Arabic in Attleboro
Bishop Feehan High School, in Attleboro, offers students an opportunity to study Arabic. Besides its obvious intellectual advantages, the course provides the moral advantages of making students aware of Arabic culture, and that languages may vary but people are people everywhere.

The importance of offsetting the jingoistic atmosphere in which AMericn children are sometimes raised cannot be overstated. Children today must climb from adolescence to adulthood in a nation that too often mistakes prejudices for patriotism. With a too-easy willingness to use our precious judicial system to persecute, rather than prosecute, some of our leaders show no shame in trampling human rights simply because of the birthplace of their prey, the color of their skin, their lifestyles, or the religion they embrace.

That's why the teaching of Arabic in this country is such a positive exercise. U.S. civilian and military leaders have called Arabic a "critical language". I would like to think that that's because our government sees communicating with our Arabic brothers and sisters as a way toward a peace process that will help erase global hatred. I would like to, but I don't. I'm afraid the U.S. government officials seek to spread knowledge of Arabic as an "anti-terrorism" tool – to further trample the rights of those whose only certain crime is their membership in a different culture.

Meanwhile, the scarcity of U.S. military personnel facile enough in Arabic to aid intelligence gathering stems partly from many translators' having been lost to shameful prohibition of openly gay men and women in the armed forces.

The Bishop Feehan High School students are taking their Arabic course through a subscription to the Arab Academy, in Cairo, says Kren Bennan, Feehan's vice principal for academic affairs. She should be commended for offering the course, and the 24 students accepting the challenge deserve our admiration. Knowledge unlocks the door to intolerance – and thus to peace.

Bernard F. Sullivan