High school in turmoil over teacher's remarks about Bush

Controversial lecture thrusts Overland into national spotlight

Kevin Vaughan and Felix Doligosa Jr., Rocky Mountain News

Published March 2, 2006 at midnight

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AURORA — Controversy over a high school teacher's comparison of President Bush to Adolf Hitler erupted into a day of turmoil Thursday — with a student protest, a threatened lawsuit and dueling talk shows.

At the center of the storm was Overland High School teacher Jay Bennish, whose lecture in a world geography class last month also included harsh words about capitalism, U.S. foreign policy and the invasion of Iraq.

At one point in a 21- minute, 40-second recording of the lecture, Bennish called America "probably the single most violent nation on planet Earth."

Bennish, who has been a teacher at Overland since 2000, has been suspended and is under investigation for violating a school district policy that requires teachers to present varying viewpoints. He has hired a lawyer and may fight back in court as early as today.

"I know about 10 federal judges who are more than willing to teach the Cherry Creek School District what the First Amendment is all about," his attorney, David Lane, said Thursday.

Lane said he expects to file a federal lawsuit as early as this morning, and that seeking a court order to return Bennish to the classroom is one option he might pursue.

He called district administrators "scared little rabbits" who bowed to pressure from parents when they suspended Bennish.

Bennish did not return a message left at his Capitol Hill apartment, and Lane said the teacher would not comment.

The controversy began brewing Feb. 1, the day after Bush's State of the Union address, when a student used his MP3 player to record a portion of Bennish's lecture.

After the student's father complained to school officials, he took the recording to KOA radio talk show host Mike Rosen, who put it on the Internet and played parts of it on his radio program.

The school district promptly suspended Bennish, concluding that, at a minimum, his comments breached a policy requiring teachers to be "as objective as possible and to present fairly the several sides of an issue" when tackling subjects with religious, political, economic or social implications.

School district spokeswoman Tustin Amole said that Bennish would have been within his rights to say everything he did if he also had provided opposing views.

"It appears that they were inappropriate because they didn't contain the balance," Amole said. "For example, he talks at one point about human rights. He didn't say, 'All right, that's my opinion, here's what other people have to say about it.' "

Bennish's statements ran the gamut.

He said that in Bush's State of the Union speech, the president was, in effect, "threatening the whole planet."

"Sounds a lot like the things that Adolf Hitler used to say — we're the only ones who are right, everyone else is backwards," Bennish said.

He told students he was "not saying that Bush and Hitler are exactly the same."

"But," he said, "there's some eerie similarities to the tones that they use."

He talked extensively about U.S. foreign policy and capitalism. At one point, he questioned Bush's stated belief that democracy is the solution to bloodshed in the Middle East.

"Who is probably the single most violent nation on planet Earth?" Bennish asked. "The United States of America, and we're a democracy — quote, unquote."

On capitalism, he questioned whether it did anything to provide "everybody in the world with the basic needs that they need."

"Do you see how this economic system is at odds with humanity, at odds with caring and compassion?" he asked.

At the end of his talk, Bennish told students he was "not in any way implying that you should agree with me. I don't even know if I'm necessarily taking a position. But what I'm trying to do is get you to think about these issues more in-depth."

Thursday began with hundreds of students — estimates varied from 200 to 700 — walking out of Overland High, located at 12400 E. Jewell Ave.

The students crowded the pedestrian bridge over Jewell chanting, "Freedom of speech, let him teach." Some wore duct tape over their mouths.

But others took the side of the student who recorded Bennish's talk, writing "Teach, don't preach" on their T-shirts.

"It's not fair," said Stacy Caruso, a 17-year-old junior. "He spoke his mind. We have Christian groups in school, and they're not censored."

Caruso has taken Bennish's classes for the past two years and praised his approach to teaching. When studying China, his class learned about sweatshop labor. When they read about Japan, students learned about the Japanese imprisoned in American concentration camps, she said.

"We want to know what's going on in the world," she said.

But Derek Belloni, who once had Bennish as a teacher, believes high school students are too impressionable and that the teacher's views are inappropriate.

"He is making interpretation as facts," said Belloni, an 18-year-old senior. "He's preaching politics in geography class. You don't teach math in an English class."

"He wants these kids to become liberals," he said.

While Bennish and the district may disagree over the limits of his First Amendment rights, school officials gave students permission to exercise theirs as long as they were back in class for the start of third period.

By the end of the day, talk radio hosts, national news and political commentators, and bloggers had all weighed in.

The outcry came as a surprise to the student who recorded Bennish's lecture. Sean Allen is a 16-year-old sophomore whose political upbringing has been varied — his mother is a Democrat and his father is a Republican.

But Allen found himself at the vortex of the debate Thursday — alternately reviled and hailed, unsure of whether to return to school, talking nonstop to reporters and talk show hosts.

He called it "probably one of the longer days of my life." Some people called him a "snitch" while others told him he "did the right thing." He said he made the recording because he grew tired of Bennish's lectures.

"It happened pretty much daily," he said.

Lane, Bennish's lawyer, said discourse at that level appropriately challenges students.

"The nature of his class is to put out controversial ideas and let the students respond, to teach them to think critically," Lane said. "Frequently he'll put out ideas he has absolutely no belief in whatsoever. . . . "That's the exercise in teaching them how to think critically and not accept what anybody says at face value, either the government or him."

Educator talks to students

Excerpts of comments made by Overland High School teacher Jay Bennish in a geography class Feb. 1:

Discussing President Bush's speech the previous night:

"The implication was that the solution to the violence in the Middle East is democratization. And the implication through his language was that democracies don't go to war. Democracies aren't violent. Democracies won't want weapons of mass destruction. This is called blind, naive faith in democracy. Who is probably the single most violent nation on planet Earth? (student answer — "India") The United States of America, and we're a democracy, quote, unquote. Who has the most weapons of mass destruction in the world? (student answer — unintelligible) United States. Who is continuing to develop new weapons of mass destruction as we speak? (student answer — unintelligible) United States."

•

"Now I'm not saying that Bush and Hitler are exactly the same. Obviously they're not. But there's some eerie similarities to the tones that they use. Very, very ethnocentric. We're right. You're all wrong. I just keep waiting. I mean, at some point in time I think America and Mexico might go to war again, you know? Any time Mexico plays the USA in a soccer match, what can be heard chanting all game long? (student answer — unintelligible) Pretty close. Pretty close. Now, do all Mexicans dislike the United States? No. Do all Americans dislike Mexico? No. But there's a lot of resentment, not just in Mexico, but all across the whole world, towards America right now."

•

"You need to understand something — that when al-Qaida attacked America on Sept. 11, in their view they're not attacking innocent people. The CIA had an office in the World Trade Center. The Pentagon is a military target. The White House was a military target. Congress is a military target. The World Trade Center is the economic center of our entire economy. The FBI, who tracks down terrorists and so on and so forth around the world, has offices in the World Trade Center. Some of the companies that work in the World Trade Center are these huge, multinational corporations that are directly involved in the military industrial complex, in supporting corrupt dictatorships in the Middle East. And so in the minds of al-Qaida, they're not attacking innocent people. They're attacking legitimate targets, people who have blood on their hands as far as they're concerned. We portray them as innocent because they are our friends and neighbors, family, loved ones. I mean I had one of my best friends from high school, elementary school and birth, lives in lower Manhattan. . . .

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