My comments in bold.
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American kids take it for granted they can go to school and get an education, but a Pakistani girl was shot in the head for speaking out in favor of a girl’s right to an education, Bozeman students learned Monday during a Human Rights Day Celebration.
The shooting of 15-yearold Malala Yousafzai, who was nearly killed by terrorists two months ago, is just one example of human rights under attack, (I was waiting to see how long it took for the first howler. With articles like these, you can be assured that some misrepresentation, misunderstanding, or outright lie will crop up somewhere.
I will not assume malicious intent, but certainly our children are being subject to maleducation. So what's wrong with the above statement? It should be quite easy to see. The girl was shot by terrorists, not by police or military. Therefore, she was assaulted. The crime is attempted murder. The terrorists didn't violate her rights, they tried to kill her. Government violates rights, people commit crimes)
64 years after the United Nations ratified the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on Dec. 10, 1948. (Can you imagine? These terrorists ignored the United Nations! Didn't they know that what they did was outlawed by the UN 64 years ago? By simple fact of ratification, the problem was supposed to be solved, right?)
Six speakers were invited Monday to talk on the anniversary to Chief Joseph Middle School students. Emma Bowen, 13, said she came away from the event feeling “how lucky we are.” (Although we don't know why this youngster feels lucky, at least she understands that we live in a country that is established on the principles of liberty and rights.)
Fellow eighth-grader Malia Bertelsen said she was surprised that it wasn’t until after the murder of millions of people in World War II – including Jews, homosexuals, disabled people and gypsies (I wonder how much emphasis the guest speaker put on these small numbers of ancillary persecutions. Not that they aren't worthy of note - any horror perpetrated against people is lamentable - but frequently the objective is to enable people to obtain "me too" status, blowing up their importance out of perspective.
ays, for example, while part of the persecution, amounted to a very small proportion: "The actual number of victims is not known. Estimates range from about 7000 to tens of thousands." I think it is safe to assume that tens of thousands represents an exaggeration. But even assuming that, say, 30,000 gays were killed, that amounts to only .5% of the 6 million Jews killed)
— that a document listing worldwide human rights was ratified. “That’s crazy,” she said (Yeah, crazy. Um, they're TERRORISTS. A UN treaty probably doesn't mean too much to them. Kids are always quick to call out violations of the rules. Immature minds are consumed with fairness. Just like liberals, it seems).
Holly Fretwell, an adjunct faculty member in economics at Montana State University and research fellow at PERC, the Property and Environmental Research Center, talked about the Pakistani girl’s story and the right to liberty and self determination.
“The freedom to do what you want to do without hurting somebody else, is the ultimate human right,” Fretwell said. (This may be the first time these kids have ever heard the conservative/libertarian perspective on this. Kudos to the school for including someone of this perspective)
Fretwell also talked about the importance of property rights, and the danger to the clean water, fisheries and the environment when there are no property rights. “If nobody owns it, who’s going to take care of it?” she asked. (Private property rights are anathema to the left. I hope that Ms. Fretwell was allowed to speak at length about this. Especially to balance the predominately leftward tilt of the rest of the speakers)
Billy Smith, an MSU history professor, talked about slaves who tried to escape in early America because they had no human rights (I'm relying on the the author of the article to accurately relate what was said. If Mr. Smith said this, he's wrong. Human rights are unalienable. They cannot be taken away or bestowed. They can only be violated or made safe, as far as governments go. The slaves had rights, but those rights were being violated).
“All men are created equal,” written by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence, is “one of the most important phrases in American history and world history,” Smith said.
But in Jefferson’s day, many didn’t believe the idea applied to slaves, or to women, Smith said (This appears to be a backhanded attempt to impugn the founders. However, it was the founders who created and signed the Declaration and Constitution. It was the founders who fought for way to move the country to liberty.
Of course some people opposed this. Apparently Mr. Smith wants to apply contemporary sensibilities to a fledgling nation as if by our standards they were evil men).
He displayed a 1769 newspaper ad Jefferson published offering a reward for the return of his escaped mulatto slave Sandy.
If you had no rights, Smith asked students, what would you do? Some slaves started to run away after Northern states banned slavery. Harriet Tubman, an escaped slave, was a “conductor” on the Underground Railroad and helped about 250 slaves escape to the North. Frederick Douglass, an escaped slave, advocated abolition to Abraham Lincoln.
Slavery still happens today around the world and even sometimes in the United States in the “underground” economy, Smith said.
The speakers were introduced by Bozeman disc jockey Missy O’Malley, who told students that human rights “hit home with me, personally.” Without freedom of speech and expression, O’Malley said, she wouldn’t have a job, and everyone would have to wear the same clothes.
“We are very lucky,” she said.
The event was sponsored by CJMS’s Million Ways Club and organized by Spanish teacher Jan Krieger and parent Aida Murga. Student Finn Vaughan Kraska, 14, said the Million Ways Club volunteers at the food bank and takes on other projects. “It’s fun to make a difference,” he said.
At Irving School, the Declaration of the Rights of the Child was read (You can read it here. This declaration consists mostly of feel-good pablum. The people who create these resolutions are largely leftists, and want to mold the world into their image of utopia. They are outraged when their precious dictates are violated by tyrants, dictators, and terrorists, as if the sheer passage of the resolution solves the problem.
But can you imagine there being a right to recreation? How would this play out? Who would pay for it? It's this kind of stuff that reminds me of the worldview of the Left, where everyone lives in idyllic surroundings with unicorns and rainbows. They make no allowance for the fundamental ugliness of human nature, which no amount of proclamations will change.)
according to parent volunteer Vickie Edelman. Bonnie Satchatello-Sawyer, director of the nonprofit Hopa Mountain (Here's their website),
spoke to students, who made drawings for a large paper quilt to illustrate rights (It appears that Hopa Mountain is intent on creating little activists and community organizers. It's all pretty vague, filled with nice-sounding goals like getting involved, changing your community, and helping at-risk people. Hopa Mountain also has a blog, which reveals a bit more of the leftist tilt of this organization.).
The article does not tell us what every speaker presented, but the guest list seems quite decidedly leftward in orientation. The reporter seems to be uninterested in the details, instead preferring to communicate platitudes and generalities. One might expect the reporter to ask what this Hopa Mountain thing is all about, or the Million Ways Club, or even FREE. These groups have access to our schools, so what do they stand for? What are they trying to accomplish? Who is behind them?
One gets the distinct impression that these poor little children are simply being indoctrinated.
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