Edge reports on the Texas School Board’s hijacking of textbooks:
The Texas School Board’ approval of a revised social studies curriculum has sparked controversy because LGBT-specific references are conspicuously absent.
Critics have described the revisions as “whitewashed” and “a warped perspective of history,” and Democratic board member Mavis Knight seemed to suggest some of her more conservative colleagues are indeed homophobic.
“They’re always bashing homosexuals,” she said matter-of-factly. “I listen to them talk and I can read between the lines.”
Voting 10-5 along party lines, the board approved changes that include renaming capitalism as free-enterprise and emphasizing the right to bear arms. The board also struck down proposals to mention Tejano historical figures and examine of Thomas Jefferson’ writings and separation of church of state. The panel also removed references to hip-hop music as a significant cultural movement, and it included the conservative renaissance of the 1980s and 1990s, the founding of the National Rifle Association, the Heritage Foundation and the Moral Majority.
Author Wayne Besen, who is the executive director of Truth Wins Out, believes these changes are not good for LGBT students.
“At best they’re going to be ignored, and at worse they’re going to be villainized,” he said. “It’ going to be a disaster where we’re going to be marginalized and rendered invisible, and the places we do pop up are going to be as sick, or freakish or a threat to morality.”
