The Texas Taliban moves beyond denying science and concentrates on rewriting history.

[Towlie]

"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past."

It's hard to imagine a more fitting illustration of this quote from George Orwell's 1984 than the current effort by the Texas School Board to remove everything from text books that they see as favorable to Islam or biased against Christianity. (Read: ...that doesn't fit their world view, no matter whether it's true or not.)

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nat...n_targets_lessons_it_claims_favor_islam_.html

http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/09/24/2492236/texas-ed-board-considers-resolution.html

more articles

They distort science, they distort history, what subject will they target next? It must really suck to raise your children in Texas.

 

[applecorped]

Texas Taliban? Lame.

 

[Ysidro]

Yes, they are lame.

 

[DC]

Children are being taught to like Islam and hate Christianity, according to elected officials in Texas, who say they're hellbent on stopping it.

in Texas? Evidence?

 

[Beerina]

"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past."

It's hard to imagine a more fitting illustration of this quote from George Orwell's 1984 than the current effort by the Texas School Board to remove everything from text books that they see as favorable to Islam or biased against Christianity. (Read: ...that doesn't fit their world view, no matter whether it's true or not.)

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nat...n_targets_lessons_it_claims_favor_islam_.html

http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/09/24/2492236/texas-ed-board-considers-resolution.html

They distort science, they distort history, what subject will they target next? It must really suck to raise your children in Texas.

What, in particular, do you disagree with in the two articles, especially the first one, which lists actual issues?

 

[DC]

"If you can control or influence our education system, you can start taking over the minds of the young people,"

yeah that why he wants to only teach Christian dogmas.....

 

[XBoxWarrior]

What, in particular, do you disagree with in the two articles, especially the first one, which lists actual issues?

Wait....are you defending the "Texas Taliban"?

 

[applecorped]

Don't forget the Tennessee Taliban, the Thailand Taliban, the Togo Taliban, the Tonga Taliban, the Turkey Taliban, the Turkmenistan Taliban, and of course the Teletubbie Taliban (the worst of them all!).

 

[XBoxWarrior]

Don't forget the Tennessee Taliban, the Thailand Taliban, the Togo Taliban, the Tonga Taliban, the Turkey Taliban, the Turkmenistan Taliban, and of course the Teletubbie Taliban (the worst of them all!).

Yeah, but the Teletubbie Taliban are like skeptics...they don't want to have fictional textbooks. They also believe in free beer on Tuesdays, and I like free beer, especially on Tuesday. Is it Tuesday yet?

 

[PhantomWolf]

Wait....are you defending the "Texas Taliban"?

Well if you take the claims in the article at face value (not saying they should be, just if you do) what is actually wrong with making sure that both major religions get the same book time on both their practices and faults? From the article the argument seems to be that Islam is getting more devoted to it than Christianity on the good side, and less on the bad. Since under US law the State isn't allowed to push one over the other, shouldn't it be that both have near enough identical time given to their actions and practices?

 

[Bob Blaylock]

Texas Taliban? Lame.

Seems to me that Godwin's Law ought to be updated to cover references to the Taliban and other extreme Islamists, in the same manner that it currently covers references to Hitler and Nazis.

 

[theprestige]

Seems to me that Godwin's Law ought to be updated to cover references to the Taliban and other extreme Islamists, in the same manner that it currently covers references to Hitler and Nazis.

You're thinking of the corollary. Godwin's Law simply states that as the length of a (Usenet) thread increases, the probability of a comparison to Hitler approaches 1.

It's the corollary that states that once the Hitler comparison has been made, no further useful discussion is possible.

That said, I'll gladly stipulate that once a Taliban comparison has been made, the thread is effectively "Godwined".

 

[XBoxWarrior]

Well if you take the claims in the article at face value...

Wait just one minute. You mean to tell me that you read the article? Before posting and everything?

Isn't this the politics tab?

 

[GreyArea]

When I read "Texas Taliban", first I thought it referred to Repent Amarillo (who have no Quran). They're worse than the Texas Board of Doom.


The Star-Telegram and New York Times articles had an interesting tidbit:

...social conservative board members warned of what they describe as a creeping Middle Eastern influence in the nation's publishing industry.

http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/09/24/2492236/texas-ed-board-considers-resolution.html

As evidence of Islamic influence in textbook publishing, Mr. Rives cited a 2008 decision by the Dubai royal family to invest heavily in a company that owns the publishing house Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in Boston.

Earlier this year, the family’s investment arm, Istithmar World Capital, lost its stake in the publishing house after the publishing company restructured its debt, said Josef Blumenfeld, a spokesman for the publisher.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/23/education/23texas.html

Is that all they got? I mean, isn't paranoia about "Middle Easterners" controlling our media so last century?

Oh, I forgot: it's an election year.

Besides, Wikipedia reports that Houghton Mifflin Harcourt was (and still is?) "a subsidiary of Education Media and Publishing Group Limited, an Irish-owned holding company registered in the Cayman Islands...." It's really those Caribbean Irishmen you gotta watch out for.

 

[quixotecoyote]

There's another thread that has a refutation of each "bias" claim piece by piece, but I forget which one.

 

[GreyArea]

There's another thread that has a refutation of each "bias" claim piece by piece, but I forget which one.

Thanks for the tip. I'll see if I can find it.

 

[Emet]

There's another thread that has a refutation of each "bias" claim piece by piece, but I forget which one.

Here it is:

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/sections/news/Islam_Resolution_Brief_LH.pdf

 

[Towlie]

Here's the thread that quixotecoyote was talking about:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=185818

It's in the Education forum, which ranks relatively low in popularity here at randi.org.

A link to the PDF file was provided by Nursefoxfire in post #7.

 

[INRM]

Unfortunately the Texas Board of Education will probably get it's way and all our textbooks will be re-written to reflect the stupid, ignorant, and possibly mentally ill views of those ordering the books to be edited.

 

[mhaze]

Well if you take the claims in the article at face value (not saying they should be, just if you do) what is actually wrong with making sure that both major religions get the same book time on both their practices and faults? From the article the argument seems to be that Islam is getting more devoted to it than Christianity on the good side, and less on the bad. Since under US law the State isn't allowed to push one over the other, shouldn't it be that both have near enough identical time given to their actions and practices?

So a religion that 1% of the population plays with should get equal time as one that 45% of the population plays with?

Note this issue is way different if the course is world history as opposed to US history. If it is US history, then it seems one should consider the percentage of religions during the time period being studied. Otherwise the "historical revisionism" is operating the other way - unduly emphasizing, say, Muslim accomplishments in the US during the 19th century would be .... ridiculous....