Why not, since you seem to think it would be relevant.
[Split Thread] Maori Creationism in Science lessons
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Why not, since you seem to think it would be relevant.
We expect China to colonize us.
How will this shape science lessons?
Paul2
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The questions on page 124, though, parallel questions about real phenomenon that occur on just about all the other pages. Without a clear statement otherwise, of course a young mind might well conclude that mauri and mana are real phenomenon that scientists have studied and measured. The opening that explains that mauri and mana are Maori concepts doesn't clear that up.
Something that's mentioned once and never used again? I think you overestimate the focus, attention span and memory of young minds. In my experience as a high-school teacher, the majority of students will begin to grasp the idea of subject-verb agreement after having heard it being explained seven or eight times accompanied by corresponding grammar exercises.
I don't think this is something you need to worry about. A way to test it would be to give the students a surprise test three weeks later to find out how many of them remember the meaning of mauri and mana. I don't remember, in spite of reading the paragraph a couple of times at this point, and I did so very recently. (And I still remember person, woman, man, camera, TV.)
I don't think this is something you need to worry about. A way to test it would be to give the students a surprise test three weeks later to find out how many of them remember the meaning of mauri and mana. I don't remember, in spite of reading the paragraph a couple of times at this point, and I did so very recently. (And I still remember person, woman, man, camera, TV.)
I think it would be relevant because people seem to think that the ideas of white colonialists might be threatened by one and a half page of Māori mythology. The collective self-deception of the descendants of those white colonialists tends to be particularly hyperbolic when denigrating the superstition of indigenous people in comparison to their own allegedly enlightened scientific and evidence-based way of thinking.
It will improve young people's attitude to science immensely!
One hour after science lessons, the students will be hungry for more.
theprestige
Penultimate Amazing
They shouldn't. Their place is in a history of science textbook.
I might make an exception for science textbooks that debunk disproven theories, as some sort of demonstration of the scientific method and how hypotheses are falsified and bad ideas discarded. But that's certainly not what's going on here.
I don't think that has any place in a science textbook either.
A science textbook is not the right place to pander to indigenous grudges, or to try to expiate white guilt.
Citing superstitions in a science textbook is not the way to solve that problem.
I'm of the opinion that you're entire defense of Maori superstitions in science textbooks is an appeal to emotion - an appeal to ethnic enmity, in fact.
Maybe ethnic grudges are a good reason to put things in history textbooks, but they're a terrible reason to put things in science textbooks.
White colonists are as threatened as they allow themselves to be.
The only self deception practiced by the white descendants is to think that pandering to Maori superstition will make one iota of difference to how the Maori see them
There is still no evidence of anybody "pandering to Maori superstition." Mentioning Māori mythology is as little pandering to superstition as linking to an article of Thor, the god of thunder, is pandering to Norse superstition in a Scandinavian article about lightning.
As for "how the Maori see" descendants of white colonialists, you seem to imply that the purpose of mentioning Māori mythology in the book is to put themselves in a better light in the eyes of the indigenous population of Aotearoa. What makes you think that this is the case? Is it because you can't imagine any other purpose than this kind of narcissistic need to be seen as good by the Māori?
As for "how the Maori see" descendants of white colonialists, you seem to imply that the purpose of mentioning Māori mythology in the book is to put themselves in a better light in the eyes of the indigenous population of Aotearoa. What makes you think that this is the case? Is it because you can't imagine any other purpose than this kind of narcissistic need to be seen as good by the Māori?
theprestige
Penultimate Amazing
Context matters, yeah?
If someone were putting references to Norse myths into science textbooks, in response to the demands of ethnic Danes alleging cultural erasure, I'd certainly call that pandering.
It is too easy to debunk most of those ideas and also not very interesting. What would make it interesting is to make students understand why people thought what they thought. I have already mentioned retrograde and parallax as examples: Mars and Jupiter appear to be moving backwards judged by the background of interstellar space, and it is fairly easy to make students understand how come. It can be done in a classroom with students moving around like the planets and one of them being the Earth and reporting on where the outer 'planets' appear to be on the background of the blackboard.
But there is no real point in debunking the idea that "people, plants and animals are all descendants of Ranginui (the sky father) and Papatuanuku (the earth mother) and their children" because nobody actually believes it. It is as little believed reality as the idea that Thor creates thunder is in Scandinavia. Nobody believes in it! (Well, to be accurate: "Very few Māori still adhere to traditional Māori beliefs — 3,699 respondents to the 2018 census identified themselves as adhering to "Māori religions, beliefs and philosophies"" (Wikipedia). In Denmark, we also have a couple of crazies who believe in Thor!) The Māori converted (Were made to convert?!) to Christianity a long time ago, and there are probably several times more Māori atheists at this point in time than Māori adhering to traditional religions, beliefs and philosophies.
Why do you think that this is what's happening? I am pretty sure that references to Thor in a Scandinavian context has nothing whatsoever to do with indigenous grudges or expiating white (or any other color of) guilt.
Probably not, but that is probably not why they mention Māori mythology in this particular textbook.
It would be if that were actually the reason why Māori mythology is mentioned in the book and if it served no other purpose. In this case, it is used as an introduction to the ideas of ecosystems and environmental thinking and it serves that purpose very well. I don't think any of you seriously believe that it will make young Kiwis, whether white or Māori, convert to Ranginui & Papatuanukuism.
Paul2
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It's not just an introduction: the questions in the bottom half of the page - i.e., "Describe how a river could lose its mauri [life force]" - are presented in the same context as measurable scientific concepts on many of the other pages ("what color would you expect the Sun to appear if you were standing on the moon," from page 108).
At best, it's not clear if the text is using Maori concepts to stand in for, as very broad generalizations, things that would reduce to scientific measurables (life force of a river as a measure of the living organisms in it, either by number, or variety of species, etc.) or whether they are actual superstitions, as if there is some life force in the woo-woo sense. That clarity is pretty important for a science textbook.
Context does indeed matter!
And if someone were actually putting "references to Norse myths into science textbooks," I would be looking at those references in the context of the books: Do they serve a sensible purpose in the context of this particular science textbook or not? If yes, then I wouldn't worry about any demands that they be put in there.
If the purpose were to make people believe in Thor, i.e. if it were presented as something more than a myth, I'd begin to worry that the Ministry of Education had been taken over by White Nationalists. If it served the purpose of being an introduction to a book about lightning and electricity, I would have no objections:
Am I bovvered?
No, I'm fine!
And by the divine power vested in me, I hereby declare that the day of the week formerly known as Thursday will henceforth be Papatūānukusday in all the islands of the Aotearoan Realm!
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And so what?! The title of the page has already made it clear that it's The Māori Worldview. That's the context, and I don't see how anybody could be fooled into thinking that it's something other than The Māori Worldview.
The correct answer to the question, Who is Thor's wife?, isn't:
Thor is a fictional character in Norse mythology, and fictional characters can't be legally wed, so Thor doesn't have a wife!
The correct answer is: Sif.
Did you find any questions asking students to calculate the life force of a river? Something akin to the farmer who "fed one of his cattle grain containing 3,060 kJ of energy"?
Paul2
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It doesn't have to be taken that far - calculating the life force - for it to be a potential problem, especially considering that all it would take to remove that potential problem would be a sentence like, "While mauri is part of the Maori worldview, it is not a real force and so can not be measured," much like a textbook might mention the ether but would clearly say that the Michelson-Morley experiment proved that the ether didn't exist.
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
I've been thinking about this for a couple of weeks now, and I've decided I like this workbook. I wish there had been something like it 50+ years ago, when there wasn't even an organized ecology course, there was an extracurricular club in my high school that learned these concepts on our own so we could then teach them at a sixth grade level to sixth graders during organized school-sanctioned camping trips. (Oh, those wacky experimental 70s! Lotsa luck trying to run anything like that today.)
One of our interactive lessons was a big laminated poster board with simple cartoon pictures on it of various things in typical environments, including a rain cloud, a tree, a squirrel, grass, a mushroom, a fox, a bee, a pond, soil, the sun, a person, and so forth. The exercise was to draw arrows showing what was dependent on what. The squirrel eats nuts from the tree, so draw an arrow. The squirrel's poop (or corpse) fertilizes the tree, so draw another arrowhead to make it bi-directional. You know the drill. By the time you're done, the diagram should be crowded with a tangle of arrows, showing how interconnected everything is.
This is the basic idea of ecology. The interdependencies of organisms and environments. But it's not easy to get across or to fully grasp. The arrow-drawing exercise has some serious deficiencies. It's easy to miss some dependencies. (I never drew an arrow from the tree to the rain cloud, because I hadn't yet understood trees as slow-motion lightning bolts of water.) It's easy to misunderstand and dismiss them. ("I'm not dependent on the rain cloud because I get my water in bottles from the store.") There are plenty of words for specific kinds of ecological relationships (predator, prey, pollinator, decomposer, parasite, producer, resource, etc.) but only vague general-use words and phrases like "dependency" or "web" or "relationship" to describe the thing the arrow-picture is (badly) showing, the totality of all the different kinds of relationships in action in an ecosystem. There's no technical term to write down the definition of in your workbook, and no unit of measurement for it, but it's something that exists and is important.
Whakapapa will do. I don't care where the word comes from, make something else up if you prefer, but it should be taught and talked about.
Then there's the condition of that whakapapa-or-whatever-you-call-it. We have an analogous word applying to human individuals, "health." It's the goal sought after by an entire letter of STEM but can anyone really define it clearly? What's the unit of measurement?
We kind of borrow the concept of health when we say something is "bad for the environment" in the same way we say some substance, practice, excess, or privation is "bad for your health." We've used this construct for the sixty years since Silent Spring, and the results have been mixed, and overall inadequate. The problem is the flip side of the cultural distinction highlighted in the objectionable "Traditional vs. Maori Worldview" section of the workbook. If "the environment" is everything in nature except ourselves and our artifacts, then everything we do is "bad for the environment." Planting a plot of potatoes is "bad for" whatever plants would otherwise be growing there, and whatever animals would be eating those plants and so forth. Concern for "the environment" pits itself against absolutely every human endeavor except self-extinction, and thus cancels itself. That's how we got where we are today.
That difference in world view, it turns out, is ******* important. So let's go ahead and call it mauri instead, or some other name drawn from any source you prefer. But as with "health," let's not disregard the concept because we can't define it rigorously or apply a numerical unit of measure. A plot of potatoes that helps sustain us might increase the mauri of the taiao, which we are part of. (As long as we don't throw on a pesticide that kills all the local pollinators...) We need to understand this better, and that's hard to do even with the best intentions.
Eh, I haven't phrased this well. My apologies. I think it would take a month to phrase it well.
One of our interactive lessons was a big laminated poster board with simple cartoon pictures on it of various things in typical environments, including a rain cloud, a tree, a squirrel, grass, a mushroom, a fox, a bee, a pond, soil, the sun, a person, and so forth. The exercise was to draw arrows showing what was dependent on what. The squirrel eats nuts from the tree, so draw an arrow. The squirrel's poop (or corpse) fertilizes the tree, so draw another arrowhead to make it bi-directional. You know the drill. By the time you're done, the diagram should be crowded with a tangle of arrows, showing how interconnected everything is.
This is the basic idea of ecology. The interdependencies of organisms and environments. But it's not easy to get across or to fully grasp. The arrow-drawing exercise has some serious deficiencies. It's easy to miss some dependencies. (I never drew an arrow from the tree to the rain cloud, because I hadn't yet understood trees as slow-motion lightning bolts of water.) It's easy to misunderstand and dismiss them. ("I'm not dependent on the rain cloud because I get my water in bottles from the store.") There are plenty of words for specific kinds of ecological relationships (predator, prey, pollinator, decomposer, parasite, producer, resource, etc.) but only vague general-use words and phrases like "dependency" or "web" or "relationship" to describe the thing the arrow-picture is (badly) showing, the totality of all the different kinds of relationships in action in an ecosystem. There's no technical term to write down the definition of in your workbook, and no unit of measurement for it, but it's something that exists and is important.
Whakapapa will do. I don't care where the word comes from, make something else up if you prefer, but it should be taught and talked about.
Then there's the condition of that whakapapa-or-whatever-you-call-it. We have an analogous word applying to human individuals, "health." It's the goal sought after by an entire letter of STEM but can anyone really define it clearly? What's the unit of measurement?
We kind of borrow the concept of health when we say something is "bad for the environment" in the same way we say some substance, practice, excess, or privation is "bad for your health." We've used this construct for the sixty years since Silent Spring, and the results have been mixed, and overall inadequate. The problem is the flip side of the cultural distinction highlighted in the objectionable "Traditional vs. Maori Worldview" section of the workbook. If "the environment" is everything in nature except ourselves and our artifacts, then everything we do is "bad for the environment." Planting a plot of potatoes is "bad for" whatever plants would otherwise be growing there, and whatever animals would be eating those plants and so forth. Concern for "the environment" pits itself against absolutely every human endeavor except self-extinction, and thus cancels itself. That's how we got where we are today.
That difference in world view, it turns out, is ******* important. So let's go ahead and call it mauri instead, or some other name drawn from any source you prefer. But as with "health," let's not disregard the concept because we can't define it rigorously or apply a numerical unit of measure. A plot of potatoes that helps sustain us might increase the mauri of the taiao, which we are part of. (As long as we don't throw on a pesticide that kills all the local pollinators...) We need to understand this better, and that's hard to do even with the best intentions.
Eh, I haven't phrased this well. My apologies. I think it would take a month to phrase it well.
arthwollipot
Observer of Phenomena, Pronouns: he/him
Sorry, who thinks China is going to colonise them?
So now you're proposing two textbooks, effectively doubling the cost of textbooks.
As though you could treat ethnic enmity as though it doesn't exist. Sorry, people - especially colonised people - don't compartmentalise that effectively.
Yeah! Which is why it's important to give cultural context in education. History is context. Colonialism is context. And yes, ethnic enmity is context. Context matters.
So you choose to go with the answer, "Thor is a fictional character in Norse mythology, and fictional characters can't be legally wed, so Thor doesn't have a wife!", just to make absolutely sure that all potential problems have been removed and no young Dane, Swede or Norwegian is temped to join the Cult of Thor.
Don't worry. There's nothing to worry about. Come next Papatūānukusday, the students will have a vague recollection that the Māori ancestors had something somewhat similar to environmental thinking.
jeremyp
Illuminator
They didn’t though. The Māori were responsible for a number of extinctions in New Zealand and a lot of deforestation.
I would add a tractor running on wind or solar-powered batteries, but I think you phrased it very well.
Paul2
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If there were some questions in a science textbook that asked about Thor in the same manner as questions about actual science, I'd be as concerned. The issue is that p. 124 is ambiguous as to whether mauri is a real force or energy in the scientific sense or not.
I have no problem with teaching students that the Maori see the interconnections inherent in ecology.
It isn't more or less ambiguous than the question about Thor's wife: You already know that the context is Norse mythology the same way that the question about mauri occurs in the context of the Māori worldview. Students know that. You don't have to make it any more complicated: One of the fictitious characters in Norse mythology is Thor, the god of thunder. In the entirely imaginary setting, Thor has a wife, who is no more real than the is, obviously. What is the name of Thor's imaginary wife?
I am sure that the question, Who is Thor's wife?, is as unambiguous as it needs to be. Even in Denmark, where Thor is a pretty common name (albeit usually spelled without the h), nobody will assume that the question is about this guy's probably very unambiguous wife.
I am sure that the question, Who is Thor's wife?, is as unambiguous as it needs to be. Even in Denmark, where Thor is a pretty common name (albeit usually spelled without the h), nobody will assume that the question is about this guy's probably very unambiguous wife.
theprestige
Penultimate Amazing
If the job is worth doing, it's worth doing right.
Sure they do. People have compartmentalized science and superstition just fine for centuries. In fact, the secular humanist approach to epistemology is generally accepted to be the acme of human reasoning about the world around them.
Keeping superstition out of science textbooks is not treating ethnic enmity as though it doesn't exist. Ethnic enmity is not a justification for putting superstition back into science. "I'm mad about being colonized and can't be bothered to reason in a non-superstitious manner!" is not a justification for putting superstition back into science.
Context matters for deciding whether a reference to superstition is pandering or not.
Context does not matter at all for doing good science. The whole point of doing science, as opposed to performing superstitious rituals or just making stuff up, is that it is context-agnostic and dispassionate in its attempts to understand reality.
I'm sorry that some Maori and some of their pakeha allies cannot imagine teaching science unless it's founded on unscientific superstitions. But just because they can't figure it out, that's no reason for me to say it's okay for them to indulge in the soft bigotry of low expectations. Rational, self-respecting Maori would figure out a way to address their legitimate ethnic grievances, preserve and celebrate their unique cultural grievances, and embrace the superstition-free scientific method that has brought so much good to the world, all at the same time.
Instead, they're going balls-out on "progressive" anti-scientism. Which is just as regressive as its conservative counterpart, plus being hypocritical as well.
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Paul2
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The element you're missing in the above, and which is not analogous to the NZ textbook, is that questions about Thor are not presented in the same way, manner, and context as the questions about mauri and mana were in the NZ textbook. The questions about mauri and mana look exactly like all the other questions in that textbook that *are* about actual science.
And for what reason are students asked about the name of Thor's wife in a science textbook?
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
You don't, but many do.
You see, the colonists spent 150 years replacing Maori culture with their own, and now that Maori are pushing back they don't like it at all. Suddenly they are faced with the possibility that they might have to learn a few words of a 'foreign' language, and accept that their worldview might not be the only one with some merit.
It's perfectly understandable for people to struggle with this, especially the older ones. At 65 years old I feel it myself. I have also seen firsthand how difficult it was for people from eg. Germany and China to learn the language and culture of an English-speaking country, and I don't think any less of them for failing.
However I think it is quite ironic how the colonists look down on indigenous people who had difficulty assimilating, then howl in protest when asked to do a little of it themselves. The irony is that they still don't appreciate what it was like for Maori in that position.
The general attitude of white New Zealanders is that Maori culture is objectively inferior, so they are doing them a favor by replacing it with their own (that's the culture that led to two world wars and the Atom bomb, and is currently in the process of destroying the World's ecology). And if Maori don't thrive under white culture that just proves they are inferior - which is not at all racist mind you...
Whitey is framing this issue they call 'Maori Creationism in Science' as purely a matter of facts and logic vs primitive superstition, when in reality it is more about asserting cultural dominance. Of course they deny it - while throwing out accusations of cannibalism, drug dependency, inherent lawlessness and general inferiority to 'prove' their point. Because without the guidance of white culture, Maori would devolve into the primitive savagery that is their true nature.
The Atheist
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Instead of repeating the tired canards of the Tino Rangatiratanga movement, riddle me this question that no Maori or any of their supporters has ever been able to answer, and I've already mentioned it in this thread.
Pasifika people in NZ have occupied the same or lower socio-economic rung as Maori and have none of the advantages given to Maori. They have zero seats in Parliament, no billions of dollars of handouts, and no Pasifika-only funds to access.
Pasifika people are incarcerated at 1/5th the rate of Maori., they have an improved longevity rate, they have much higher childhood immunisation rates, and all that in spite of having by far the lowest rate of home ownership.
It's almost like racism has nothing to do with it, and Maori attitudes have everything to do with it.
Note that Pasifika people do not ask others to share their beliefs or language. Note also that Pasifika people were brought here with the express intention of being exploited.
As for speaking Maori and using Maori terms, I'm happy with that - Canada seems to have no trouble being bilingual, and I'm well and truly on record as stating that I'd rather the country was called Aotearoa than some idiotic name given by a bloke who never set foot here. Likewise our major cities of Auckland, Wellington, Hamilton and Palmerston North, et al. Not 1 Kiwi in 100 could tell you who Auckland, Wellington and Palmerston were and none of them ever came here.
And the islands! South and North. While Te Ika a Maui is a dumb name, it's a big improvement on "North".
What do you know about the the context of my questions about Thor? If used as an introduction to a textbook about lightning and electricity, the context of the story about Thor would have been made clear in the first line saying, 'In Norse mythology, Thor was ...' or 'To the Vikings, Thor was ...'. More than that wouldn't be necessary. The follow-up questions would assume that students now know that this is about the worldview of our ancestors since they have already been told. (And the follow-up question would probably not be about Thor's wife but rather something along the lines of, 'How does Thor cause claps of thunder and flashes of lightning?' - unless it was one of those nights where he really made Sif's world rock.) The questions about mauri and mana follow the same principle, and they do so in a book that is explicitly and obviously teaching students about speciation and telling them that this particular paragraph is about The Māori Worldview. It's made bold for a reason!
And why would they have to look different??? They are questions about a piece of text - exactly like all the other questions in that textbook. That this is a short paragraph about The Māori Worldview has already been made clear, and not one single student believes that Ranginui & Papatuanuku are real. That is the context. And it isn't even true that the questions in this paragraph "look exactly like all the other questions." There are no questions in the paragraph about The Māori Worldview that look exactly like the questions about the farmer and his cow or the analysis and interpretation of a cat skull.
See above, but based on my experience as an author of books for high-school students: There are many kinds of questions, which isn't always apparent to everybody. Most people just see questions, and that's it, but some questions are very simple. Other questions are about analysis and interpretation. As for the simple questions, their only purpose is to establish that the students have read the text and remember the details. In the specific case, that might be a question like, 'Who is Ranginui?' Now, let me ask you a question (the kind of question high-school students hate!): Why do you think that's not the question they asked in this book? Why did they instead ask about mauri and mana?
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Whitey is framing this issue they call 'Maori Creationism in Science' as purely a matter of facts and logic vs primitive superstition, when in reality it is more about asserting cultural dominance. Of course they deny it - while throwing out accusations of cannibalism, drug dependency, inherent lawlessness and general inferiority to 'prove' their point. Because without the guidance of white culture, Maori would devolve into the primitive savagery that is their true nature.
You know, there's primitive paganism and sophisticated paganism. Whakapapa and Ìṣẹ̀ṣẹ are primitive, unlike Greek, Roman and even Norse mythology, which is why we still read about Odin, Thor, Freja, Sif and the other Æsir gods in my country. (I found the stories boring as ****, and usually spent those lessons reading something more entertaining under the desk.) And we still name the streets in Copenhagen after them: Ægirsgade, Baldersgade, Mimersgade, Heimdalsgade, Bragesgade, Fenrisgade. The most recent addition was the Mjølnerpark in 1986. It's part of our cultural heritage, innit?!, and not even the seriously endangered species of actual Christians seem to mind.
And you can't expect to be considered a person of culture if you never read Homer, can you? Whereas all that Māori **** is unscientific and would pollute the innocent minds of new generations with autochthonous nonsense. Where is the relevance of all those ancient myths by illiterates for illiterates? It is not as if Hollywood ever considered basing a superhero on Ranginui or Ogún and give them a place in the Marvel or DC universes, is it?!
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
You make it sound they were captured and brought here on slave ships, when in reality they are seasonal workers or immigrants who came here willingly like the European settlers did (many of whom were also exploited).
If you can't see how different that is from being invaded by a foreign culture then you are either thick or blinded by racism.
The Atheist
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Way to miss the point entirely, which is no surprise, because you don't want to attempt answering the question. Pasifika people were sold a lie.
Their cultures are identical to Maori in every way except for the negative statistics. Maori weren't conquered or enslaved - except by other Maori.
Yeah, right.
It's racist to point out that two identical cultures have a situation where one is advantaged over the other in numerous ways but the disadvantaged one doesn't fall into crime, benefit dependency and poor lifestyle choices.
Yet again, the hilarity of people who never set foot in NZ making ignorant comments about the country is pure gold.
Are you sure of this?
https://nzhistory.govt.nz/page/pasi...s was the era of,axes – and sometimes, rifles.
Yes I know that Australia was very proficient in “blackbirding” (which is a national shame) but it seems the NZ colonists also indulged.
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
I did enjoy reading the Greek and Roman legends as a child, though we were not taught anything about them at school. I was spared Latin, but unfortunately had to learn French and Shakespeare - or at least attempt to - because they were an essential part of my 'European' culture - not. I was an excellent Bible student too - until my mother found out about it and pulled me from that class (there goes my promising career as a priest!).
Dead right.
I am reminded of my biology teacher on the first day of class, who started by telling us that evolution was just a theory we should pretend was true for the purpose of getting grades - not that he was a creationist mind you, but to avoid puncturing their precious beliefs. Can you imagine him giving the same deference to traditional Maori beliefs? Nah, Maori were all Christians by then, filled up with the same nonsense we were!
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
Yes, it's racist. Their situations were not at all alike, but even if they were you are still accusing Maori of having some inherent flaw that makes them inferior. That you can't see how racist this is is telling.
Assuming facts not in evidence.
You are aware that slaves weren't 'blackbirded', weren't indentured laborer and weren't sent home with or without rifles, aren't you? Was indentured servitude exploitation and abuse? Sure! But it wasn't slavery.
So ******* what. It wasn’t voluntary immigration as Roger Ramjets said.
Even in the days of the World Wide Web when everybody can fact check (almost) everything, 'I live there and you don't!' trumps any argument and even facts you can link to. It's the reason why it appears so often, and I assume it's also the reason why it doesn't seem to count as an ad hominem attack to accuse people of ignorance:
Mind reader, are you? He didn’t say he wasn’t talking about the past. Read it again.
Paul2
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I see no reason why a science textbook should be asking a question about how Thor caused thunder and lightning without making it explicit that Thor causing thunder and lightning is not scientific, or has been rejected as an explanation, etc.
If you can find an example of that type of thing happening without the qualification I mention above income other science textbook, I'll reconsider my position.