Chicago Tribune: The crazy imaginings of the Texas Board of Education

[marmar]

The crazy imaginings of the Texas Board of Education
April 04, 2010


During the era of McCarthyism, red-baiters fed upon the image of "godless" communists infiltrating our educational system to brainwash the youth of America. As it turned out, that image was largely imaginary.

Ironically, though, we now really do have a coterie of Christian evangelicals who are attempting to infiltrate our educational system to brainwash our youth.

They are in Texas.

For reasons peculiar to the textbook industry and the Texas educational system, the Texas Board of Education has an enormous influence on the content of textbooks used throughout the United States. Conservatives and Christian evangelicals have taken over the Texas Board of Education, and they are in the process of rewriting the American history our children will learn.

Among the propositions the board is attempting to impose is that the U.S. was founded as "a Christian nation." What follows from this, of course, is that our Constitution and laws must be understood through the prism of this perspective. Although evangelicals have been pushing this line for two centuries, it is factually false. But the members of the Texas board, who are not historians, nonetheless persist in this effort to propagandize our children.

This is dangerous. It must be contested. ..........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2010-04-04/news/ct-perspec-0404-textbook-20100404_1_texas-board-evangelicals-christian-nation

[dmr]

1. r&k Thank you for posting this. n/t

[LiberalFighter]

2. Need to target the publishers of the school books too.

[DCKit]

4. True. Why should there even be a choice of science and fact vs. fundy fantasy? n/t

[Chiquitita]

3. Texas is a huge textbook market

and this board then determines the way textbook companies will pitch their books. Then other states buy them and there you have it...rewritten history.