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, 24 tweets, 5 min read

*THREAD*: 1
I rarely talk about details of my military service, to the point where I know my OH will read this & say “I never knew that”. I really feel that with the sectarian nature between some in the Twitter-sphere that we need some perspective.

2: I’m skipping over the nuanced history here, but this is what I changed my outlook on life as someone who was a very angry young man.
Yugoslavia was an amazing country. Populated by 3 ethnic groups. They all lived together, side by side, & many inter-married.

3: The Head of state died - these ethnic groups all had factions who believed they should take over the control of the country, others wanted independence. Civil war broke out. Each side thought they were the ones in the right.

4: Thousands of innocent people were caught up in this civil war. I’ve witnessed those living with the war crimes of what a minority in a country decided to do. In the depths of winter, I carried a teenage girl home who had two false legs - Soldiers had done this to her as a kid.

4: I use the term “soldiers” very loosely! They held her down so a train could run over her legs - she was 7. That night, I lay in my bunk at the troop house and cried.

5: When patrolling the local area, locals would stop us & share food with us. We would give the kids sweets, the adults would give us šljivovica - plum brandy; Our AO was a Catholic area. A farmer sent his wife in to get us food, as guests. She brought piles of hot roasted pork.

6: We could see he wasn’t happy. She went back into the house and came out with some chicken. Our interpreter told us she’d been told off for forgetting some of us could be Muslim, as one of the lads didn’t have any alcohol. That small gesture stuck with me.

7: You see, while there are those who seek to take a nation to war to prove their point, have their way, and ethnically cleanse their corner of the world; there will always be those who have to live with the real consequences of others in power.

8: Those that want to acknowledge we have differences, but can still live side by side if we acknowledge three core concepts. Working in a war zone taught me this:

9: 1. Everyone wants to feel safe, and wants their kids to be safe from harm - Not to feel scared.
2. Everyone wants good food in their bellies. What they believe is good food is personal, but each should be able to eat and drink what they want.
3: Everyone wants a roof overhead.

@BrewEdMansfield

@BrewEdMansfield

10: My last unit was The Queens Royal Lancers. The Regt Colonel always had 3 quotes on Orders:

“All of one company” - Inspired by this, @BrewEdMansfield uses #AllOneCommunity

11: We are all part of something much bigger than ourselves, with shared traditions and goals. While we might disagree, we are all part of a wider family of support, comradeship, and work toward the same objective.

12: “Think to the finish” - What are the consequences of one’s actions? What is the thing we are doing that is larger than us? How am I going to be part of that? What sort of contribution will I bring to the table.

13: “Do as you ought, not as you want” - Always do the right thing! It’s not a hard concept. There are times when you have to stick your neck on the line for someone else. There are times when hiding the truth would be easier than being honest.

14: I have Maj Gen Patrick Marriott to thank for influencing who I am today because of these 3 simple messages. I carry them with me today as a teacher.

15: My point is this, certainly now I’ve slept after seeing it all kicking off on here yesterday!

We have one goal eduTwitter: We want what is best for the kids we teach & their communities. The most traditionalist of Trads & progressive of Progs all want this.

16: While you’re doxxing each other, receiving DMs of screenshotted posts, arguing over the CCT, the rest of us are caught in your ‘firefights’. As an ECT I can tell you we, the ‘children’ in our profession look on in despair. We want to see our ‘adults’ guide us in teaching.

17: We need to feel it is safe to ask questions, without having them descended on with ‘sectarian violence’ - with either side offering promises of theirs being ‘the best/right/most caring way’ like someone trying to indoctrinate a child-soldier into their cause.

18: We need the breadth & depth of teaching experience out their for us to find our own way. We need eduTwitter to be somewhere we can gain more exp than a single sch can give, to develop as practitioners.

19: I don’t agree with everything individuals say, but I am able to respect them - across all sides of eduTwitter. I value opinions from all; taking knowledge learnt from exp & research. *I want to be a better teacher* - most of us are caught in the crossfire of Prog & Trad.

20: In vernacular becoming of my time in the Army: “Get a grip” eduTwitter. 6 years ago I started my journey into this profession and started following some of you back then. I looked on in awe of what you did, and hoped that I’d be able to have the same impact on kids’ lives.

21: Today I feel like we need to do this better. We need to remember those 3 things that everyone in the world wants. Remember what unites us, not what makes us different. We need to stop & think about how tine can be inferred into a tweet depending on the reader’s mood.

22: TL:DR - We are better than this as a profession eduTwitter. Yesterday, I went to bed disappointed. In true teacher fashion “Today is a new day, a fresh start. Have a great one!”