Texas Board of Ed member says health textbooks should define marriage as b

[Judi Lynn]

Texas Board of Ed member says health textbooks should define marriage as between man and woman
Friday November 05, 2004
By NATALIE GOTT
Associated Press Writer
AUSTIN (AP) A State Board of Education member called on textbook publishers to change the wording in health books being considered for use in Texas schools to clearly state that marriage is between a man and a woman.

Terri Leo said certain books attempt to nullify a Texas law banning the recognition of same-sex civil unions by using ``asexual stealth phrases'' such as ``individuals who marry'' instead of husbands and wives.

``I want the reader, the child to know that marriage is between a man and a woman,'' Leo, R-Spring, said in a written statement released during a board meeting Wednesday.

The 15-member board is scheduled to vote Friday on whether to approve the books for middle- and high schools. The decision could affect dozens of states because books sold in Texas, the nation's second-largest textbook buyer, often are marketed elsewhere.
(snip/...)

http://cbsnewyork.com/national/Textbooks-Marriage-aa/resources_news_html

[killbotfactory]

1. What about a man and many women?

The more the merrier. You know, like in the Bible?

We founded this nation on the bible, right?

[tavalon]

8. LOL

As a polyamorist, I wholeheartedly agree....

[VegasWolf]

18. How about one guy and a couple of hot chicks! n/t

[Ilsa]

20. How about a Paint Your Wagon scenario...

One wife with several husbands?

[aquart]

2. Go ahead and spend the money, bigots.

It's like they say, you won't change until you hit rock bottom.

Go, Texas! Let's see how low rock bottom is.

[tavalon]

9. I'm a reluctant Texan

If you're wanting to send Texas in to find the bottom, they are going to go really deep. Texas is like a whole other country (I kid you not - that is the tourist board slogan). The thing they don't tell you is that it's like a third world country.

[MSgt213]

3. I am certainly glad that Texas schools have improved so much we can worry

about bullshit like this.

[liberal N proud]

4. And the book burning followed!

[SoCalDem]

5. Marriage does NOT belong in a health book..

Health books should be about nutrition, hygiene, and basic stuff.. Leave the "morality" stuff for sunday school, thankyouverymuch

[no_hypocrisy]

6. Then how do they explain the term "animal husbandry"?

[Tashi]

7. Happy families

and I suppose they will tell the little kiddies that as long it's a man and a woman they will all live happily ever after.

[DrDan]

10. the neo-cons take such joy in bashing our schools

and they can't seem to grasp that they are the major contributors to the failures.

They don't support the teachers.
They continue to vote against more educational funding.
They see the educator's unions as "terra-ists"
They are bellicose when it comes to responsibility, but want to allow
for vouchers funding private education - where there is no
responsibility nor oversight.

Now they want to dictate curriculum based on "moral values".

So many of the issues surrounding education in the U.S. could be solved if everyone would channel their energy and get behind the schools and support the teachers - rather than calling in to Sean Insanity and complaining.

[jhain]

11. THERE IS ANOTHER FACTOR

This is a big battle for us all....as Texas buys the most text books of any state the publishers will tend to push these texts on all schools.
You WILL be finding them in YOUR child's backpack sooner than later if this happens.
NOTHING but abstinence based 'Health' texts.
Nothing but creationism "science".
PUH.

Another reason I homeschool.

want more:

http://www.ncac.org/cen_news/cn95txtextbook.htm

[Sabriel]

15. I agree. This is very dangerous.

All it takes is a movement in one of the Big Three: FL, TX, CA, to produce a shift in textbooks nation-wide. Coming soon to a textbook near you: abstinence, Creationism-only, AIDS-as-plague, etc.

[Boudica]

12. Cox News Service Version

<http://www.statesman.com/news/content/auto/epaper/editions/friday/news_14b843f8a39222b5007b.html>
I attempted to link to the Cox News Service version of the article. This part of the story makes my blood boil. A quote from Terri Leo not in the AP version.
"Some of her suggestions, however, go beyond the marriage issue.

One passage in a teachers' edition says that "surveys indicate that 3 to 10 percent of the population is gay. No one knows for sure why some people are straight, some are bisexual and others are gay."

Leo wanted to replace those sentences with: "Opinions vary on why homosexuals, lesbians and bisexuals as a group are more prone to self-destructive behaviors like depression, illegal drug use and suicide."

"This is an effort that is both ridiculous and hateful, to essentially try to eliminate homosexuality from health textbooks," said Samantha Smoot, president of the Texas Freedom Network, an Austin group that monitors social conservatism in government. "

This is the war we face.

[Cerridwen]

13. They're BAAAAAAaaack.

Textbook Controversies
The Right has long looked to public school textbooks as a way of promoting its political agenda. Current right-wing strategies to influence textbook development have their origins in the 1960s, when Texas-based activists Mel and Norma Gabler first led a nationwide effort to purge public school texts of what they viewed as the "mental child abuse" of liberal ideas. The Gablers were among the first to recognize just how influential textbooks can be. As they put it, "Textbooks mold nations because they determine how a nation votes, what it becomes, and where it goes."

<snip>

Case Study: Texas Textbooks
In no other place is the Right's influence on textbooks so profound as it is in Texas. The Lone Star State is the country's second largest purchaser of public school textbooks. As a result, publishers often go out of their way to gain acceptance for their books in Texas. Publisher efforts to cater to conservative tastes in Texas have a national impact - a fact not lost on the state's right wing. As the field director of ultraconservative Texas Citizens for a Sound Economy puts it, "The bottom line is that Texas and California are the biggest buyers of textbooks in the country, and what we adopt is what the rest of the country gets."

More here http://www.pfaw.org/pfaw/general/default.aspx?oid=3641

[drscm]

14. and war as killing foreigners for fun and profit, and environmentalism

as a commie pinko plot, and the the poor as a burden on society, and the wealthy as god's gift to ...

Oh, sorry. My sole reason for existence is to ensure proper sexual relations as I believe they should be.

[Judi Lynn]

16. Kicking !

[AZCat]

17. Am I to assume that the history books are next?

Behind the glossy photo of our dear leader on the front cover (halo in attendance, of course) will be no mention of those 'horrific years' when the nation went a little crazy. Social Security, Welfare, environmental law - all will be erased to prevent our young one's minds from being 'dirtied' by the filth of liberalism!


Remember - If you see a liberal, shoot it! It might be rabid.



</satire>

[VegasWolf]

19. Aren't they sticking Creationism in there for good measure? n/t

[Ilsa]

21. The real mandate...

is for all the fucking loony-toon bastards to come out of the fundie closet thinking we won't take names. Since Dimson's re-selection I've heard more of these idiots speak freely about Dominionism, Bush's Devine Right of Kings, etc. Their idiocy should be encouraged. Let's get it all out in the open so the the moderates can see what they're really like.