- cross-posted to:
- europe@lemmy.ml
- cross-posted to:
- europe@lemmy.ml
A high school science teacher in France has been suspended since late March for holding a minute’s silence for the victims of Israel’s war on Gaza.
Le Parisien reported on Thursday, citing education authorities, that the physics and chemistry teacher at Janot Curie high school in Sens, Yonne, was suspended on 31 March. Five days earlier, a minute’s silence was held just at the end of her class to pay tribute to the victims of the war, just as Israeli forces unilaterally broke a ceasefire in Gaza and killed more than 700 Palestinians.
The decision marks the latest episode of French authorities taking punitive action over protests and remarks related to Israel’s war on Gaza. Jean-Paul Delescaut, leader of the General Confederation of Labour union, was handed a suspended one-year jail sentence for writing in response to the 7 October Hamas attacks: “The horrors of illegal occupations… are receiving the responses they provoked.”
Genocide is not just a political topic.
Yes teachers are hired to teach specific subjects, but that isn’t their only role.
They teach how to be a person within society, the social contract (a French term I might add), and how to engage critical thinking.
They’re not there just to blindly teach how to memorise the curriculum. There’s nuance to their role.