How do We Teach about Park 51?

I am looking forward to my first Model United Nations (MUN) Team meeting with my students today.  As a former United States History teacher and a current MUN coach, I am often faced with the dilemma of presenting a politically or socially charged issue to students and at the same time trying to keep my opinion out of it so they can arrive at their own conclusions.

It's not always easy to do this; I taught the Civil War in a West Philadelphia school.  The entire student body was black.  It was difficult to convince some of the students that I, at that time a 22-year-old white female from the Connecticut suburbs and straight out of the bubble of Boston College, had any authority on the issue.  Some students felt that it was not right for ME to be teaching about such a racially charged historical issue.  It was a great lesson in how important it is to handle these topics delicately.

The group of students I work with now are older and much more diverse, so I am not as worried about them questioning my identity in relation to bringing up the issue of Park 51.  However, I do question my ability to keep my opinions and biases out of this issue.  It is important for the students to come to their own conclusions about the controversy.  I imagine that most history, civics and government teachers face similar dilemmas on a daily basis.

Starting today and over the next few weeks, I will use this curriculum to guide the MUN students through  thinking about Park 51.  It will be a great warm up activity for thinking critically about other issues they will examine through out the year.  At the end of the day, I think it is most appropriate to teach a curriculum that promotes a "multi-cultural/coexistence" approach.  This is especially true for student living in New York City, one of the most diverse cities in the world.  Further, one of the main points of the MUN club is to give students the tools they need to understand controversial issues from an array of perspectives.

I will do my best to teach this subject, but I worry about the rest of the country as the school year starts.  The content of history text books is usually determined by the Texas State Board of Education (Texas is the largest purchaser of history text books, so often whatever they determine should be in texts books is what the rest of the country typically gets).  Now Texas starting to think about the way they teach Islam.  Texas' Board of Education is known for being socially conservative, so I worry about how they will chose to present this information.  Educators (especially those teaching history, civics and government) have a responsibility to show all sides of an issues.  I hope Texas will handle this issue appropriately, but I have my doubts given their previous record.

Photos of Ground Zero and the Surrounding Neighborhood, September 10 2010

Around midday, I stepped out to snap a few photos of Ground Zero and the sorrounding area.  I want to give my readers a better idea of what the neighborhood looks like both before and during tomorrow's commemoration events--so please return tomorrow for more photos!

Photo 1

This picture is taken directly outside of my apartment building, looking onto Ground Zero in the background.

Photo 2

Taken at the corner of Liberty Street and Greenwich Street.  This is where the FDNY is located, as well as the tribute memorial to 9/11.

Photo 3

A view of Ground Zero

Photo 4

Zucotti Park.  Every year they hold the Commemoration Service here.  Taken from the steps of my office building.

Photo 5

Picture of pedestrian traffic at Courtland and Church Streets, right across from Ground Zero.

Photo 6

Another view of Ground Zero

Photo 7

At the corner of Park Place and West Broadway (Park 51 is located on Park Place)

Photo 8

Two Police Officers standing in front of Park51.

Photo 9

Park 51 is the first stoop you see, located next to the Dakota Road House

Photo 10

Park 51

Photo 11

Parking garage across the street from Park 51

Photo 12

Standing in front of the parking garage, looking at Park 51.

Photo 13

View of the remainder of the street (Park Place)

Photo 14

Corner of Park Place and Church Street

Photo 15

This photo was taken from the corner of Ground Zero that is the closest to Park51.  The white arrow points to Park Place.  Park 51, or the "Ground Zero Mosque" is down this street.  As you probably noted from the previous pictures, you cannot see Park51 from Ground Zero, and similarly, you cannot see Ground Zero from the Park 51.

Photo 16

This, however, is what you see directly across the street from Ground Zero.

The Golden Rule?

Since I last wrote, tensions have climbed around the building of the Islamic Community Center, Park 51, or the Ground Zero Mosque. Over the past week, another issue has developed: A religious group in Florida plans to burn Qu’rans in protest of the building of Park 51. Some politicians, like Sarah Palin, have come up with the following argument: If it is within our First Amendment Rights to build a Mosque near Ground Zero, does that mean it’s also acceptable for the group who is burning Qu’rans to do so? Or conversely, if it shouldn’t be right to do one thing, it should not be right to do the other (by application of the ‘golden rule.’)

So the question remains: beyond having the right to build at 51 Park Place, is it a good idea? Is burning Qu’rans is definitively wrong if people also have a ‘right’ to do that?

Under the American Constitution, there is both a ‘right’ to build the Mosque, and there is also a ‘right’ to burn Qu’rans. The Constitutionality of these issues remains undisputed. Our conversation must address the idea of responsible behavior.

Actions can be morally wrong if they put innocent parties in a precarious situation. It is profoundly irresponsible to hold a “Burn a Koran Day” on September 11th, particularly by a religious leader advocating for the truth of Christianity. An act like this buttresses the extremist voices within Islam. It is an act of hatred of one group of human beings towards another and fuels the fires of extremism and irrationality on both sides. It puts everyone in a more precarious situation. For the sake of the American soldiers in Iraq (like the one I have been writing back and forth with), these acts are plainly irresponsible.

However, building a community center a few blocks away from Ground Zero is not comparable to an act designed expressly to inflame tensions. The community center aims to promote religious tolerance. It will help revitalize a neighborhood in need of revitalization. This is not acting irresponsibly or irrationally. It does not put others in harms way. Worse yet, moving the location of the potential Islamic Community Center would validate claims of Islamic extremists that the West systematically persecutes Muslims.

"Taste" and Park51

September 11th is right around the corner.  As someone who lives two short blocks away from Ground Zero and whose office building sits directly across the street from the site, this day means that tourists will clog my neighborhood, memorial services will close some streets down, and a general somberness will fill the air.  This will be my fourth September 11th in the Financial District, and it will be my first time sharing it with protesters.

Park 51, The Cordoba House, or the “Ground Zero Mosque” has brought international attention to my neighborhood.  There is an event planned for September 11th to protest its construction.  My friends and family are divided on the issue of whether or not Park 51 should be built.  Those who disagree with the building of the Mosque usually tell me that although the group has the right to build, it is in poor “taste” to do so.  It’s not just my friend’s and family--the idea of “taste” has entered the vocabulary of the media as well.  

What exactly is “taste”?  Taste is what I talk about when picking out patterns and colors of my bedding.  On the show Project Runway, taste comes into play when judges talk about their personal preferences and prejudices.  When talking about charged political and social issues, taste is a word people invoke to reify their own personal prejudices.  As a philosophy major, I know I can’t use the “taste” argument in any meaningful sense.  Taste caters to feelings, and not to an answer of what is right and wrong.

Let’s take a look at when Taste has been used as an argument in through American history:

• In a New York Times Article “Matter of Taste” written on May 3, 1908, the article states: “We regret to notice the disposition of our Southern Contemporaries to grow hysterical over the recent miscegenation banquet of the “Greater New York Cosmopolitan Society.”  Of course, the whole affair was eminently disgusting, but really it does not concern the South in the least.  It is a matter of Northern taste, though taste most offensive to the very instinct of every man and woman who has a right to be recognized as white, and not a Caucasian degenerate and pariah .”
• In another New York Times Article “Critises Jane Adams” written on August 21, 1912, Charles W. Eliot, then the President of Harvard University said, “Women have no proper share in a political convention.  Never before in our history as a Democratic Nation have we gone so far as to permit women to nominate a candidate for President.  Miss Addams received a great deal of popular acclaim when she seconded Mr. Roosevelt’s nomination. It was a very spectacular proceeding, but it was in very bad taste.  I also understand Col. Roosevelt had the bad taste to publicly compliment her on her action and thank her.”
• In Chicago Tribute article written on June 5, 1920 entitled “Ready To Picket Coliseum: This Debate on Women Pickets is Quite Spicy- "Bad Manners" Vs. "They Can't Think." Leola Allard writes “"Bad manners" and "poor taste" are only two of the things the women taking part in convention preparations said of Alice Paul and her picketing plans.”

And now, of course, what Park 51 is trying to achieve is also “poor taste” according to several commentators, family and friends.   All of these issues are charged with prejudice and demonizing the ‘other’.  What is more scary about this is when the constant media attention about Muslims and their “tastes” filter into our everyday lives, some people start to believe that there is something inherently wrong with being Muslim. There isn’t. I have already seen this misconception materialize in some of my students’ Facebook status updates.  The “taste” argument slides sloppily into prejudice.

Over the last three years, I worked with a student named Hassan through the Model United Nations Program at his high school.  We often practiced on days off during the school year because we could get more accomplished those days.  When practice was on a Friday, Hassan could not easily come to our law office because his closest place of worship was far away.  If Park 51 existed while a Hassan was a student, this problem would have been remedied.

Hassan is Muslim.  He was born in Pakistan and moved here when he was twelve.  He is one of the most tolerant and accepting people I have met.  He’s had coaches from Israel and India that he got along with phenomenally.  He is now attending a Catholic college, and working as an intern in the Financial District.  He has an impeccable record--he was salutatorian of his class, served as police commissioner for a day, and was generally in charge of running most community events at his high school.  He is not an extremist Muslim, and the acts of the terrorists certainly had nothing to do with him.  This is true of the overwhelming majority of Muslims living in the United States  and throughout the world (see this graphic).  Why should someone like Hassan be told that he can’t have a conveniently located place to worship because a small group of radicals that happened to be part of his religion did something ridiculous?  For those of us who are religiously affiliated, nearly all major world religions have histories of violence and hatred. For example, if you are a Christian, would you like to be told that a church couldn't be built in any of the places the Klu Klux Klan performed lynchings?

I do know this: America was founded on the values of freedom, equality and tolerance.  Tastes change, but these values do not.    These values hold up regardless of tastefulness.  Can we live up to those values?  I hope so. The Ground Zero Mosque controversy at the end of the day gets at the same issues that have plagued the America since its inception.