The Dumbing Down.

[Editorial]

I tell you that is their goal, they are always talking about “originalists” back in colonial times and that is what they want to bring us back to.

DeSantis said public schools were religious when U.S. began. Is he right?
Scholars say the Founding Fathers’ thoughts on public education are often misconstrued.
Tampa Bay Times
By Jeffrey S. Solochek
April 24, 2024

Before signing into law a measure allowing religious chaplains in public schools, Gov. Ron DeSantis said the initiative brought Florida closer to what the nation’s founders wanted for educating youth.

“When education in the United States first started, every school was a religious school. That was just part of it. Public schools were religious schools,” DeSantis said at an April 18 news conference.

“There’s been things that have been done over the years that veered away from that original intent,” he continued, “but the reality is I think what we are doing is really restoring the sense of purpose that our Founding Fathers wanted to see in education.”

The just want “Reading, ‘Riting, and ‘Rithmetic,” an uneducated population is easier to control. That only the ruling class gets the education.

Education historians said the notion that the founders intended for a religion-based public schooling system is an increasingly common misconception. It’s gained traction amid high profile incidents including a taxpayer-funded church-sponsored charter school in Oklahoma, a lawsuit over whether public high school coaches can pray at games in Washington, and now this provision for chaplains in Florida schools.

They want a Christian nation! They are our version of the Taliban in creating a nation in the image of the evangelicals.

They live in their little own fantasy world, where Blacks know their place, gays and trans people do not exist. They forget that the Pilgrims fled England because of the English state religion.

“An act passed in Massachusetts in 1647, ‘Old Deluder Satan Act,’ is often cited as the first public education in what would become the US,” Curran wrote. “Requiring communities across the state to hire teachers, the general purpose of the act was to ensure a level of literacy sufficient for reading the Bible and preventing individuals from falling prey to ‘the old deluder, Satan.’”

Back to that level of education is where they want to take us.

Just look at the Republican attacks on schools… Book bannings, “Don’t Say Gay,” “Parental Rights,” the removal of Black history, vouchers, and their attacks on liberal colleges are all weakening the public education system.

The Daily Kos writes,

GOP's long-term plan to kill public schools in America might be succeeding
By SemDem
November 22, 2023

Not long ago, everyone agreed that public education was a value in this nation, much like the notion of a democracy. Yet just like with Republicans shifting attitudes toward democracy, more prominent Republicans are now openly disparaging the entire concept of public schools. Laura Ingraham claimed that “a lot of people are saying it's time to defund government education or at least defund it by giving vouchers to parents.” Fox’s Greg Gutfeld similarly declared that private school vouchers are needed because public schools are “a destructive system” and described teachers as “KKK with summers off.”

Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida has called public schools “a cesspool of Marxist indoctrination.” Donald Trump declared, “public schools have been taken over by the radical left maniacs.” And Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia called them taxpayer-funded indoctrination centers that need to end, which is a bit ironic since she is the poster child for the necessity of funding public education.

Although Republicans have long held a disdain for public schools, only recently have they openly advocated for ending them. Like libraries, they are arguing that giving taxpayer money to educate people is a socialist concept. Thankfully, we have had a public school system for centuries, which makes it hard to destroy. However, the GOP has opened up a new front by starving public schools for funds while diverting the resources to charter schools, private institutions, and homeschooling without any of the standards that public schools must adhere to. After all, the biggest threat to their party is critical thinking and an educated populace.

Just look at the Voucher system where middle and upper class family can afford to send their children to private schools while at the same time cut the funding to public schools where lower class families have to send their children. They also know that private schools can turn away the undesirables like Blacks, gays, trans children, and non-Christians.

Right now, red state legislatures are trying to do this through "school choice" reforms. Conservative states, like Florida, are burdening public schools with expensive requirements and taking money to give to unregulated charter schools. They defund schools while supporting a fast-growing sector of charter schools funded by right-wing billionaires to deliver indoctrination of their ideology. The money they take away from public schools cuts not just educational programs, but mental health funding to prevent violence, suicide, and drug abuse.

And now they are putting religious chaplains in schools, how much do you want to bet that they will all be Christian chaplains? Do you think that there will be any Jewish chaplains? Or Muslim chaplains? And I’ll even bet that there would be no affirming Christian chaplains.

[/Editorial]

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Sticking it to them!

When it comes to Girl Scout cookies, I love them but they don’t love me since I’m a diabetic, but did you know that the Girl Scouts allows trans Girl Scouts which has set the holier than thou groups in a tizzy.

Book Banning County Commissioners Censor Honor for Girl Scout’s Banned Book Library

Book Riot

By Kelly Jensen

April 24, 2024

The Hanover County Supervisors has censored the honor they are giving to one of their young community members. Why? Because that student’s Girl Scout project is related to banned books — something that the local school board is actively engaged with and something that Commissioners themselves are currently engaged with at the public library.

Hanover County School Book Bans Lead to A Teen Girl Scout Service Project

Hanover County, Virginia, has become a familiar name in the book censorship world. In June 2023, the district adopted a policy to combat so-called “explicit” books in school libraries. The policy allows any resident to file a complaint over a book, and the decision over the book’s fate lies solely in the hands of the school board — not a review committee, not the school or district administration, and not the actual professional librarians or educators in the schools. Just months after the policy was approved 5-2 by the board. Nineteen books were banned at that same meeting with unanimous yes votes by the board, and by the end of 2023, over 75 books were banned from the district. The bulk of those books were by or about LGBTQ+ people.

In response to the policy and removal of books, one local Girl Scout named Kate Lindley decided she knew how she could get engaged locally and work on a project that would impact her community and help her earn her Gold Award from the Scouts — the highest honor given. Kate created an app called the “Free to Read” app, which offered information about the bans and books impacted.

Now here is the quandary the Hanover County Supervisors is in; every year they give an award to Girl Scout who earn a Gold Award. But this years Gold Award Girl Scouts received her award by creating a work around for banned books! Oh what a supervisor to do?

Well they did what any good Republican does… lie!

On April 10, Kate was to be recognized by the Hanover County Board of Supervisors alongside her fellow Girl Scouts, who earned their Gold Award. But instead of being commended, one of the board members, Cold Harbor Supervisor Michael Herzberg, changed the language around Kate’s project for her honor. No longer was the school board and its book ban policy and practice mentioned — the very things that spurred the project itself. Upon censoring the language around the honor, the rest of the Board of Supervisors approved the changes.

Kate’s work has been removed from its context, meaning that not only is her work being undermined by the adults who are supposed to be honoring it, but her work will enter the historical record without noting that it was done in response to the school board’s book banning.

So Kate got banned because of banned books!

But there craziness doesn't end there!

But It Gets Darker & Fishier

Unfortunately for Hanover County, it isn’t just the school district that earned a name for its book banning. The Hanover Public Library also found itself at the center of right-wing censorship in early March 2024, and it is impossible not to connect the censoring of this proclamation with the ongoing battle between County Supervisors and the public libraries.

During a toddler story time at the Atlee Branch Library, one person was offended by the inclusion of Todd Parr’s The Family Book, which showcases all of the ways a family can look. The idea of two same-sex parents “normalized homosexuality,” and the person took their concerns to the library’s board director. The book was deemed perfectly appropriate, but the individual wasn’t satisfied.

The book police got on the case!

Floyd attended the following library board meeting and spoke during public comment, parroting the same language about the book being inappropriate and demanding that the situation be handled (minutes for that library board meeting are not yet available).

Per the library board minutes, she stated, “Personal agendas do not need to be pushed on children and we do not find that acceptable in Hanover County.” Immediately after Floyd’s public comments — the final comments after a series of pro-book banning and anti-book banning sentiments during that time — the Goodrich County Library Board representative Barb Young introduced Floyd and fellow County administrative members to the new point of contact for the county attorney’s office.

[...]

The same day that Kate’s commendation was edited, the April 10 County Supervisors Meeting, Hanover County resident Peggy Lavinder noted that something was fishy at the public library. Per the County Supervisor Board Packet:

Ms. Lavinder spoke regarding the Pamunkey Regional Library Board of Trustees meeting held on Tuesday, the 9th of April. Ms. Lavinder explained that documents were not provided to individuals prior to or at the meeting. When she questioned that, she was told that the Board did not want to release that information because they felt the public would be confused. She continued, saying a Board member did confirm that those documents need to be shared with the public in the interest of transparency. She noted that towards the end of the discussion, a proposal was put forth to revise the collection policy, and that is going to involve changing the way the library is in general. The proposal is to have an adult section, and that any book, even if it’s written for a child, a teenager, a 17-year-old, if it has any sexual content in it, it’s going to be put in the adult section. She added that there was no consideration whether it was a sex education book that was written for a young teenager or how this restriction was going to be enforced if a teenager picked up a book from the adult section. Ms. Lavinder spoke regarding book titles that received complaints which she added was 50 maximum and suggested, instead of trying to determine what the public does not want to read, the Board should spend time finding out what the public does want to read. If the library does not have a title, it can be requested. She added that it is the same thing that happened with the school division, and she suggested that the Board use the process developed for the school division and spend time learning what people want. She closed by asking for the Board’s help.

You want to guess who the next Board members are going to be?

But let’s go back to the Hanover County Schools for a second. Supervisor Floyd and fellow County Supervisor Faye Prichard — who was absent from the meeting where the proclamation for Kate’s project was censored — are currently involved in the process of selecting two new members of the Hanover County School Board as well. Floyd is aligned with a local right-wing group, the Hanover Patriots, who’ve had a hand in the policy-making that led to banning dozens of books in the school district.

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Update: April 28, 2024

I just found this quote that is about the dumbing down of education...

“In 100 years, we have gone from teaching Latin and Greek in high school to teaching remedial English in college.”

― Joseph Sobran