It is the choice between Ninja Turtles and censorship.

While the California Department of Education may be having its troubles with the subtleties of portraying ethnicity in American history books, a more immediate question is nagging at teachers in the classroom these days.

It is the choice between Ninja Turtles and censorship.

It seems that a lot of elementary and preschool teachers are growing frantic with their students’ martial shenanigans, which seem to have replaced the mom and dad or doctor roles of old. The current model is the gang of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles from the movie of the name and now appearing on TV, subduing evil with an act of violence every 45 seconds.

Having weathered GI Joe and “Kung Fu,” some teachers draw the line at Ninja Turtles, forbidding any manifestation of the warrior cult in their classrooms. They associate the turtles, cute as they may be to look at, with the rise of violence and aggression in American culture. There are even teachers who will send a kid home for coming to school in a Ninja Turtle T-shirt.

This has brought on a backlash among teachers, and some parents, who think the little whirlwinds of retribution deserve the protection of the First Amendment every bit as much as the sadomasochistic photographs of Robert Mapplethorpe.

Opinion split irreconcilably when the debate recently came up at the Verdugo Hills Chapter of the Southern California Assn. for the Education of Young Children, which is part of the nation’s largest association of early childhood education teachers.

Unable to lay down any policy, the group’s directors set up a debate, so that members could hear the best thinking of both camps and choose for themselves.

It was held Tuesday night at the Child Educational Center of Caltech/JPL, a corporate-sponsored day-care facility that occupies 10 classrooms of a La Canada Flintridge elementary school.

About 50 women attended, mostly teachers and parents from the area and some students of early childhood development. Only two men were in the audience.

Four panelists were seated by viewpoint, their positions identified by two lime-green T-shirts draped over a table. One sported a Ninja Turtle crossed out with the circle and bar symbol for no , and the other the word “Censorship,” also crossed out. T-shirts were on sale at $12 apiece.

Panelist Carole Lieberman, a psychiatrist is a consultant on TV and film scripts, objected to the polarization of the question, which made it seem that being against Ninja Turtles made one for censorship. She said she was against Ninja Turtles but not for censorship.

She cited studies showing that violent imagery causes “psychological unrest and bad development.”

“I feel very strongly that Ninja Turtles should not be allowed in school,” she said. “When children play with violent toys like Ninja Turtles, their play becomes aggressive.”

Joann Hannaford, a teacher at the La Crescenta Presbyterian Center for Children, said matter-of-factly that she banned Ninja Turtles from her classroom and had been rewarded with a drop in unruly behavior.

“If that’s censorship, I do censor what goes on in my classroom and I’m not ashamed of it,” she concluded.

Walter Draude, a teacher at the Child Day Care Center at Mt. St. Mary’s College, said he had just tuned in to his first Ninja Turtle show and found it to have a highly moral theme, of four men learning to follow a role in the battle against evil.

Reading a handwritten lecture, Draude cited Freud and several authorities on childhood development. His point was that kids have always played super-hero games to address the powerlessness of childhood. He said he delighted in war games as a child, then grew up to be a conscientious objector. His conclusion: taking away the super heroes merely denies the teacher a tool for guiding children to an understanding of their aggression.

Deane Phinney, director of the Burbank First United Methodist Nursery School, advocated a middle-of-the road position neither banning specific games or toys nor allowing them to dominate play. She thought teachers could intervene to help those children who display excessive aggression.

The question period became a rapid-fire give and take. One young teacher asked how she could be expected to intervene when there is “a little group over there kicking each other and a little group over there kicking each other.”

Another pointed out that the Ninja Turtles present a sexist image.

Several dismissed Draude’s eloquent argument with testimony of their experience that when the Turtles are banished, the classroom violence stops.

But others argued that they have found ways to channel the Turtle games.

“We have not banned anything, but we do not allow children to hurt each other,” one teacher said.

At one point, Draude tried to shrug off the threat.

“My kids don’t play with Ninja Turtle anymore,” he said. “It’s come and gone.”

“Ninja II is coming out,” a woman shot back.

Ninja Turtles seem to be as divisive as abortion. But at least there is a middle road and it is taken by nurturing people.