A bear by any other name

This is a disheartening story in many ways. My initial reaction was one of slightly weary annoyance: honestly, it's a freakin' teddy bear. But then I took myself to task, shook myself from my library-induced lethargy and pondered a while (in between dealing with readers' questions and checking out books).

Now my annoyance is turned onto this teacher. I just cannot believe that she is unaware of the level of sensitivity that situations like this demand. This is not the first time that an issue like this has made the news in the past few years. While my initial reaction remains - I cannot understand that level of devotion to a name (surely there are people bearing the prophet's name whose lives constitute a slur on his memory - in the same way that not everyone named 'Jesus' is likely to be a saint) - it is not my faith and I am not called to understand it. I would like to believe, were I in this teacher's place, that I would be aware of the culture in which I am working and living.

It's a teachable moment badly missed. I think it would have made a lovely lesson to ask, when a child suggested 'Muhammed' as a name for a teddy bear, why they thought it would be a good name. What does the name mean to them? Given it's popularity as a boy's name, perhaps whoever suggested it had a brother called Muhammed or a father or uncle, or was so called himself. I'm wondering if, from there, it might be an interesting way into teaching them a culture/history/religious lesson on the spot. Why couldn't the bear be called Muhammed? What does the name mean? What does it mean to hold something sacred? I appreciate that I'm likely oversimplifying it and I don't teach young children and it's a very complex and large problem. I also think that that is crap. I'm particularly interested in the way that this teacher is implicitly absolved because she tried to teach the children a lesson about democracy instead...

And I will not countenance any whining claims that this is 'PC gone mad'. Few statements - usually accompanied by a liberal toss of the head and stamp of the foot - irritate me more. This has nothing to do with political correctness and everything to do with sensitivity and tolerance. I know that some reactions to this serious - but innocent - lapse in judgement will cause problems as well - there will be people (apparently there already are) who wait for events like this to excuse or explain violence. And that's a shame too. More than a shame. But I think that it is a separate issue and what I'm interested in now and shall go off and ponder is how big the world has become and how much more is demanded of us when we go out to play.