Category: Courts / Laws / legal

FL Defends Ban On African-American History Course

FL Defends Ban On African-American History Course

CNN reports:

Florida rejected a proposed Advanced Placement course focused on African American Studies because it included study of topics like the Movement for Black Lives, Black feminism and reparations, according to a list of concerns provided to CNN on Friday by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ office.

The state also said the course framework for the study of reparations – the argument to compensate Black Americans for slavery and other historical atrocities and oppressive acts – includes “no critical perspective or balancing opinion in this lesson.”

The state Department of Education on January 12 informed the College Board, the organization that oversees the Advanced Placement program, that the course violated state law and rejected its inclusion in Florida schools.

Read the full article.

 

Bruno2 days ago

Interpreted: you can’t teach about racism unless you teach that racism could be fine.

Paddycakes2001 2 days ago

I wrote up an acceptable black history curriculum for Florida:

– Once upon a time, there was a kind of embarrassing practice where some people were forced to do jobs — even though it wasn’t as bad as some people like to say. And the same thing existed in Africa too, so it wasn’t the Americans’ fault.

– All of the divinely-inspired Founding Fathers wanted to end it.

– Eventually, the North invaded the South, and the South fought back valiantly. But the North overwhelmed it by throwing overwhelming, sacrificed bodies of soldiers at the brave defenders — who only wanted to be able to have their own laws and culture without woke, federal interference.

– Then the North told all those workers they didn’t have jobs anymore.

-The North tried to make those people serve in government for about 10 years, but everyone agreed that it was a disaster, and things went back to normal.

– Those people liked to call themselves “colored.” Some of them had some good qualities like Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass, who were both Republicans and loved guns. They opposed the Ku Klux Klan, which was created by the Democrat Party.

– Eventually, there was a guy named George Washington Carver. He invented peanut butter. He was also a Republican.

– Not much happened for a long time. Eventually there was the great Martin Luther King, Jr. He was a Republican too. He taught everyone that it is wrong to talk, or even think, about skin color.

– Then Obama became president and brought Democrat racism back.

Tim 🇺🇦2 days ago

“FL Defends Ban On African-American History Course”

It’s fucking indefensible… period.

🇺🇦 Bayside Lucas  Tim 🇺🇦a day ago

……

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Sam_Handwich 2 days ago

When your political base is old, low info white people…

Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️  Sam_Handwich2 days ago

aka.
Poorly educated.

Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️  Sam_Handwich 2 days ago

Even his hand gestures are Trumpian…

Guest   Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️ 2 days ago

They don’t look all that old in the pictures. Don’t blame old people, blame racists.

JCF   Guesta day ago

If you’re talking about the pic at the top of the thread, a bunch of those are minors who have been GROOMED.

DreadPikathulhu 2 days ago edited

It isn’t African American Studies if it includes balancing perspectives from the Klan.

It isn’t LGBT studies if it includes balancing perspectives from the Westboro Baptist Church

It isn’t Native American studies if it includes balancing perspectives from George Armstrong Custer

It isn’t Women’s Studies if it includes balancing perspectives from known grabber-in-chief Donald Trump.

kelven2 days ago

The truth is the truth no matter how many people deny it. A lie is still a lie no matter how many people believe it. I’m paraphrasing someone there.

Houndentenor a day ago

DeSantis with a sign that says Freedom from Indoctrination? That’s some Orwellian shit right there.

heleninedinburgh 2 days ago edited

‘The course neglects to mention that in the Civil War there were very fine people on both sides.’

JackFknTwist 2 days ago edited

So tell me, what’s the ‘balancing opinion’ on slavery?
Maybe, “it wasn’t all bad”?

Or ‘there were some good Nazis’.
The drift towards revisionist history must be crushed.

amy cuscuriae  JackFknTwista day ago edited

Neo-Confederates in the US have been pushing their bizarre ,revisionist history of the Civil War and slavery for as long as I can remember.. This is the first tine a state government has turned those lies into an official state sanctioned history..

The thing is, every revisionist lie about slavery, and the cause of the Civil War they tell is contradicted by contemporary documents from the Civil War: the articles of session by the various states, the constitution of the Confederacy, the Congressional record of the Confederacy, public speeches by confederates, such as the infamous Cornerstone Speech.

billbear1961   JackFknTwista day ago edited

(2) I wonder how long it will be before they decide to give Holocaust-deniers “equal time.”

billbear1961   JackFknTwista day ago

If the media examined what happened in the Nazi murder camps using the “both sides” approach they’ve adopted today, they wouldn’t denounce the Holocaust as evil. They’d tell us what happened and then insist on getting the Nazis’ “point of view.”

jugomono2 days ago

This story just hit it home to me how really frightening floriduh & the US is becoming.

billbear1961 2 days ago

A previous draft version of the concerns sent to CNN by DeSantis’ office included an objection to the study of “The Black Power Movement and The Black Panther Party.” The draft version asserted that “The Black Panther Party (BPP) was based on the ideology of Marxism- Leninism. Goal of the BPP was to fundamentally change or overthrow the American government.” However, in an updated version of the state’s concerns, the references to the Black Panther Party were removed and replaced with an objection to the study of “Black Queer Studies.”

There is NOTHING in education, especially higher education, that students should not be exposed to so they have a good knowledge of WHAT IT IS. That is what education is about, for Christ’s sake, not keeping people in ignorance! Any student of history, certainly of U.S. history, should know what the Black Panther Party was. Any high school student should be familiar with what it was, should know what Marxist-Leninism is! And why should they not be made familiar with contributions made to society by gay people in the Black community?!

Lazycrockett2 days ago

All the other AP classes that addressed different ethnic and cultural aspects were allowed to continue however.

Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️2 days ago

If we can’t learn it…
Then did it ever exist?

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vermont quebec border lizard 2 days ago

Florida is southern/rebel state. The south hasn’t changed at the government level.

SFExPat   vermont quebec border lizard a day ago

Doesn’t seem to have changed much st the ordinary people/voters level.

Dave B 2 days ago

This is worth your time to read.

THE CASE FOR REPARATIONS

Two hundred fifty years of slavery. Ninety years of Jim Crow. Sixty years of separate but equal. Thirty-five years of racist housing policy. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.
By Ta-Nehisi Coates

https://www.theatlantic.com…

Ninja09802 days ago

Once again, a fuck you to anyone in FL who screams about how horrible socialism is while you cheer shit like this.

HZ812 days ago

I am just embarrassed this is happening in 2023. Beyond. Sickened, too.

Flagrant racism. That’s our GOP. Just disgusting bigots at their core.

 

jk1052 days ago

I went to university at one of NYC’s city colleges and it was possible to major in religion. In fact it is possible to major in religion at many public universities. I probably disagree with much of what is taught in thise departments, but I would never approve of the state banning the classes. Which is just another example of how the right wing engages in cancel culture and stifling free speech. Yet the media would have us believe the left engages in it.

Franciscan   jk1052 days ago

People who go to religious seminaries often emerge questioning their former religious beliefs and even becoming atheists. Not necessarily a bad thing.

 

Let’s talk about Alec Baldwin, charges, and lessons….

Let’s talk about the differences between the Biden and Trump cases….

New Arkansas Bill Could Ban White Chicks, Mrs. Doubtfire & Mulan?

Florida lawmakers consider extending Don’t Say Gay law up to sixth grade

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2023/01/florida-lawmakers-consider-extending-dont-say-gay-law-sixth-grade/

What the right is claiming is any discussion of gay, trans, or same sex couples is sexualizing kids.    Even talking about the existence of same sex families and of gay / trans kids in class is harmful to kids.   It again is the Russian model and it is easier to pass regressive restrictions on society if you claim it is to protect kids.   We all want to protect kids, but the truth is the right only wants to protect straight white Christian kids.  The rest are going to hell anyway and might even have demons in them.   This will not stop until they get what they want, a regressive white straight Christian state that enforces their view of religious values.   Rufo has admitted the goal is to make New College over in the image of a deeply conservative Christian school, and use it as the model for all education systems.   And they are coming for the entire country unless people wake up and fight against them now.  Oh and the point is to indoctrinate the kids and then the public in the deeply right republican mode of how society must be without exceptions.   the indoctrination they claim they are fight the left over is inclusion, diversity, and tolerance of others.   That is something the right is fighting with all they have.  They cannot have acceptance or even tolerance of those different from themselves.    We must not let them win this fight and become the US Taliban.    Hugs

A DeSantis staffer often expresses his belief that “the purpose of our education system is to educate kids, not indoctrinate kids.”
 
By  
Gov. Ron DeSantis
Gov. Ron DeSantisPhoto: Shutterstock

The office of Florida Gov. DeSantis (R) has confirmed that the anti-LGBTQ+ governor is supportive of extending the stipulations of the state’s Don’t Say Gay law – known formally as the Parental Rights in Education Act.

Right now, the law bans discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity up to third grade, and a staffer for the state’s Senate President Kathleen Passidomo (R) told The Daily Mail that lawmakers are thinking about introducing legislation to expand the law up to sixth grade.

In a press conference in December, Passidomo expanded on this, saying that she doesn’t think she’d “be supportive of high school because kids in high school are, hopefully, a little more mature, or at least they should be, but you know, the middle school, maybe go up to 6th grade or something like that.”

DeSantis Press Secretary Bryan Griffin then said that “The governor would certainly consider the merits of such a bill in final form if it comes to his desk as a product of the forthcoming legislation session.”

Griffin said DeSantis often expresses his belief that “the purpose of our education system is to educate kids, not indoctrinate kids.”

In addition to banning classroom instruction on LGBTQ+ issues up to third grade, the law as it currently stands also requires in vague terms that discussions on the topic in older grades be “developmentally appropriate.”

Instead of defining those terms, the bill allows parents to sue schools if they believe the law was violated.

DeSantis’s support for increasing the age range for the Don’t Say Gay law is not a surprise, as he has made it clear he is virulently opposed to protecting LGBTQ+ students.

In December, it was revealed that DeSantis helped members of the anti-LGBTQ+ group Moms for Liberty get elected to local school boards in his state.

An educational anti-censorship expert says this development is part of DeSantis’ plan to shift his state’s schools toward a conservative ideology. With Moms for Liberty in control, curricula will exclude LGBTQ+-inclusive and anti-racist education.

And more recently, DeSantis appointed the far-right anti-LGBTQ+ activist Christopher Rufo to the board of trustees of the New College of Florida – a school with a reputation for being progressive and queer-friendly.

Rufo told the New York Times the board is planning a “top-down restructuring” of the school that will involve designing “a new core curriculum from scratch.”

“If we can take this high-risk, high-reward gambit and turn it into a victory,” he said, “we’re going to see conservative state legislators starting to reconquer public institutions all over the United States.”

 

Florida Universities Are Renaming Their Courses

Florida Universities Are Renaming Their Courses

Yet the right says the democrats are the ones indoctrinating students.   These are upper levels of schooling, college and universities, that they are removing any talk of equality, racism, and so much more.   Professors having to scrub their courses and presentations of anything that might upset the ruler / dictator DeathSantis.   Imagine this country wide.   Talk about the Taliban or moral / vice police.  This is stunning and worse it is not getting any national attention or scrutiny.   It is scary how fascist the state of Florida has become in several short years.  With DeathSantis making Florida a maga white Christian paradise the state is being flooded with intolerant people who won’t accept any social advance since the 1850s.  Plus notice the drive is to make a public school be just like a conservative Christian college.   Hugs

 

The Orlando Sentinel reports:

Yovanna Pineda, hired more than a decade ago to teach Latin American history at the University of Central Florida, rebranded one of her signature courses last fall. Striking references to “dictatorships” and “human rights” from the title, she decided to simply call her class “History of South America.”

Pineda said many of her colleagues are making similar changes, either because they fear blowback from state leaders who say they are trying to eliminate “indoctrination” from university campuses or because they don’t want the hassle of additional scrutiny.

DeSantis continued his campaign last week, appointing far-right activist Christopher Rufo to the Board of Trustees at New College of Florida. Rufo is best known for launching a national campaign against critical race theory. Rufo told The New York Times he and his new colleagues seek to transform New College into a public version of Michigan’s Hillsdale College, a conservative Christian school.

Read the full article. That’s Rufo standing appropriately on the far-right in the screenshot above.

zheraan hour ago

“Freedom from indoctrination”

Double-speak, much?

Ninja0980a few seconds from now

If you want to see true hypocrisy, look no further then Cuban Republicans in FL who scream about how evil socialism and Castro are while applauding everything DeSantis does.
They hate socialism but love fascism.

zhera Ragnar Lothbrokan hour ago

It’s terrifying! I fear for you Americans.

JoeMyGodModan hour ago

Like openly gay Florida state Rep. Carlos Smith (seen above), I am a graduate of UCF, which is now the nation’s largest public university by enrollment.

jeffg166 clayan hour ago

Accreditation may just become a problem for Florida schools as they try to muzzle thinking.

TrollopeReader jeffg16629 minutes ago

aren’t accreditations done by regional groups? So as FL / GA / the Deep South grow less “tolerant” the agency will just go along?

Jay Silversmithan hour ago

The Grievance On Parade party.

heleninedinburgh2 hours ago edited

So the ‘academic freedom’ they’re so loudly in favour of just means the ability of professors to use slurs and misgender their students without being talked to by HR.
I mean we knew that, but nice to see it actually being confirmed in real time.

weshlovrcman hour ago

In the Fascist State of Florida, the remaking of education continues on course. Henceforth, all institutions of learning will be used to groom children into fascism and eliminate anything that does not support/agree with fascist theory.

J.Martindale2 hours ago

“Freedom from indoctrination” by stifling free speech. The irony of it all!

J.Martindalean hour ago

What I don’t understand is why the ACLU or some other organization hasn’t brought suit against the governor for violation of the First Amendment. This is exactly what the amendment was designed to prohibit: governmental interference with free speech.

bambinoitaliano2 hours ago

Why even send your children to Florida universities at this point. Soon none of the institution live up to the normal standard of operation. Moron Death Sentence is hell bend on turning Florida into a shit hole state.

TexasBoy2 hours ago edited

What good is college if they can’t present alternative views and stimulate the students analytical thinking to make up their own minds.

This is what stimulates creativity, abstract views, and new inventions to improve everyones lives.

Republicans….taking us back to the Middle Ages without the need for a flux capacitor.

Melissia TexasBoyan hour ago

Simple.

If they cannot stimulate the students’ minds, then they shall be indoctrination centers for capitalism.

There is no such thing as an apolitical education, it either serves to liberate men or make them slaves.

J.Martindale2 hours ago

And the administrations of these schools are unable to protect academic freedom for their professors because of fear of retribution and firing. DeSantis is Big Brother.

JT2 hours ago

“A History of Our Lord and Savior DeSantis”

John Tan hour ago

Imagine living in a state where you can get in trouble for criticizing dictators in a classroom lecture.

Leftyan hour ago edited

He is scary evil. Dog help us if when he runs for president.

What, me worry?an hour ago

Welcome to 1984 and Newspeak. Double-plus good!

Frankly, I can hardly wait to flush this timeline down the Memory Hole.

TexasBoy2 hours ago edited

All public educators, at all grade levels, should simply walk out. There is no way Florida would be able to replace every single teacher and college professor in the state. The federal government would be forced to step in.

The goal is to erase gay and trans people and return society to a straights only time these people enjoyed. It also is about regulating what other people can see or read.

russian warship go fucck yrslf3 minutes ago

OT, but not just school libraries. public libraries
https://twitter.com/Esqueer…

GOP proposes anti-drag bill that classifies gender non-conforming performers as “adult oriented”

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2023/01/gop-proposes-anti-drag-bill-classifies-gender-non-conforming-performers-adult-oriented/

Clothing is scary for republicans it seems.    Pants on women, dresses on men, I wonder they don’t freak out about ear rings on men or long hair.    Stupid, pure stupidity, rather than work on real issues they want to worry about what other people wear.    Hugs

The Arkansas GOP thinks if you’re gender non-conforming and tell a dirty joke, you’re like a sex worker.
 
By  
drag show bans, drag queen performers, censorship, Republicans, laws, legislation
Photo: Shutterstock

Arkansas state Sen. Gary Stubblefield (R) has filed a bill that would classify drag queens as employees of an “adult-oriented business,” similar to nude models, porn actors, and sex workers.

The bill would put restrictions on transgender and non-binary people singing and dancing in public. It would also require bars, restaurants, shops, and theaters to relocate if they allow such behavior from people of those identities or anything resembling drag.

The bill, S.B. 43, defines a drag performance as one in which a performer “exhibits a gender identity that is different from the performer’s gender assigned at birth using clothing, makeup, or other accessories that are traditionally worn by members of… the performer’s opposite sex,” and performs a song or dance “intended to appeal to the prurient interest” in front of an audience of two or more people.

By this broad definition, a transgender or non-binary person singing a song about lovemaking, reciting a sexual story, or gyrating while dancing would be legally considered the same as a sex worker or someone having sex on camera. In fact, the law would consider any person doing these things as someone who works for an “adult-oriented business” if they wore anything not associated with the sex they were assigned at birth.

The law would also redefine an adult-oriented business as any place where such a performance occurs. This would include bars, restaurants, and any places that allow gender non-conforming individuals to sing, dance, or otherwise perform.

The state’s zoning laws would require such businesses to be relocated outside of areas where children can easily view them.

Legislators from at least seven states — Arizona, Idaho, Michigan, Montana, Missouri, Tennessee, and Texas — have proposed anti-drag laws in recent months, according to Bloomberg Law. Republican legislators in these states claim that drag shows “sexualize children” even though such performances rarely ever feature sexual content.

The proposed legislation would almost certainly be challenged in court soon after being signed into law since it violates constitutional protections for free speech. But the real aims of such laws are to silence LGBTQ+ allies and generate outrage against the LGBTQ+ community.

Their proposed legislation has also emboldened neo-Nazis, Proud Boys, white supremacists, and other anti-LGBTQ+ activists to issue death threats against businesses and public libraries that hold all-ages drag events. At least 124 incidents targeting drag events were reported in 2022 far this year across 47 U.S. states, according to the LGBTQ+ media watchdog group GLAAD.

 
 

NE Bill Would Criminalize Taking Kids To Drag Shows

NE Bill Would Criminalize Taking Kids To Drag Shows

News Channel Nebraska reports:

A bill proposed in the unicameral would place limitations on who can watch drag shows in Nebraska. The bill would ban anyone under 19 from watching a drag show, and it would prohibit anyone under 21 from watching drag shows where alcohol is present.

LB371 was introduced by Republican State Sen. Dave Murman and is already stirring debate in the Legislature. Democratic State Sen. Megan Hunt has filed a motion to postpone the bill indefinitely, a decision that is still pending.

Anyone who knowingly brings someone underage to a show would be subject to a misdemeanor. The entities themselves would be subject to a $10,000 fine per violation. The bill would also make it illegal to use state funds to host a drag show.

Read the full article.

 

Paddycakes20012 hours ago

Looking for the silver lining, this means parents can’t take kids to church anymore, right?

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liondon#traitor-ex-president7 hours ago

Guns kill thousands pf kids yearly and pedophile clergy prey on thousands more… so eff these mofo’s.

Strolling In, Softly Whistling7 hours ago

I bet they’re not banning child beauty pageants, though.

Uncle Mark Strolling In, Softly Whistling7 hours ago

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charemor Uncle Mark3 hours ago

I wonder what these kids think about this as they grow older and mature.

Zorba Strolling In, Softly Whistling7 hours ago

I’ve always thought that these child beauty pageants were pedophiles’ dreams.
{Sigh}

Moms for Liberty say they’d like to see Parental Rights in Education law expanded

Moms for Liberty say they’d like to see Parental Rights in Education law expanded

And so the haters / republicans / right wing pushes it further.   Really it is turning the clock back.  It is regressive.   It is denying every advance in society and in medical science since the 1950s.   Ask your self why that age / time stamp is so attractive to republican males?   Because everyone but them were oppressed and they had unfettered control.    Hug

 

Advocates want the bill to forbid discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity to 8th grade.

The Florida chapter of Moms for Liberty, the conservative nonprofit that advocates for parental rights in schools, would like state lawmakers to expand the state law that restricts classroom instruction about gender identity and sexual orientation for children from kindergarten through the third grade.

The Parental Rights in Education law, dubbed “Don’t Say Gay” by its critics, ignited a firestorm of criticism among Democrats and LGBTQ advocates and received national attention after it was introduced and later signed into law last year.

“We are advocating to increase that as far as ages and grades to have it be K-8,” said Angela Dubach, the Pinellas County chapter chair of the organization, speaking to the members of the Pinellas County legislative delegation as they met as a group on Wednesday morning at the Clearwater branch campus of St. Petersburg College.

A group of students, parents, and teachers filed a lawsuit last year to block the measure from being implemented, alleging it is unconstitutional in part because it “chills speech and expression that have any connection, however remote, to sexual orientation or gender identity.”

Brandon Wolf, press secretary for Equality Florida, slammed the idea.

 

“At every step of the way, right-wing extremists have gaslit the community about its insatiable desire for censorship and erasure of LGBTQ people,” he told the Phoenix in an email.

“They insisted that the Don’t Say LGBTQ law would be narrow in scope and limited to K-3, despite knowing that the law’s impacts would be far broader and more sweeping. Already, we’ve seen books with LGBTQ characters banned, ‘Safe Space’ stickers peeled from classroom windows, the contributions of LGBTQ people in history censored, and LGBTQ History Month itself rejected in districts across Florida,” he continued.

“The desire of right-wing groups like Moms for Liberty to wield more government censorship over more students is shameful and at odds with the bogus rationalization for this harmful policy they were peddling throughout 2022. LGBTQ people are a part of society’s fabric. We are your neighbors, family members, and friends. And our state should be a place committed to protecting all students and respecting all families.”

Four asks

The expansion of that law was one of four proposals that Dubach called on lawmakers to consider going into the 2023 legislative session. Dubach said that she’d also like legislators to “take a look” at expanding the timeline on legislation signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2021 that bans private employers and government entities from implementing COVID-19 vaccine mandates and school districts from requiring face masks. The measure is slated to expire on June 1.

 

Another measure that the Florida chapter of Moms for Liberty supports relates to school board races.

“Myself and our organization supports partisan school board elections,” Dubach said. “That’s something that we are asking you to take a look at. I was originally told that we’d have to change the Florida Constitution so we wouldn’t be able to do that, so if you could advise me on that that’d be wonderful.”

Measures have been filed in both the House and Senate this year calling for a constitutional amendment to require members of a district school board to be chosen in partisan elections. If approved, it would go into effect in 2026.

Florida voters voted overwhelmingly in 1998 to make school board races nonpartisan, and efforts to put such an amendment on the ballot have failed in recent legislative sessions. But that was before Gov. DeSantis weighed in on the topic last summer and endorsed 30 candidates in school board races, the majority of whom won either in their Primary or General Election contests last year.

The last item Dubach mentioned was “some type of legislation” around the amount of mental health funding that public schools in Florida receive.

“Right now, Pinellas County schools have $140 million allocated for mental health, and I talk to teacher after teacher after teacher and they say, ‘We are not mental health counselors. We want to educate these children and get them ready for the next grade,’” Dubach told the group of legislators. “They don’t want anything to do with mental health. That is up to the parents, their doctors, and all of that stuff is at home.”

The Phoenix reached out to the Pinellas County School District to confirm those financial figures but did not immediately receive a response.  State lawmakers have five more weeks of committee meetings scheduled between now and the official beginning of the legislative session on March 7.