- Blog
- Bios
- Boards
- Classifieds
- DIY
- Gallery
- Vendor Reviews
- Shop Weddingbee
Weddingbee boards
This really burned my butt this morning:
"Other amendments to the state's curriculum standards for kindergarten through 12th grade would minimize Thomas Jefferson's role in world and U.S. history because he advocated the separation of church and state; require that students learn about "the unintended consequences" of affirmative action; assert that "the right to keep and bear arms" is an important element of a democratic society; and rename the slave trade to the "Atlantic triangular trade.”
Whitewashing history is exactly why we can't move past certain things and continue to pass ignorance on to future generations. Let's call a spade a spade....well in this instance...a slave a slave. "Atlantic triangular trade" my arse! Hmph....glad my children aren't being taught in the Texas school system.
oh my goodness.
sometimes i wonder if im going to need to homeschool my children down here to give them a proper education.
@JamaicaBride - unfortunately, it still affects them since Texas is the #2 textbook buyer in the country. California, who is #1, is trying to combat this:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/05/good_news_from_california.php
I can't believe these people can wake up and look at themselves in the mirror every day! how can one morally live with themselves? I spent all morning emailing my local government b/c of the new anti-choice legislation being passed here. I'm going to get all fired up again!
I think history is history and should be kept exactly the way it happened, was named, and has been learned-- i think that if they keep trying to fluff things in history eventually there won't be much truth in explaination of what actually happened and how we got to where we are.
I think it's sad- I personally am not black or of any colored descent- but i definately believe that other people's histories were greatly influenced by these events in history and changing them destroys their own histories which is just not acceptable
Shameful...just shameful. I can see that when I have children and they are school-age I'm going to have to read their texts from cover to cover just to see what they are actually going to be taught. Then I'll have to counter these idiotic, ridiculous things such as this because these nutjobs are putting such crap into texts.
The slave trade was the process of buying slaves and transporting them here and then treating them as property and 3/5 of a person. This should be taught to all children because THAT is what happened...argh! How in the world can you call it the Atlantic Triangular Trade? Honestly, this just makes me sick...what a slap in the face to all slaves and the families of slaves...
@JamaicaBride- Why do you think Slave Trade is a better, more accurate name than Atlantic Triangular Trade? (I'm seriously just asking because I don't know- I'm not a history buff.)
That just chills me down to my bones. Life is starting to feel like a movie that takes place in a twisted, dystopian future.
@Jacqi - well, for me, it seems very Orwellian. The Atlantic Slave Trade has been called such for years because African people were the primary "thing" being traded. Within their own culture in Africa it's often referred to as what translates to a Holocaust or genocide, it was so massive. Calling it the "Atlantic Triangular Trade" is a huge sign of disrespect for the suffering and loss those people went through, especially because it's actively changing what we already call it and glossing over the "unpleasant" reality.
Of course, history has always been skewed. I remember Japanese internment camps being glossed over until high school and even then, we didn't spend an entire day on them. It's a shame, and I wish ALL textbooks would clean up and be more honest. But moving backwards is just making the situation worse.
i'm from Texas, and their scary conservative school board is one reason why I will NEVER move back. I don't want to spend my future kids' childhoods running behind them trying to undo the damage their schools do. I grew up in Texas, and never learned about evolution (I now study microbiology and the evolution of microbes), and every world history class emphasized Christianity as the "correct" religion and put down others. UGH.
And while some of the trade was done between those three places it leaves a HUGE portion out, the part about stealing people and bringing them into the slave trade.
I read the news every morning and when I read the article it immediately got my goat...LOL
@Jacqi...I think the Slave Trade is an accurate representation because slaves are what was being traded. Yes, other things were traded in order to obtain slaves, but that was secondary. To call it the "Atlantic Triangular Trade" to me, takes away or minimizes the fact that the primary purpose of this particular trading route was for the procurement of slave labor. For me personally, it FURTHER denigrates people of African descent b/c now it's like they are saying...well we just got slaves along with some other GOODS as if the slaves weren't people forcibly snatched away from their country and forced to be free labor and were treated worse than animals used for food.Those ships didn't come back to the states loaded with goods. They came back loaded with PEOPLE...packed asses to elbows: men, women, and children lying in their own filth...thinking only God knows what. To try to minimize that horror by changing the name for the sake of "patriotism" really had me upset this morning. "Social conservatives on the 15-member Republican-dominated board are optimistic they will be able to push through curriculum changes that, according to board member and conservative Texas lawyer Cynthia Noland Dunbar, “promote patriotism.”"
Like I said in my OP....this burned my butt this morning...I called my FI this morning to tell him abt it so he could calm me down and HE got pissed...LOL. I can laugh about it now but sheesh. I am drafting a letter o fprotest but I have deleted it and started over multiple times b/c I don't want to sound like a raving lunatic....LOL.
EDIT: I want to edit this to point out that the fact that they are Republican is irrelevant to me. This is an excerpt from the article. Wrong is wrong regardless of race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, or political affiliation.
Aren't there enough lies and whitewashing in our history textbooks already?
Atlantic Triangular Trade implies something else. If you hear that phrase, you don't think "slaves" unfortunately. Maybe that's the point. Sheesh. Aren't we supposed to learn from the bad things we did in history so that we don't repeat them in the future?
I'd be willing to write a letter as well, JamaicaBride - where are you sending yours? TX is actually a likely place to move for our family, should we ever need to transfer or something w/in my husband's company. I'm a big public school believer, but I'd have two full time jobs there: working during the day, and re-teaching my (future) children all over again at night.
@crayfish - wow! Good for you, i'm glad that you were able to see through the one-sidedness of their curriculum and now be in the biology field! i love it.
Oh wow. I agree with you ladies. This is craziness and utterly disappointing.
I think everyone made a lot of great points, and besides this all being hugely disrespectful and inaccurate, I don't think the legislators realize that "whitewashing" prevents whites from owning and understanding white guilt, and ultimately moving past it to more productive action. That hurts everyone as well.
As a historian, the thing that really gets me about the Texas textbook debacle (besides the obviously offensive changes like the one that Jamaicabride has pointed out) is the fact that ACTUAL HISTORIANS are being totally ignored. By the time I'm finished with my degree I will have 4 years undergraduate and 6 years graduate education on the subject. But apparently 10 years of professional training means nothing to the people on this school board. They seem to think that any idiot off the street can and should determine what is a good and appropriate curriculum in history. It just makes me so angry! I mean, I wouldn't presume to say that my opinions on medicine were as valid as a doctors, or that my opinions on aerospace engineering were as good as someone who worked at NASA. So why does my professional training not merit that same type of respect?
I think Jon Stewart said it best here: http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-march-17-2010/don-t-mess-with-textbooks
@greenleaf - That's amazing. thanks for the clip! Those board members could use a bit more education themselves - they can't even debate or argue a point! it's pathetic. Why would they be given the job of setting a curriculum?! ugh
Just watched the clip (love Jon Stewart by the way!!) and I'm feel really sick to my stomach. How are these people on this board? When setting any cirriculum, there needs to be unbiased experts. (While I know the word "expert" is a little ambigous and somewhat vague, I definately don't think THESE people remotely qualify!) This is just sickening...and I just want to add that I'm NOT saying this because I'm a liberal. I think it's just flatout wrong for children in this country in this day and age to NOT be taught ALL important historical topics in an unbiased way!!! AHHH!
Ugh, this is very upsetting. Makes me very mad. It’s sad what changes to history are being proposed under the guise of “promoting patriotism”. That’s sadly one of those words/phrases, like “family values” that is a huge red flag for me. It shouldn’t be that way.
@gabrielleelise1981- I agree about the patriotism part. I have no problem with an informed, thoughtful patriotism. That can be a very good thing. But withholding the truth from people is no way to promote "patriotism". Patriotism cultivated by lies and misinformation is no patriotism at all.
What is the point behind the Triangular name? I get the Atlantic because they were crossing the Atlantic but not Triangle? I too agree that the names should be kept the way they were spoke of back in those days and have for years.
I think the idea behind the "traingular trade" is that the (very simplified) Atlantic economic system involved three main points- England, Africa, and the New World. Ships would begin in England, go to Africa to pick up slaves, trade those slaves in the New World for cash crops like tobacco and sugar/rum, and then return to sell those crops in the European market.
It's a crappy name for a bunch of reasons. First, it assumes that the whole New World is only one point, while even at it's most simplistic you really should have the Caribbean, the US south, and the US north, so apparently these people fail geometry as well as history.
Second, it is completely confined to the British Empire, when you can't really understand the motivation for any of this Atlantic trade without considering the Spanish, Portuguese, and French trade networks as well.
Third, it doesn't even get the British part right, because it ignores the eastern half of the British Empire (why do you think they wanted all that sugar in the first place? Because they were sick of drinking unsweetened tea from India!).
Fourth, (and most offensively) it reduces slaves to one of several "products" on an international market. It doesn't discuss the experience of enslavement, it's human cost, and the lives that enslaved people managed to create in spite of the violence against them. If you call it the "slave trade" you might ask questions about race, slave culture, and slave experience. But if you're spending all your time talking about rum and tobacco- well I don't know of anyone who would ask what the experience of a crate of tobacco was like when crossing the Atlantic.
But if your goal is to say "Hey slavery was no one's fault, it was just a part of this system that developed. No one chose it and no one could do anything to prevent it" then "triangle trade" works really well. If you want to start asking why Europeans would choose to enslave Africans in the first place- when human beings are so obviously not a commodity like sugar- then you probably call it the "slave trade".
I have no idea what the board was thinking when they made this change. Probably they aren't even conscious of the message they are sending. Thinking about slavery makes them uncomfortable (and rightly so! It should make all of us uncomfortable!) and they just want to stop talking about it. They want to use rhetoric to obscure it as much as possible. But I think if they were to stop and reflect on that discomfort, rather than just pushing it away, they would have reached a better decision.
/endhistoryrant ;)
This is the e-mail address to the Texas Education Agency (TEA) textbook division. I plan to send them an e-mail when I get home...which will probably be ignored but it's wortha try.
JamaicaBride - Can you name your source for the article? I have a hard time reading biased info, especially without a source.
I just want to throw out there that until the finalized documents come out, it's all just media hearsay. California (in my understanding) has it's own "editions".... No state is "required" to adhere to Texas' standards or use "Texas Edition" textbooks. California passing a bill banning textbooks before they are even finalized is basically like kids on the playground saying "you can't play because I don't like you and I don't think you'll be good." It's a bunch of rediculous, un-necessary, tax-payer wasting time and money (because CA is doing so much better than Tx fiscally as well, right? btw, they are in massive trouble fiscally, unlike Texas). If they don't like it, don't use them, there's no need for a bill. Texas education does have it's low points (TAKS tests) but from what I've heard, the students leaving Texas are performing better on standardized tests than Ca kids....
Basically, all I'm saying, is this needs to stop being political, looked at rationally, and see what the real changes are first.. then draw conclusions. There's a whole massive thread here on this, and so far, after reading the majority of the document they are voting on, the media (CNN AND FOX, both sides) make it sound so much worse. I've stopped relying on the media for any info... if we want to talk education, go educate yourself, and read the documents in their entirety for yourself. They're online, easy access....
Then, see if your own school system uses Texas Edition Textbooks. If you still have an issue, and your local district has the textbooks (WHICH HAVE NOT EVEN BEEN WRITTEN YET, BTW), let THEM know you don't agree with their choice of material for your area, why, and what is in them you don't like.
"JamaicaBride - Can you name your source for the article? I have a hard time reading biased info, especially without a source."
@KLP....Not exactly sure what you are calling biased...my OP, the comments that came after, or the article...which it seems you haven't read in order to form an opinion one way or the other. In any case, here is the link to the article
@greenleafmountain, when I have kids, can you teach them? Your rant was both intelligent and profound. I think you should write these textbooks and let those texas schoolboard people go hang.
"History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon." (Napolean Bonaparte)
History will always be subject to interpretation (different sides have different views - winners and losers have different perceptions, etc). I'm not saying that I agree with these changes, just saying that history is truly an interpretation made by a group of people at some point in time.
thanks for all your responses to my question.
@greenleaf- I definitely get your points, but how does the name "Slave Trade" accomplish any of that either? Besides making it obvious that slaves were traded?
Also- are they changing what is taught about it or just the name? To me the name doesn't matter if the facts are presented. I would think they would still teach about how terrible the conditions were for the slaves in Africa, on the boat, and in the Americas. And I think adding information about the economics behind it would be a good thing. I think slaves were traded for economic reasons, right?
But like KLP said, we haven't even seen the actual proposed changes yet, so it is impossible for me to make an informed opinion.
@ KLP: I agree with you that unless you are from Texas, the best approach to this issue is to contact your own school board and encourage them to use other text books.
But I do not understand the idea of "media hearsay." The way that these administrative processes work is that the board puts out a proposal, it is circulated for public consumption, they receive comments form the public, and then they vote. So that initial proposal is actually a hugely important step in the process. It is what allows the public to make a meaningful contribution to the final product. So the fact that the standards have not been finalized doesn't diminish the information, per se, the proposals themselves are an important step towards the final product.
Sorry to be slightly off topic, but @crayfish - I went to public school in Texas, and we were taught evolution in my biology classes. And I was never taught in my world history classes, nor any other class for that matter, that Christianity was the only right religion and that other religions are bad. It's unfortunate that you had that experience, but please don't make the broad generalization that what you experienced is the current Texas curriculum. That being said, I believe the public education system in Texas, and the country in general, is seriously flawed. The proposed changes to the Texas textbooks are really just the tip of the iceberg.
It's astounding how a few ignorant people could have so much influence over our future. We need to be educating our children. so that they can succeed in life... not set them up to fail b/c they're forced to learn all of this backwards crap. Just because you teach your children about history correctly doesn't mean that they'll lose their value's/morals/beliefs.
Jamaica Bride - I was referring to the generalizations made, not quoted in the article. With no source, there's no way to know where this un-named source came up with the reason T.J is "minimized" is because of church/state separation. That wasn't "quoted" it was put forth that it is the intended reason for the supposed minimization but there is nothing to support it (i.e. a quote saying so).
"or the article...which it seems you haven't read"
Obviously, That's why I wanted to know your source. What I HAVE READ, which I would be curious to know if you have... is the ACTUAL document of proposed changes from the TX SBOE themselves. As I said, it's online and easy to find and read, "straight from the horses mouth."
Media is biased. If it was not, would you be OK with getting 100% of your news from only say... FOX News? (I only used that as most liberals loathe that news source.) It's no different with any other station.
monitajb - As I said, The documents are online and easy to find. Once I read them, I realized that everything I have been hearing in the media was blown way out of proportion. So, as I mentioned, I do not rely on the media... the media sensationalizes information, makes it bigger, wants the ratings, etc... These days there is no "truth" in any media. I've read the actual document of proposed changes.... I have a feeling I'm the only one here who has. I just meant people need to read the actual document (which is not short at all) instead of just blindly following every word from any random news source or online quotation.... which is again, why I was wondering the source.
I went to private school through the 8th grade, but am a product of the Texas public school system in HS. I too was taught just like owlbride above, and agree 100% with her statement.
@owlbride: thanks for saying that because I too was taught in Texas public schools and we learned about evolution, and we didn't really talk about any religion being good or bad. Not to say that the proposed books are not flawed because clearly they are, but fortunately that wasn't my experience.
@ KLP: no, you aren't the only one who has read it.
If anyone is curious, the color coded version is the easiest to understand:
http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/teks/social/HS_TEKS_1stRdg.pdf
You must log in to post.
| Visit our sister sites | eHarmony Online Dating |
eHarmony Advice Dating Advice |
Project Wedding Wedding Songs |
JustMommies Pregnancy Calendar |
Create the honeymoon of your dreams.
| User | Posts Today |
|---|---|
| ndreighton | 5 |
| Suikerbossie | 5 |
| Miss Godiva | 3 |
| Future Mrs K | 3 |
| Rivendeler | 3 |
| janetsnakehole | 3 |
| krisanne | 2 |
| hamikay | 2 |
| aussiebee | 2 |
| PaulBabyBallerina | 2 |
Sorry, there are no users yet.
that's just crazy
