
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Babbylonian said:
Yes, you should reject your [straw] philosophy. The step of labeling four black students as monkeys was actually taken.
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Certainly. In the context of the innocuous and widely known expression of "monkey see-monkey do" with further overtones that humans of every "race" zoologicaly share a great deal with our monkey and gorilla cousins, and even further context that the same had been done to students of other races which indicates that the example was one of humans place in the animal kingdom and not simply black humans place in it.

Perhaps it should be further examined to see if the epitet "boys" was ever used to describe the students. The well known use of that word as pejorative surely must indicate that its' use to describe a juvenile black male is a racist assault in every context.
 
Distracted1 said:
I guess in a zoology lesson it is important to point out that humans are definitely not animals. Or primates, of course.
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These were not images to amusingly point out that humans are animals. These were not zoology lessons. Specific children were the target of jokes with a nasty edge. Not the best idea in general.

Sure, the kids probably feel the need to at least pretend to laugh along but jr high and high school are difficult environments for many kids to get through just as is. A popular kid might not care being in one of these slides, but a kid having problems, or a social loner, being called out in this way by teachers, will very likely have their situation bad worse. Imagine someone already being bullied now being called a monkey too!

It is an authorized form of bullying, not science education. Bullies make fun about any flaws (real or not) in their prey and when challenged claim that they were "only making a joke." Yeah, ha, ha, ha - I remember just how funny it was from the bullied point of view. Here we have teachers doing it! "We were just making a joke." The more I think about it the more I think the entire school administration needs to be snapped out of their stupidity and ignorance.
 
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In thread after thread, at least according to a few posters, no matter what occurs there is no evidence of it being racism. Apparently the black people involved in these incidents who do believe that racism has taken place are wrong; just over-sensitive and/or incited by others to leap to the wrong conclusion and "play the race card."

Thankfully we white people know better and that most racism has disappeared! Certainly we don't see it...

Having lived through the 1960s I am reminded by a very common response by those in opposition to the civil rights movement at that time, "Its all those outside agitators! We whites and them "racial slurs" got along just fine until those communists, Jews, and Northerns came down and started putting ideas into their heads."
 
Giordano said:
Having lived through the 1960s I am reminded by a very common response by those in opposition to the civil rights movement at that time, "Its all those outside agitators! We whites and them "racial slurs" got along just fine until those communists, Jews, and Northerns came down and started putting ideas into their heads."
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My grandparents used to call Martin Luther King, Jr., long after he had been murdered, a "troublemaker."
 
Babbylonian said:
My grandparents used to call Martin Luther King, Jr., long after he had been murdered, a "troublemaker."
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And indeed he was!:)

Achieving justice is a whole lot of trouble! Especially for those who were already on the top of the heap previously...
 
Giordano said:
And indeed he was!:)

Achieving justice is a whole lot of trouble! Especially for those who were already on the top of the heap previously...
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Yeah, I don't think that's how they meant it (obviously). It's particularly disheartening given that they were 1st and 2nd generation children of immigrants who should have known something about discrimination. One of my great-grandfathers never even spoke English.
 
Babbylonian said:
Yeah, I don't think that's how they meant it (obviously). It's particularly disheartening given that they were 1st and 2nd generation children of immigrants who should have known something about discrimination. One of my great-grandfathers never even spoke English.
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My parents were the opposite of racist, being 1930s radicals. But one of my grandparents was quite racist in his speech even having experienced much discrimination himself (having left Eastern Europe in response to anti-Semtic pogroms). Apparently not everyone can learn from their own experiences to step out of their own brain and put themselves in someone else's head...
 
Distracted1 said:
If being "mindful" means considering race primarily in every thought, word, and deed with which one interacts with another human being how is it functionally different from being "racist"?
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Right, again that idea is the source of a lot of cringe comedy. We do manage to build and break habits of language. It doesn’t seem that hard to treat people with dignity and respect while avoiding racially loaded expressions out of good habit.

This teacher didn’t make just a slip of the tongue and had many stop and think checkpoints on the way to showing the image that she produced.
 
Thermal said:
No, I'm questioning whether this was racist symbolism at all. A racist certainly cannot say anything remotely like this. A regular person could, IMO, without being thought of as a racist.

I was serious about that question I asked you. When someone says monkey, why do you think of black people? I think of monkeys. I don't mean that as a slam, btw. I mean, are you making a concious effort to be hyper viligant about the perception of racism?
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It is racial symbolism. White people have a long history of portraying black people as apes. I don’t actively think of black people when I think of monkeys but I am aware of this class distinction between black and white and its horrendous history.

A lack of authorial intent does not make something no longer a symbol. The meaning exists beyond an individual but in a culture and language.
 
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