The Associated Press
Matthew LaClair of Kearny, N.J. says his school's American government textbook has a conservative bias.
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Posted 33 weeks 5 days ago
Is your high school textbook politically biased?
A high-school senior in New Jersey has raised questions about political bias in a popular textbook on U.S. government, and legal scholars and top scientists say the teen's criticism is well-founded. They say ''American Government'' by conservatives James Wilson and John Dilulio presents a skewed view of topics from global warming to separation of church and state. Are your child's high school textbooks biased?
Thoughts
Historicism and Lies
Submitted on April 9th, 2008 by Chuck_JohnsonI subscribe to a utilitarian view of education. We don't spend a lot of time studying the flat earthers and so we shouldn't spend a disproportionate amount of the time studying Marx.
I don't have any problem studying Marx, but there was no antidote. In fact, there was Bellamy, and of course, more Marx.
Few people even heard of Milton Friedman or F.A. Hayek. No one read Ayn Rand.
Why should they study Zinn? Zinn has been throughly debunked. Wilson is a serious and reputable historian. You don't always have the time to teach both. (As an aside, I wonder how you would feel about teaching both evolution and intelligent design.)
The following is a list of myths I had to endure in high school.
1. The New Deal ended the Great Depression
2. Upton Sinclair and Teddy Roosevelt dragged the meat packing industry kicking and screaming into regulation.
3. "Social Darwinism" was invented by Herbert Spencer as a justification for racism and greed.
4. The Pledge of Allegiance was written by a socialist.
5. Separation of Church and state (which isn't Constitution) means alienation of church and state.
6. The Gilded Age was an example of government non-intervention in big business.
There are others too, but those are just the ones that come to the top of my head.
Chuck Johnson is a student at Claremont McKenna College. Feel free to contact him.
You had to study Marx?
Submitted on April 9th, 2008 by JoelGosh, that's awful that you had to read a guy whose thoughts helped shape the 20th century.
Don't get me wrong, if your teacher was endorsing Marxism -- and let me just say I have my doubts -- then that would be nutty. But understanding a historic figure in his own words; probably not a bad idea.
As for the rest of it: I think students should study Wilson AND Zinn. Let them realize that history isn't static, never settled, and teach them how to think critically about it. Might make the classes more interesting.
I would have killed to read James Q. Wilson
Submitted on April 9th, 2008 by Chuck_JohnsonInstead, I was stuck with Zinn, Marx, and a bunch of other loons. Politically correct fictions that the Founders were influenced by the Iroquois Confederacy and the obsession with slavery sadly characterizes most classrooms today.
In middle school, I had to debate whether Columbus was a mass murderer or involved in a genocidal project.
Noam Chomsky and others are routine texts for anyone studying the Middle East.
To even suggest that history has a right-wing bias is to be out of touch with reality given how much politically correct curriculum committees have become.
Chuck Johnson is a student at Claremont McKenna College. Feel free to contact him.
History Books
Submitted on April 9th, 2008 by cowphotoPeople of all walks of life, race, creed, and color have been trying to change history for years. Rather it is for politics or personal gain or because they can as in the case of my son's Colorado history teacher. It didn't matter what might have been written in that textbook, because he never gave it to the students just made up stuff everyday. My son has now graduated from college and the only thing he knows of his states history is the story of Alfred Packer the cannibal.