"What they're worrying about is your kids learning about what white people did." Michael Harriot looks at the changes to school curriculums in places like Florida and Tennessee and finds that states aren't erasing Black history; instead, schools are leaving out white people's role in Black history.
What they’re doing is erasing white history. So, what do I mean by that? Well, if you look at the curriculums and the laws that they’re passing to make white children feel comfortable, first of all, they’re not opposed to children learning stuff like the civil rights movement was an effort to gain equal rights. They’re not even worried about your kids learning about slavery. What they’re worrying about is your kids learning about what white people did.
According to the articles, the specific complaint was that the unit may not address the internal slave system/trade within Africa, and that quote, “it may only present one side of the issue and may not offer any opposing viewpoints or other perspectives on this subject.”
there was another story that Tennessee objected to lessons on Ruby Bridges because, you know, Ruby Bridges actually integrated schools, but they didn’t want to know about the parents who lined up outside of the schoolhouse when Ruby Bridges was entering school and yelled at her and spat on her. So they’re cool with the Ruby Bridges part, right? Ruby Bridges is an uplifting story about how one brave little girl triumphed and gave freedom for her people. But they don’t want you to understand what she triumphed over.
I thought this was a very interesting perspective on the goals and motivation of the Republican party regarding their attempts to remove Black history from schools.
I regularly read Michael Harriot’s threads on Twitter, so I was expecting the episode to be longer; but at 11 minutes long, I encourage you to give it a listen.
It is an interesting perspective, but the white vs black history distinction feels like semantics to me.
How does black history make any sense without naming who did all the enslaving, lynching, segregating, … ? I think I’m more in the camp of “there is accurate history” and there is “white-washed history” and the people who would like to continue to propagate white supremacy love the latter.
Well it is a lose lose from your governments perspective on one hand its supressing the truth on the other hand they think if everything is taught openly to the next generation it would increase an already negative sentiment/distrust of white america and the powers that be.
The only solution they can come up with to negate this is to dilute the facts and drip feed it slowly.
If we honestly taught about white people’s role in things like slavery and genocide, then it would interfere with the dissemination of the white supremacist lies that this was all “a long time ago” and that we magically fixed it with the power of love.
Least bad interpretation: they want younger generations to believe black people had as good a time in the US as any other group & from that to blame black people for current position in the socio-economic class hierarchy.
More likely interpretation: they hope to reinstitute chattel slavery, or at least a massive expansion of less intense forms of slavery, don’t want as many of the younger generation bothering to resist that & need some to actively support it.
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I thought this was a very interesting perspective on the goals and motivation of the Republican party regarding their attempts to remove Black history from schools.
I regularly read Michael Harriot’s threads on Twitter, so I was expecting the episode to be longer; but at 11 minutes long, I encourage you to give it a listen.
It is an interesting perspective, but the white vs black history distinction feels like semantics to me.
How does black history make any sense without naming who did all the enslaving, lynching, segregating, … ? I think I’m more in the camp of “there is accurate history” and there is “white-washed history” and the people who would like to continue to propagate white supremacy love the latter.
Well it is a lose lose from your governments perspective on one hand its supressing the truth on the other hand they think if everything is taught openly to the next generation it would increase an already negative sentiment/distrust of white america and the powers that be. The only solution they can come up with to negate this is to dilute the facts and drip feed it slowly.
If we honestly taught about white people’s role in things like slavery and genocide, then it would interfere with the dissemination of the white supremacist lies that this was all “a long time ago” and that we magically fixed it with the power of love.
Mmhmm.
Least bad interpretation: they want younger generations to believe black people had as good a time in the US as any other group & from that to blame black people for current position in the socio-economic class hierarchy.
More likely interpretation: they hope to reinstitute chattel slavery, or at least a massive expansion of less intense forms of slavery, don’t want as many of the younger generation bothering to resist that & need some to actively support it.
Duh, we crushed racism after they…shot…Dr. King. Or something.
No, it was Obama’s election against the massive alt-right backlash.