Schools Shut Down Over Immigration Uproar - Corporate Censorship - this News Article Was Blocked by Norton Securities' Parental Control Function.

Editor's Note: As is often the case, we received this article from an Axis of Logic reader, asking us to publish a reprint. We clicked on the URL (internet address) to review the article and we received the following message from Norton Security - one of our anti-virus, firewall programs: "Parental Control".

"Norton Internet Security has blocked access to this restricted site.

"Site: http://news.aol.com/topnews/articles?id=n20060330030809990009
Blocked categories: User-blocked site"

Now with all due respect for the need for Norton's ubiquitous parental control in the minefields of the Internet, we ask, "Why is information about the protest of some students against US immigration policy so "dangerous" that it has to be blocked from the view of other young students?" At Axis of Logic, we think we know why: "You can't allow the disease to spread". We only want to draw attention at this time to the fact that an Internet corporation - "Norton Securities" - has blocked this report from other students in public schools.

Moreover, we suggest that the "average" parent who sees - "Norton Internet Security has blocked access to this restricted site" - will probably go no further and say: "NO" to their child.

3 years ago we identified this practice conducted by corporations on behalf of their allies in government. When the U.S. government faces the difficult decision to directly cenure the media, where do they turn? To corporations whose role is ostensibly to protect our children. Protect our children from whom? From what? From pornograpy? From violence? No, in this case and in many others - Norton Security is not protecting our children from these things to which most parents object. They are "protecting our children" from news that many other students are protesting an act of the U.S. government against the immigrants of this country from living and working in the United States of "the Americas".

We are trying at this time to track down another AP article that seems to have disappeared. One that uses the following title, subtitle and other perjurative language for this article:

Schools Shut Down Over Immigration Uproar
California District Officials Hear Rumors of Possible Violence
By Jacob Adelman, AP

- Les Blough, Editor

Walkouts Enter Classroom Discussions

By CHRISTINA ALMEIDA and JEREMIAH MARQUEZ

Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (March 30) - Teachers and students are turning the walkouts that have emptied high schools across Southern California into a real-life civics lesson about national immigration policy and even the nuances of civic duty itself.

In Christian Quintero's social studies classroom, the conversation flowed easily from English to Spanish - but the topics his students discussed didn't have easy answers.

"So do you think yesterday was a good thing or a bad thing?" Quintero asked of Monday's walkout, which involved an estimated 36,000 students in Los Angeles County, including many from Belmont High School where he teaches.

"A good thing!" a boy in the back shouted.

"Why?"

"Because we let them know what's up," the boy said.

Indeed, the protests landed the Los Angeles Unified School District - the nation's second largest, and 73 percent of its students Hispanic - in the debate on congressional proposals to crackdown on immigration.

Wednesday was relatively quiet after two days of protests that began with blocked freeways and pleas from the mayor to go back to class, and escalated Tuesday to school lockdowns and truancy citations. On the popular Web site MySpace.com, where many students have said they went for protest instructions, the word was wait until Friday for the next mass protest.

Meanwhile, in classrooms and hallways some students have turned to reflection - were the protests effective? were they the right thing to do?

Some teachers seized the opportunity to make the connection between the textbook and real life. Some offered lessons on how a bill becomes law. In one school, lunchtime morphed into an organized forum on immigration policy.

The shape of the discussions was up to individual schools and teachers.

"There is an opportunity to take this and fold it into what students are learning in their government, history and civics classes," said district spokeswoman Susan Cox.

Keeping kids in class also helps the 746,000-student district. With two days of walkouts, the Los Angeles district alone could lose more than $900,000 in state funds based on student attendance.

The principal at Belmont, on the edge of downtown Los Angeles, told teachers to let students talk freely about the walkouts but to stress "the merits of being in school and continuing with their studies to make a difference."

For 10th grade history teacher Ernesto Torres, that meant fielding questions about legislation working its way through Congress.

Why is the government targeting immigrants, one student asked.

Torres asked the 18 year old whether he registered to vote.

When the student said no, Torres responded, "That's why."

The students were surprised to learn theirs wasn't the first mass student protest in Los Angeles' history. Torres told them about the landmark 1968 Chicano walkouts to protest poor learning environments in East Los Angeles.

"You are a part of history now," Torres said.

Students at some other schools complained that their teachers didn't want to discuss the issues. And some said their peers didn't seem to know what they were protesting.

"I don't think any of them actually read the 40-page proposed bill. They were just jumping the gates to get out," said Amanda Ellis, 15, a student at San Pedro High School on the edge of the bustling ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles.

After students there walked out, police issued 100 truancy citations.

"I don't think it's fair to us," said 15-year-old Destiny Duran of the crackdown.

Asked whether she was angry with her classmates, Duran shook her head.

"I blame the government," she said.

http://articles.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20060330030809990009

(If you have trouble going to the original source of this article, try opening your "security" sofware program and turning on "Parental Control" - then "refresh". - LMB)