In my Jan. 12 letter to the Saratoga News, I made some very broad generalizations about what "we teachers" teach [at Saratoga High School], and then signed my name to those generalizations, affiliating myself with Saratoga High School.

Upon further reflection, it is clear to me that I had no such right to claim to be speaking for any other teacher at Saratoga or, for that matter, what any other public school teacher does or does not teach to his or her students, and I was wrong in doing so.

In my letter of Jan. 12, I also made some very specific generalizations about fundamentalist religious fanatics—generalizations which apparently have been misconstrued by a number of people within the community as a wholesale condemnation of two of the world's great religions: Christianity and Islam. Nothing could be further from the truth of my intention. My intention was not to malign the Christian faith or the Muslim faith (or any faith for that matter). What I was condemning was the negative effects which can come from any religion when religious beliefs are taken to an extreme.

When religion is taken to an extreme, and then used as an excuse to discriminate or otherwise oppress other people who have the right to believe (or not believe) in any religion they wish, or to impose their beliefs on others, that is the type of fundamentalist fanaticism I was referring to.

Over the last seven years I have been teaching at Saratoga High School; in each and every one of my classes, I have had students of all faiths in attendance: Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, and Buddhist. Had I been preaching all of the heresies for which I now stand accused of over the last seven years, I'm sure such heresies would have come to light prior to my Jan. 12 letter.

Todd Dwyer

Saratoga High School

We need to iron out
our differences

I was troubled by the vitriolic tone of Wesley Ferguson's response to Todd Dwyer's letter. We have just gone through one of the most divisive periods in recent history. What we need now is to conduct rational conversations to iron out our differences rather than to label one another in the manner of the late '50s McCarthyism.

Let's not accuse our educators of "indoctrinating" our children in "ideologies" of "socialism" and "liberalism." Let's let them do their job of educating our children, including educating them about the history of past wars and the true causes of those wars. The things that draw us together are far stronger than those that push us apart. Democracy has enough enemies in this world. Let us not be democracy's worst enemy.

Pat Kaspar

Meadow Oak Road

Dwyer tosses out a
line, catches reader

A nibble, a bite—hook, line, and sinker! Wesley I. Ferguson writes in the Jan. 26 Saratoga News: "Who can fail to be struck by the total lack of respect for tolerance and diversity that Saratoga High School teacher Todd Dwyer demonstrated in his letter published in the Jan. 12 issue of the Saratoga News?"

Who can fail to be struck by Mr. Ferguson's total lack of humor? I'm absolutely sure Todd Dwyer raps on the subject of Christian fundamentalists—comparing them to Muslim fundamentalists—at every opportunity he has. Well, Mr. Ferguson is sure he does, in any case. I'm not.

Dwyer raps on a lot of things in class, but this time mostly, Mr. Ferguson, he was just twitching the line for Mrs. Hocker and happened to catch you on his hook, too. And in so doing, he certainly proved "beyond any doubt that what she has been saying is true, perhaps doing so beyond her wildest expectations and fears."

Indeed.

Sal Towse

Bellecourt

Teacher is just
opening his mouth

I would like to respond to the Saratoga teacher, Todd Dwyer, and his comments. It is very apparent that Todd Dwyer has read neither the Koran nor the Bible but is, in fact, teaching a visceral political agenda.

Other countries are teaching reading, science, math, history and physical education. They don't have time left to teach personal opinions. Perhaps our national scholastic standing would improve if our teachers would do the same and actually teach. What a novel concept!

The word "liberal" is used to connote a mind open to ideas. The only thing open about Mr. Dwyer is his mouth.

Jerlyn V. Hollars

San Jose

Dwyer's claims don't
pass for education

Mr. Dwyer, a teacher at Saratoga High School, claims to shed the "full light of day" on a myriad of subjects listed in his letter of Jan. 12. Perhaps this passes for education in the minds of many teachers, but I certainly do not call it that.

One wonders whether such teachers explain to their students that atheist statism, in an attempt to create an atheist utopia by stamping out the "ancient and dilapidated fairy tales" that Mr. Dwyer refers to, has brought the world more murder, misery, grief and woe in just the last century, than in all previous centuries combined--precisely because atheist statism, in all of its variant forms of Marxism, Fascism, Communism, Ba'athism, Nazism, Maoism, etc., is an ideology that is based on a dangerously bogus view of human nature. One wonders if such teachers have read St. Thomas More's Utopia which clearly predicted the repression resulting from such misguided and na•ve utopian notions.

If Mr. Dwyer and other such teachers really intend to shed the "full light of day" on "such viewpoints," then they ought to be examining history in its fullness. Those who don't only prove that they are neither well informed nor well educated and, frankly, just people who arrogantly claim to know everything but who, in fact, do not.

Christina Capurro Sand

Saratoga