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What is being taught in school today?
I went to public school in a liberal area during the 2000s/10s. Here are some things I learned:
The United States is a great nation, largely because of its Constitution. The amendments, Bill of Rights, and separation of powers (along with access to plenty of natural resources) has kept our nation alive for (by now) almost 250 years.
The first amendment is very important, and it grants true free speech which is a very good thing. The exceptions are specific and largely uncontroversial, like direct threats, leaking classified information, and (the textbook example) shouting "fire" in a crowded theater. The other amendments are also important, although we covered them less, but I do remember covering the second, fourth, fifth, and tenth.
George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Benjamin Franklin, Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, MLK Jr...these people were covered extensively and framed very positively. Even Christopher Columbus and Thomas Edison were framed positively in elementary school, although later I learned they were immoral and fraudulent (Columbus was not the first person to discover America, and Edison ripped off Nikola Tesla).
Slavery, the Civil War, and the Civil Rights era were covered very extensively. Fascism, communism, and Nazism were covered extensively. I remember socialism being described as maybe OK, but the way it was implemented in the USSR was catastrophic. "Jingoism", Japanese internment, and the Red Scare were shameful and immoral, although covered minimally. The Enlightenment era, factories, robber barons, unions, United Fruit, "The Jungle"...capitalism as a whole wasn't irredeemable, but certainly in need of regulation. The atomic bomb was...controversial, but it was effective and there wasn't a clear alternative. The US destabilized foreign countries' governments for profit and the Vietnam War was largely a failure. 9/11 was a tragedy, and the Taliban and terrorists are barbaric, but the GWOT was too recent to really judge.
History in the early years was almost entirely positive, but in high school I learned more and more of the unsavory details. However, I never got the impression that the US as a whole was bad, just imperfect. We still looked up to the founding fathers and the Constitution (I learned that Thomas Jefferson owned slaves and had a child with one, but he was still portrayed as humane overall because "it was a different time"). We still learned about and looked up to the "great men" (and some women, we seemed to focus on individuals more than groups). We still celebrated the US's success, it's growth and eventual dominance, victories in World Wars I/II, and cultural influences ("the American Dream", the Wild West, Hollywood, Woodstock, 80s, 90s). I graduated with (and to this day have) pride and patriotism, albeit nuanced; our nation isn't without flaws, because no human, group, or nation is without flaws, and acknowledging your mistakes is how you overcome them and improve.
I did learn about other countries and history before 1776, but my lessons were very US-centric.
Granted, this is only some of what was covered, and of what I remember. It's (not intentionally but) certainly biased towards the lessons I felt were important and my interpretation of them. But when I hear what people in the US are saying and doing today, I wonder if they grew up learning something completely different. I've always thought the above is a general curriculum that exists in most schools, but maybe not so?
This one always sounded very weak to me, mostly because what if there actually is fire in a crowded theater? Apparently even the sentence itself is incorrect compared to the original which also included the word falsely. It is also interesting to see, that the same argument was used in 1919 against somebody protesting draft service in WW1 under enforcement of Espionage Act and his anti-draft speech was likened to falsely crying fire.
Not exactly a stellar argument either historically or even on its face.
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Thats about what I learned approximately five years later from your timeline.
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Catholic school, same time period-
Lot of emphasis on colonial history, very in depth on the runup to the revolutionary war. Lewis and Clark and the Louisiana purchase were triumphal statecraft. We kind of glossed over the civil war era. We learned about religious discrimination in 19th century America- the know nothings, the mormon pioneers, the need for the knights of columbus, the KKK.
Lot of emphasis on the industrial revolution. US intervention prevented the European colonizers from doing far worse things to China and Latin America than they wound up doing. Monroe doctrine, Teddy Roosevelt, USA good. The AFL, Teddy Roosevelt, Cornelius Vanderbilt were all portrayed as good guys at the same time. Intervention in WWI was sadly necessary.
The depression was emphasized, but not as much as WWII. Oh gosh WWII ate the rest of the curriculum. Patton was a good guy, Macarthur was more conflicted, the new deal was a good thing but might not have worked as well as it's thought. Straightforwards USA and Britain good, Germany and Japan bad. The soviets were portrayed as bad, but maybe a lighter shade of black than the Germans and Japanese- but still very evil.
We learned about the cold war. Not a lot about anything in specific, but USA good-commie bad. JPII's role in ending the great evil of communism was very important. That's about where it ended.
For the world in general, we learned a lot about Rome, the renaissance, and the age of exploration. There wasn't a true global focus but we probably got a lot more latin american history, especially early latin american history, than a typical public school would have.
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Same time period. Blue state. I would say at least my middle and high school history had much more discussion of pre-American history than yours seems to have had, and also a much greater emphasis on slavery, civil rights, and the vietnam war once we get into the post 1776 era.
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This tracks with my experience in a roughly similar age bracket. I'd guess you were in accelerated tracks and likely took AP courses. This is the basic way we teach history: start with basic myths then add nuance as a child develops. Myth making has taken a backseat to nuance at earlier ages, but your mileage may vary. There's a lot of districts with a lot of different teachers and schools. If I had to guess, your experience with history is still the modal experience of American children that attend adequate schools.
Most kids don't get much out of history. Girls, especially, consider history boring and irrelevant. History is old and they are young. Which is why I think you deploy my brainwashing program in a national civics curriculum. That's my thought anyway.
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I feel compelled to point this out every time it comes up but this is not a true exception. It was briefly law as an example to justify banning handing out communist pamphlets but it was struck down as plainly unconstitutional.
IIRC they were anti-draft pamphlets.
Yes, anti-draft pamphlets handed out by the Socialist Party of America (motto: "Workers of the World, Unite!").
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I think you're of the age where your school experience was a "last chopper out of Saigon" situation.
Grievance politics is larger now, although I strongly suspect it's incredibly school and teacher dependant.
In "generic suburban highschool #42 outside of Boise, Ohio" I bet it's similar to what you wrote. In "MLK Jr highschool in Bushwick" I bet it's a lot more grievance-y
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That's... remarkably similar to what I was taught; same time period. And I moved around the country and went to both public and private schools, so it wasn't just localized.
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