Radical right-wing ideas poluting public education

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Democrats in Texas are howling because "far right wing extremists" managed to influence the official school curriculum a bit.  Those dastardly "ultraconservatives" forced schools to include notions such as American exceptionalism, the benefits of limited government intervention in the free market, and calling the US a constitutional republic instead of a democracy.

I say good job, Texans.  More than that, I'm bemused that the opposition considers these things to be far right fringe radicalism.  If they think these ideas are extreme, I can't imagine how they'd react if they ever encountered some real far right extremism.



http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100313/ap_on_re_us/us_texas_schools_social_studies

  By APRIL CASTRO, Associated Press Writer April Castro, Associated Press Writer   – 50 mins ago

AUSTIN, Texas – A far-right faction of the Texas State Board of Education succeeded Friday in injecting conservative ideals into social studies, history and economics lessons that will be taught to millions of students for the next decade.

Teachers in Texas will be required to cover the Judeo-Christian influences of the nation's Founding Fathers, but not highlight the philosophical rationale for the separation of church and state. Curriculum standards also will describe the U.S. government as a "constitutional republic," rather than "democratic," and students will be required to study the decline in value of the U.S. dollar, including the abandonment of the gold standard.

"We have been about conservatism versus liberalism," said Democrat Mavis Knight of Dallas, explaining her vote against the standards. "We have manipulated strands to insert what we want it to be in the document, regardless as to whether or not it's appropriate."

Following three days of impassioned and acrimonious debate, the board gave preliminary approval to the new standards with a 10-5 party line vote. A final vote is expected in May, after a public comment period that could produce additional amendments and arguments.

Decisions by the board — made up of lawyers, a dentist and a weekly newspaper publisher among others — can affect textbook content nationwide because Texas is one of publishers' biggest clients.

Ultraconservatives wielded their power over hundreds of subjects this week, introducing and rejecting amendments on everything from the civil rights movement to global politics. Hostilities flared and prompted a walkout Thursday by one of the board's most prominent Democrats, Mary Helen Berlanga of Corpus Christi, who accused her colleagues of "whitewashing" curriculum standards.

By late Thursday night, three other Democrats seemed to sense their futility and left, leaving Republicans to easily push through amendments heralding "American exceptionalism" and the U.S. free enterprise system, suggesting it thrives best absent excessive government intervention.

"Some board members themselves acknowledged this morning that the process for revising curriculum standards in Texas is seriously broken, with politics and personal agendas dominating just about every decision," said Kathy Miller, president of the Texas Freedom Network, which advocates for religious freedom.

Republican Terri Leo, a member of the powerful Christian conservative voting bloc, called the standards "world class" and "exceptional."

Board members argued about the classification of historic periods (still B.C. and A.D., rather than B.C.E. and C.E.); whether students should be required to explain the origins of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and its impact on global politics (they will); and whether former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir should be required learning (she will).

In addition to learning the Bill of Rights, the board specified a reference to the Second Amendment right to bear arms in a section about citizenship in a U.S. government class.

Conservatives beat back multiple attempts to include hip-hop as an example of a significant cultural movement.

Numerous attempts to add the names or references to important Hispanics throughout history also were denied, inducing one amendment that would specify that Tejanos died at the Alamo alongside Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie. Another amendment deleted a requirement that sociology students "explain how institutional racism is evident in American society."

Democrats did score a victory by deleting a portion of an amendment by Republican Don McLeroy suggesting that the civil rights movement led to "unrealistic expectations for equal outcomes."

Fort Worth Republican Pat Hardy, a longtime teacher, voted for the new standards, but said she wished the board could work with a more cooperative spirit.

"What we've done is we've taken a document that by nature is too long to begin with and then we've lengthened it some more," Hardy said, shortly after the vote. "Those long lists of names that we've put in there ... it's just too long.

"I just think we failed to keep that in mind, it's hard for teachers to get through it all."

[makattak]

God bless Texas.

[Monkeyleg]

In addition to learning the Bill of Rights, the board specified a reference to the Second Amendment right to bear arms in a section about citizenship in a U.S. government class.

Conservatives beat back multiple attempts to include hip-hop as an example of a significant cultural movement.

To hell with the Bill of Rights, let's learn about 50 Cent.

[MicroBalrog]

Using public education to influence the minds of the next generation: only wrong when it's the lefties who do it.

[209]

The article doesn't say exactly what ALL of the proposed changes are, but it's a good example of the pendulum effect.  Public education (solely IMO) has been tilted well to the left for years.  It's nice to see it coming back towards the middle.  Of course, the pendulum won't stop there as the system always over-corrects.

.... to easily push through amendments heralding "American exceptionalism" and the U.S. free enterprise system, suggesting it thrives best absent excessive government intervention.

I see nothing wrong with that.

Teachers in Texas will be required to cover the Judeo-Christian influences of the nation's Founding Fathers...

Nor that- there was indeed such an influence.

...but not highlight the philosophical rationale for the separation of church and state.

Probably because the whole notion has been twisted into something unintended and absent a rather prolonged class on how it got twisted and is interpreted in today's society, it'd be hard to explain.

Curriculum standards also will describe the U.S. government as a "constitutional republic," rather than "democratic," and students will be required to study the decline in value of the U.S. dollar, including the abandonment of the gold standard.

The former is true and the latter is something worth knowing.

In addition to learning the Bill of Rights, the board specified a reference to the Second Amendment right to bear arms in a section about citizenship in a U.S. government class.

Both valid instruction for young minds.  After all, they are there to learn and a basic primer on the BOR should be required instruction for all students.  Now if they can pull off actually teaching exactly what those rights are without warping the intent, so much the better.

[taurusowner]

Using public education to influence the minds of the next generation: only wrong when it's the lefties who do it.

I'm not sure what you are insinuating.

If the left teaches that America was founded as a democracy but the right teaches that we were founded as a representative republic, there is nothing ambiguous about that.  The left is wrong and the right is correct.  We were founded as a representative republic

If the left teaches that the founding fathers were opposed to religion and any religious influence in government but the right teaches that many of the founding fathers were in fact deeply religious, and their beliefs played a large role in the early years of this nation, there is nothing ambiguous about that either.  The left would be wrong and the right is correct.  The unbiased facts are simply that many founding fathers were very religious, and even the US Government itself was deeply intertwined with Christianity.  The first session of the US Supreme Court was a 4 hour long prayer meeting.  The teaching of religion was was actually required/encouraged for schools in Territories applying for Statehood (Northwest Ordinance, Section XIV, Article III, passed by the House, passed by the Senate and signed into law by President George Washington, August 7, 1789)

Micro, those are just 2 of the points in contention here.  You seem to be trying to equivocate the left's view being taught in public schools with the right's.  But no such comparison can be made.  The things that Texas schools are trying to teach are just fact.  They are not party lines, candidate sound bites, speech excerpts, or anything relating to a political party.  They are just plain simple facts about this nation, the economy, history, etc.  And that is what has the left upset.  You Micro are falling right into their trap when you try to put their teaching of lies on the same level with the teaching of fact.

[De Selby]

Ragnar, that bit about religion is hardly an "unbiased fact."  Some of the more influential founding fathers were either not really Christian (like Washington) or stridently anti-Christian, considering it to be an ancient superstition that kept humanity in ignorance (like Jefferson.)  That is obviously relevant to the claim that the US was founded with "Judeo-Christian influences", whatever that means in relation to government.  When you think about the constitution, the concept becomes a bit silly: Is free speech a judeo-christian thing? What about the separation of powers?

I think Micro is on to something here- we're all celebrating this curriculum.  What will you all have to say when a national curriculum gets made that undoes it, and celebrates FDR and federal programs as the saviours of the nation?  Then having ideologues monkey with the school curriculum won't look so good.

Sometimes process is more important than outcome in politics.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

I think Micro is on to something here- we're all celebrating this curriculum.  What will you all have to say when a national curriculum gets made that undoes it, and celebrates FDR and federal programs as the saviours of the nation?  Then having ideologues monkey with the school curriculum won't look so good.

Say what?  There already is a national (nation-wide) curriculum that seeks to undo traditional American concepts like liberty, constitutional government, individualism, capitalism, and personal rights.  The ideologues have been monkeying with the school curriculum for half a century, and we're paying the price for it today with an ignorant electorate that believes in garbage like collectivism and keynesianism and hopechange.  

This isn't monkeying with the curriculum, this is unmonkeying with the curriculum.  It used to be that Americans were taught about economics, civics, history, and the goodness of America and the founding (and not only taught these things, but taught them correctly).  

Y'all want your liberties back, right?  The perversion of the public schools has had a causative affect on the loss of our rights.  Can you not see how a truer, more liberty-minded public school system is a necessary component of any long-term strategy to recover our rights?  The people who wrote each of our state constitutions surely did, that's why they all incorporated free, high-quality public schooling into each state's charter.  Until the populace relearns history and American civics, we'll be fighting an uphill battle to regain our birthrights as Americans.

And I know that micro groks this concept, so I'm baffled why he objects to it.  Maybe just an allergic reaction to anything perceived as "right wing"?

[Perd Hapley]

Some of the more influential founding fathers were either not really Christian (like Washington) or stridently anti-Christian, considering it to be an ancient superstition that kept humanity in ignorance (like Jefferson.) 

Please cite sources that show which of the Founders were "stridently anti-Christian."  If you want to say they weren't all fundie Baptists, or good little choirboys, fine.  But I think you might be over-stating things. 


All this reminds me of a book I just read, Lies My Teacher Told Me.  Among other things he got wrong, the clumsy author is worried that our history textbooks might be telling children that their country is better than other nations.  And I'm still trying to figure out what's wrong with that. 

[MicroBalrog]

 The people who wrote each of our state constitutions surely did, that's why they all incorporated free, high-quality public schooling into each state's charter. 

You realize, of course, that mass public schooling in the form we know it today took decades to introduce and was not a Founder-era invention? (there were some compulsory education laws in 1752 in Massachusets, but it was only in the 1850's that mass, compulsory, schooling as we know it began to be introduced, state after state.).

Many state constitutions lack any mention whatever of public schooling to this day.

Now, granted:

This specific curriculum is better than the ardent leftist idiocy often encountered in schools.

But frankly, I just don't trust the government – any government, no matter how awesome – with the power of controlling the education of most of the country's children.

Do you think I'd be content if someone took over the schools, introduced school uniforms and caning, and started teaching the next generation some form of arch-social-conservative curriculum? Why would I be?

To be fair, I prefer a generation of children that respect  the right to keep and bear arms and the free market. But I still am concerned when we get diverted into struggling with the Left over the form and function of public schools because I oppose public schools existing in the first place.

[makattak]

You realize, of course, that mass public schooling in the form we know it today took decades to introduce and was not a Founder-era invention? (there were some compulsory education laws in 1752 in Massachusets, but it was only in the 1850's that mass, compulsory, schooling as we know it began to be introduced, state after state.).

Many state constitutions lack any mention whatever of public schooling to this day.

Now, granted:

This specific curriculum is better than the ardent leftist idiocy often encountered in schools.

But frankly, I just don't trust the government – any government, no matter how awesome – with the power of controlling the education of most of the country's children.

Do you think I'd be content if someone took over the schools, introduced school uniforms and caning, and started teaching the next generation some form of arch-social-conservative curriculum? Why would I be?

To be fair, I prefer a generation of children that respect  the right to keep and bear arms and the free market. But I still am concerned when we get diverted into struggling with the Left over the form and function of public schools because I oppose public schools existing in the first place.

I quite agree that government should not be involved in education.

However, so long as we're in a war for the future of our country, why not give liberals a reason to want the government out of education, too?

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

You realize, of course, that mass public schooling in the form we know it today took decades to introduce and was not a Founder-era invention? (there were some compulsory education laws in 1752 in Massachusets, but it was only in the 1850's that mass, compulsory, schooling as we know it began to be introduced, state after state.).

Early 1800's, yes.  The ideas behind public schooling came about at about the same times as most of the American states came into being.  The idea is that self-governance requires an educated populace.  Most states list public education as a right of all state citizens.  Even the states that don't include education in their constitutions certainly behave as if it was included.  Functionally, public education is just as much a right as free speech is.  

To be fair, I prefer a generation of children that respect  the right to keep and bear arms and the free market. But I still am concerned when we get diverted into struggling with the Left over the form and function of public schools because I oppose public schools existing in the first place.

That's just the thing, this isn't a right vs left issue.  This is a right vs wrong issue.  Teaching that we're a constitutional representative republic and not a pure deocracy is right.  Teaching that the founders were generally religious and that intervention in the markets doesn't help and that America is a Really Good Thing are all right.  These things should be taught, and not because I'm a Republican and want right-leaning biases in the schools, but because I want schools to teach a complete and correct curriculum.

Don't be confused by the right vs left lingo in the original article.  The Democrats in Texas (and the left-leaning reporters reporting on the Democrats in Texas) are doing their darndest to portray this as a partisan political issue rather than a teach-the-right-thing-not-the-wrong-thing issue.  That's the only way they can get away with claiming that teaching hip hop is more important than teaching the constitution.  (Why they'd want to teach hip hop over constitutional concepts is another matter entirely...)

If you have a gripe against public education existing at all, I'm afraid you're out of luck.  Public education is an enshrined right here.  People aren't going to be comfortable with eliminating it.  But if nothing else, getting back to teaching the constitution and the philosophies that underpin our country will be a huge help in any future efforts to remove government from education.  You won't eliminate public schooling as long as the current system is in place teaching everyone that government is a panacea.

[MicroBalrog]

If you have a gripe against public education existing at all, I'm afraid you're out of luck.  Public education is an enshrined right here.  People aren't going to be comfortable with eliminating it.  But if nothing else, getting back to teaching constitutional rights and the philosophies that underpin our country will be a huge help in any future efforts to remove government from education.  You won't eliminate public schooling as long as the current system is in place teaching everyone that government is a panacea.

To be certain, it won't come at once.

However:

1.The text of modern state constitutions does not reflect Founding-era views as much as modern views of the subject. There's been 150 state constitutions and 12,500 amendments since the Founding days. It's far easier to amend a state constitution that the Federal document.
2.Just because we can't have an up or down vote on the abolition of public schooling tomorrow doesn't mean we should give up on it altogether.

[MicroBalrog]

New York Times:

Cynthia Dunbar, a lawyer from Richmond who is a strict constitutionalist and thinks the nation was founded on Christian beliefs, managed to cut Thomas Jefferson from a list of figures whose writings inspired revolutions in the late 18th century and 19th century, replacing him with St. Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin and William Blackstone.

Seriously? No Thomas Jefferson?

[tyme]

No Thomas Paine either?

How much screeching do you think would emanate from the conservative moral majority on our Board of Education if someone proposed a comparative religion class, studying C.S. Lewis and other representative modern religious authors alongside Dawkins, Hitchins, Harris et al. as a counter-point?

[Perd Hapley]

If you matched up writers like C.S. Lewis against those three, I would expect all the students to emerge as solid theists.  Wouldn't you? 

Or was that the point? 

[SteveS]

From the NY Times:

In the field of sociology, another conservative member, Barbara Cargill, won passage of an amendment requiring the teaching of “the importance of personal responsibility for life choices” in a section on teenage suicide, dating violence, sexuality, drug use and eating disorders.

“The topic of sociology tends to blame society for everything,” Ms. Cargill said.

Sociology is the study of society, so if you are going to study those things in terms of sociology it would make sense to look at the relationship between the individual and society.  I don't know what Ms Cargill is trying to correct, but teens, as a group, tend to be fairly influenced by 'society'.  This is especially true when you look at something like eating disorders.  Developing a positive snese of self is certainly important when it comes to those issues mentioned, but one can still look at the negative societal effects.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

No Thomas Paine either?

How much screeching do you think would emanate from the conservative moral majority on our Board of Education if someone proposed a comparative religion class, studying C.S. Lewis and other representative modern religious authors alongside Dawkins, Hitchins, Harris et al. as a counter-point?

I received several semesters of comparative religion and abstract theology/philosophy in high school, including Lewis and Dawkins.  I don't remember any Harris, but it's beena while.  It was a Lutheran HS, and nobody there seemed to have a problem with rigorous study of religious matters, either pro or con.  They also seemed to understand the difference between teaching about religions in general, and proselytizing their religion in particular.

I am a bit surprised by the lack of comparative religion classes in public schools.  Religion is inseparable from daily life, culture, history, geography, and politics for the majority of the world's people, past and present.  I'm not sure how you can omit any study on religion and still expect to have a well-rounded education. 

[taurusowner]

I am a bit surprised by the lack of comparative religion classes in public schools.  Religion is inseparable from daily life, culture, history, geography, and politics for the majority of the world's people, past and present.  I'm not sure how you can omit any study on religion and still expect to have a well-rounded education. 

You can't.  And the Founding Fathers knew this, hence my citation of the Northwest Ordinance signed into law by George Washington.

[MicroBalrog]

If you matched up writers like C.S. Lewis against those three, I would expect all the students to emerge as solid theists.  Wouldn't you? 

Or was that the point? 

So you don't mind omitting THOMAS JEFFERSON from the curriculum?

[taurusowner]

If you matched up writers like C.S. Lewis against those three, I would expect all the students to emerge as solid theists.  Wouldn't you?

Or was that the point? 

So you don't mind omitting THOMAS JEFFERSON from the curriculum?

Micro, I'm re-reading the quoted portion of text, and I am failing to see where fistful mentions being ok with Thomas Jefferson being omitted. 

Maybe you saw something I didn't and can help me out here.  Here's the quote you selected one more time

If you matched up writers like C.S. Lewis against those three, I would expect all the students to emerge as solid theists.  Wouldn't you?

Or was that the point? 

Care to point out where you saw him speaking about Thomas Jefferson?

[MicroBalrog]

What I find issue with is people attacking the argument they regard as weak, and ignoring entirely something that really is problematic with the new curriculum (i.e. Jefferson being removed).

[Perd Hapley]

Micro, if you're referring to this:

Cynthia Dunbar, a lawyer from Richmond who is a strict constitutionalist and thinks the nation was founded on Christian beliefs, managed to cut Thomas Jefferson from a list of figures whose writings inspired revolutions in the late 18th century and 19th century, replacing him with St. Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin and William Blackstone.

It doesn't sound like something I'd go in for, unless she could show me some really good reasons.  Which I doubt. 


I was responding to one comment from tyme, not supporting Cynthia Dunbar or anyone else in the article. 

My point was that C.S. Lewis seems like a much more persuasive (and less histrionic) presenter than Dawkins, Harris or Hitchins.  Though to be fair, I haven't gotten around to reading anything from the latter three. 

[De Selby]

Of course Jefferson would be removed - he spent lots of time building the "wall of separation" between Church and state, ridiculed the claim that Jesus was divine, was a major supporter of revolutionary France (ie, proto-socialism).  His views were far too radical for dogmatic conservative education.

On teaching religion, this is a symptom of the problem.  Hitchins is and always has been a clown.  Dawkins has clownish tendencies.  Why they would be picked to represent atheism when basically every giant of modern philosophy embraced atheism is telling as to the intellectual rigor of the public system: why on earth would you teach Dawkins on atheism when you could have your pick of Sartre, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Russell, Wittgenstein etc?

C.S. Lewis was a great polemicist.  But his work never approaches the level of detail or argument of the greats.

Anyway, here we are celebrating a content based victory when the whole problem in the first place is the process.  It makes no sense.  Being happy for this boardroom decision is the equivalent of being happy that the Government gives massive subsidies to free-market think tanks: ironic, and ultimately self-defeating.

[Perd Hapley]

  Hitchins is and always has been a clown.  Dawkins has clownish tendencies.  Why they would be picked to represent atheism when basically every giant of modern philosophy embraced atheism is telling as to the intellectual rigor of the public system: why on earth would you teach Dawkins on atheism when you could have your pick of Sartre, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Russell, Wittgenstein etc?

I don't know, either.  It was an atheist who picked them.