To the editor
In her letter in the April 24 Beacon, Jill Alecci describes a phone conversation between the two of us. While the gist of her description basically parallels one that I could provide, the details would certainly vary something that makes sense given that all accounts of human events come from some teller’s point of view.
There are two details in Ms. Alecci’s letter, however, that I consider quite inaccurate and therefore address here.
First, the event to which I invited Ms. Alecci was a teach-in called Choosing Peace sponsored by Somerset Voices for Peace and Justice for which I was one of the organizers.
Specifically because of Ms. Alecci’s reference to Sept. 11 in her prior letter, I mistakenly thought that she might be interested in hearing directly from people whose lives had been touched by war and/or terrorism and who had chosen peace as a path people including Dave Cline, a disabled Vietnam War veteran and current resident of Veterans for Peace (www.veteransforpeace.org); Maryellen DeCoster, a local mother whose son is currently serving in the US Army’s enlisted ranks; and James Della Bella, a college student and member of Peaceful Tomorrows (www.peacefultomorrows.org) whose mother was killed in the Sept. 11 attack on the World Trade Center.
These are the event details that I provided over the phone not the details that Ms. Alecci provided in her recent letter.
Second, Ms. Alecci described me as saying that I am an educated woman unlike her. This is simply not what I said. What I did say in response to Ms. Alecci saying that she "simply supports [our] country," is that I think people should become more broadly educated about our government’s policies and not simply support these policies without question.
At this point Ms. Alecci referred to my having a Ph.D. and said that she herself was educated without one.
I would like to be very clear on this particular point. I do NOT believe that having a Ph.D. makes me or anyone else educated on all topics. Both Peter and I first identified ourselves in the Beacon as individuals with Ph.D.s in education several years ago around topics concerning educational practices in our community, topics for which our formal education and professional experiences were quite relevant, and simply retain this identification as part of our signature.
And as educators, we believe that being educated about ANY topic requires studying multiple points of view (pro, con, neutral, …) in order to take informed stances and make informed decisions, a sentiment that we have expressed innumerable times on these pages and one that characterizes one of the most touted outcomes of modern educational systems the ability to think critically.
Further, we do not believe that it is possible to study multiple points of view on a variety of topics if one’s sole source of information is the U.S. corporate media.
These beliefs are not based on blind faith, but rather on the results of our own study of multiple points of view. Neither Peter nor I make claims in this or any other venue without being able to support those claims with evidence.
When I attempted to clarify what I meant by "becoming more broadly educated" in my conversation with Ms. Alecci, she said she had no interest in reading anything I might suggest in reference to cited sources in various Beacon letters Peter and I have written, not even position statements/papers from The Project for the New American Century (http://www.newamericancentury.org), an organization with which she apparently ideologically agrees.
So with regard to the current state of world affairs, Ms. Alecci and others please ask yourselves this: Would you buy a car based solely on the manufacturer’s marketing material or the assurances of a sales person or former owner?
If not, don’t you think your stances on US foreign policy deserve at least as much investigation as you might put into buying your next car?
Zion Road

