Unfunny and Cruel Satire about Seattle Schools Over at The Needling

You all in Seattle know The Needling, Seattle's Only Real Fake News? It's like The Onion for Seattle. It can be somewhat amusing in its pokes and digs at Seattle and its denizens and the Seattle Way.

However, a new post about school closures in SPS is decidedly unfunny and tasteless and you have to wonder what the real message is (which has little to do with Seattle in specific). Here's the title: 

SPS Contracts with IDF to Close All Seattle Schools

In case you don't know, the IDF is the Israeli Defense Force. They accompany it with this photo:
 

You all know that I am not supportive of how Seattle Schools is handling school closures but I do feel compelled to stick up for them here. 

The Needling does several things wrong. 

One, they give the attribution to Superintendent Brent Jones of several alarming statements. I might not have been so unhappy with this post had they not done that. 

Two, clearly they are using Seattle Schools and school closures to feed a bigger message of how terrible it is that Israel is bombing just about anything they want to and yes, they are killing children. 

(I will slip in here that I do not support Hamas and their ongoing keeping of prisoners and prisoner bodies.)

But it's an ugly linkage that The Needling makes because no one should joke about killing ANY children. 

Three, as closures go on, will this be an on-going theme for The Needling? I sure hope not. 

Comments

Anonymous said…
Jesse Hagiopian on the SfT FB group makes a similar comparison and wrote a poem about it on his website, iamateacher.com. The far left is really going down fantastical rabbit holes lately trying to make sense of the world. I have NO idea how any reader is supposed to move forward with this information, especially since there’s been a giant breakdown with the voters and the will to fund schools or to put a serious Boardmember over the district. I don’t know Jesse, maybe let’s burn it all down by voting down the school levies since mean old SPS is so terrible? It is perplexing that this line of thinking has found its way to the Needling…

“ I had to write this poem. As a teach in Seattle, watching the bombing of schools in Gaza has been enraging and terrifying. It is also crushing to know that the money that should be spent on educating youth in my city is being used to kill children and destroy their schools in Gaza.

On May 8, 2024, the Seattle Public Schools approved a plan to close 20 schools--in the shadow of some of the wealthiest corporations, such as Boeing. On June 6, Israel bombed the Al-Sardi school in the Nuseirat refugee camp.

The poem "Droughts and Floods" explains the connection of the two events and is dedicated to the children of Palestine and Seattle.”
7/23/24, 4:38 PM
Benjamin Lukoff said…
Everything is about Palestine these days, apparently....
7/24/24, 10:44 AM
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