The left's Florida freak-out
The Left and its media allies are now issuing a continuous stream of falsehoods about Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL). Most recently, in a kid-gloved interview with Vice President Kamala Harris, NBC News's host Andrea Mitchell claimed in contradiction of all reasonable evidence that DeSantis had banned the teaching of "slavery and the aftermath of slavery" in Florida schools. This is 180 degrees at odds with the truth. Florida's state history guidelines specifically require slavery and continued racism through the Jim Crow South to be taught in all public schools.
If Florida's history guidelines are online for all to see, why is Mitchell misrepresenting them? The story begins with a Florida law enacted last July requiring schools to vet all the reading materials in their libraries and to publish a list of books to which students have access — the law that led to what has been dubbed "the Great Florida classroom library freakout of 2023." Such a policy would not have been needed if the Left did not display a disturbingly persistent desire and determination to introduce completely inappropriate sexual topics to children at younger and younger ages. That persistence and determination led activists to shout down or persecute anyone who tried to protect childhood innocence.
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Some teachers nevertheless reacted to the Manatee and Duvall boards' poorly worded notice with what might be called "malicious compliance." Abandoning common sense and choosing "Literacy Week" for their disingenuous display of pique, they removed books that were obviously unobjectionable such as several by Dr. Seuss and others about baseball greats Jackie Robinson and Roberto Clemente, who were black. None of these could be thought offensive by reasonable people, but they were seen by the recalcitrant teachers as useful to turn public opinion against a commonsense ban on pornography in schools. As one maliciously complying teacher put it to CNN, "I think it is a stronger statement to cover [the books] up" than just to comply with the obvious spirit of the law, vet books that might fall into a gray area, and disclose to parents what books are on school library shelves. The Florida teachers' propaganda effort worked as intended by triggering a sympathetic freakout.
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The Florida law is not that hard to comprehend. What is hard to comprehend is why so many in the education establishment did not get it.
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