Another Teacher in France Threatened with Death

In France, another teacher, still unnamed, has been threatened with death for mentioning Islamist attacks in his classes. Unlike Samuel Paty, a lycée teacher of history and geography, who was murdered by a Muslim for daring to use a caricature of Muhammad as part of a discussion on free speech, and unlike Dominique Bernard, a teacher of literature, who was murdered as he attempted to prevent a Muslim Chechen, armed with two knives, from attacking students, the latest victim was not killed, but only threatened with death. Robert Spencer reported about this briefly here, and more on his story can be found here: “Nanterre: a teacher threatened with death after a lesson on Islamist attacks,” translated from “Nanterre : un professeur menacé de mort après un cours sur les attentats islamistes,” Valeurs Actuelles, December 31, 2023 (thanks to Medforth):

A history and geography teacher from the Lycée Joliot-Curie was threatened in Nanterre, in Hauts-de-Seine, according to information from Le Figaro. A tag would have been discovered within the establishment itself: “You’re more like Samuel Paty fdp (son of a bitch, editor’s note)”, it was written in particular. According to our colleagues, this incident took place after a lesson given by this teacher, during which he mentioned Islamist attacks. The Versailles rectorate, which “condemns” the facts, announced that the official now benefited from functional protection.

“The situation is particularly monitored by the Rectorate and the management of the departmental services of national education (DSDEN) of Hauts-de-Seine in conjunction with the police forces,” specified the institution. However, despite the threats made against him, the professor does not want to give in. In fact, he wants to return to high school after the end of year vacation.

Teachers are the target of students these days. As a reminder, in Yvelines, two students were placed in police custody after the “attempted poisoning” of a teacher. The student presented himself with his family to the director of the establishment “to acknowledge his action, which he regrets.” A disciplinary council is planned for the resumption of classes in January.

Amazing, isn’t it?Having tried to murder, by poison, one of his teachers, the student simply fessed up and apparently is not being held for attempted murder. His expression of “regret” is likely to end with only a slap on the wrist; he won’t even be expelled from school, one can bet, by the disciplinary council to be convened in January. His apology will be enough to keep him out of jail and in school.

In President Macron’s New Year’s Eve address to the people of France, he spoke frequently about the importance of education, the need to prepare French children for a new economy. He did not mention the upsurge in violence in the schools, that make learning so much more difficult. No mention at all of the Muslim students who attack French classmates, who refuse to obey their teachers, and who even walk out of class when subjects displeasing to them — Catholicism in France, the French kings, the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, the Rights of Man, the Holocaust — are discussed. And of course no mention of the planned or carried-out murders of teachers who have offended Muslims.

Nor did Macron mention the increase in threats of murder, and of actual murders, carried out by Muslims against French teachers who anger them. Samuel Paty and Dominique Bernard are two who have been murdered, but many more have been threatened. It’s not only the parents of students, or the students themselves, who make these threats or kill teachers. In the case of Paty, his killer was neither a student at the school nor a parent, but simply a Chechen Muslim who had heard about Paty’s use in a class on free speech of a caricature of Muhammad. In the case of Dominique Bernard, the killer was a former student at the Lycée Gambettta, apparently with a grudge against the school; Bernard died trying to save the lives of students who were under attack by his killer.

One can imagine how this Muslim violence against teachers in France has affected their morale. Those who teach are now naturally frightened of offending Muslim students in any way, and try to avoid discussing many subjects that they fear might enrage them. But certain topics are part of the national curriculum, and cannot be avoided. The students are required to have studied such subjects as the wars of religion in France, the Divine Right of Kings, the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, colonialism, the World Wars, and the Holocaust. The teachers are caught, between fulfilling their government-mandated tasks, and risking danger to themselves from angry Muslim students, their parents, and their unrelated coreligionists.

This has had several consequences for French education. First, many public schools now have guards posted at them because of Muslim students’ indiscipline and violence in both classes and the court yard, and threats made to both classmates and teachers by Muslim parents as well. The money spent on extra security at schools is not available to be spent on education. Second, low morale among teachers, both from fear, and from frustration at not being able to teach as freely as they would like, has led to a rise both in resignations, and to early retirements, as teachers seek alternate, less stressful employment. Third, teaching is no longer the desirable occupation it once was in France, and there has been a significant drop in the number of French people choosing it as a career. Fourth, French parents are pulling their children out of public schools where they have a high proportion of Muslims as their classmates, and putting them in private schools if they can afford it. They are willing to endure the considerable expense to avoid having their children learning in physically unsafe environments, where they might be bullied, or worse, by Muslim classmates who are notably less self-disciplined, and less committed to their own studies. The absence of these French students who move to private schools lowers the standards in the classrooms they leave behind. The more French students there are who leave public for private schools, the worse the public schools they left behind become.

The quality of education in France suffers, and as the Muslim school-age population inexorably increases, things can only get worse. Macron did not address the problems of French education, but in Pollyanna fashion, proclaimed without evidence that things were getting better in French schools. They are getting, in fact, much worse, pari passu with the rise in the number of Muslim migrants.