Enjoy.
Meanwhile, further conservative idiocy is afoot in in Arizona's state legislature. Thayer Verschoor, Republican majority leader of the Arizona State Senate, intoduced a bill last week that would "discipline, fine or fire educators for speaking about elections, legislation, judicial action or 'a social, political or culture issue that is a matter of partisan controversy,'" according to the Arizona Daily Star. What does that mean? Unfortunately the bill doesn't contain much in the way of details.
What is clear is that this bill is Verschoor's attempt to reverse that terrible trend in public education: teaching critical thinking.
The bill prohibits instructors from advocating "one side of a social, political or cultural issue that is a matter of partisan controversy," but it doesn't offer any definitions.
Evolution, global warming, foreign policy, voting rights, education policy - the list of verboten topics could be endless. So loosely is the bill written that a teacher who plays devil's advocate to prod a student to think more critically and refine his or her position might be accused of breaking the law.
Verschoor's bill would discourage teachers from offering opinions in class about the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education that desegregated public schools.
Verschoor also said, "You don't need to be in a science class and have someone telling you whether Bill Clinton is or isn't a great president." However, if students are to learn about the real-life effects of environmental policy, then it's perfectly appropriate to mention Clinton or any other president. We do wonder, however, if Verschoor's outrage would reach the same intensity if the president being praised in the classroom had views closer to his own.
Incidentally, the bill would also make it illegal to "hamper or impede the lawful access of military recruiters to campus." Combine that with Verschoor's assault on critical thinking and it's pretty clear that he does not view schools as places from which young people can gain an education, but as factories for teenage cannon-fodder.
Critical thinking: outlawed!
Le prochain move logique est de renommer les écoles des camps d'entraînement pour jeunes patriotes. Le fascisme gagne du terrain aux USA.
