Texas Board of Education Chooses to Teach Conservative Opinion of Facts

The Texas Board of Education voted March 11th on new reforms to the textbooks used in grade school classrooms which will change which organizations, people, and ideologies are highlighted as being important to the history of the U.S. The board’s new curriculum demands the inclusion of “the conservative resurgence of the 1980s and 1990s, including Phyllis Schlafly, the Contract with America, the Heritage Foundation, the Moral Majority, and the National Rifle Association.” It hyperbolizes the achievements of Republican heroes while downgrading the achievement of democratic and minority leaders like Martin Luther King Jr., Thomas Jefferson, and Caesar Chavez. The board even decided to completely remove the word ‘democratic’ from textbooks, in favour of describing the American government as a ‘constitutional republic’.

This will give grade school education an obvious political spin, which should of course be left entirely out of the education of children who should be given the straight facts and allowed to form their own opinion. Unfortunately, this is like creating subliminal messaging in textbooks. Children will grow up believing they are learning their country’s true history, when in fact they are learning the opinion of their esteemed Republican-majority Board of Education. Also, as Texas is a very influential state due to its size, these conservative-leaning textbooks will most likely begin migrating to other states throughout the country.

Countries hyperbolizing their achievements in teachings to their youth is nothing new of course. North Koreans are taught that Kim Jong-Il did numerous amazing things, including inventing the light bulb and walking on the moon. The Soviet Union greatly exaggerated their part in winning World War II through their educational institutions, at times making it seem as though it was them who bailed out the Allies and single-handedly toppled the Third Reich. Even Canada is somewhat guilty of this in our telling of the ’72 Summit Series. I grew up hearing about it believing that we were the underdog to the great Soviet team, when in fact, as I learned later, they were the underdog to us, but humiliated the superstars of Team Canada with total unknowns at the time.

This type of picking and choosing in Texas though will only lead to ignorance and the breeding of more Ann Coulters. But, let’s give Texas some time for their institutions to come to their senses. I mean, they still can’t even agree on whether evolution is a valid theory.

Steeves

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You Can Argue With An Opinion; You Can’t Argue With Ignorance (Ann Coulter)

A person is ignorant when they hold a view that defies factual evidence, which they know of, yet continue to hold the view. A person has an uninformed opinion if they hold their opinion due to the facts they have and know, but are unaware of evidence that disproves their opinion.

Ignorance leads charismatic people like Ann Coulter to spread their views and lead people to believe them; because people believe almost anyone on television has authority on the topic their speaking about. Hearing about what fellow Canadians felt and said about her during her recent Canadian university tour made me feel just that much prouder about being one. Her racial views on Arabs generalize all of them as terrorists. She has been quoted as saying that “If only we could get Muslims to boycott all airlines, we could dispense with airport security altogether.” During Coulter’s speech at the University of Western Ontario, she told a Muslim student to “take a camel”, in response to the student’s question about previous comments by Coulter that Muslims should not be allowed on airplanes.

She’s the epitome of conservative, bigoted, mean-spirited America, trouncing on anyone with a different point of view or background than her with unfounded insults. In an article she wrote in for USA Today covering the 2004 Democratic National convention she referred to female attendees as “corn-fed, no make-up, natural fiber, no-bra needing, sandal-wearing, hirsute, somewhat fragrant hippie chick pie wagons.” What does that even mean? She is just taking stereotypes and negative qualities and branding the women at the convention as embodying them. She’s a child. She comes fast with playground insults that will have a negative impact on the people she is speaking of no matter how little truth there is to them.

There’s no place on Earth for the Ann Coulters of the world, Rush Limbaugh included. I hope she knows now that there is at least no place for her in Canada.

Steeves

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