Under Ron DeSantis Florida has gone through a long process of white conservatives dictating what can or cannot be read, discussed, or allowed in schools. This includes the very racist gaslighting that CRT is a “Marxist” attack on our country, and therefore must be banned.
This is what happens when graduate level people of color dare to address the history and effects of slavery and racism. This of course also feeds into the fascist screed that universities are indoctrinating our kids into communism.
Yeah, Hitler had the same idea.
Enter Florida’s white conservatives. They alone believe
they are entitled to define racism and they alone must dictate the teaching of
African American history. Mighty white of them to let us know.
One of my observations of the far white right is, “Racism isn’t racism to racists”.
Nowhere is this demonstrated so absurdly as when they
play their ever-present “victim card”. It turns out most of them believe THEY
are the “real victims” of racism.
Whites Believe They Are Victims of Racism More Often Than
Blacks
Whites believe that they have replaced blacks as the
primary victims of racial discrimination in contemporary America, according to
a new study from researchers at Tufts University's School of Arts and Sciences
and Harvard Business School…"These data are the first to demonstrate that
not only do whites think more progress has been made toward equality than do
blacks, but whites also now believe that this progress is linked to a new
inequality, at their expense," note researchers. Whites see racial
equality as a zero-sum game, in which gains for one group mean losses for the
other.
It should come as no surprise what happens when white conservatives in Florida decide what African American History Standards can be taught in public schools.
Two of those white conservative workgroup members,
Dr. William Allen and Dr. Frances Presley Rice, provided a statement to TV10
Tampa Bay, saying in part, “The intent of this particular benchmark
clarification is to show that some slaves developed highly specialized trades
from which they benefitted. This is factual and well documented…Any attempt to
reduce slaves to just victims of oppression fails to recognize their strength,
courage and resiliency during a difficult time in American history. Florida
students deserve to learn how slaves took advantage of whatever circumstances
they were in to benefit themselves and the community of African
descendants."
“Slavery wasn’t all bad” seems to be their heartwarming
message in the latest version of Florida’s State Academic Standards.
No doubt you’ve heard about the latest hoopla around them
promoting, “Florida students deserve to learn how slaves developed skills
which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit”.
After reading their “standards” I found that’s not even the
most insidious thought control device in their program.
SS.912.AA.4.6
Examine organizational approaches to resisting equality in
America. Benchmark Clarifications:
1: Instruction includes the immediate and lasting effects
of organizations that sought to resist achieving American equality (e.g., state
legislatures, Ku Klux Klan [KKK], White Citizens’ Councils [WCC], law
enforcement agencies, elected officials such as the “Pork Chop Gang,” private
school consortiums, Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission [MSSC]).
2: Instruction includes different methods used by
coalitions (e.g., white primaries, acts of violence, unjust laws such as poll
taxes, literacy tests, sundown laws, anti-miscegenation laws).
Any history student will notice a common feature of the
“organizational approaches to resisting equality”.
Did you see it?
Everything they mentioned was from the 19th Century and
first half of the 20th Century. Nothing new to see here, amirite? It as if
those delicate “victims of racism” want everyone to think racists were ALL
Democrats. Of course, this includes their “Black tormenters”.
Noticeably absent are the facts that racists abandoned the
Democratic Party and are all Trump supporters now. Not a peep about the Proud Boys,
the Oath Keepers, and the “Unite the Right” racists who held the lethal
tiki-torch rally in Charlottesville in 2017. It’s as if they don’t exist,
aren’t relevant, or just don’t matter. See no evil, see no racism…except
against white conservatives.
20th and 21st Century Republican race-based gerrymandering
is also missing. Nothing to see here either, amirite?
Never happened. Nope. Don’t want the kids or their parents
to feel “uncomfortable”, do we?
Most recently Alabama Republicans defied federal courts in
passing their new congressional map. Arrogantly violating the Voting Rights Act
the new Alabama congressional map allows Black voters to elect a candidate of
their choice in only 1 of 7 districts despite being 1 of 4 Alabamians.
Since racism isn't racism to racists, whitewashing isn't
whitewashing to white whitewashers.
Leave it to conservative white men to do their damnedest to
whitewash slavery and racism as they amplify their fantasies of racist
“victimization”. Yes, apparently, they deserve to learn how white conservatives
“took advantage of whatever circumstances they were in to benefit themselves
and the community of White American descendants”.
Posts
15 comments:
Great post. It reminded me of what NYTimes columnist and Nobel Prize winning economist, Paul Krugman, wrote about this Florida abomination:
"For now, the important thing to understand is that people like DeSantis are attacking education, not because it teaches liberal propaganda, but because it fails to sustain the ignorance they want to preserve."
Shaw,
Orwell's "1984" party slogan, "ignorance is strength" has taken root in the US as Trump's "I love the poorly educated".
5 African American History Strand
SS.5.AA.1 Resiliency, contributions and influence of African Americans on the
United States beginning in the colonial era through westward expansion.
SS.5.AA.1.1 Examine the life of African Americans in the colonial era.
Benchmark Clarifications:
Clarification 1: Instruction includes what life was like for the earliest slaves and the emancipated
in North America.
SS.5.AA.1.2
Examine the Underground Railroad and how former slaves partnered with
other free people and groups in assisting those escaping from slavery.
SS.5.AA.1.3 Examine key figures and events in abolitionist movements.
5 African American History Strand
SS.5.AA.1 Resiliency, contributions and influence of African Americans on the
United States beginning in the colonial era through westward expansion.
SS.5.AA.1.1 Examine the life of African Americans in the colonial era.
Benchmark Clarifications:
Clarification 1: Instruction includes what life was like for the earliest slaves and the emancipated
in North America.
SS.5.AA.1.2
Examine the Underground Railroad and how former slaves partnered with
other free people and groups in assisting those escaping from slavery.
SS.5.AA.1.3 Examine key figures and events in abolitionist movements.
It appears David is just spreading media misinformation
Citing other aspects of the Florida Academic Standards does NOT negate or remove the radical Right bias on racism.
It feeds into Republican lies about democrats being racists and ignores the vast campaign by Republicans to undermine Black voter rights. It pretends Republican white nationalism doesn't exist. It pretends Proud Boys and Oath Keepers don't exist. It pretends racist mass murders don't happen.
Funny how Anonymous can't cite ONE point of "media misinformation" in what I wrote. Not one.
No wonder Anonymous can't even discuss what I wrote and would deflect from the Republican poison pill in these highly politicized "standards".
Dave... nice catch on the late 19th/early 20th century issues.
Gotta wonder why the Florida standards do not teach about Ax Handle Sunday. I wonder how the Florida standards handle evangelical across the south, Florida included support for late 20th century Jim Crow laws. How much mention is there of official state support for laws that made it a crime to marry across racial lines in Florida? How about Florida education laws that the SCOTUS struck down in Brown? Is that ever mentioned?
I hear the conservative lament that progressives want to focus on the negative, but to ignore past realities, some far in the rear view mirror and others very current, while centering on what's good today, would be tantamount to teaching German history without any focus on volk and/or Nazism...
Dave,
Thanks. Well, we don't have to wonder too much, do we?
The racist radical right Republicans are as likely as Nazis to admit and denounce their own racism. Instead it's, "Look at those racist Democrats and Blacks tormenting ME and all the other Real American(TM) white victims".
The poor triggered wretches. Isn't it enough hardship, oppression, and torture for them to put up with Bud Light and Barbie?
No wonder they want a cruel dictator in power to punish everyone they hate.
Is it not true that any ideology, whether conservative or liberal in nature (labels are merely constructs and generally not useful due to their dualistic nature), carries with it the potential of becoming as limiting and tyrannical as that which is being critized?
Any political, philosophical, or religious belief system is problematic when it becomes hard wired into a belief system that is reified and made concrete.
Les,
That is a question worth exploring. I think the answer can be both yes and no, depending on the ideologies. A yes answer applies to the tyrannies inherent in fascism and communism. They are by nature extreme and authoritarian.
I think political, philosophical, or religious belief systems can be polar opposites or on a less dualistic continuum.
Somewhere amidst fascism, unchecked oligarchical capitalism, autocratic monarchy, and a communist dictatorship lies democratic socialism, ideally with constitutional rights, public healthcare, public education, open elections and fair representation. The balance is elusive due to entrenched power structures and the imbalances of wealth.
A government of, by and for the people seems to be the most stable and just system. Tragically fear, anger, hate, and greed are ever-present curses and hurdles on the human condition.
I highly recommend Aldous Huxley's "Island" for the ideal model of a sane society.
It has taken me a very long time Dave, most of my adult life, to relize that any "system" or society with a very high degree of dualistic thinking will always be problematic and experience a heightened degree of suffering. In our culture right now we are experiencing .
But yes, you have ennunciated a path (democratic socialism) that understood by all, supported by a sizable majority, and not enamored of any ego driven dualistic thinking may very well be the gem that has alluded humans, and continues to do so to this day.
If this planet is to survive another millennium i truly believe it will be due to a global understanding and acceptance of Ancient Eastern spititualities.
We are all part of a divine consciousness (the creators) . As such we are all one. There is no duablity when one understands, feels, and accepts this ultimate reality.
Peace,
Dr. William B Allen, the historian the produced this curriculum is an 79 yr old African American with a degree from Michigan. Desantis had nothing to do with it. This curriculum is entirely this mans work. Do your homework David you sound so clueless.
Allen is an African American. So is Clarence Thomas.
Both are highly partisan Republicans.
Florida Academic Standards MUST comply with DeSantis's own "standards".
Thus we see no reference to REPULICAN enacted voter suppression and current white nationalist Trump/DeSantis supporting racist groups. It's obvious you speak as if you are one of them.
If you disagree with any of my points, do so. You have no facts to refute them so all you want to do is insult me.
Go back to your cult and send your beloved "billionaire" Trump MORE of your money to pay for more criminal defense lawyers.
Even if a presidential candidate with a Yale B.A in history and a Harvard Law School Juris Doctor has merely assumed the guise of a bigot, racist, and homophobe in order to win GOP primaries, that candidate, if elected, would prove to be a far greater threat to democracy than the many uneducated bigots, homophobes, and racists who support him.
DeSantis practices the paranoid style in politics — the style delineated by Richard Hofstadter in 1964. Hofstadter cited the heated exaggerations, unfounded suspicions, and conspiratorial fantasies whereby demagogues leverage “the animosities and passions of a small minority” to their own political advantage.
DeSantis is divisive at every turn: in his whitewashing of history; in his rigid anti-abortion stance; in his cynical employment of asylum seekers as political pawns; in his attacks on a largely fabricated “wokeness;” in his anti-LGBTQ extremism — the extremism displayed in his ongoing feud with the gay-friendly Mickey Mouse; in his book banning and opposition to academic freedom; in his anti-scientific and anti-vaccination posturing; in his Big-Lie-inspired “justification” of voter suppression; in his depiction of himself as God’s chosen fighter in the culture wars.
He may employ populist tactics, but is at heart an elitist libertarian. In his 2011 book “Dreams From Our Founding Fathers,” DeSantis stated claims: Our nation’s founders “strived to construct a system … that prevented government-mandated wealth redistribution.” He described the Affordable Care Act and the federal bureaucracy as despotic “constraints on the whole of society.” Although he did not directly oppose Social Security and Medicare, such opposition is consistent with his extreme anti-redistributionism. He is now calling for their “reform”.
DeSantis is a far graver threat to democracy than Trump. He is the type of candidate the Republican donor class treasures most -- a well educated corporatocratic anti-redistributionist cloaked in populist clothing.
Shaw,
Yes, DeSatan is indeed a mortal threat to democracy.
Trump did a great deal to pave the road to fascism that every bigot will follow.
Without pandering to bigotry, there would be no Republican Party as it is today.
The entire insidious party is on course to inflame racism, hate and bigotry, as every other fascist movement that has waged war on democracy.
As i give thought to the dualistic nature of our very existence i see little difference between our two MIC supporting, corporate ass kissing, power grabbing politicians of both parties.
Both parties play to the wealthy corporate donors and the movers and shakers of the financial sector. Both parties wish to control our lives through ever increasing laws to restrict our liberties and keep us dependent on suckling on their brand of BS.
Both parties are responsible for the egregiously divisive atmosphere in which we are forced to exist. And neither party has a clue as to how exactly to change it. Probably because neither actually want to.
Sure, there are subtle differences in methods, and the dems are better at managing the economy in general. As well as being less authoritarian minded than cons and repubs... The reason i support dems now rather than rebubs. But it does not give any real comfort because eventually it isn't really gonna matter in the end. Both roads will lead to the same end.
Unless there is a tsunami strength change in the national consciousness. Something about as likely to happen as elephants flying.
Les,
Decades ago I learned that our 2 party corpo-regime offered two options.
One is a rapidly approaching trainwreck and the other a slower approaching trainwreck.
Now the Atlantic current is degrading, which will only speed us further into instability and autocracy.
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