The Florida Legislature created the African History Task Force in 1994 in order to write guidelines for teaching the history, culture, experiences, and contributions of African Americans in public schools.
But Governor Ron DeSantis’ “Stop WOKE Act” prohibited any teaching that could make students feel they bear personal responsibility, guilt, anguish, or “other forms of psychological distress” for actions committed by members of their own race.
So the curriculum was rewritten. In the African American History section for grades 6-8, teachers are now required to include “how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”
Critics are blasting this revision as historically inaccurate and a racist dog whistle. Regardless of the level of accuracy, it was obviously motivated by partisan politics.
Race to the Bottom
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DeSantis is flushing it all down the toilet: the state education standards of Florida, his election chances, people’s willingness to see Ron DeSantis as a human being (I see him as a Balrog in a cheap suit.) Endless damage for no gain.
“Motivated by partisan politics”? Perhaps.
But ONLY in the horribly twisted sense that the political “liberal” believes that such societal atrocities as a) private prisons, b) “three-strikes your out,” c) all the rest of the 1994 Biden/Clinton crime bill, d) “end of welfare as we know it” and e) the miserably-failed legal retribution for some 12 million families (mostly black and brown), the victims of illegal foreclosures, that was just too difficult to fathom for purported 16-D chess master, and smug fraud, Obumma … all*** prove that the Dem party cares sincerely for justice for the descendants of slaves and slavery.
That is, the Republicans are just more honest and straight-forward than Dems about their part of the bipartisan sublime hatred of the “little people,” especially the ones of ≥ slightly tinted skin color.
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*** this is NOT comprehensive list, by any means!!!
This is one of those instances where related, but different, concepts have been erroneously commingled into one thing.
First, as Star Trek tells us in “Encounter at Farpoint,” “In the years 2036, the new United Nations declared that no Earth citizen could be made to answer for the crimes of his race or forbears.” This is, in my opinion, a very sound legal concept. You are responsible for what you do, not for what others do because once you open THAT loophole, there’s no stopping it.
What DeSantis’ legislation does is the usual coin trick. The Stop WOKE Act, as described by Ted, is actually sound law: no student should be made to “feel they bear personal responsibility, guilt, anguish, or ‘other forms of psychological distress’ for actions committed by members of their own race.” Further, as a substantial number of black people in the United States are genetically partially white as well, a strict interpretation of the Stop WOKE Act actually prevents a lot of trauma to those students, who would have to be simultaneously taught how they are victims and perpetrators. Or would they? I’m sure no one would take that issue and deliberately use it to simply stir up racial anger and upset everyone. Why would anyone do that? (Other than because it distracts beautifully from all the other much more important issues that might otherwise be discussed. That, too, being a Republican coin trick.)
This is what the Republicans do so well. They … pervert. They start with something that not only SOUNDS good, but actually IS good — no teacher worth a shucky darn thinks students should be shamed for what other people did — and they use it as the way to go in and rewrite the curriculum. And the democrats? Well, when they aren’t gutting welfare, bailing out banks, sending military aid to foreign countries that oppose gay marriage (Yes, Ukraine, I mean you), losing abortion access for the poor, rigging primaries, or even getting caught taking bribes, the democrats are hard at work fighting for pronouns and demanding respectful civility for diversity initiatives in schools where most of the children are testing at below grade level in math, science, and reading. (See? Whereas the Republicans know when they’re pulling a fast one, the democrats, collectively, are simply too unorganized and too shallow thinking to realize they’re shooting themselves in their feet with the issues they’ve been told to tell themselves that they support.)