Toronto middle school students give a Jewish teacher the Hitler salute
Police and school authorities are investigating an incident in which Toronto middle school students gave the Hitler salute to a teacher who is the daughter of Holocaust survivors.
The incident is the third such display of Nazi symbology at middle schools in North York, a Toronto district, in recent weeks.
“One of our teachers, a French teacher, a Jewish teacher walked out of the room,” Shari Schwartz-Maltz, a spokeswoman for the Toronto District School Board, told City News, a local TV news outlet, on Tuesday. “When she came back into the room, several students surrounded her and gave her the Heil Hitler salute. This particular incident was very hateful, very hurtful, very upsetting to the teacher who happens to be Jewish, and she’s just allowed me to share with you that she’s also the child of Holocaust survivors. So this is something that hits her in the heart.”
Schwartz-Maltz, who chairs the school board’s Jewish Heritage Committee, said there would be “consequences” for the children involved, and that there would be expanded Holocaust education. “This has come from the top that we are committed to proactively bringing more Holocaust education into our schools for middle school up,” she said.
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This is exactly why we need an honest teaching of history. It can be hard, it can be unpleasant, but that’s how we learn from it.
If kids don’t know the meaning behind this stuff — and if their parents give them the idea that it’s okay — then we’re fulfulling Santayana’s prophecy.
This is one of the biggest mistakes we’ve made — deemphasizing American and world history. This started when the parents of these hoods were in school themselves, most likely.
A few years ago I saw a stage production of “The Diary Of Anne Frank.” Schoolkids were in attendance, and as we were leaving afterward, many of them were sobbing because they clearly had no idea what happened to Anne and her family. While it hurt to see them crying, a part of me thought it was a very good thing. Maybe they learned something that day.
