The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) this week opposed a model law being introduced in over a dozen states. That is not itself uncommon. The ACLU historically opposed laws that denied free speech and other rights under the Constitution, a legacy that I have long cherished and supported. However, this is a transparency law that simply requires teachers and schools to post the educational materials used in classes online. It is meant to assist parents in tracking the education of their students and the priorities of their school systems. Yet, the ACLU has declared the law to be so threatening and chilling that it has officially opposed its enactment in any state.
For those of us who have long supported the ACLU, the organization has changed dramatically in the last ten years into a more political organization. Those critics recently included former ACLU former head Ira Glasser, who questioned whether the ACLU still maintains its defining commitment to free speech values.
In recent years, the ACLU also struggled with controversies like an ACLU staffer encouraging activists to “break” Sen. Krysten Sinema (D., Ariz.) and another staffer opposed the admission into college of Nicholas Sandmann. At points, it has become a parody of its own self like celebrating the legacy of Ruth Bader Ginsburg by editing her words as offensive.
The greatest concern for those with a long association with the ACLU has been its shift on constitutional rights. In addition to its eroding support for free speech values, it now opposes due process rights when they support the wrong people — a striking departure from the traditional apolitical stance of the group. It has particularly opposed the rights of one particular group: parents. On parental notification laws, the ACLU has brushed aside the rights of parents to be informed (let alone have a say) in medical decisions for their children, including abortions.
This latest position is particularly baffling. I understand the the impetus of this law was opposition to racially divisive materials, including Critical Race Theory (CRT) material. Putting aside the effort to dismiss objections by technically claiming that CRT is not taught outside of law schools, parents are objecting to material that focuses on teaching concepts of white privilege and supremacy that stigmatizes and demonizes identity groups.
Just this month, kids in Fairfax County public schools (where all of my children have attended or currently attend) were given a “privilege bingo” exercise. The exercise titled “identifying your privilege” had students pick boxes like “military kid,” “white,” “male,” “cisgender,” “Christian,” to establish identity and privilege.
Assistant Superintendent Douglas A. Tyson said that the exercise was designed for students to determine whether authors have “privilege that may or may not be present in the work” and then to reflect on their own biases based on their race as well as economic and educational status. (Notably, Fairfax later responded to the inclusion of the military family box but not the other privileged identities like being Cis or Christian or white).
The controversy over the bingo game came after a statewide race for governor that centered on the teaching of such issues of racial privilege and identity politics. Gov. Youngkin was elected in part on a pledge to oppose such material.
This brings us back to the model law. The laws passed in states like Pennsylvania are not CRT prohibitions but mandates to post teaching materials, syllabi, and scholastic achievement information online. It is a level of transparency that is common in college and graduate schools, including my own classes.
Greater transparency on public education (like other government programs) would seem a good thing. In the category of “perfecting democracy,” information is generally a good thing. That is why we have freedom of information acts on the federal and state levels. Yet, school districts and teachers have opposed such FOIA requests in court. As a result, parents face barriers in obtaining information needed not just in making decisions about their children’s education but also in making decisions as voters. School boards are elected by the voters who have a right and a need for such information. For those who commonly decry attacks on democracy, this is an effort that facilitates the democratic process. Parents have a say in how their public schools are run, which is why these boards positions are subject to elections.
Yet, the ACLU is opposing greater transparency, declaring “Curriculum transparency bills are just thinly veiled attempts at chilling teachers and students from learning and talking about race and gender in schools.”
My immediate reaction to that statement was to ask why the ACLU is now holding forth on such political and social issues. It is not claiming that these laws are unconstitutional — they are not. It is once again using the organization to support a political cause rather than a constitutional or civil right. I understand that the ACLU is not limited to constitutional questions but it is also an organization that was meant to function as an apolitical defender of civil liberties.
James Madison is often quoted for his statement that “a popular government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy; or, perhaps both.” What is not widely known is that Madison made that statement in response to a letter from William Taylor Barry, a Kentuckian who wrote him about the effort to create primary and secondary educational programs in his state. Information remains the paramount value in public education as well as the transparency needed to secure it.
The creation of The New Chosen People is not a communist conspiracy. It is quite clearly a capitalist conspiracy, if advertising is to be believed. The laws of “freedom” oblige us to believe it.
Thinkitthrough says:
“If you think that I am blowing things out of proportion just remember when the early church was forcing people to be saved. Or else.”
You are correct sir. Religion IS indoctrination.
I absolutely agree with Turley’s statement that “Information remains the paramount value in public education as well as the transparency needed to secure it.”
Parents should be informed if teachers are subtly indoctrinating their students with a teacher’s religion.
Or a teacher’s politics?
Yes.
The question that must come to mind is why would they want to hide what they are teaching from the parents? If the teaching is so virtuous it seems that they would want to openly present the instructions that they are providing to the.students. Instead they want to keep the information in the shadows. Perhaps they understand that their efforts will simply be construed as simple propaganda used to indoctrinate the children at the earliest possible age. If you think that I am blowing things out of proportion just remember when the early church was forcing people to be saved. Or else.
…and in the Chinese Cultural Revolution, citizens were required to turn in other citizens and children were required to turn in parents to the local political officers.
Wake up and smell the coffee.
America is at war with communists and communism.
You might want to engage the enemy BEFORE you are shipped off to re-education camps.
I could be wrong.
_____________
“[We gave you] a [restricted-vote] republic, if you can keep it.”
– Ben Franklin
___________
You couldn’t.
You didn’t have the courage. You didn’t have the resolve. You didn’t have the —-s.
What the —- do you think Ben Franklin was telling you; why was Ben Franklin admonishing you?
The entire American welfare state is unconstitutional communism.
The communists (liberals, progressives, socialists, democrats, RINOs) have nullified the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and diluted the moment of the vote out of existence.
Turnout in 1788 was 11.6% by design of the Founders, and voters were male, European, 21 with 50 lbs. Sterling/50 acres (rational vote restrictions are imperative).
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”
– Declaration of Independence, 1776
The Declaration of Independence was crafted by revolutionaries. The Founding Fathers were counter revolutionary. To advocate implementing actions based on the principles found in the Declaration of Independence is a crime. Revolution is not allowed.
The ACLU is not monolithic. The ACLU has about 53 affiliates in almost every state and territory. Supposedly the court cases are bottom-up starting at the state affiliate office and moving up. In more rural states the ACLU affiliates have even defended 2nd Amendment gun rights following the rights cases that affect a particular state or region. So it’s not entirely a monolithic top-down hierarchy on court cases.
I see the ACLueless as saying one thing doing another for the most part when it comes supporting the ConstitutioN.
Not only do they rarely take that stance they most often go in the other direction including Where’s The Beef.
Ira Glasser is one of the greatest leaders of the ACLU. Glasser was unfairly criticized in his Skokie case. Rarely reported by the mainstream press but this case protected the future rights of all Americans including African-Americans and Jewish-Americans. The precedent was that a government agency can’t discriminate based on viewpoint. Glasser’s real client was the First Amendment.
Question for all of us: if there were potentially dangerous people belonging to hate groups, living in your neighborhood or teaching your children – would you want to know who they are or would you prefer that they go underground? Seems like police, federal officials and anti-hate groups would want to know who and what the potential threats are. If they go underground we can’t police it, can’t provide necessary education or other effective solutions.
Censoring hate speech doesn’t solve any problem, the haters just go underground and are more dangerous. Sort of like sticking our heads in the sand. It’s impossible to write a law favoring or opposing a viewpoint. That is why Glasser got unfairly tarnished by the ACLU.
“this is a transparency law that simply requires teachers and schools to post the educational materials used in classes online. It is meant to assist parents in tracking the education of their students and the priorities of their school systems.”
Public schools are failing in education. Students are graduating barely able to read. We are behind other Western nations in math, science, and literacy. It’s shameful.
In addition, the public education system has lurched far Left. It teaches children to be confused about their gender, and judge each other based on race.
Parents should take an interest in their child’s education. Public education is funded by taxpayers. Taxpayers in general, and parents in particular, are entitled to know what exactly is being taught.
The ACLU wants to enable the public education system to hide what it’s teaching vulnerable children. You hide what you’re ashamed of, or what you think won’t be acceptable.
Shine the light on it.
My own son told me he felt uncomfortable with a survey all the kids got in school. He said it asked him about his mental health and what he thought of race. Somehow, it didn’t submit properly, so he was able to complete it from home. I took photos of it to show others. It asked questions like how comfortable he felt talking about race with his friends and fellow students. He’s in 6th grade. Boys don’t discuss race with each other. They talk about who’s “it”, what game to play next, and about homework. Normal kids don’t judge each other based on race. Racists do. Schools are trying to turn our precious children into racists against whites and Asians.
Don’t be silent and accepting. Speak up.
Karen+S,
As always, well said.
I find the idea of teaching children, by putting into classes based on race, or into boxes as those oppressed and those who are the oppressors divisive and teaching children to hate themselves or hate others.
That is something we do not need in this country.
And I would say the same about if a teacher was white supremacist, teaching history of the Nazis and Hitler in a positive light, or teaching anti-Semitic points of view.
I would like to see kids in high school, talking about WWII, all of it, the holocaust too and even read Pulitzer Prize winning graphic novel, Maus.
My high school glossed over everything after after the Civil War that was deemed to scary to teach. So they were just names and dates and a two paragraph description.
Oy! Vey!
I just read that The View’s host Whoopie Goldberg just said some rather interesting comments about the Holocaust and even the Pulitzer Prize winning graphic novel, Maus.
I did not know she said that (disclaimer, I do not have cable since 08′ or watch The View), prior to my previous January 31, 2022 at 2:10 PM
comment.
The thing a lot of current dems don’t seem to realize, and it honestly baffles me as this goes back decades, is that their party and its affiliations have been in this state for decades. I grant that Bush era Conservatives were not exactly a consolation, but this behavior on the part of the ACLU and similar organizations is not remotely new. Ten years? LOL Try 20, or even 30. I used to donate to all of them – ACLU. WWF, GreenPeace, Amnesty International, et. al.; i stopped because it was clear what they were becoming. For better or worse, liberalism is a religion, and asking people to change their minds is like asking life long, generational catholics to leave the church. And you know – just because you leave the dems doesn’t automatically make you a ‘conservative’. It’s a free country, and you can register as an independent, Libertarian, whatever you like, and still vote the way you want. if primaries are your thing, you can change your registration at will. On that note, **** the dem voting reform bills and the accompanying falsehood that try to convince to convince you otherwise, whoever you are. It is patently false. You can do this right now as much as you like if you are a legal citizen. Change your voting status ten times in a week if you like, your county clerk won’t care. This clown show has to have an end, and I’m thinking it’s a bad one for the modern DNC.
So the parents, who are paying for those materials and whose children are being taught from those materials — those parents do *not* have a right to see those materials?!
Give us your money and your children. Then shut up and obey. (It’s a page right out of Plato’s _Republic_.)
Too bad there is so much moral “preening”. We actually need independent thought as well as thought protection. As my mom and first boss both said: “when two people think alike you don’t need one of them.”
I have often wondered who died and made the ACLU “god” on all things constitutional? At one time they did some commendable things regarding free speech but those days are long gone. The ACLU is just another “woke”, leftist organization promoting a leftist version of social justice. The policies they support or oppose will be based upon whether it promotes or assists a leftist cause. Simple enough, draw your conclusion and work your way backwards, right?
Of course, they oppose transparency in these matters, parents might get upset if they learn that there kids are constantly being told how evil and privileged they are. Didn’t Terry McAuliffe say parents have no role to play in what their kids learn?
And s@@tlibs certainly don’t mean themselves or their children as they constantly whine about “white privilege”. No, they are good whites and morally superior to their opponents whom they detest.
antonio
I’m for the ACLU. All Catholics Leave Universities. Even Jesuit ones
In more than twenty-five years of teaching, all of my syllabi, course readings, and, on occasion, outlines of my lectures, as well as any handouts, were public and available to whomever requested a copy. My students got copies, my chair got copies, as did those colleagues who asked for them. I met with both students and parents if they had questions about grading and did my best to explain why I had marked a paper or exam as I had. I tried to be as open as I could be regarding the materials I was using and as honest as I could be in my teaching. Perhaps that is why I was accused of being everything from a fascist to a communist to a liberal, but never of having a hidden agenda.
So I have difficulty understanding why teachers balk at having their course materials made public, unless there is something to hide or they fear being attacked by ideologues.
I can understand not wanting to be recorded, an intrusive activity which changes the dynamics of a classroom. But the materials used and the standards and expectations for students should be public, especially in courses which deal with race or sex or politics. When I was teaching, if a student informed me that a parent, a sibling, or a friend had read a book or an article which I had assigned, or that they had discussed one of my lectures, I was delighted, not alarmed, although if I was teaching in today’s climate I am not sure that I would be as nonchalant.
As for the ACLU, I once sought their help with a personal matter. They asked for my age, sex, and race, then politely informed me that they could not help me. Since then, I have not held that organization in particularly high esteem. Happily, a local lawyer helped me, but refused to charge me for his advice. So I have developed a certain respect for members of that profession, with whom I have worked closely on more than one occasion.
As one of my own professors observed, people staff institutions, so any institution can be corrupted, and all are, eventually . . . . and the more corrupt, the less transparent. Jefferson, Hamilton, & cpy. understood that because while they might seek perfection, they knew it was unattainable; having studied history and the Bible, they knew how flawed our nature is and how ephemeral our creations.
An old guy: Great comment! Perhaps the key difference between yourself and many of today’s teachers is that you were actually teaching … while today, teachers seem to be in the business of indoctrination. There is an agenda behind the teaching facade, and that’s what they’re trying to hide. The ACLU lost its way years ago. Today it defends Antifa’s violence (violence is just “free speech”) and attempts to silence parents. Thoroughly corrupt and thoroughly useless.
You are correct. I retired from teaching two years earlier than I had planned simply because I was going to be required to attend a workshop that would instruct me in the book of materials I would be teaching from. Every teacher on the same page every day. My belief is that there is an art to teaching and when the brushes are taken from you and you are left only with the canvas–well.
An old guy,
Maybe it wasn’t a big problem back when you were teaching. The problem today is not the issue of transparency itself. It’s the parents. Many talk about parents being the ones who decide how their children should be educated and deciding how their schools should be run. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that concept.
HOWEVER, every teacher knows not all parents are going to be right or some are literally irrational in their expectations. There are a LOT of Karen’s out there who are also parents. There are idiot parents, bigoted parents, racist parents, parents with massive egos fed by privilege and entitlement, or parents who are entirely clueless as in stupid. There will be vindictive parents upset about a perceived slight to their child by a teacher or even politically motivated parents seeking to berate teachers for doing their jobs.
Teachers these days are under appreciated glorified baby sitters for many of these same parents. Teachers are already under stress because of covid restrictions, grading deadlines changing standards, keeping up with THEIR own education. Some are parents themselves who have to keep a household maintained. The last thing these teachers need is for a bunch of irrational belligerent parents of the Karen variety to cause trouble over perceived “indoctrination” or teaching subjects that parents themselves don’t understand, but their kids do.
The kind of scrutiny that these transparency laws propose are also ripe for abuse by parents. Teachers don’t get paid enough to deal with the additional stress of fighting off belligerent or irrational parents bent on getting them fired over political or petty grievances.
There’s this “the customer is always right” mentality in regards to parents and their kids education. Retail workers know all too well what BS that slogan is. Teachers know this too. Not all parents are going to be right and it’s always going to be the most loud and irrational and belligerent ones that will abuse these laws.
The last thing these teachers need is for a bunch of irrational belligerent parents of the Karen variety to cause trouble over perceived “indoctrination” or teaching subjects that parents themselves don’t understand, but their kids do.
The first thing teachers need then is transparency of what they are teaching. Parents aren’t demanding teachers explain the principles of algebra, how to construct a sentence, or why it’s called the ring of fire. The best way for teachers to earn the distrust of parents is to tell them they have no right to know what their children are learning.
Olly,
“ The first thing teachers need then is transparency of what they are teaching.”
That is already available to parents. They CAN request the information whenever they want. OR talk to the teachers themselves.
There ARE those parents who WILL abuse those laws because parents like those I described do exist. Those are the kinds of parents that will make other parents who legitimately want to know look bad.
Yep. It’s called a free country. People can behave in ways that may displease you. Generally speaking, there are consequences for such actions if they are egregious. Your own fragile mental state is not a consideration in these matters, and it’s likely that the things that p*** you off the most have no actual bearing on your day to day life, because, again, we live in a free country. Trolls like you are all alike. This is about your own personal comfort and whatever it is you experience within the confines of your own tortured mind. You are the one that is incapable of living in a legitimately diverse – which includes diversity of thought, and that is defacto with cultural diversity, BTW – community. Stop projecting your own personal dysfunction and inability to cope with reality onto humanity writ large. We thank you in advance, because your ideas are pretty much useless. We need better going forward. Tiy are not a steward but a hindrance, and that will become only more apparent as more and more of us open sleepy eyes.
if you are truly as fragile and unstable as your comments suggest, i don’t know that even government intervention would help you. You are the guy in Creepshow that was afraid of cockroaches. If that reference doesn’t ring a bell, Google it, if you aren’t too entitled and intellectually and morally lazy.
This blog does not allow the editing of comments, forgive the typos. Nevertheless, all I get from posters like Svelaz who are high on opinions and short on facts, is that they are probably related to plantation owners, who as history shows and cannot be refuted by deflection as a great many of us have families and family histories – were firmly entrenched in the Democratic party. I used to think it was best to ignore and carry on, now I think it is imperative to call these clowns out at every opportunity. I suspect some of the trolls on this site are paid, and not by Russians, but by associates of the DNC, and none of this will go away if we just roll over. People like Svelaz used to be confined to street corners rambling their nonsense and handing out flyers before the era of mega funding by oligarchs; let’s get them back there and make their patrons deeply, deeply regret their investments.
James, obviously it seems you’re the one who is more fragile. Being so easily triggered by an honest opinion is quite revealing. I’m not at all bothered by the notions you hilariously put forth.
Sadly, your post confirms it!
That is already available to parents. They CAN request the information whenever they want. OR talk to the teachers themselves.
Not ALL information is being provided by teachers and/or schools to parents that request it. It has taken some extraordinary sleuthing to get it.
There ARE those
parentsteachers who WILL abuse those laws becauseparentsteachers like those I described do exist. Those are the kinds ofparentsteachers that will make otherparentsteachers who legitimately want toknowteach look bad.Teachers, Teachers Unions, School Boards, School Management, and County Tax Collectors sure do not object when Parents and others cough up their money that is allocated to Public Schools……but they sure seem miffed these days when those people footing the Bill want a say so in how that money gets spent and what it gets spent on……which is the indicator of how wrong the beneficiaries of all that money are when called upon to be transparent and at times justify what they are doing.
The Classroom Teacher is at the bottom of that Totem Pole….and generally must perform their duties as set forth by their management that runs from the School Principle right on up to the School Board and State Laws.
👍
You know who else doesn’t want transparency with regard to what your children are learning? Sexual predators.
If more transparency chills a particular behavior regarding our children, then that behavior needed to end. Put another way, a behavior regarding our children that needs to be done away from public scrutiny, should immediately be terminated.
How does a parent determine a teacher is a sexual predator from reading curriculum materials or lesson plans?
How does a parent determine a teacher is a sexual predator from reading curriculum materials or lesson plans?
Don’t know. Who was making that point? You apparently missed the word else. The point being, for predators to be able to groom (teach) children (learn), they need to hide that from the parents (no transparency). The greater point being, anyone having interaction with our children, that needs to keep parents from knowing what that interaction involves, should be as far removed from children as possible.
Olly,
“ You know who else doesn’t want transparency with regard to what your children are learning? Sexual predators.”
You’re insinuating teachers are sexual predators here.
“ The point being, for predators to be able to groom (teach) children (learn), they need to hide that from the parents (no transparency).”
Who are these predators that are supposedly taking advantage of a lack of transparency in schools to groom these children?
This is a column about transparency in schools and teachers.
How do parents knowing about their kids curriculum prevent sexual predators from harming children? Are you insinuating that teachers are potential sexual predators?
Svelaz:
Can you explain to me why you are so resistant to the idea of parents getting a list of curricula taught in school, including the books and textbooks they’ll be reading? What, exactly, is your issue with knowing what’s taught in school?
Karen,
I’m not resistant to the idea. That information is already available to any parent. Laws like those being proposed CAN be abused by parents as I explained to old guy.
Just like those belligerent and irrational parents disrupting school board meetings. Teachers have to worry about parents being vindictive or using that information to threaten a teacher with all sorts of accusations. It can force teachers to walk on eggshells more than teach. Every law has consequences.
Just like those belligerent and irrational parents disrupting school board meetings.
Do you consider a parent trying to voice his outrage after the rape of his daughter was covered up by the school superintendent to be irrational? If laws have consequences, why did it take this belligerent and irrational parent to get something, anything enforced?
You’re insinuating teachers are sexual predators here.
Only in your fevered imagination would you assume that was the point of my comment.
This is a column about transparency in schools and teachers.
Transparency being the keyword involving what parents know with regard to anyone having any interaction with their children. Parents have an absolute right to know what the teachers are teaching their children. Parents have an absolute right to know what coaches are teaching their children. Parents have an absolute right to know what their children are learning at Church. Parents have an absolute right to know what their children are learning anywhere, from anyone, until their children leave the parent’s home and are no longer being supported by the parents.
Are you insinuating that teachers are potential sexual predators?
Disregarding the fact you’ve assumed to know the answer to that question; I didn’t insinuate that at all. But as a direct answer to whether teachers are potential predators…absolutely proven to be true.
Olly,
“ Are you insinuating that teachers are potential sexual predators?
Disregarding the fact you’ve assumed to know the answer to that question; I didn’t insinuate that at all. But as a direct answer to whether teachers are potential predators…absolutely proven to be true.”
If you were not insinuating teachers are potential sexual predators then why bring up sexual predators? How does not knowing information about curricula and text books help sexual predators? You brought up the issue.
If you were not insinuating teachers are potential sexual predators then why bring up sexual predators?
Once again, the concept of transparency for the parents to know everything and anything that has to do with their children. If you insist that the issue of transparency has to be limited to curricula and text books, there have been numerous examples of parents discovering inappropriate “educational content” within their children’s schools.
Concerned citizens all over the country are joining the resistance to what the sexual-radical Left calls “comprehensive sex education” (CSE). One such group is Informed Parents of Washington (IPOW), who describe themselves as “a coalition of parents dedicated to fighting Comprehensive Sexxx Education in our schools and legislation that [infringes on] parental rights.”
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/02/sexualization_pornography_and_grooming_in_the_schools.html
Svelaz:
If the reading material includes gay porn or child porn, then the teacher might be a sexual predator.
If the reading material purported to be sex ed for 7th grade is actually a how-to manual on BDSM, anal sex, and other explicit sex acts, then the teacher might be a sexual predator.
If the syllabus includes a day in which students are blindfolded and fed salty tasting cookies, (See the scandal of the Cookie Teacher in CA), then the teacher might be a sexual predator.
But there are other forms of predation and grooming besides sexual. There’s the activist who grooms young children to become far Left brainwashed activists, passed on grade after grade to like-minded activists, until they hate themselves, and their parents, and are neurotic.
Karen,
“ If the reading material includes gay porn or child porn, then the teacher might be a sexual predator.
If the reading material purported to be sex ed for 7th grade is actually a how-to manual on BDSM, anal sex, and other explicit sex acts, then the teacher might be a sexual predator.”
Good grief Karen. Gay porn? Child porn? When was the last time all those instances actually happened at any school? Especially in curriculum and textbooks?
Kids these days are more likely to watch porn at home than in schools. Or from their friends or their parents themselves.
Or from their friends or their parents themselves.
One day you may marry, settle down, have children and gain experience on the topic, then ask yourself WTF you were saying when you trolled for dollars.
🎶 Just sit down, take it slowly
You’re still young, that’s your fault
There’s so much you have to go through
(I have to make this decision)
Find a girl, settle down
If you want you can marry 🎶
Svelaz,
Karen is well-known as a Trumpist exaggerator. I would like to see her face when she makes these over-the-top statements. By looking her straight in the eye, you might be able to discern whether she is pulling your leg or simply losing it.
jeffsilberman, she doesn’t have a leg to stand on.
Thank you, giocon1. Yes, the ACLU has lost its way. It is wandering in an ideological wilderness and worshipping all manner of golden calves.
Svelaz, your observations about how hard teaching applied when Laura Ingalls began teaching, when I taught, and today. Some of my students and colleagues considered me a great teacher, others a doctrinaire leftist, and I had my share of upset parents, usually about grading, not content, although one of my students brothers who had served in the military once offered to beat the living daylights out of me for being so unpatriotic. But I was also a parent, and at the elementary and high school level, the parent has rights that diminish once the child has become an adult. If you are an anti-racist, then you must object to teaching anything which presents any group — even white folk — as homogenous and flawed simply due to their skin color. I also assume that you would object strongly to the teacher attempting to dissemble and pretend that they were actually teaching a vague concept called systemic racism. Indeed, I assume that if the group was Jewish and the teaching was an anti-Semite, you would be outraged.
Thank you both for the thoughtful comments.
[and my apologies for not proof-reading my text more carefully– ‘how hard teaching is . . . brother’s . . .. the teacher was an anti-Semite]
”Those who lead disorderly lives tell those who are normal that that is they who deviate from nature, and think they are following nature themselves; just as those who are on board ship think that the people on shore are moving away”.—Blaise Pascal (1670)
The ACLU is not what it once was – it has perhaps reverted to its’ original purpose – to support left wing politics under the guise of advocacy. It is not the same organization that I supported in the 70’s. We need a new group
So everything you “thought” the ACLU was now has been proven true. All the Marxist are coming out in the light.
Parents are responsible for educating their kids, so they should know what kids are being taught. Schools should not be a black box. Community members should know how their tax dollars are being spent–not just salaries and the cost of keeping the heat on but what educational materials are being purchased. They, too, have a stake in the education of their neighbors’ children if they do not have kids in school. These children are growing into our future leaders–are they going to be ready? Will they understand history sufficiently so as not to repeat mistakes? Will they understand a broad swath of how the world works to make wise decisions?
Prairie Rose,
Well said.
What happened to the days when parents were encouraged to be involved and engaged with their children’s education? That is not some yesteryear, 1950s idea, as I heard it as a child in the 80s and 90s.
We can teach children history in context, the good, the bad and the ugly, without putting them into boxes of oppressed or oppressors, furthering division and hate.
No, they will have learned (as they have for the last couple of decades) what the leftist teacher’s union wants them to learn. Why America is evil and how to advance to socialism and then communism.
Prairie Rose,
I agree with you.
Turley says:
“parents are objecting to material that focuses on teaching concepts of white privilege and supremacy that stigmatizes and demonizes identity groups.”
When the children come home, their parents will ask them, “What did you learn in school today?” They will answer, “White privilege.” At which point, the parents can counter this “bad” speech with their good speech!
This is how Turley wants it: absolutely no censorship of the “pedagogical privileges” of teachers like him to speak freely where the parents of these students are as free to dispute what their children have been taught in school.
Alston Chase had a good essay on the main goal of American Public Education: that it wants conformity. This goal has made it mediocre at best. Due to this goal, we see the Titans struggle for control of the narrative.