Oh, my. From Stephen Schafersman with the Texas Observer (emphasis mine):Commissioner of Education Robert Scott responds that the social studies standards adoption process is already a year behind and it is not advisable to delay further. "Let's get this process done." He also complained about the bloggers who, in his opinion, distorted the Board's work, such as the false claim that Thomas Jefferson and the Enlightenment was removed from the standards. As usual, Scott is confused and wrong, since Jefferson was indeed removed from that standard and the term "Enlightenment" was also removed so non-Enlightenment religious figures could be added. The intent of the malicious radical right Board members was to remove mention of the Enlightenment and the important role of Jefferson in it, and to include two religious authorities (Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin) who have nothing to do with the Enlightenment (indeed, they would have opposed it!).In my opinion, Scott is both right and wrong. Plenty of bloggers, and folks in social media, have wailed about "Jefferson being taken out of the TEKS!" which is plainly not true. Those folks are obscuring the truth to make a political point, and they are taking advantage of unintelligent people. Scott has the right to complain about that.
On the other hand, Scott is wrong, and Schafersman does a great job explaining why.
Another piece of truth is that the social conservatives on the SBOE eliminated Jefferson from the Enlightenment philosophers (where he most certainly belongs and should be included), to make a political and religious point. Jefferson coined the term "separation of church and state, " which the social conservatives hate. Cynthia Dunbar successfully passed an amendment to kick out Jefferson and replace him with Christian philosophers (see Brian Thevenot's piece in the Texas Tribune for more background on that.)
Someone has to tell the whole story, when a public figure appointed by the Governor of Texas does not. Bloggers are part of the modern reality of reporting and opinion sharing - we are on the scene witnesses at SBOE board meetings, we have our own deep knowledge and expertise on government and education, and we are paying attention.The far right certainly bangs very loud pots and pans about "patriots" and their brand of Christianity.
What we need to do is swing the pendulum back in November and knock some folks out of office and out of jobs. And, then we need to get creative about undoing the bad social studies TEKS that will surely get passed tomorrow.
1 comments:
Thank you for your dedication to education and to my favorite topic Jefferson, the Enlightenment, and the founding of these United States. Don't think when I teach this section of college government I won't tell students why first it is important that they learn it, why learning it terrifies the SBOE--free thinking-got to stop that out. We are from the conservative government and we know what you should be thinking and it isn't about freedom of your own conscious, conscience, mind.
Jefferson was the first political philosopher in America to be concerned with the pursuit of our happiness. He trusted us to know our own minds, our own beliefs, to decide for ourselves who we are, what we want. He trusted us, not the government, to decide our own religious beliefs, too.
He was a dangerous man to the Far Right and rightly so. They cannot exist in a Jeffersonian world. No wonder he said we should have a new constitution and a new government every twenty years or so.
You go girl. Hold them accountable. Jefferson would
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