TO THE FAR-RIGHT, “IGNORANCE IS BLISS”

The following are five examples of what the conservatives are attempting in their Red state legislatures.

Just when you think some people can’t go any lower, they turn around and surprise you.

In many US states, the GOP has gone to amazing levels to keep minorities from voting.  This includes Hispanics, Blacks, Seniors, Teens, Vets and the Disabled. 

Now those on the far right have decided that the more ignorant you can keep the voters, the better chance that they will support the far-right political wing.  It’s an interesting concept.

The first sign I saw of this approach popped up in Oklahoma.  The Oklahoma legislature recently had an 11-4 vote to advance a bill that would ban classic US history curriculums from Oklahoma schools.  What this means is that the schools in Oklahoma would remove history courses that teach actual history, and replace them with flattering stories designed to imply that America can do no wrong.  They aren’t even attempting to hide the fact that their goal is to keep students ignorant of reality so that they are more susceptible to right-wing propaganda.

The bill’s sponsor, state Republican representative Dan Fisher, has argued that the schools should be teaching “American exceptionalism,” and avoiding teaching parts of American history that are less than flattering.  The Republican National Committee (RNC) has endorsed this idea that US history courses should teach less strife and present a more up-beat view of American history.

 

Now, the next assault on keeping the nation stupid comes from the Governor of Wisconsin, Scott Walker. 

This governor is still walking so tall from his success in decimating public service unions in Wisconsin, that he is now taking on the stellar decades of success of the University of Wisconsin.  Governor Walker’s latest goal is to slash a whopping $300 million from the UofW’s budget over the next two years.  They have yet to determine how many instructors will need to be let go if the governor is successful in making those cuts. Walker wants to do this while he takes that same budget money to finance a new high-end sports arena for the Milwaukee Bucs.

The University of Wisconsin is a point of pride for the state at large, to the point where their mascot, the badger, is blanketed over everything Wisconsin-related, including government services that aren’t even affiliated with the school.  Yet, the Governor wants to decimate one of the finest state Universities in the nation.

The new arena he wants will cost over $400 million, and so far there is no plan as to where that extra money would come from, other than the unfortunate Wisconsin taxpayers.

 

So, the next state that is taking on this idea of “keeping the people ignorant” comes from the great state of Mississippi.

Mississippi state representative Gene Alday, made national headlines recently by saying one of the most racist things to come out of a politician’s mouth in recent years.  For Mississippi, that’s saying a lot.  Per Rep. Alday,  "I come from a town where all the blacks are getting food stamps and what I call 'welfare crazy checks.' They don't work."  He added that he once had to visit a hospital emergency room and, "I liked to died. I laid in there for hours because they [the blacks] were in there being treated for gunshots."

This representative went on in his rant because he was trying to justify his opposition to increased funding for elementary school education.

Mississippi schools have always been majorly underfunded.  This has resulted in extremely high rates of Mississippi students being held back.  Alday’s racist comments were an attempt to insinuate that teaching kids reading and writing basically amounts to “welfare”.  He was suggesting that education is wasted on black people in Mississippi.

While his comments were extremist, the refusal to properly fund schools is the mainstream thinking of the Republicans in Mississippi.  Gov. Phil Bryant, has supported this same idea by being against the idea of putting more effort towards teaching kids to read.  The governor continues to suggest that he’s fine with just holding the black students back or dropping them from the rolls.

 

Now, next we move on to Kansas.  For years, Kansas has been getting crazy, right-wing nutty, and now they have gone totally wacko.

Kansas Republicans are no longer satisfied with their laws that require teachers to teach that it’s normal for people to wait until marriage to have sex.  There is now growing support in Kansas to not tell students during their sex education classes that sex is a thing that some married couples do for pleasure.  In fact, the idea is that Kansas teachers should actually fear serving jail time, should they ever hint this suggestion to students.

A Kansas teacher was recently severely chastised who had put up a poster that suggested that sex is sometimes used to show affection.  The poster in question had no pictures, just words.   Republicans in the state are now sponsoring a bill that would allow officials to criminally charge teachers for daring to acknowledge such a thing.

No, I’m not kidding.

 

Finally, we move on to South Dakota.

The creationists are still at it….again and again.  South Dakota Republicans are once again pushing for a bill that would “allow” teachers to “question” evolution in the classroom.  This is just a fancy way of saying that teachers would be permitted to treat being ignorant of evolution as the equivalent of being properly educated about science.

Traditionally, these laws don’t succeed when they get challenged in the courts, that’s probably why these legislators finally abandoned it. 

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, in trying to become the Republican nominee for president in 2016 was asked about evolution while visiting Great Britain.  Walker had responded with, “That’s a question politicians shouldn’t be involved in one way or another. I am going to leave that up to you. I’m here to talk about trade not to pontificate about evolution.”  Walker just epitomized the new conservative mentality of supporting “ignorance above everything else”.

As the United States continues to be a nation of more and more immigrants, and as white citizens become just another minority group, the Republican party will continue to shrink as they spurn anyone that is not white, older and highly conservative.  Since they are not seriously embracing any minorities, the best they can do is continue trying to fool them into remaining ignorant.  Thus way they can drink the Fox News Kool-Aid and accept the right-wing concept of being properly educated as they are subjected to far-right propaganda.

The items above are just the tip of the iceberg for what the right-wing zealots have in store for our youngsters, if we are not diligent in dealing with their bizarre plans.

Copyright G.Ater  2015