Since it was proposed by the Texas Education Agency earlier this year, the elementary school reading and language arts curriculum has faced strong opposition from parents, advocates and faith leaders for its heavy use of biblical teachings, which critics say could lead to the bullying and isolation of non-Christian students, undermine church-state separation and grant the state far-reaching control over how children learn about religion.
A second grade lesson called “Fighting for a Cause” notes that “slavery was wrong, but it was practiced in most nations throughout history.” It does not detail the race-based nature of slavery in America that made it distinct from other parts of the world.
Another second grade lesson covering the U.S. Civil War focuses heavily on Robert E. Lee’s “excellent abilities” as general of the Confederate Army, which fought to maintain slavery, and his desire to find “a peaceful way to end the disagreement” with the North. It does not teach that Lee enslaved people or highlight his racist views that Black people were neither intelligent nor qualified to hold political power.
I just skip stories like this now, because they’re depressing. Plus, in a couple months, it’s only going to get worse.
How do they teach the US emerging as a world power? I can kind of imagine them saying it just happened because they’re cleverer and harder working.
They have been saying that for decades. American exceptionalism and all that.
That’s just not fair. Most people received a decent public education and had acceptable U.S. history classes. That’s how I learned how messed up U.S. history really is. This is coming from someone who grew up in a farm town in the 90s.
These religious extremists and southern followers allowing all of this to happen are loud and now in charge. The U.S. education system has been defunded, criticized, and abused by the GOP for decades and, more recently, by the people in these states. It’s easy to point at it after all that and say it’s not working. But let’s be fair—it’s being dismantled on purpose.
Today, as far as American Exceptionalism goes, that’s the core curriculum for these folks. They’ve successfully created an alternate reality and history.
I went to top schools in wealthy suburbs my entire childhood in blue neighborhoods in blue states, and we were taught American exceptionalism and the strength of our adherence to capitalism was what built the country, as well as what defeated communism. Slavery was a problem but it was gone now and things were fine, especially since the civil rights movement.
It wasn’t all framed quite that simply, but they were the obvious takeaways. I didn’t even realize it until I started devouring history books in my adult life. We learned an accepted view of history, but the arguments for why those things happened and their impacts were wildly disparate from what I (on the basis of what seems to be the historical consensus today) believe is realistic.
it does not derail the race based slaveryn in America that made it distinct from the rest of the world
This blogger can’t be this dumb, the derivation of slave comes from Slav because of the Muslim enslavement, specifically of whites.
Arabs continued the slave trade long after it was outlawed and still do race based slavery to this day. I don’t agree with downplaying it, but at least teach it accurately.
What blogger are you talking about?
This is printed in an exceptionally well regarded and award-winning newspaper by a journalist with a master’s in investigative journalism from Columbia University.
Edit: You’ve now made clear that your only agenda is to discredit a story that makes you uncomfortable. You are willing to embarass yourself to do so, but I have no interest in indulging you.
Apparently didn’t investigate enough. In high school I had a teacher that had a masters from Columbia and was a total moron. Made me realize that maybe Ivy League is more about who can afford it than brains. Also, journalism isn’t a history degree and it shows. You ever wonder why the best authors on historical topics all come out of Britain and have history degrees? Is well known that American “historians” post 1985 are all trash because they are journalists and not historians.
We need to stop being like “they went to Ivy League so they must be smart!” The most brilliant people I work with went to state schools and I work at a very recognizable tech company.
Everybody’s letting their Nazi flag fly high now, I see.
Don’t they have to teach why slavery was good in Florida too? When do we stop letting this qualify as an education?
Robert E. Lee’s “excellent abilities” as general of the Confederate Army
Lee did do very well. Civil War history isn’t specifically my area of interest, but I don’t think that there’s another high-ranking commander who one could reasonably say used his forces more effectively in the war. He had a heavily-winning record while fighting larger forces that were better-equipped.
He was also highly-regarded in his time; he was offered command of the Union Army, and commanded the most-important Confederate military formation for much of the war.
You’ve either completely missed the point or are running for a Texas GOP seat. Maybe both.
What do you think the point is?
It’s pretty clear from the article, as well as the excerpt above. The curriculum is teaching about a history that is closely intertwined with slavery while avoiding mention of slavery. No one is contending the military expertise of Lee; teaching about his life and political legacy while expunging his racist motives is dishonest.
So you don’t object to the curriculum stating that he was an effective military leader, which is what I was quoting and responding to?
No one is claiming that’s the problem. You were taking the quote out of context. The context is the entire point:
[A] lesson covering the U.S. Civil War focuses heavily on Robert E. Lee’s “excellent abilities” as general of the Confederate Army… [However,] does not teach that Lee enslaved people or highlight his racist views that Black people were neither intelligent nor qualified to hold political power.
