So, apparently the backwards-thinking school boards of a few southern states, most notably Texas, have been seeking to revise school textbook histories to reflect, among other things, the sunnier side of the slaveholding founding fathers. They've sought to pass measures such as the renaming of the Transatlantic Slave Trade to the Atlantic Triangular Trade (which, in their defense, is more accurate to those who are still willing to include human beings as just another type of cargo--you know, "molasses, to rum, to slaaaves"). But I digress. Dear Texas and other backwards looking states:
Might I suggest a few things that are being overlooked here?
1) Black people aren't just mad because they were told something bad happened to them. They are mad because bad things have actually happened to them and are still happening to them at disproportionate rates.
2) or 1(a): Any group of people, given a story about themselves that flies in the face of reality, will resent and reject the story once another story comes along that teaches them the truth.
2 (a) or 1(b): What's going to happen when these kids get into a history class that actually gives them primary sources? Will they never read Frederick Douglass, Olaudah Equiano, Harriet Jacobs, Thomas Jefferson? What'll they think Juneteenth is--Freaknik part deux?
Really, Texas?!
"No portrayal of minority experience in the history which actually occurred shall obscure the experience or contributions of the Founding Fathers, or the majority of citizens, including those who reached positions of leadership."
But what about places in which the majority of people weren't citizens? Are their stories not also part of the American history which actually happened?
I was taught the "sunny" side of slavery once. Didn't sit well with me. Years later, I have a Masters degree in Africana studies. I don't think you're going to get what you're looking for, Texas.
Sincerely,
Miseducated in Macon.
