Virginia Democrats are moving to require teachers to tell students that Jan. 6th was an “insurrection” and effectively bar them from referencing “peaceful protests” or election irregularities. The characterization of the riot as an insurrection is historically and legally false. However, any parents who want to send their children to Virginia public schools would have to accept this form of indoctrination as part of their children’s education.
In the last election, Democrats campaigned as moderates, including Abigail Spanberger. Once in control of the Governor’s mansion and the legislature, however, they have moved quickly to the far left in a flurry of measures. Democratic legislators just voted themselves almost a 300% increase in salaries. They will need it. They are moving to increase taxes on ride shares, concerts, counseling, leaf blowers, Amazon deliveries, DoorDash, Uber Eats, ammunition, and other areas.
However, HB 333, drafted by Del. Dan I. Helmer of Fairfax, raises serious concerns over academic freedom and free speech.
The summary of the bill mandates “a program of instruction on or relating to the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the United States Capitol” and further:
“prohibits any such program of instruction, any accompanying curriculum or instructional materials, or any instruction provided by a teacher as a part of such program of instruction from (i) describing, portraying, or presenting as credible a description or portrayal of the actions precipitating or involved in the January 6, 2021, insurrection as peaceful protest or (ii) stating, suggesting, or presenting as credible a statement or suggestion that there was extensive election fraud that could have changed or actually changed the results of the 2020 presidential election. The bill requires any such program of instruction, any accompanying curriculum or instructional materials, or any instruction provided by a teacher as a part of such program of instruction to describe the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the United States Capitol as an unprecedented, violent attack on U.S. democratic institutions, infrastructure, and representatives for the purpose of overturning the results of the 2020 presidential election.”
Soon after Jan. 6th, I condemned the riot but rejected the argument that this was an insurrection. However, it soon became part of an orthodoxy in politics and academia despite the fact that the public rejected it. As former House Speaker Pelosi declared, “It is essential that we preserve the narrative of January 6th.”
Yet, “insurrection” and “sedition” are legal terms. They have a meaning. The FBI investigated thousands after January 6th and charged hundreds. Not one was charged with insurrection or conspiracy to overthrow the country. The vast majority are charged with relatively minor offenses of trespass or unlawful entry or property damage- the type of charges that are common in protests and riots.
Indeed, the Supreme Court effectively reduced many of the charges to mere trespass in later litigation, rejecting obstruction claims.
Faced with a collapsing historical and legal narrative, Democrats are now moving to simply indoctrinate students that this was an “insurrection.”
Notably, Helmer is running again for Congress after Democrats, with the support of Gov. Spanberger, moved to reduce Republicans in the state (which is divided down the middle between the parties) to just one of eleven districts through gerrymandering.
Helmer is running in one of the most notorious new districts, called the “lobster” or the “scorpion,” because it runs from the Potomac River in Arlington southwestward, then splits into two “claws” toward the West Virginia line near Rawley Springs and Goochland and Powhatan.
In my book, Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution, I discuss the radicalization of the American left. While many on the left advocate censoring “disinformation,” they are far less circumspect in promulgating their own disinformation.
Likewise, where Democrats have objected to the pressure put on universities for greater diversity of viewpoints as an attack on academic freedom, these Democrats see no problem in mandating the teaching of positions that are demonstrably false.
Here, Rep. Helmer and other Democrats are mandating the teaching of a false narrative to children rather than simply relying on public debate. The reason is that they are losing the debate over the characterization of this riot as an actual insurrection.
This, and other moves on the left, will only accelerate the exodus of families from public education. Notably, Fairfax County (which Helmer represents) has seen a sharp fall in enrollments in recent years.
The hostility amongst a group of “friends“ as to how this event should be described, was so thick that you could cut it with a knife. The official possession of the department of justice is reflected in the charges which were brought, prosecuted, and adjudicated, That the act which is a subject of this post should be brought at all is an anathema and should be challenged in the courts. Any representation other than those which reflect the charged which were brought is false. We had better wake up to the fact that Orwell’s writings are a clarion call that we should not fail to hear and heed.
That is completely wrong. Facts in history are in no way dependent on how someone was charged. Prosecutors do not determine what is historically accurate.
As a retired social studies teacher, I cannot help but view this with a gimlet eye. I think i might be tempted to just skip the whole issue.
Is anyone really surprised? The “insurrection” narrative fell apart under scrutiny. It fell apart as evident by the clown show that was the Jan6th committee. The one that required a TV producer, scripts, heavily edited videos and their star witness got all her information, as if any of it was credible, third hand. The FBI even said she was not credible and would not put her on the stand in a court of law.
So, it appears in desperation to revive the failed narrative, VA Democrats are going to attempt to re-write history, tell a lie to indoctrinate VA children.
We have seen what this looks like in history.
“So, it appears in desperation…. re-write history,…” But why? To indoctrinate kids. They don’t vote.
Yet..
“He who controls the children controls the future..”
BTW, thanks for quoting Hitler. Certainly not a bunch of 12 year old’s from VA. But do not take that seriously.
Do the math, before any current publicly schooled child gets to voting age, it’ll impact VA voting demographics within 1 and 18 years, from 2028 thru 2046. And then, its not an given they’ll vote dem. So, naaaa … cute quote but essentially meaningless, except to the leftists.
Upstate, Spanberger is a monster of the D.C. suburbs. So is Jones. Virginia is toast. Hello, Tennessee.
Prof. Turley often observes that the water is good in Tennessee.
He could appear in any forum via a shack in the back.
Dear Gen Xers, Millennials, and Zoomers,
I wish to apologize for the national plague of Woodstock boomers. These lunatics have destroyed media and public education in America. Many of you have had your lives ruined by following the quack nostrums of these lunatics, and I am truly sorry for that.
Most of us boomers are not of the Woodstock variety, but we still bear some culpability. We failed to notice in time their insidious plan to hijack social media and spread their neurotic cringe to innocent minds. We didn’t understand until too late how deliberately they were ethnically cleansing academia and media.
They would even accuse everybody of cultural appropriation, and in the next breath, give white stories to black activists, as if jolly ol’ England had been conquered by Hutu militias. The hypocrisy of it all.
Why did they do all this? They tell each other that they made young men and women hate each other to lower the future carbon footprint. They tell each other they opened the border to wipe out racism and patriarchy. But really, it was just too much pot and gonorrhea; only rats occupy their attics.
I hope you can forgive us. We’re trying to rectify the situation, but it will take time and maybe some smash mouth. Unfortunately, reason isn’t always an antidote to lunatic cringe.
Sincerely,
Diogenes the Younger
Diogenes? Really, ya gonna dump that nonsense here? There’s nothing philosophical about you comment.
Let’s keep in mind, you’re kind caused the near collapse of the USA. And you wane philosophical using a greek meme. Lay off the drugs old old smelly hippie.
I sense a fluctuation in the force. The cringe is strong in this one!
Diogenes,
HAHA!!! Thank you for that response and your apology. Well done!
Anonymous the Fiend is my muse 🙂
The aroma of fortified pot is also showing up in the force.
“you’re kind” ?
Are you aware that you have very succinctly characterized the quality of YOUR public education with that single adjective/noun pair?
Dio, I must add that the demonic controllers of democrats subscribe to nihilism and existentialism and believe meaning is a social construct imposed upon cultures. They’re attempting to prove it.
The progolf circuit is now 80% other ethnicities and 20% percent white ethnicities because the idea that American minorities were kept out and they’ve leveled the playing field. Old video of Olga korbut etc , gymnast, has her looking like a novice. It’s AI generated video all.
It’ll all fail and people will be hunting and gathering food without clean water and energy for the bottom half. The bottom needs to wake up. The upper half have ceased all communication with the bottom. Jesus rings true again of this time– don’t be concerned with the rich because they have their OWN reward and indeed they do.
Spanberger is taxing the poor now and they love it. 300 % raise is costly. 😂
Carpe diem
The Great Replacement is still underway. This fight might become a permanent thing.
It might be a good test of truth. As to permanent without food, energy, water etc for the bottom? Remains the same, what it always is.
@Diogenes
Big thumbs up. The hippies were the biggest propagators of all of this, and many don’t realize a lot of them (though certainly not all) came from privilege and were hypocritical *back then*. I won’t dismiss everything the 60s wrought, as it was important to bring consciousness to a great many things, and we did, but a lot of it was also temper tantrums not too different from today. Apples do not, indeed, fall far from the tree.
James, most of us learned from our mistakes, but some became the mistakes. I hope we can still fix this.
Good comment, Diogenes! I just learned about Elise Stefanik’s book about post secondary education. The title is: Poisoned Ivies: The Inside Account of the Academic and Moral Rot at America’s Elite Universities. It will be published April 14. Stefanik, is an Upstate New York Congresswoman, who graduated from Harvard. Many of us New Yorkers hope that she will replace Chuck Schumer. K-12 education is problematic.
Catherine, K-12 in Virginia needs proof of life.
To Diogenes, James, Upstate, and Catherine Cassidy:
Great to read all four of your related comments on this.
And may I humbly add that the tainting of academia and media for our younger generations is always cached in lofty terms characterizing them in an almost clique-ish fashion, as Most Desirable for potential wannabes:
Here’s a recent example of how the Woke, Leftist British newspaper, The Guardian, manages to show up on so many United States’ desk top homepages on their devices or in search engine results: it is described as having “a well-educated, affluent, digitally-savvy, liberal audience.” (see, e.g., https://www.coursehero.com/file/227927087/the-guardian-18th-jan-22-fact-sheetpdf/ )
(that description, “…well-educated, affluent, digitally-savvy…” appears in numerous write-ups about the Guardian)
What college kid today would not want to be associated with such a readership?
HA, I meant to say painting, not tainting. The two letters are not even close on my device so I do not know how I did that! …..but humorously, which is more correct?
Yeah, that’s part of the sophomore appeal, Lin. Status by association. Little do they know their professors actually look down on them, while Prof collects tuition and textbook rents. Maybe these status seekers deserve to be looked down on if they lack that much agency.
“Status by association.” You said it much more precisely than I. Thanks.
Some things are contagious.
With the article and the comments it seems that the important thing is to correctly interpret and describe the facts that support the subject. If the facts are wrong, the judgment is proportionally wrong. It does no good to take misrepresentation either into the public or legal forum. I agree with one of the above, misrepresentation evidences some sort of analytical pathology. Judge not lest ye be judged!
Hell yeah – Comrade Spanberger is making sure the REDUCATION of Virginians and their spawn is aligned with the History of Soviet America. Would we expect anything less from a CIA Alumni who believes in psyops? Those who resist will meet the Iron Fist of their friendly State Government.
I also would wonder if this will fail constitutional muster. This could be government compelled speech and may be challenged successfully by some teachers. The SCOTUS could take a very dim view of this. I suspect a federal court challenge almost immediately if they pass it and then try to institute it. Probably will get an injunction. Interesting to see what judge gets the case and what the outcome is.
Forcing kids what to think is not a crime. Using text books with another version of 1/6 is not a crime. As far as I know.
I suspect its a test balloon, or signal to other states, to test limits.
What business does SCOTUS have in this? States control their own ed. systems. Look at the lgbqt books controversy. Its a parents issue.
Good thing the defunct DOE has it all under control.
Good analysis, GEB. New York State legislators are attempting to do the same thing. We’ll see what happens.
A good point you make, GEB. The fed dept of ed isn’t online thinking local control best followed by local taxes to support their local control deleting fed completely.
That is the education VA is offering. Which fed laws are violated? Speech, press? It’s already factioned into the histories of foreign nations having deleted history of the United States excepting the foreign point of view. After that the language will depart excepting a form of pigeon, lingua franca that contains the effusive use of profanity. Really, one response needed as FU demonstrated by the statesman Rash Tlaib?
Carpe diem
Why is this at all remarkable? Public school education has been nothing but thinly disguised propaganda of one kind or another for virtually as long as it has existed. As with its many, many other serious issues, the only effective solution is to permanently abolish it.
American history focus was of a great nation and how that happened by a train of rights. The story of a failed nation wasn’t told because it didn’t apply until now with the focus of failures seen via the eyes of failures. 😂
“where Democrats have objected to the pressure put on universities for greater diversity of viewpoints as an attack on academic freedom,
these Democrats see no problem in mandating the teaching of positions that are demonstrably false.”
Touché!
This measure is strong evidence for the need for school choice. If public schools feature leftist indoctrination by law, then parents should not be forced to send their children there. Parents should be given the means to send their children to a school that doesn’t feature such indoctrination.
I agree with school choice, but this bill is a LAW, not a recommendation to the teachers union. Private schools must follow the law.
Can’t wait to see the bill that instructs teachers how to “teach” children about Russia-Gate where Hillary, Barack and Biden were all involved in a hoax perpetrated on the American people and why none of them are in jail.
January 6th was 100% Democrats lead!
Proof?
Maybe the ever growing number of 200+ undercover FBI agents and informants, who’s presence was previously denied during the J6 hearings.
And when Hillary and the Democrats worked with Foreign spies and Russians to overthrow the elected president?
Or when Democrats imported millions of illegal invaders in the WAR against America?
Again, proof? Paper trail?
Maybe when Hillary’s campaign used her law firm to hire former UK spy Steele, who in turn, hired a variety of Russian spies, to concoct a phony report to discredit Trump.
None of that ever happened.
What about BLM and the cities they left wrecked along with the dead.
What cities? What dead?
BLM was never implicated or charged for any crimes by the actions of white US citizens.
Lol
Did you sit out that time? Ano
Here is a few loser
________________
During the summer of 2020, following the murder of George Floyd, widespread protests associated with the Black Lives Matter movement occurred in Washington state, particularly in Seattle. These events, which included the creation of the 6-block Capitol Hill Organized Protest (CHOP) zone, resulted in significant, often violent, clashes with police, property damage, and several shootings.
Following the murder of George Floyd in May 2020, Minneapolis and St. Paul experienced severe unrest, including riots, arson, and looting, resulting in over
million in damage and 1,500+ properties affected. Activists, including those associated with Black Lives Matter (BLM)
DustOff,
Ohhh!! Historical facts! Good one!!! I wonder if the VA lawmakers/Democrats will try to erase that from history? How will they paint the Biden admin opening of the border to violent criminal illegals who committed crimes like assault, rape and murder? Will the forbid a teacher from saying the name Laken Riley?
time to OUTLAW Public Unions the political army of the democrats….paid by TAXPAYERS!
Unions paid by taxpayers? How do you figure that? Maybe at the state level. Maybe indirectly… explain that please?
public unions…are schools, cops, etc who do you think pays them?
I did NOT say Autoworkers, etc at private companies?
You do know who funds government, right?
but who pays the union dues? you?
Unions are a 1A right of association and petition of government.
More moronic behavior from frantic Democrats.
This is all part of the agenda, overwhelm the system with myriad proposals to see if any of them can get into law then keep pushing the ones that fail over and over again until they pass from sheer fatigue. Both the American revolution and the civil war began in VA. Civil War 2.0 is underway now in the state.
Revolution began in VA? NOPE. Massachusetts, Lexington/Concord.
Civil War began in VA? NOPE, South Carolina, Fort Sumter.
CW 2.0. NOPE. Washington D.C.
Mike, really, get the basics right at least.
It’s true that the first shots of the revolution were at Lexington/Concord but If I recall my history the seeds of the revolution were first planted in Virginia at Williamsburg when the colonists began agitating against the crown for things like the Townshend and Stamp Acts. The President offered Robert E Lee command of the Union armies after Fort Sumpter but he chose to go with VA and began forming the armies in VA. Civli War 2.0 has many fathers, CA. NY, VA IL OR and the other treasonous democrat states. So my post is correct.
These rule-makers, now led by Governor Spamburger (sp), have no bounds. My guess is that the Dems suspect that she will not survive a reelection bid. Thus, they want to make as many changes as possible, irrespective of their wisdom. Expect more taxes, more assaults on education, more bloating of state payrolls with localists. And of course, placing illegals well above citizens for benefits.
What if you’re wrong. It not like you’re in the inner circle of the VA DNC
gdonaldallen,
While I agree with most of your assessment, the fact Spamburger was able to dupe the voters of VA into believing she was a moderate, I would not put it past her to do it again.
Again? Based on what? Voters may have now learned they’ve been tricked (SOP nowadays for Dems., see TX recently) doesn’t guarantee reelection. In fact the opposite. Common sense. Once bitten, twice shy? You’re always big on common sense, yet you lack it.
In Virginia the Governor can only serve one term so no reelection issue.
The Governor of Virginia can serve only one four-year term at a time and is not eligible for immediate re-election. However, there is no lifetime limit on the number of terms a person may serve as governor, as long as the terms are not consecutive. Source: Termlimits.com
There will be no reelection bid. VA is a 4-year one-consecutive-term for Governor state. If it were not, Governor Youngkin would have been reelected for life.
Wiseoldlawyer,
Thank you for the clarification. I forgot about that.
Spamburger is barred by the VA Constitution from serving consecutive terms. Been that way forever. However that s likely the next amendment that the democrat traitors will propose since the state supremes have ruled in favor of this “temporary” amendment to the constitution allowing them to gerrymander the GOP out of existence in the state.
“These rule-makers, now led by Governor Spamburger (sp), have no bounds. My guess is that the Dems suspect that she will not survive a reelection bid.”
The idea is probably to destroy the potential of Virginia to become rallying for resurrection of the Republic so completely that they won’t need to care whether or not she can be reelected. I also saw something somewhere recently that linked her to the Deep State intelligence apparatus of some kind, which would surprise me not in the slightest.
Will the nonsense never cease?
Attention whores, thieves, and propagandists are insufferable and unforgivable.
Who were the 3 media companies allowed to bid on Cowgirl Barbie’s $220M vanity video grift?
Nice deflection. Now yell EPSTEIN instead of dealing with subject at hand, the pushing of propaganda by Fascists in Virginia. Sieg heil!
It is precisely the “Attention whores, thieves, and propagandists” who are pushing this fictional nonsense about 1/6 on school children.
Barbie is not exactly a topical example but she is a good example of an attention whore and a thief.
And, since you brought up Epstein, it would be good for the USA to see how the political blackmail operation worked against our interests. A peristaltic cleansing would do the nation some good.
Does any of that have to do with the above opinion?
Fascists always move to control the minds of children. Since the Nazis and Soviets, they realize children’s minds can be shaped and lead to long-term support for their policies, as with the Hitler Youth and Young Pioneers. Typical move to spread propaganda, and the Demedia will cheer like trained seals.
Only fascists? America has a history of indoctrination. You’ve been indoctrinated. Your bizarre comments attest to that. You think you have free choice, but do you? Every day like clockwork you scream at the top of your lungs that everyone is crazy but you. I’m guessing this might be therapy? Then this all makes the situation that much more bizarre.
Free will is true except bots don’t have free will. Two roads diverged in a yellow wood and sorry I could not travel both I stood and looked down both to where one bent in the undergrowth…
Maybe fate is true OTOH. 😂