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this post was submitted on 26 Jan 2025
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Where do you people come from where "I don't negotiate with terrorists" is a normal phrase that teachers say to children?
I don't even know any adults who have said something like that to each other in years.
The kid wouldn't even have gotten the reference because they were born many years after Bush was in office.
I hear it often enough, I'm from MA. I don't know what to tell you, but it's a common expression.
Here's the scenario, often as an adult you have to tell children what to do, (eat your dinner, get dressed, we have to leave now, etc). Sometimes they start making ultimatums or threats over issues that really aren't up for debate, "No! I won't do X unless Y!" - that kind of thing. It's at that point one might use that expression, it's really not uncommon.
Hey, maybe the phrase isn't in your normal vocabulary, but you're going to have to accept that it is in a lot of other people's normal vocabulary. You don't have to like it, but it's a fact, and it's generally best to just accept facts, cause you don't really have other options.
So given that this is a normal thing to say, it was still a pretty massive fuck up. Being put on leave is probably an appropriate response. Was it racist? I'm like 85% sure no.
I mean, I come from a place that that's a normal thing people say. And I'd think I'm as likely to say it to a child as "I'll be back," or "clever girl," or "what we have here is a failure to communicate," or any number of other referential phrases that a child is unlikely to understand the reference to.
But maybe you're right it's an age/generational thing. It's definitely a phrase still in the zeitgeist of people my age, but maybe less so in a younger demographic? Maybe that's why there's a skew in the comments, where some of us see it as a phrase as common and normal as "we're gonna need a bigger boat," and some think it's super out of left field and weird.
But the child not getting the reference is immaterial. Part of learning language is learning what phrases are in the zeitgeist. It's not weird for me to use any of the above phrases with a child, even if they haven't seen any of the things they're from.
I don't know what age you are, but I am 47 and I have not heard that phrase in years.
And you're right, it's immaterial whether or not the child gets it. The material part is a teacher insulting a child. Racist, not racist, it is absolutely inappropriate either way.
Have you ever heard that phrase used as an insult? I've only ever heard it used as a joking way to say "no." Especially in cases where the person is being bullheaded about something.
I've literally never heard that phrase used in a pejorative way.
Yes. Yes I have. Because I know plenty of Muslims.
Maybe this is purely cultural/regional then. I grew up in an area without a large Muslim population. Perhaps the phrase was used pejoratively elsewhere.
Well this teacher is somewhere with Muslims, so maybe they should figure out how to be a little fucking culturally sensitive with the people in her class.
We don't even know how old this kid was. It could have been a seven-year-old. What seven-year-old would even understand that was not insulting if you called them a terrorist? They don't have that sort of ability to reason yet.
I kinda doubt many seven year olds are asking for a seat change?
But, so long as we're making up scenarios that support our side of the argument, what if it was an otherwise white presenting student, who's ethnic background the teacher didn't know, who told the teacher, "change my seat or I'll beat your ass"?
Without full context, it's hard to say how deplorable the usage of the phrase truly was. It could have been horrible and racist, sure. I'm not arguing that it couldn't, or even that it wasn't. I'm just arguing that it also could also have been a completely normal and understandable turn of phrase that was not intended to be offensive, but unfortunately was.
Then the teacher goes and gets help.
It is never okay for a teacher to insult a student and I have no idea why you and others don't realize that. Teachers always get disciplined for that if it is found out.
In the scenario I outlined, it's not an insult. It's just a common turn of phrase.
For it to even possibly be an insult the teacher would have to know the students ethnic background. It wouldn't be reasonable to construe it as an insult if the student wasn't Arab. And a person's ethnic background isn't always apparent.
No one is arguing that it's okay for teachers to insult students. Literally no one has taken that position in this conversation. People have asserted that point many times, but you keep circling back to it, so I'll emphasize. Of course it's not okay for teachers to insult students. Literally no one is arguing that, and you're not listening.
I'm just saying a lot of common words and phrases can be loaded in certain circumstances. If I tell a child that's hoarding toys, "now now, let's not be greedy, we need to share with our friends, okay," that's fine. If it turns out that kid is Jewish though, it could taken very poorly.
Hell, a kid could tell me about their weekend plans, and I could say, "wow, that's crazy," not knowing their mom is in an institution, and the headline could read, "teacher tells student they are mentally unwell, just like their institutionalized mother." Expecting someone to perfectly avoid all potentially charged language is impossible.
And I'm not saying that the person in the article is blameless. I'm saying the article has very very little in the way of detail, and I'm leary of joining a pitchfork weilding mob over what could have been a simple, though deeply unfortunate, choice of words.
I have no idea why you think it is ever okay to call any student a terrorist for any reason, but I sure as hell hope you aren't a teacher.
I mean, clearly it's sometimes okay to call a kid a terrorist.
What if a highschool decides to do a stage production of The Hurt Locker, and one kid has to play a terrorist. Can the drama teacher call them "the terrorist" when blocking a scene?
What if a kid brings a gun to school and says, "I'm holding this school hostage as an act of terrorism!" Could a teacher refer to them as a terrorist then?
What if a kid's first name is terrorist? Terrorist Jones they call him. Is a teacher not allowed to refer to them by their name?
It's clearly okay to sometimes call a kid a terrorist. We're just quibbling over when it's okay to call a kid a terrorist.
Do you think one of those times is when a child wants to change seats?
Also, what child's name is Terrorist? Be serious.
Dang, the closest I could find in the NYC white pages was "Terrarese," which like, sounds pretty close, but not quite there, lol. Some people's parents give out some wild names, lol. I wouldn't be shocked if there was a Terrorist Jones out there somewhere. But you're right, that was largely tongue-in-cheek (which isn't a racial epithet against people with big cheeks, and I'm sorry if you happen to have big cheeks and feel insulted).
But, to answer your question, no. Again, if the kid was like, "Mrs Marples, can I change seats," and the teacher responded with, "screw you, you little terrorist," then that's clearly wildly out of line. But there are reasonable times to use the phrase "I don't negotiate with terrorists" that aren't racially charged. If I say that to a buddy (ethnically white American) who's being a dick, I'm not some raging racist who hates Arab people. I used a reasonably common phrase, in the zeitgeist, at a time where it made sense to do so. And I'm not saying that's definitely what happened here. I'm saying it could be the case, and I'm willing to give reasonable doubt until I see an article that's more than 3 sentences long with less detail than was in the headline.
Oh for fuck's sake, you keep talking about saying this to a friend. Teachers and students are not friends. Teachers have power over students. Calling one of them a terrorist when they just want to change seats is so far beyond the pale. It's not even a racism thing. If she had said "assholes" instead of "terrorists,* I am sure you would not approve. I have no idea why you are defending this teacher.
The issue with your counter example is that there's plenty of times a teacher might use the word terrorist in a classroom. Any history lesson covering the past half century for example. There are precious few times a teacher should be actively swearing in a classroom, in any context.
But if it's a power dynamic thing, I'd be equally fine saying "I don't negotiate with terrorists" to a subordinate at work if they were being a particular kind of dick, same as I would with a buddy. Because it's a normal phrase people say.
I would like you to find one other example of a teacher saying that to a student. Go for it.
I'll do that as soon as you find me one example of a teacher saying "hey there buster brown, why don't you sit down!”
You probably can't, because it's not news worthy, as this wouldn't be 99.9% of the time. The only reason this is, is because the kid in question was one, Arab, and two, offended. If either hadn't been true, none of us would have ever heard about it.
But I recall people using that phrase in highschool. I remember teachers using it. That was back in the Bush era, to be fair, but it was pretty normative. We didn't really have any Arab population, so not much chance of anyone being offended though.
That is totally different and you know it.
I really, genuinely don't. You may not believe it, but those feel equally charged to me.
But I think that's at the crux of our disagreement. My lived experience is that that phrase is uncharged, and your lived experience is that it's terribly charged. This is probably due to regional or cultural differences, and honestly, that's fine.
We could debate who's lived experience is the more generalized one. Who is more representative of the average American. But honestly, I don't know that it matters.
And even if you found out that 95% of people think it's uncharged (which I'm not saying is the case), it still wouldn't make it feel any different for you I'm sure, as again, in your lived experience that phrase is tantamount to a slur.
But all that said, I appreciate the discussion about it. It's always interesting to come across these things that, due to fluctuations in region or age or whatever, both seem so obviously true to each side, while being so polarizing.
And I know I see you around here a lot, and I generally agree with you on stuff. So like, I know you're not an unreasonable person or whatever. I respect your opinion on the issue even. We just disagree this time.