The Florida Board of Education’s new guidelines for teaching African American history have caused an unjustified stir. This piece by Robert Cherry from last Sunday’s edition of the newsletter explains just how misplaced critiques of the curriculum are, and in this clip John McWhorter and I offer our own read on the situation.
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I wrote and sent a letter to the editor of the WSJ last night about this disingenuous flap about a single sentence in a 300 page curriculum on slavery co authored by black scholars. It probably won't be printed because what I wrote is pretty snarky.
That said, this VP seems to be identifying as a fellow victim. However poorly phrased, the point of the offending sentence holds up on every metric. If you're doing all the work planting and harvesting crops, tanning leather, doing the forging, keeping the horses properly shod, cooking and managing a plantation, etc., you've picked up some skills no one can take from you. This person has diminished everything about the office she so undeservedly holds and she keeps making it worse. Has she no shame?
Here's what I wrote since you probably won't see it published:
The growing horror of child sex slavery in America today seems of no interest to media or the current administration. Why is that?
VP Harris seems so deeply concerned about a single poorly worded sentence in a 300 page Florida curriculum on slavery which was co authored by black scholars who strenuously disagree with her assessment of the sentence in question.
Sadly, I am reminded that in 2018 Harris’ Jamaican father, now a retired Stanford professor, inconveniently wrote he was “…descendent of Hamilton Brown who is on record as a plantation and slave owner.” On July 2, 2019 Dan MacGuill wrote an article for Snopes on the matter and concluded there was a missing link that undermined Harris’ own father’s assertion.
Perhaps it’s time for Mr. MacGuill to revisit and clear up the question of VP Harris’ personal connection to this ugly stain in America’s history. Knowing for certain might energize her to actually do something about the very real and current horror of child slavery in America today.
I ran the entire curriculum by a distinguished black historian who is a friend. Not a "conservative" by the way. It was a private communication, so I am not giving his name here. Not only did he see no problem with the offending phrase, and not only was he impressed by how much was covered--he also looked through the REST of the history curriculum and was very pleased and surprised to see much of African American history conveyed in the OTHER history sections too. As he has long believed it should be. I commented on this on your earlier piece Glenn, but it bears repeating because it was buried in the comments. I have not seen this reported by anybody, and you should be aware of it if you didn't read the entire document either (I didn't!). African American history is American history and not all of it should be siloed.