IRON FIST

I am a regional leader in the orginaization know as the Iron Fist we are a student's union dedicated to bringing communist ideals in our schools and places of higher education. For more info please contact me.

Question---

In what Light will communist history be taught?

I was part of a similar learning 19-20 years ago...it was not spun in a very positive light... because of who taught it...teaching it from a capitalist biased perspective would be utterly useless....

i mean teaching from a neutral point of view displaying the triumphs and defeats

Misrepresentation of the people's movement from 1999 Seatle needs chellenging, certainly.

This would be a very positive thing. Reason being that the cold war left a fairly one sided arguement. and not in the favor of communism. one could produce more of like...communism in history... and how history was effected by communism as supplement. although this may be hair splitting,, but I think effective.

Yes I would support Communist history being taught from both points of view - there is no such thing as a neutral standing point to history.

I believe that students might become more open to different frameworks for viewing society if they are shown history through multiple perspectives, so yes.

what basic framework of studies would on esuggest? would it be all history or could it potentially work into a 'socialism in action' type course as well?

Well call me un Marxist or something, but I don´t think that school should be teaching history from political tone(yes I know imposible in practice). Rather than teaching "communist history" there should be teached working-class history. What I mean by that is when school teach about Napoleon etc. there should be allso teached the living conditions and way of life ordinary workers of that time.

Quote:

Well call me un Marxist or something, but I don´t think that school should be teaching history from political tone(yes I know imposible in practice). Rather than teaching "communist history" there should be teached working-class history. What I mean by that is when school teach about Napoleon etc. there should be allso teached the living conditions and way of life ordinary workers of that time.

I for one can say that any schooling I ever recieved was completely biased...and from a right wing agenda...

If they could simply teacha history class that didn't editorialize...it would be an improvement....

This reminds me of a teacher I've had who would always insert his own commentary when we watched films in class. When we were watching "A State of Mind", a film about a girl preparing for the mass games in North Korea, he repeatedly spoke at points during the video to bring the overall bias of the class more to the anti-communist perspective. I wish he would've just let the film play and let his students form their own opinions rather than indoctrinating them with his own beliefs. Even before showing the film, he'd distributed an out of date anti-DPRK article.

Throughout his entire class, it was fairly obvious that he advocated capitalism and that he was obsessed with the positive role of the bourgeoisie. He viewed the bourgeoisie as the class that motivated the important changes over the years and mostly understressed the proletariat and peasantry which he did not consider to be as important. This teacher also equated socialism with policies like those under Clement Attlee, which were really more a regulated capitalism. He also drilled it into his class that communism had to be violent, full stop. The teacher even went so far as to say 'The difference between socialism and communism is that people can choose to be socialist'. I was quite irritated by him when he was my teacher and wanted to point out where he was wrong, but I was silenced by the pressure to not make a spectacle or stand out in any way. I was sure that I would be ridiculed for taking a different stance on such matters. I did, however, try to make neutral or mildly pro-socialist comments at times and it became clear to my teacher what side of the political spectrum I was on.

Quote:

When we were watching "A State of Mind", a film about a gril preparing for the mass games in North Korea, he repeatedly spoke at points during the video to bring the overall bias of the class more to the anti-communist perspective.

I went to high school in dallas. after growing up in chicago with the social democrats and then being exposed to blind faith republicans.... scary.... It was really when I fianlly saw how deep the bias was.... they wouldn't just stop at leftists were wrong... the democrats were wrong too.. It was not just a class or a teacher or two....the whole department... they actually dismissed a teacher there allegedly for insubordination, but the real reason was for being a member of the socialist party...

I am currently in high school and I have not meet an anti-communist bias yet but most likely I will one year I do like that my teachers aren't agianst me from reading my communist books in the class room then again for some reading anything at all will be an acoplishment.

Having just graduated from high school i cannot say i did not meet any bigots, but i can say that most of my friends were supportive (though quite ignorant)

If you went to school in a less than acceptive environment like the south east US is, you may have had those life expirences. that being said, I cannot comment on your regions' schools for lack of knowledge on the subject.

I went to a school in southern ontario in an area in which you could paint a rock blue (conservative) and it would win the election. The school itself while promoting free thought to a point was much restricted by its far right views.