The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, (No. 7)

April 24, 2021

The Good

Much of what is good in America today is coming from ordinary, everyday Americans who are rediscovering the spirit of American liberty. K-12 education is, with every passing day, the front line of America’s culture war. There is a fight back now even in California: “California Group Files Federal Civil Rights Complaint Over San Diego School District’s Racist Teachings.”

And in Arizona, this bill supporting parental rights is a good first step.

Wow! Just. Wow! The insanity continues, but one father stands up and says “no mas, no mas!” Three cheers for this dad who stood up and said no to indoctrination and censorship (see here). For the father’s brilliant and courageous letter, see here: “You Have to Read this Letter.”

And another three cheers, this time for Kroger Grocery stores. They too stood up and said, “No mas, no mas” the ruling class. (Story here.)

Time for the conservative/libertarian investor class to put up or shut up. Seize the moment. Just Do It! Buy a college and start over. There will be a fire sale on a lot of brick and mortar colleges in the very near future (see here).

Freedom for Africa! This is very good news, indeed: “Africa Tries Free Trade.”

The Bad

Do you remember the story I wrote about a couple of weeks ago on the math teacher at Grace Church School in Manhattan who published a scathing essay on the cesspool of ideological indoctrination that has become his school? You will recall that I ended by saying there was a decent chance that said teacher, Mr. Paul Rossi, would lose his job. Well, they did it!  They fired him. According to the cowardly and craven Head Master, George Davison,

It is clear to me that Paul cannot be effective as a teacher at Grace any more. I have informed him that he is relieved of his teaching duties, and we've asked two support teachers to take over his math classes for the final quarter.

He has been asked to not come into the building without prior coordination.

On Rossi’s termination, see here.

Well, well, well! What do we have here? Said Head Master at Grace Church School, Mr. George Davison, the same Head Master who fired Paul Rossi, has been exposed on audio tape as saying that yes, the “anti-racist” curriculum used at his school is “demonizing white people for being born.” Nice. The conversation between Davison and his about-to-be-fired teacher, Paul Rossi, was posted online this week by the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism (FAIR). You can listen to the recordings of the conversation at the link here (recordings are along the right column).

I need a new category to capture some of the news these days. Did you know that 2 + 2 = 4 is soon to be declared racist in the Eureka state? It turns out that in California getting the “right” answer in math class is a form of racism. In other words, the truth is racist. The actions taken by the California education establishment in the following story is worse than bad or even ugly. It’s metaphysically evil. This is cognitive child abuse. See here.

Or, as Katya Rappaport Sedwick, a Russian émigré to the United States writes at Legal Insurrection:

There are features of American wokeness that make me gasp that socialism in the U.S. is going to be worse than the USSR where I grew up in the 70’s and 80’s. The ongoing effort to transform mathematics education into a crypto-Marxist indoctrination vehicle seems like the sign of things to come.

This can only represent the decline and fall of a once educated nation: “Woke Math and the Intentional Destruction of Free, Independent Thought.”

I’m old enough to remember when denying African Americans the opportunity to learn to read and write standard English was literally a central attribute of systemic racism. I still think that’s so, and yet . . . the English Department at Rutgers University announced last year that it was deemphasizing the use of traditional grammar for “students of color” and replacing with—yes, you guessed it: “critical grammar.” According to the Chair of the Rutgers English Department:

“This approach challenges the familiar dogma that writing instruction should limit emphasis on grammar [and] sentence-level issues so as to not put students from multilingual, nonstandard, ‘academic’ English backgrounds at a disadvantage, department chairwoman Rebecca Walkowitz said. Instead, it encourages students to develop a critical awareness of the variety of choices available to them [with] regard to micro-level issues in order to empower them and equip them to push against biases based on ‘written’ accents.”

You don’t want to miss Rutgers Declaring Grammar Racist.

America’s government schools are not to reopen because, well, according to the teachers’ union, we should blame it on the Jews. (See here.)

A nation that hates itself cannot stand. They’re coming for your children and grandchildren and YOU did nothing. Last month, the U. S. Congress introduced legislation (i.e., the Civics Secures Democracy Act) that seeks to require (aka force) all American children in the government school system to be indoctrinated in Critical Race Theory and what the educrats euphemistically call “Action Civics.” And what does this Orwellian bill call for? According to Howard Kurtz writing at National Review:

Above all, it appropriates $1 billion for federal grants to support K–12 curriculum development, teacher training, and research on the K–12 teaching of history and civics. Sounds good, if expensive, until you look at the fine print. Priority for grants is decided according to two basic criteria.

First of all, priority goes to grants that support “evidence-based practices.” The bill goes on to list these supposedly evidence-based practices, which are essentially the menu of troubling teaching techniques favored by the movement for Action Civics. . . . These are the very same practices I have written model legislation to block at the state level. They include: 1) directing teachers to discuss current social and political controversies in class; 2) out-of-class political protests and lobbying (nearly always for leftist causes) for course credit (in the bill, called “projects” and “experiential learning”) and 3) internships with (invariably leftist) lobbying and advocacy organizations for course credit (in the bill, called “service learning”). . . .

The second criterion for priority applies to grants that “improve knowledge and engagement” among “traditionally underserved” students, as well as grants that promise to “close gaps in knowledge and achievement among students of different income levels, racial and ethnic groups, and native languages.” This gives the inside lane to Critical Race Theory, while largely disqualifying those who believe that American history and civics can unify if presented in a broadly similar manner to students of all incomes, races, and ethnicities.

It goes without saying, of course, this bill is supported by two Republicans, Tom Cole (R-OK) and John Cornyn (R-TX). See this important essay by Stanley

Kurtz at NR on “The Greatest Education Battle of Our Lifetimes.”

Because hating America should make you a lot of money—a lot of other people’s $$$ taken from them by force: “Biden Education Dept. Seeks to Prioritize Critical Race Theory and 1619 Project Grant Applications.”

The Marxian moral-political principle “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need” is around the corner in America.” Just remember: you didn’t earn it, so you shouldn’t get to keep it. Tax it until it can’t breath. Boy oh boy, we’ve come a long way since the Stamp tax. (See here.)

The Ugly

University of Texas—Austin goes full 1984.  Never go full 1984: “UT-Austin Approves Orwellian Strategic Plan for Faculty Diversity, Equity, and Inclusivity.”

Apparently love is in the air, and who can deny love? Incestuous marriage was the obvious next step.

This is a tragedy that did not have to happen. Death by overdose is one of the unintended consequences of the COVID lockdown.

. . . and the Beautiful

I love this piece of music. The haunting Second Movement (Lento e largo—Tranquillissimo) of Henryk Górecki’s Third Symphony (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs) is one of the most beautiful pieces of music I’ve ever heard. It tells the story of a young girl separated from her parents and imprisoned in a Gestapo prison cell. From evil hath come beauty.

H/T to subscriber Tim Sandefur, who recently introduced me to the architecture of Jon Bernhard:

For an article on Bernhard and credits for the photographs shown here, see “The House Whisperer.”

Don’t forget to submit your aesthetic recommendations to: redneckaesthetic@gmail.com. Please always use as your subject line: “The Beautiful.”

Have great week!