Texas discredits textbook

[moggie]

Article in the Columbia Missourian about conservative lobbying groups getting an environmental science textbook rejected for school use because it contains inconvenient facts. Extracts:

The groups had several qualms with Chiras’ book. They decried his assertion that Americans, only 5 percent of the world’s population, generate 25 percent of the greenhouse gases widely believed to contribute to global warming. They labeled him “anti-free enterprise” for describing American industries’ roles in environmental pollution, and they compared him to Osama bin Laden for noting the pollution caused by the country’s airlines.

Two other books were adopted instead, Chiras said. One, largely funded by the coal-mining industry, contains 62 pages on mining and only four paragraphs on its environmental impact. The other changed a time reference to avoid contradicting some fundamentalist Christians’ belief that the Earth was created 6,000 years ago. It amended a reference to ice ages from millions of years ago to read ice ages of the “distant past.”

Frey determines whether books point out errors in evolution theories, support Judeo-Christian values, advocate abstinence-only sex education and support capitalism. Failing to include such conservative values, Frey said, amounts to “errors of omission” and “errors of viewpoint discrimination.”

So, the battle isn't just over evolution. Want to get your textbook into schools? Don't present any facts which might upset conservatives, and be sure to bang the drum for conservative values.

[rodeodance]

1. this is one reason why schools are failing.

[Rude Horner]

2. Disgusting, isn't it?

When I was a kid, I always thought textbooks were filled with facts. How naive I was. You've got it exactly right. Textbooks nowadays are screened before they're release, and they take out all the stuff that these groups find offensive, regardless of any facts.

Makes me sick to my stomach, the bullshit we're passing on to future generations.
:puke:

[bluestateguy]

3. textbooks are a political hot potato in Texas

As the 2nd biggest state, the books that are adopted here set a trend for the rest of the country.

[sakabatou]

12. I smell book-burnings

[flamin lib]

4. These are the same people who decry the quality of public

schools and wonder why the US is so far behind in the Math and Science skills needed by business.

A pox on religion! But only a small pox, please . . .

[Rude Horner]

5. It's years and years of brainwashing

our society into the belief that it's us and them. American is the perfect country. We have no faults. And that's the freeper's mentality, I have to say. I think liberals are far more willing to admit that our history isn't perfect and that we can always make things better for the future. Repukes want to wave the flag, believe that we're the best, believe we've never done anything wrong, and don't want any facts getting in the way of those beliefs.

[CrispyQ]

6. What's that bumper sticker?

The last time religion ruled the world it was called the dark ages.

[zbdent]

7. I'd be careful about going into the fields of

biology, geology, astronomy, among others . . . basically, science.

Unless I get a guaranteed contract teaching at a private school (hah! They won't pay much . . .)

[ThoughtCriminal]

8. I get a huge kick out of conservatives who whine about

"Dumbing down". They wrote the textbook on that.

[OneBlueSky]

9. this actually has implications beyond Texas . . .

because Texas is such a big state and purchases so many textbooks, they're actually influencing what publishers include (and omit) in science, social studies, and other texts that are used not only there, but throughout the nation . . . not a good thing for quality education . . .

[agincourt]

10. Inconvenient facts

That seems to be the thing that gets these people riled up. Inconvenient truth.

[mopinko]

11. how texas goes, so goes the rest of the schools

since the late 70's texas nutjobs have been dumbing down and slanting the text books. and they have gotten their money's worth. look around at the idiots who think this is a christian country. how the twig is bent, yada yada.