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Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

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Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#401

Post by mfer »

nobody9999 wrote: post #387
mfer wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First, let me say that I'm not attempting to give my own opinion on the direction that folks should go in. I'm most interested in bringing awareness as to what's going on so we can have deeper understanding and discussion. With the school his is from, look at what their vision isn't. It's not to create well educated people who can excel at their jobs. Their vision isn't to create people who are self sustaining adults…

>Their vision is to get people civically engaged around certain forms of change. >The specific forms of change are not agreed to as a culture in the US. This is an area where we don't have good in depth thoughtful conversations, either. That's not what you initially said, nor do I understand how "civic engagement" is ever a bad thing. In fact, we need lots more of it. You are applying ("The specific forms of change a…

To try and be more clear, I'm not attempting to give my own opinion on what should happen with regard to these topics. I'm attempting to highlight the disconnect. To get closer to a root of what's happening. This is from direct conversations with people across the political spectrum and from reading about it.

> Discouraging civic engagement for any reason is bad, IMHO.

When we deal with things there are priorities. What's the most important, what's less important, what's mildly important, etc.

Where does pushing for civic engagement relate priority wise with things like being able to handle your finances as an adult? Or being able to take care of your home? Or being able to hold a job? Or being prepared for college (if that's your route)?

The vision, in this case, points to civic engagement. It leaves out the others which makes them less of a priority.

Now, relate that to things like skilled trades. That's not something you need a college degree for and doing those jobs doesn't relate to being civically engaged. Many schools don't provide the foundation for people to even start in skilled trades even though we have a lack of skilled trades folks that's growing.

This is a simple angle for priorities.

Even within Civic Engagement there are priorities. Who gets to choose the priorities to steer the kids into? At what age does the steering start? Who gets to prioritize that?

Should it be university professors putting together programs for teachers to go through? Then those teachers implement those ideas with their students? Should it be the general public opinions?

Priorities are multi-dimensional. The leaders who lead our school leaders are setting the agenda. And, there are a bunch of people who disagree with that.

Again, please note, I'm not stating my opinion on these topics. I'm trying to highlight a little deeper on the root.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#402

Post by danaris »

mrguyorama wrote: post #392
danaris wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Posted elsewhere in the discussion, but that ended up being on a dead thread) There is a strong movement afoot to define any material teaching about 1) consent (whether it mentions sex or not) 2) the child's own body (in ways designed to help them recognize and avoid things like sexual abuse) 3) queer issues of any kind, but especially trans issues as pornographic, regardless of the actual content, so that they can…

Remember that the conservative take for decades was "if we allow gays to marry, what's next, allowing dogs to get married? Or people to marry kids?" Conservatives have been pushing to make being gay or trans or queer in any way to be morally equivalent or at least directly leading to pedophilia forever.

...And while I honestly never would have believed it a decade ago, it's becoming increasingly and horrifyingly clear just how much of that is naked projection. So much has come out recently about their complicity in both committing and covering up child sexual abuse, and yet due to the prevalence of Fox News and the advent of the "post-truth era", their base—who supposedly cares very deeply about that sort of thing—simply waves it off as at best a left-wing smear campaign, and at worst, well, one or two of them may have done some stuff, but that's nothing compared to Pizzagate, right??!

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#403

Post by motohagiography »

crooked-v wrote: post #346
motohagiography wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can make a charitable case for it. It's mandatory state/public education, so the curriculum is legislated and kids are forced to be there, and to start, we have a captive audience. The subject legislation was in response to some arguably extreme cases where there is a concerted effort to distribute lgbtq pornography to kids as a way to use critical theories to shift social norms around sexuality, but uniquely using…

> some activists are using pornography as a vehicle to inject this critical narrative into the sexual developent of school children Which activists would those be, and what pornography?

There isn't a bland news source that covers the stories of parents reading the explicit content out loud from books at their kids' schools at school board meetings, but it is common enough that Florida responded to it with legislation. If you would like to track down the stories that made the legislation viable, those instances are where I would recommend starting. The most recent example in the news was from a controversy in California about the governor's wife's charity being used to distribute similar material through the school system.

Toward quality discussion, the culture war issue over this isn't just about provincials banning books and how it's a symbolic faux pas, there are very real networks and NGOs coordinating to spread this specific ideology as a means to destablize societies so as to coopt and dominate them, using a really old playbook, and the tools themselves are the conflict and outrage itself, not the details of what those are about. The Florida legislation isn't just a sop to a reactionary base, it's strategic by people who have just begun to fight something they recognize as much worse. When you stop seeing your opponents as merely ignorant and realize they're being as smart and strategic as you are, it's a very different perspective.

For background, I would read Arendt and Solzhenitsyn who saw it first hand, and as a foundation for what current writers like Mattias Desmet, and in a more accessibly popular sense James Lindsay have been writing about with significant depth. All of them write about how popular movements with good and sincere intentions are co-opted and used as vassals for one much more dangerous movement.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#404

Post by ccn0p »

dvlsg wrote: post #305
anon291 wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How to vote: (1) register, (2) vote. What is difficult about this? If you cannot follow through from 1 -> 2, you really should not vote.

Voter disenfranchisement has been part of the playbook for a long time now. Take this issue for example - if this passes, and a teacher gets a felony from suggesting a book off of the pre approved list, they probably can't vote anymore.

Most felons in Florida are allowed to vote [1].

[1] https://www.findlaw.com/voting/my-voting-guide/can-felons-vo...

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#405

Post by fnordpiglet »

notch656c wrote: post #125
fnordpiglet wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Felony inflation is rampant, and horrendous.

It's to make sure you can't be re-licensed in a profession, like teaching. Anywhere.

A felony also prevents you from doing a great many things, like finding any job or renting or most anything. We have built a society that punishes conviction for life, long after the punishment has been served. Add to that we’ve been making more and more misdemeanors felonies, we are producing a society of misery.

These people are just cruel and self serving. They are scoring points by being more and more radical and destroying lives in exchange. They are vile, and I consider their behavior more felonious than most felons.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#406

Post by mfer »

yamtaddle wrote: post #389
nobody9999 wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Other schools [2] in the US are more explicit on change... ?> School of Education devoted to developing civically engaged children, youth, and adults for a diverse and inclusive society. Why is developing "civic engagement" among our population a bad thing? Why is a "diverse and inclusive" society a bad thing? Not being snarky here, I just really don't understand how reducing civic engagement and excluding those who…

Many right wingers believe "diverse and inclusive" is code for "progressive/communist indoctrination and telling our kids that LGBTQ people are better than cis straight people". They don't object to the literal words, they object to what they believe is the hidden meaning behind the words. (this is not an exaggeration—I have a sickness that causes me to be fascinated by right-wing media, so I watch/read/listen-to qui…

I think this already makes too many assumptions.

Teachers are responsible for teaching kids how to read, write, do math, learn the basic geography of the world, to learn sports, possibly learn music, maybe learn how to manage money, learn to use tools, program computers, and so much more.

What priorities are the highest? Should learning math be at the top? Should kids still learn cursive? Does memorizing spelling matter now?

The vision statement says that being civically engaged around diversity and inclusion sits above those other things. People chase after visions.

A lot of people don't agree on this. Even those in the middle.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#407

Post by kwhitefoot »

Jsebast23 wrote: post #374
kwhitefoot wrote: post #213

This would have caused an uproar when I was at school. We organized student strikes for less in junior high school (southern England 1960s).

You organized student strikes in the 60's because they wouldn't let you read gay-sex children's books in school?

No. We organized them because we were promised student representation on the school council but it turned out to be in name only and our representatives were simply ignored and kept in the dark about everything.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#408

Post by seanw444 »

yakireev wrote: post #323
seanw444 wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't step in non-constitutional-carry states. The good thing is that, with the exception of basically Florida, there are no states I care to visit that don't already have it. The problem is traveling to those states. I'm temporarily a felon to get there, even though it is my right to keep and bear that handgun nationally. Beats me. I will not contribute my money to a government that does not allow me my rights, an…

> I will not contribute my money to a government that does not allow me my rights, and will also not disarm myself Out of curiosity, do you ever travel out of your country? If yes, how do you deal with the gun issue? If no, how do you feel about being locked within your national borders?

I personally don't feel the desire to visit other countries. If it's not somewhere I'd want to live, it's not somewhere I really care enough about to see. I care more about experiences and knowledge, both of which can be had where I live.

It helps that my state is also comparable in size to larger European countries. And has a pretty dynamic environment. Very mountainous and foresty in the north, planey in the east, red desert to the south, and tan desert to the west. Blazing hot in the summer, and well below freezing in the winter. I still haven't seen the majority of just this state.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#409

Post by slowmovintarget »

jackson1442 wrote: post #335
phpisthebest wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well in some states having a Masters in Math would not qualify you to teach math because you do not have a Teaching Degree... Government regulations rarely make any logical sense

a masters in math doesn't necessarily mean you're good at teaching it, see anyone with a computer science degree.

But it usually means you had to actually attempt teaching math and have some experience in practice. That's part of what a Master's degree is supposed to mean, unless that, too, has diminished.

Re: Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools

#410

Post by slowmovintarget »

mcv wrote: post #348
0xblood wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Encouraging children to read is not a crime and nobody ever claimed that it was, will be, or should be.

Read the article, man. Felony means it's a crime.

Encouraging children to read is not covered by the law. You read the article.

Having a library of books is an easy way to encourage literacy, probably even the best way. It is not the only way.

Far more important to the development of literacy in children is the presence of books in the home. There are decades of statistics on the impact of just having a stack of books in the same home as the child.

All of this is also failing to touch on the problem that drew this overreaction. To be sure it is a huge over-extension of what the government ought to do. But the thing it was a reaction to... That never had anything to do with literacy, and everything to do with ideology. When one uses literacy as the shield, and depends on the perpetual good graces of people one has spent years demonizing on ideological grounds, one should expect damage to the very thing everyone thought was sacrosanct.

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