A 13-Year-Old's Slavery Analogy Raises Some Uncomfortable Truths in School

[bayareamike]

228. If you took the time to read my post

Last edited Tue May 8, 2012, 08:24 PM - Edit history (2)

you'd see that I was criticizing the TARGET of her analogy. Her analogy is flawed because she compared her teachers to slave owners. In that respect, you're right: I don't think teachers are similar enough to slave owners to be compared. Do you disagree?

As we've established, an analogy requires similarities between two things. Please point out the similarities between teachers and slave owners, if you'd be so kind.

As I pointed out in my original post, I agree that the educational system is deeply flawed and DOES in fact disadvantage and discriminate against the underclass. However, Ms. Williams placed the blame on her "white teachers". In fact, she asserted that the white teachers were not instructing her or helping her learn because of her skin color. She wrote that her teachers "desired" her failure in the classroom in a concerted effort to keep her, a minority student, from becoming educated. Do you truly believe that is the case? Do you really think that teachers want their kids -- specifically black kids -- to fail in the classroom to promote the superiority of white Americans?

Let me reiterate that I understand -- since you've been so keen on repeating this throughout the thread -- that an analogy does not require complete symmetry between two objects. However, her essay made an analogous relationship between teachers and slave masters. Those are NOT analogous. In fact, having read the article that this thread cited and having watched her read her essay, I noticed that the only person mentioning the structural inequities of the system is the author of the news article, not Jada. Jada's critique is aimed directly at the teachers but fails to mention the structure of the educational system itself. This is the failure of her analogy.

There are two BS things going on here: the first is your ad hom attack on me and the second is the promotion of anti-teacher rhetoric -- the same rhetoric coming from radical Republicans like Paul Ryan.