Jan 17 2011

Dr. King would oppose revisionist literature

 

On a day designated for honoring the life of Martin Luther King Jr., we might want to spend some time reflecting on education.

I’ve been a teacher for 30 years. I’ve had good days and bad in the classroom. But my belief in the value of education to straighten the crooked, right the wrong, make the unfair just and to raise the quality of life has never faltered.

During those 30 years, I’ve seen myriad efforts to “improve” education in our country — from open classrooms to “back to the basics,” to standardized testing, to year-round classes and everything in between.

I read about “sanitizing” textbooks, revisionist history, renewed efforts to ban books and lawsuits revolving around banning bracelets in schools.

I shake my head and wonder: What would true believers in the value of education think — people who really understand the value of learning?

And now the “revision” creep makes its way into classic literature via a professor who thinks “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” by Mark Twain needs a rewrite to swap inflammatory terms with the words “slaves” and "Indians."

The professor thinks children don’t need to face those words in their reading and to face racism in that context. He and others think politically-correct creep helps children learn through softening reality and ignoring fact — and the author’s message in a piece of fiction?

A lot of people ask, “What would Mark Twain say about this?”

I wonder: What would Dr. King say about this “novel” idea to help school kids learn tolerance?

“The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically . . . Intelligence plus character — that is the goal of true education,” King said.

I think he would add — courteously — that this rewrite is folly. He would say that action — not words — define someone’s moral code. He and I would say:

“Don’t we have bigger fish to fry?”

Meanwhile, a local school board decided to ban students from wearing the increasingly popular support-a-cause rubber bracelets, this one recognizing the fight against breast cancer.

The bracelets state: “I Love (sub in a heart for ‘Love’) Boobies.”

Apparently the word “Boobies” dangling harmlessly from someone’s wrist threatens the “educational environment” in which kids wear them. At least one mom is suing.

The things parents — and through parental impetus — school boards find threatening these day both amuses and appalls me. I’ve taught for three decades at every level from fourth grade to college. I cannot recall one time when a T-shirt, armband, button, bumper sticker or bracelet caused any disruption of learning.

Yet, this is what “educators” focus on — along with throwing more and more money at the education beast.

In this case, I’ll ask: “What would Mark Twain say?”

“In the first place God made idiots,” Twain said. “This was for practice. Then He made school boards.”

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