Texas Board Of Education Rewrites History

The Texas State Board of Education is meeting again, and it's looking like they will be successful in rewriting history to fit their own narrow political views. When they have finished, the real history of the United States and Texas will be replaced by right-wing propaganda. Just look at some of the outrageous decisions they have made.

* They have refused to allow history teachers to teach that many of the Alamo's defenders were Tejanos (Hispanics). This will give students the false impression that the Texas War of Independence was a war between Anglos and Hispanics. That is not just untrue, it is an OUTRAGEOUS LIE! It was actually a revolution of Texas patriots, many of whom were Hispanics, against the government of Mexico. A cursory look at the many counties and cities named after these Hispanic Texas heroes of the War for Texas Independence shows this.

* They have eliminated Thomas Jefferson from world history textbooks as a political philosopher of note (even though Jefferson's views were a prime cause of not only the French Revolution, but also other freedom movements in the world). Are they unhappy with Jefferson because he was a deist and strong believer in separation of church and state (which the majority of the board disagrees with)?

They replaced the guideline to "explain the impact of Enlightenment ideas of John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Voltaire, Charles de Montesquieu, Jean Jacques Rousseau and Thomas Jefferson on political revolutions from 1750 to the present" with the lame guideline to "explain the impact of the writings of John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Voltaire, Charles de Montesquieu, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin and Sir William Blackstone."

This not only excludes America's foremost political philosopher, Thomas Jefferson, but also effectively eliminates "the Enlightenment" also.

* The board voted to exclude an ethnically diverse list of Medal of Honor winners from history textbooks.

* The board voted to include a discussion of the right to bear arms in the section in government courses designed to discuss First Amendment rights (even though the right to bear arms has nothing to do with the First Amendment and is already included in a study of all the amendments and rights).

* The board defeated a proposal to include a guideline to "examine the reasons the Founding Fathers protected religious freedom in America by barring government from promoting or disfavoring any particular religion over all others." The majority of the board said this just wasn't true, because the Founding Fathers "intended to promote religion" and "didn't intend for separation of church and state in America."

They are obviously ignorant of the wishes of the Founding Fathers who wanted to avoid a tyranny of any one religion. They are not only rewriting history and government to suit their own views, but they are putting words and thoughts into the mouths and minds of our Founding Fathers that are clearly false.

* They have banned the use of the words "capitalism" and "free markets" from class discussion because they say liberals have given those words a negative connotation. Teachers must use the term "free enterprise".

These people are making changes to education guidelines that make no sense except to propagandize their own right-wing views and inject them into the classroom. And they're not done yet. Who knows what kind of idiocy will come next.

Remember, because of Texas size and number of students, these silly ideas will be incorporated into textbooks that will be sold across the nation. This will not just result in the "dumbing down" of Texas students, but students and schools across our nation will be affected.

It would behoove most of the other states to get together and write their own guidelines. If enough of them join together and refuse to buy textbooks designed for Texas, they could force publishers to publish another set of books containing real history, government and science. Otherwise, they will just follow Texas back to the 19th century (a century the Texas State Board of Education would be comfortable in).

Texas is lost. Are the other states going to follow?