According to an article in the Times Union on April 13, an unnamed Albany High School educator with an excellent track record was verbally eviscerated and suspended because this educator requested that his/her three English classes write compositions as 1930s German civilians supporting the Nazis and denouncing Jews under the threat of prison or death. The purpose was to feel the terror imposed on the general population.
“Talk is cheap” so requiring a written statement, committing pen to parchment, has a profound psychological and indelible resonance. This tactic is exploited by ruthless regimes as “proof” of the people’s support. As the old Chinese proverb states, “The weakest ink lasts longer than the strongest memory.”
