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UFO: A Cover Up No:15 (Mr. Daniel Sheehan, attorney)
He was told by a high-ranking government official that in 1977 President Carter order the then-director of the CIA George H. Bush to release all the information related to UFOs and extraterrestrial intelligences and the request was denied. Sheehan tried the same with the Vatican and was denied.
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ACADEMIC COMEDY, CHAPTER TWO
The real truth has emerged. Steve Bitterman was fired not for what he said but for how he said it. He was acerbic, brash, sarcastic, and made his students cry and feel like crap. Every opinion—expressed by teacher or student—must be treated with respect. Here’s the update and the real truth as reported by Des Moines Register reporter Megan Hawkins:
Students of a fired Iowa community college instructor say they were offended more by his brash teaching style than the remarks about the Bible that he claims led to his dismissal last week.
Adjunct professor Steve Bitterman said administrators at Southwestern Community College in Red Oak sided with students who became upset when he called parts of the Old Testament a fairy tale that should not be interpreted literally.
He made the comment in a class last Tuesday and was fired two days later.
But students in the class, which was transmitted to a classroom in Osceola over the state fiber-optic network, say Bitterman also told them to question their religious beliefs and at one point in the heated debate told one of the Osceola students, Kristen Fry, to “pop a Prozac.”
Fry said she left class in tears.
”I talked to a lawyer and was told that what he was doing was illegal,” she said. “He was not allowed to be derogatory toward me for being a Christian. I told my adviser I would sue if I had to.”
Both sides say the conflict arose from remarks Bitterman made in a Western Civilization class about the biblical story of Adam and Eve. He said he approached the topic from an academic and symbolic standpoint, rather than a factual one. Bitterman maintains he wanted to spark debate. But he instead sparked a controversy over academic freedom and the perceived lack of support from administrators for part-time teachers.
Bitterman said the Prozac comment was a joke meant to disarm a student who “was screeching at me.”
”Sometimes you say something outrageous just to see if you can provoke some discussion.... I can be a little acerbic at times, I don’t deny that,” he said. “I certainly take students’ viewpoints seriously in the sense that I encourage them to express it, and then I will challenge that viewpoint, regardless of what it is, to see how well they can back it up with reason and critical thought.
”Often, these students are essentially right out of high school and they take things so personally,” Bitterman said. “They really can’t distinguish between a critical assessment of their argument and an attack upon them personally.”
Casey Overton, 19, who also was in the Osceola classroom, said Bitterman spoke “very crudely and made us feel like crap.”
”I think he was trying to start a debate, but it came across as insulting and offended everybody,” Overton said. “After some of the comments he made, I didn’t expect him to be fired, but I’m kind of glad he’s gone. There’s no way I could have finished the class.”
Bitterman said that when he was fired over the phone, he was told it was for teaching religion instead of history, and no mention was made of how he treated students.
Southwestern President Barb Crittenden declined to comment on many aspects of the situation, but did verify that this section of the class has been canceled for the rest of the semester.
”Generally, we see it as our mission to provide educational services to students,” she said. “Both faculty and students must be treated with respect. We do believe in academic freedom and the exchange of ideas. There are going to be differences in opinion, and in order to have free exchange, there has to be respect shown for opinions on all sides of issues.”
She declined to comment on what procedures are in place for student complaints or for professors to explain themselves, but said that in this case, the employee is part-time.
Some part-time community college professors in other parts of the state said the Southwestern situation does not surprise them. One referred to their lives as “adjunct hell.”
James Ralston, a math instructor at Hawkeye Community College in Waterloo, said he has been fired twice for political reasons or false accusations from students.
”All adjunct teachers are under the same pressure that they cannot teach, because if they offend, no matter how crazy the students are, they are going to be fired,” he said. “It’s a huge problem.
------------------------
Megan Hawkins, ”Students: Teacher’s Style, Not Faith, Led to Firing,” Des Moines Register 25 September 2007.
-------------------------
Every opinion deserves equal respect. I certainly aspire to that ideal in my classroom. Never do I crack even a smile at student opinions. Never do I employ irony to indicate my skepticism! Student opinions expressed, past and present, in my classes have included the following:
I'll keep adding to this list of opinions and keep you informed so that you, like me, can practice receiving and responding to each opinion with the respect both it and its expresser deserve. Oh, one more—how did Jonah escape the belly of the whale? He ran around and around and around inside until he got pooped out.
Students of a fired Iowa community college instructor say they were offended more by his brash teaching style than the remarks about the Bible that he claims led to his dismissal last week.
Adjunct professor Steve Bitterman said administrators at Southwestern Community College in Red Oak sided with students who became upset when he called parts of the Old Testament a fairy tale that should not be interpreted literally.
He made the comment in a class last Tuesday and was fired two days later.
But students in the class, which was transmitted to a classroom in Osceola over the state fiber-optic network, say Bitterman also told them to question their religious beliefs and at one point in the heated debate told one of the Osceola students, Kristen Fry, to “pop a Prozac.”
Fry said she left class in tears.
”I talked to a lawyer and was told that what he was doing was illegal,” she said. “He was not allowed to be derogatory toward me for being a Christian. I told my adviser I would sue if I had to.”
Both sides say the conflict arose from remarks Bitterman made in a Western Civilization class about the biblical story of Adam and Eve. He said he approached the topic from an academic and symbolic standpoint, rather than a factual one. Bitterman maintains he wanted to spark debate. But he instead sparked a controversy over academic freedom and the perceived lack of support from administrators for part-time teachers.
Bitterman said the Prozac comment was a joke meant to disarm a student who “was screeching at me.”
”Sometimes you say something outrageous just to see if you can provoke some discussion.... I can be a little acerbic at times, I don’t deny that,” he said. “I certainly take students’ viewpoints seriously in the sense that I encourage them to express it, and then I will challenge that viewpoint, regardless of what it is, to see how well they can back it up with reason and critical thought.
”Often, these students are essentially right out of high school and they take things so personally,” Bitterman said. “They really can’t distinguish between a critical assessment of their argument and an attack upon them personally.”
Casey Overton, 19, who also was in the Osceola classroom, said Bitterman spoke “very crudely and made us feel like crap.”
”I think he was trying to start a debate, but it came across as insulting and offended everybody,” Overton said. “After some of the comments he made, I didn’t expect him to be fired, but I’m kind of glad he’s gone. There’s no way I could have finished the class.”
Bitterman said that when he was fired over the phone, he was told it was for teaching religion instead of history, and no mention was made of how he treated students.
Southwestern President Barb Crittenden declined to comment on many aspects of the situation, but did verify that this section of the class has been canceled for the rest of the semester.
”Generally, we see it as our mission to provide educational services to students,” she said. “Both faculty and students must be treated with respect. We do believe in academic freedom and the exchange of ideas. There are going to be differences in opinion, and in order to have free exchange, there has to be respect shown for opinions on all sides of issues.”
She declined to comment on what procedures are in place for student complaints or for professors to explain themselves, but said that in this case, the employee is part-time.
Some part-time community college professors in other parts of the state said the Southwestern situation does not surprise them. One referred to their lives as “adjunct hell.”
James Ralston, a math instructor at Hawkeye Community College in Waterloo, said he has been fired twice for political reasons or false accusations from students.
”All adjunct teachers are under the same pressure that they cannot teach, because if they offend, no matter how crazy the students are, they are going to be fired,” he said. “It’s a huge problem.
------------------------
Megan Hawkins, ”Students: Teacher’s Style, Not Faith, Led to Firing,” Des Moines Register 25 September 2007.
-------------------------
Every opinion deserves equal respect. I certainly aspire to that ideal in my classroom. Never do I crack even a smile at student opinions. Never do I employ irony to indicate my skepticism! Student opinions expressed, past and present, in my classes have included the following:
Negroes are more closely related to great apes than to Caucasian humans.
Slavery was God's curse on the descendents of Ham.
Women are too emotional to be president.
Stars are tiny lights in the heavens, not suns.
Bitches are women who just need a good f---.
The universe is 7011 years old.
Iraqis hijacked airplanes and crashed them into the WTC.
Homosexuals should be executed.
If a woman is raped, she should just lie back and enjoy it.
Every opinion is just as good as another.
Karl Marx is alive and the present dictator of the Soviet Union.
The total number of people on earth may be as many as one million.
Chinese and Spanish languages are gibberish.
Child molestors, rapists, and homosexuals should be castrated.
The ark of Noah has been found on Mt. Ararat.
Jesus will return to earth in the next seven years.
St. Theresa ate no food and lived only on sunlight.
The Kaaba in Mecca levitates in mid-air by the will of Allah.
Nine Jews rule the world.
Jews murdered God.
Jews planned the 9/11 attacks.
God chose Jews to be his special people.
God promised Jews the land of Canaan for perpetuity.
God speaks only to men; women learn God's word from men.
Legalizing marijuana would save the planet.
If everyone took Extasy, there would be world peace.
The peak experience of human life on earth is orgasm.
Reading is a waste of time.
Satan rules the world.
All Mexicans secretly carry knives or razor blades.
Communists do not value human life as we do.
Chinese do not value human life as we do.
Arabs do not value human life as we do.
Africans do not value human life as we do.
Mexicans do not value human life as we do.
Koreans do not value human life as we do.
Moslems do not value human life as we do.
Socialists do not value human life as we do.
Liberals do not value human life as we do.
Atheists do not value human life as we do.
Agnostics do not value human life as we do.
World war is good for our economy.
Poor people has poor ways.
Anything is possible if you want it bad enough.
God never gives you more than you can handle.
Slavery was kind to Negroes; they hadn't the skills to survive in the real world.
If we cut off the hands of thieves, theft would stop.
If we castrated rapists, rape would stop.
If we decapitated killers, killing would stop.
Every American should be required by law to carry a gun.
If we enforced a dress code, learning would improve.
People with the wrong belief will be tortured forever in hell.
Prayer cures cancer.
Faith cures cancer.
Every Christian has a guardian angel.
Exactly 144,000 Elect will go to Heaven.
Black skin is thicker than white skin.
Carpeting Iraq with nuclear bombs will solve the problem.
Dropping a nuclear bomb on Mecca will solve the problem.
The Ten Commandments should be posted on the wall of every classroom.
We should begin every class by facing the American flag and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.
We should begin every class by reciting the Lord's Prayer.
The human soul weighs twenty-four grams.
Class attendance should be optional.
Students who attend half the classes and do half the assignments should get B.
An open mind is the most dangerous thing on the face of the earth.
We are all racing down the wrong path to Oblivion.
Women who have abortions are murderers who should be executed.
Doctors and nurses who assist abortions are murderers who should be executed.
Tehran is in Russia.
I'll keep adding to this list of opinions and keep you informed so that you, like me, can practice receiving and responding to each opinion with the respect both it and its expresser deserve. Oh, one more—how did Jonah escape the belly of the whale? He ran around and around and around inside until he got pooped out.
How Music Came To Earth Part 1
I found this today in a book and I'm copying it here because I think that it needs to be shared. It's a retold myth, written by Cynthia Benjamin...
Sorry I was interrupted~
Sorry I was interrupted~
How Music Came to Earth
An Aztec Myth
An Aztec Myth
The Aztecs were powerful warriors who rules an empire in central Mexico from the 14th to teh early 16th centuries. The most important Aztec God, Tezcatlipoca, was called the God of the Smoking Mirror. He is associated with the Great Bear constellation. It is believed he came to earth on a spider web an ruled the Aztec world. His rivalry with Quetzalcoatl, known as the feathered serpent, as told in Aztec myths. In this myth, Quetzalcoatl appears as the Wind God and agrees to perform an important task for his rival.
When the world was young, Earth was silent. People spent their days caring for their fields and their homes. They raised families and passed on their ancestors traditions. However they did not join together in song during happy times. They did not dance or play the flute. Nor did they lift their voices to the sky during times of grief. They lived their lives in silence, never knowing the the joy that music brings to the soul. Although their hearts beat, they never soared.
High above the Earth, Tezcatlipoca, the God of the Smoking Mirror, watched sadly. One night, he came to Earth and called to Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent.
As the mighty Wind, Quetzalcoatl blew the clouds across the sky and the foam high above the seas. When he pushed against the clouds, they fell from the sky as rain. When he beat against the rocks, they turned to sand.
The God of the Smoking Mirror and the Feathered Serpent had never been friends, but now the great Tezcatlipoca needed the Wind's help. "We must put aside our past anger and work together. It is time to bring music to the world and songs to all people. Earth must not live another day without the sound of the flute or the the drums. This must be your quest."
When the world was young, Earth was silent. People spent their days caring for their fields and their homes. They raised families and passed on their ancestors traditions. However they did not join together in song during happy times. They did not dance or play the flute. Nor did they lift their voices to the sky during times of grief. They lived their lives in silence, never knowing the the joy that music brings to the soul. Although their hearts beat, they never soared.
High above the Earth, Tezcatlipoca, the God of the Smoking Mirror, watched sadly. One night, he came to Earth and called to Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent.
As the mighty Wind, Quetzalcoatl blew the clouds across the sky and the foam high above the seas. When he pushed against the clouds, they fell from the sky as rain. When he beat against the rocks, they turned to sand.
The God of the Smoking Mirror and the Feathered Serpent had never been friends, but now the great Tezcatlipoca needed the Wind's help. "We must put aside our past anger and work together. It is time to bring music to the world and songs to all people. Earth must not live another day without the sound of the flute or the the drums. This must be your quest."
ACADEMIC COMEDY, ADDENDUM
In response to my last post, a colleague responded, "The firing of Steve Bitterman certainly does make a lot more sense given this added information."
My reply:
Not to me it doesn't. If members of my department had been fired every time they used mockery, ridicule, sarcasm, irony, taunts, snickering, cackling, and belly laughter in response to ideas proposed by other members, we wouldn't have anybody left in the department.
But we're all grown up. We can survive it. We know what is permitted and what occurs in an open forum when people who care passionately about what they teach disagree.
Thank "god," our dean, and the college that we have procedures in place requiring students to write down their complaints and submit them first to the teacher who is the subject of the complaint and inviting the accused faculty to respond in kind.
Much of the world is at war over the myths in "holy" books. People are being bombed and shot for their beliefs and disbeliefs. I don't see how it would be possible for a history teacher to address either the truths or the falsehoods of religious history without using the word "myth."
My students and I aspire to mutual respect, but most of us know that the spontaneity of face-to-face conversation and debate may and will often evoke shock, laughter, irony, incredulity, mockery, jokes, even profanity, and, before we begin, we acknowledge the need for us to forgive one another if and when such responses occur so that we can go on.
Every day students react to my own opinions on many matters in ways for which Bitterman was supposedly fired. I don't cry or feel like crap or leave the room or call my lawyer. Nor do I react that way in our department meetings when colleagues express themselves in spontaneous, natural, emotional, or even satirical ways.
Bitterman was fired because Christian students threatened to sue the college for what he said about the myths of "holy" books, though it is predictable that his supervisors would deny it and say that he was fired for something else. Bitterman, obviously, may also sue.
When several of my students this quarter said the solution to the war in the Mideast was to carpet-nuke the entire country of Iraq and kill all Iraqis there, both fellow students and I expressed our incredulity and disagreement in exactly the same ways that Steve Bitterman did.
Should we be punished for it?
ACADEMIC COMEDY
A community college instructor in Red Oak, Iowa, claims he was fired after he told his students that the biblical story of Adam and Eve should not be literally interpreted.
Steve Bitterman, 60, said officials at Southwestern Community College sided with a handful of students who threatened legal action over his remarks in a western civilization class Tuesday. He said he was fired Thursday.
“I’m just a little bit shocked myself that a college in good standing would back up students who insist that people who have been through college and have a master’s degree, a couple actually, have to teach that there were such things as talking snakes or lose their job,” Bitterman said.
Sarah Smith, director of the school’s Red Oak campus, declined to comment Friday on Bitterman’s employment status. The school’s president, Barbara Crittenden, said Bitterman taught one course at Southwest. She would not comment, however, on his claim that he was fired over the Bible reference, saying it was a personnel issue.
“I can assure you that college understands our employees’ free speech rights,” she said. “There was no action taken that violated the First Amendment.”
Bitterman, who taught part time at Southwestern and Omaha’s Metropolitan Community College, said he uses the Old Testament in his western civilization course and always teaches it from an academic standpoint.
Bitterman’s Tuesday course was telecast to students in Osceola over the Iowa Communications Network. A few students in the Osceola classroom, he said, thought the lesson was “denigrating their religion.”
“I put the Hebrew religion on the same plane as any other religion. Their god wasn’t given any more credibility than any other god,” Bitterman said. “I told them it was an extremely meaningful story, but you had to see it in a poetic, metaphoric or symbolic sense, that if you took it literally, that you were going to miss a whole lot of meaning there.”
Bitterman said he called the story of Adam and Eve a “fairy tale” in a conversation with a student after the class and was told the students had threatened to see an attorney. He declined to identify any of the students in the class.
“I just thought there was such a thing as academic freedom here,” he said. “From my point of view, what they’re doing is essentially teaching their students very well to function in the 8th century.”
Hector Avalos, an atheist religion professor at Iowa State University, said Bitterman’s free speech rights were violated if he was fired simply because he took an academic approach to a Bible story.
“I don’t know the circumstances, but if he’s teaching something about the Bible and says it is a myth, he shouldn’t be fired for that because most academic scholars do believe this is a myth, the story of Adam and Eve,” Avalos said. “So it’d be no different than saying the world was not created in six days in science class.
“You don’t fire professors for giving you a scientific answer.”
Bitterman said Linda Wild, vice president of academic affairs at Southwest, fired him over the telephone. Wild did not return telephone or email messages Friday. Bitterman said he can think of no other reason college officials would fire him and that Smith, the director of the campus, has previously sat in on his classes and complimented his work.
“As a taxpayer, I’d like to know if a tax-supported public institution of higher learning has given veto power over what can and cannot be said in its classrooms to a fundamentalist religious group,” he said. “If it has…then the taxpaying public of Iowa has a right to know. What’s next? Whales talk French at the bottom of the sea?”
---------------------
Megan Hawkins
Des Moines Register
Sept. 21, 2007
Steve Bitterman, 60, said officials at Southwestern Community College sided with a handful of students who threatened legal action over his remarks in a western civilization class Tuesday. He said he was fired Thursday.
“I’m just a little bit shocked myself that a college in good standing would back up students who insist that people who have been through college and have a master’s degree, a couple actually, have to teach that there were such things as talking snakes or lose their job,” Bitterman said.
Sarah Smith, director of the school’s Red Oak campus, declined to comment Friday on Bitterman’s employment status. The school’s president, Barbara Crittenden, said Bitterman taught one course at Southwest. She would not comment, however, on his claim that he was fired over the Bible reference, saying it was a personnel issue.
“I can assure you that college understands our employees’ free speech rights,” she said. “There was no action taken that violated the First Amendment.”
Bitterman, who taught part time at Southwestern and Omaha’s Metropolitan Community College, said he uses the Old Testament in his western civilization course and always teaches it from an academic standpoint.
Bitterman’s Tuesday course was telecast to students in Osceola over the Iowa Communications Network. A few students in the Osceola classroom, he said, thought the lesson was “denigrating their religion.”
“I put the Hebrew religion on the same plane as any other religion. Their god wasn’t given any more credibility than any other god,” Bitterman said. “I told them it was an extremely meaningful story, but you had to see it in a poetic, metaphoric or symbolic sense, that if you took it literally, that you were going to miss a whole lot of meaning there.”
Bitterman said he called the story of Adam and Eve a “fairy tale” in a conversation with a student after the class and was told the students had threatened to see an attorney. He declined to identify any of the students in the class.
“I just thought there was such a thing as academic freedom here,” he said. “From my point of view, what they’re doing is essentially teaching their students very well to function in the 8th century.”
Hector Avalos, an atheist religion professor at Iowa State University, said Bitterman’s free speech rights were violated if he was fired simply because he took an academic approach to a Bible story.
“I don’t know the circumstances, but if he’s teaching something about the Bible and says it is a myth, he shouldn’t be fired for that because most academic scholars do believe this is a myth, the story of Adam and Eve,” Avalos said. “So it’d be no different than saying the world was not created in six days in science class.
“You don’t fire professors for giving you a scientific answer.”
Bitterman said Linda Wild, vice president of academic affairs at Southwest, fired him over the telephone. Wild did not return telephone or email messages Friday. Bitterman said he can think of no other reason college officials would fire him and that Smith, the director of the campus, has previously sat in on his classes and complimented his work.
“As a taxpayer, I’d like to know if a tax-supported public institution of higher learning has given veto power over what can and cannot be said in its classrooms to a fundamentalist religious group,” he said. “If it has…then the taxpaying public of Iowa has a right to know. What’s next? Whales talk French at the bottom of the sea?”
---------------------
Megan Hawkins
Des Moines Register
Sept. 21, 2007
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