Deep in the Heart of Texas

[Minor Axis]

Texas Reviews School Curriculum Targeted by Conservatives over Alleged Communist Propaganda.

Texas authorities are beginning a sweeping review this week of the state's dominant public school curriculum under pressure from critics who charge that it indoctrinates the children of Texas with communist, pro-terrorist propaganda from behind a shield of secrecy.

The State Board of Education will hold the first of a series of public meetings to organize the review in Dallas on Friday, three days after the state attorney general's office told NBC News that it has been looking into "potential improprieties" that raise "significant legal concerns about the program's operations."

It didn't specify those concerns, but legislative hearings have questioned the program's nonprofit status and the locking of some materials behind passwords accessible only to teachers and other "authorized users."...

But since it began in the 2006-07 school year, CSCOPE has been a target for activists and conservative websites. Pressure has grown in recent months as critics have published details of its lesson plans.

"CSCOPE Teaches ALLAH is God" and "CSCOPE Promotes Communism," proclaim two of several dozen articles on Texas CSCOPE Review.

Glenn Beck's TheBlaze has run at least five "exposés" this year with headlines like "CSCOPE: Exposing the Nation's Most Controversial Public School Curriculum System," while Tucker Carlson's Daily Caller last month ran a story listing "egregious examples of the curriculum's inadequacies and absurdities."..

Several examples have circulated around Texas in the past few months. One asks pupils to design a flag for a new socialist nation, using "symbolism to represent aspects of socialism/communism." Texas Conservative News called that an "attempt at secretly indoctrinating Texas children."

Another unit depicts a hiker walking up a staircase of money. "Free enterprise (capitalism)" is the bottom step; "Communism" is at the top. Ginger Russell of the widely read blog Red Hot Conservative wrote that the graphic was "all about portraying communism in a positive light."

Perhaps the most controversial lesson asks pupils to discuss this news report (PDF):

A local militia, believed to be a terrorist organization, attacked the property of private citizens today at our nation's busiest port. Although no one was injured in the attack, a large quantity of merchandise, considered to be valuable to its owners and loathsome to the perpetrators, was destroyed. The terrorists, dressed in disguise and apparently intoxicated, were able to escape into the night with the help of local citizens who harbor these fugitives and conceal their identities from the authorities.​

Not until later, during a discussion period, do teachers reveal that the report describes the Boston Tea Party.

Good one.

How dare they use the word "Allah" somewhere in a book as a reference to God, you know because all of those Allah-loving terroristic people are going straight't hell with their communist sway, dark skin, funny clothes and such... God hates that.

When it comes to politics, guns, religion, and paranoia, I'm embarrassed to say I live here. These kinds of articles really paint conservatives in a very intolerant paranoid light, but maybe it's just a liberal conspiracy to smear God's chosen? Actually, no, that's how they feel and are stupid enough to say it outloud.

PS, having an issue with the word 'Allah' is like having an issue with a foreign language except in the conservative view, 'Allah' is a terrorist's word and somewhere one of the targeted books said something nice about the Middle East, that's one of the many issues regarding this communist plot.

 

[Alien Allen]

I will make you a deal. Your side lets CA and NY fall into the ocean never to be heard from again. And in return Texas can go back to Mexican control. If that is not a fair trade then I will make it one on one with Texas and CA

Both extremes are shits

 

[The Man]

Texas Reviews School Curriculum Targeted by Conservatives over Alleged Communist Propaganda.



Good one.



When it comes to politics, guns, religion, and paranoia, I'm embarrassed to say I live here. These kinds of articles really paint conservatives in a very intolerant paranoid light, but maybe it's just a liberal conspiracy to smear God's chosen? Actually, no, that's how they feel and are stupid enough to say it outloud.
.

You have stated you position on guns.
What do you propose to about the religion?
And the paranoia

Perhaps a better question for you should be...when do you think it all went downhill and why?

 

[buffalo hunter]

When it comes to politics, guns, religion, and paranoia, I'm embarrassed to say I live here.

I would venture to guess there are plenty of Texans that would agree.

 

[Jackass master]

There has been a shift in curriculum over the past 30 years. I don't agree with a lot of it. Kids K-12 should be learning the basics and not tackling societal issues. Our history should be taught as it was, not modified to create a slant in young views. Part of our overall issues today, I am afraid.

 

[The Man]

There has been a shift in curriculum over the past 30 years. I don't agree with a lot of it. Kids K-12 should be learning the basics and not tackling societal issues. Our history should be taught as it was, not modified to create a slant in young views. Part of our overall issues today, I am afraid.

Good points.

 

[Alien Allen]

There has been a shift in curriculum over the past 30 years. I don't agree with a lot of it. Kids K-12 should be learning the basics and not tackling societal issues. Our history should be taught as it was, not modified to create a slant in young views. Part of our overall issues today, I am afraid.

The indoctrination gets kicked up a notch when they go to college

Atlas Shrugged should be mandatory reading in middle school with a follow up in high school

Young people have no clue about reality when it comes to the govt

 

[Accountable]

When it comes to politics, guns, religion, and paranoia, I'm embarrassed to say I live here.

Yeh. We are, too.
It's got to be a slow news day, for the fringies to make the news. We used to use CScope. There's nothing indoctrinal about it.

There has been a shift in curriculum over the past 30 years. I don't agree with a lot of it. Kids K-12 should be learning the basics and not tackling societal issues. Our history should be taught as it was, not modified to create a slant in young views. Part of our overall issues today, I am afraid.

History was never taught as it was ... unless you mean history should be taught as it was taught in your youth. There has always been spin. It's really unavoidable. You can't teach everything in history. There's just too much of it. So you have to decide what's most important ... and decide who gets to make those decisions. There will always be special interest groups who will always cry indoctrination if you're not indoctrinating their line of thinking.

 

[Minor Axis]

You have stated you position on guns.
What do you propose to about the religion?
And the paranoia

Perhaps a better question for you should be...when do you think it all went downhill and why?

If you want to know my views on religion, see the Religion forum, I'm agnostic, I don't propose to do anything about it, just observing that the far political and religious right seems to have lost their collective minds. They are paranoid, intolerant and see conspiracies where I don't believe there are any. The article I quoted is a prime example, plus they have chips on their shoulders thinking they are special as 'God's chosen'. As far as Texas I lived here in the early 1980s and since moving back about 3 years ago, the right seems to have veered to the extreme right in the last 30 years or maybe it did not bother me as much before. As a former supporter of Ronald Reagan, I have noticed as the right moves right, I have moved left, but I am not an extremist. I want a system that is fair for everyone. It's the only system that can be valid, and if you want to use the standard, it's the only standard I believe God would approve of. Too bad he does not speak up.

There has been a shift in curriculum over the past 30 years. I don't agree with a lot of it. Kids K-12 should be learning the basics and not tackling societal issues. Our history should be taught as it was, not modified to create a slant in young views. Part of our overall issues today, I am afraid.

I agree except that kids must be informed regarding social issues. The problem are the people who want indoctrination, not education. Ironically it's the right who would claim the kids are being indoctrinated by a leftist agenda, when it appears to me to be the opposite. They say history is written by the winners or could it be the squeaky wheels? It's up to the majority to not allow a minority of extremist views to decided what our kids learn in school.

Yeh. We are, too.

It's got to be a slow news day, for the fringies to make the news. We used to use CScope. There's nothing indoctrinal about it.

Glad to hear you confirm this. What worries me is Texas's conservative bias in combination with their educational book buying influence on the entire country. I don't know if this is still being pushed, but teaching intelligent design should be reserved for Sunday School, not in science class.

 

[Accountable]

I don't know if this is still being pushed, but teaching intelligent design should be reserved for Sunday School, not in science class.

http://www.offtopicz.net/showthread.php?87557-Intelligent-Design-as-Science