Yes, I remember...now that you mention it.
Actually, the occurrences of those in charge either eliminating or
altering information goes on constantly. And it's not unique to the
good ol U.S of A.
Hopefully people who support the smoothering of information they
disagree with, will understand that this practice always ends up with
them being on the receiving end.
Carl Jarvis
On 3/5/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Do you remember a few years ago when Arizona banned an ethnic studies
program? I think that ban was aimed at Mexican Americans.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, March 05, 2017 11:30 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: Matthew <mcblack@xxxxxxxxx>; Jennifer Ford <dandjford88@xxxxxxxx>;
delores selset <dselset@xxxxxxx>; jamesjarvis98 <jamesjarvis98@xxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Bill Introduced to Ban Howard Zinn Books From
Arkansas Public Schools
When the long entrenched Ruling Class is threatened, regardless of when or
where in Time, one of the first Defensive Acts is the Offensive Act of
destroying any literature or materials which disagree with the Ruling Class.
From the burning of the Alexandria Library...and probably far earlier
examples, to the Nazi Purge of non Aryan people, declared inferior to the
Master Race, and the burning of any books that taught, or suggested a
different belief, to the more recent times when Christian groups burn the
Koran, the practice has been an effort to protect the Ruling Class, and for
the most part it has been a total failure.
But here we go again. One of the truly great historical works, A Peoples
History of the United States, by Howard Zinn, is seen as a threat to the
White Supremacists Ruling Class in Arkansas. Clear minded people understand
that the effort to remove Zinn's book from circulation is simply an
admission by these White Racists, that they have no rational defense for
their long established control over the People of Arkansas.
As an Agnostic, I disagree with books such as the Holy Bible or the Koran.
And yet, there is great value in these books. If my best argument against
the belief that there is some Intelligent Creator directing our lives, is to
rush about burning their books, then I, and my beliefs, are failures.
But beyond all of this, what people need to watch out for, is that once the
books have been removed, the next step is to begin removing those people who
subscribe to the teachings in the newly banned books.
First from their jobs. Next, from their communities. Prison. And even
execution.
Are we witnessing the res erection of the Witch Hunts of early America? Are
we going to purge our People of whatever the Ruling Class finds undesirable?
Will we wind up with everybody looking and acting like Donald Trump?
Carl Jarvis
Sent on 3/5/17:
> Howard Zinn. (photo: The Progressive)
Howard Zinn. (photo: The Progressive)
Bill Introduced to Ban Howard Zinn Books From Arkansas Public Schools
By Max Brantley, Arkansas Times
04 March 17
he deadline for new legislation is fast approaching and it can't come
too soon. Just in from Sen. Rep. Kim Hendren: Legislation to prohibit
any publicly supported schools (you, too, charters) from including in
curriculum or course materials any books or other material authored by
Howard Zinn.
(Actually, anything Zinn wrote before 1959 is not covered.)
Zinn, who died in 2010, was a Ph.D. historian, social activist andwrote the best-selling "A People's History of the United States." A
more who
version for young readers came out in 2007.
His New York Times obituary probably gives you a taste of the danger
Kim Hendren sees in Howard Zinn:
Proudly, unabashedly radical, with a mop of white hair and bushy
eyebrows and an impish smile, Mr. Zinn, who retired from the history
faculty at Boston University two decades ago, delighted in debating
ideological foes, not the least his own college president, and in
lancing what he considered platitudes, not the least that American
history was a heroic march toward democracy.
Almost an oddity at first, with a printing of just 4,000 in 1980, "A
People's History of the United States" has sold nearly two million
copies.
To describe it as a revisionist account is to risk understatement. A
conventional historical account held no allure; he concentrated on
what he saw as the genocidal depredations of Christopher Columbus, the
blood lust of Theodore Roosevelt and the racial failings of Abraham
Lincoln. He also shined an insistent light on the revolutionary
struggles of impoverished farmers, feminists, laborers and resisters
of slavery and war.
Such stories are more often recounted in textbooks today; they were
not at the time.
"Our nation had gone through an awful lot - the Vietnam War, civil
rights, Watergate - yet the textbooks offered the same fundamental
nationalist glorification of country," Mr. Zinn recalled in a recent
interview with The New York Times. "I got the sense that people were
hungry for a different, more honest take."
Even some on the liberal side thought Zinn's revisionism went too far.
That criticism barely raised a hair on Mr. Zinn's neck. "It's not an
unbiased account; so what?" he said in the Times interview. "If you
look at history from the perspective of the slaughtered and mutilated,
it's a different story."
He inspired a movie, documentaries and song. Dangerous stuff for the
Arkansas student in one legislator's
