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Texas teachers were told to teach opposing views when discussing the Holocaust. That is what NBC News, who committed actual journalism, discovered this week.
A top administrator with the Carroll Independent School District in Southlake advised teachers last week that if they have a book about the Holocaust in their classroom, they should also offer students access to a book from an “opposing” perspective, according to an audio recording obtained by NBC News.
Gina Peddy, the Carroll school district’s executive director of curriculum and instruction, made the comment Friday afternoon during a training session on which books teachers can have in classroom libraries. The training came four days after the Carroll school board, responding to a parent’s complaint, voted to reprimand a fourth grade teacher who had kept an anti-racism book in her classroom.
There’s a great deal more to this story. As the District responds, this is in regards to Texas legislation recently passed and signed into law. According to the District’s interpretation, every single book in the school libraries needed to be vetted. If it was a single subject book or deemed controversial, then an opposing view needed to be brought into the discussion.
Hence the following commentary.
Carroll Independent School District exec director of curriculum Gina Peddy: "Make sure that if you have a book on the Holocaust, that you have one that has an opposing — that has other perspectives”
— NBC News (@NBCNews) October 14, 2021
Teacher: “How do you oppose the Holocaust?”
Peddy: “Believe me, that’s come up”
That teacher asked exactly the right question. How does one oppose the Holocaust? By bringing in Leni Riefenstahl’s propaganda films promoting Hitler’s Nazi Germany? Oh wait, how about teaching Mein Kampf as the opposing view. Seriously, that was the school district’s interpretation of this new state law.
One thing the NBC News report doesn’t make clear is what, exactly, does the law say about this matter? Via our friend Amanda, I find its something vastly different than the school district’s interpretation.
(h-3) For any social studies course in the required curriculum:
(1) a teacher may not be compelled to discuss a particular current event or widely debated and currently controversial issue of public policy or social affairs;
(2) a teacher who chooses to discuss a topic described by Subdivision (1) shall, to the best of the teacher ’s ability, strive to explore the topic from diverse and contending perspectives without giving deference to any one perspective;
Read the above again. This refers to CURRENT events. It refers to politics or social events that are happening now. The legislation is clear. This involves topics surrounding current events. Therefore Gina Peddy’s bringing up the Holocaust was a blatant misinterpretation of the law.
Needless to say, the school district is scrambling to fix this mess.
“I express my sincere apology regarding the online article and news story released today. During the conversations with teachers during last week’s meeting, the comments made were in no way to convey that the Holocaust was anything less than a terrible event in history. Additionally, we recognize there are not two sides of the Holocaust,” the statement read.
“As we continue to work through implementation of HB 3979, we also understand this bill does not require an opposing viewpoint on historical facts. As a district we will work to add clarity to our expectations for teachers and once again apologize for any hurt or confusion this has caused,”
The district, the school board, Gina Peddy the curriculum director, and the attorney for the school district should’ve reviewed the new law BEFORE running with scissors on this! But instead, it’s quite obvious that the school district and Gina Peddy for certain, either read the legislation and completely misinterpreted it, or didn’t read it at all.
Quite frankly, I’m going with Peddy intentionally misinterpreting the law and deliberately using the Holocaust as an example. And, she chose very very poorly.
“We find it reprehensible for an educator to require a Holocaust denier to get equal treatment with the facts of history,” says Robison, spokesperson for the Texas State Teachers Association.
— NBC News (@NBCNews) October 14, 2021
“That’s absurd. It’s worse than absurd. And this law does not require it.”
Gina Peddy is the director of CURRICULUM for the school district. Folks, this incident is a prime example as to why parents are speaking up. This is a prime example as to why parents NEED to speak up about what districts are and aren’t doing. But, as with the DOJ and many school districts/boards around the country, parents and taxpayers are being told to sit down and shut up.
My latest for @BusinessInsider
— Matt Walton, M.Ed (@Matt4VA) October 13, 2021
Parents should not get to decide what belongs and what doesn't in a public school curriculum.
Imagine if InfoWars conspiracy theorist Alex Jones had a say in what was being taught in his child's school.https://t.co/dBGxkdZM8O
Using Alex Jones as an example is just plain stupid. Using the Holocaust as an example is horrifically wrong on every level. Sadly this is another example of an educator showing their history ignorance.
I’m thinking that Gina Peddy needs an in-depth course on the Holocaust courtesy of the Holocaust Memorial and the Auschwitz Museum, while the Carroll ISD works to clean up the mess she created.
Feature Photo Credit: Woman and children at Auschwitz via Pixabay, cropped and modified
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rbj1 says: An opposing view might not be a Holocaust denier, but pro-Holocaust. Maybe import an Imam from Iran. Or someone from the Taliban.
GWB says: Well, there are opposing views.
The NAZIs wanted to kill the Jews. (The Arabs and the Soviets and a goodly chunk of Europe agreed.)
The Jews didn’t want to be killed.
I will gladly teach that to students.
I am also willing to teach the opposing views that there was a “Holocaust” and that some morons actually disbelieve all the physical and eyewitness evidence and think there was not one. Then I will let them know that “viewpoints” do not trump facts and if they express the viewpoint that goes against the facts in my class, they will fail. Because history is what it is.
Cameron says: And there are a lot of Democrats who think that the Jews not dying off like they were “supposed to” from the Holocaust is why we have so much conflict in the world.
GWB says: If it was a single subject book or deemed controversial
But see, here’s the point: it is NOT controversial among intelligent, educated people. It’s not something you need an opposing viewpoint on because it’s FACT. If there was a book on whether men landed on the moon in the late 60s, you do NOT need a book that claims the moon landings were faked. Because that event was factually true.
If you had a book claiming a battle before or after Waterloo was the turning point against Napoleon, you might want an opposing view. Because that is about interpreting history. (Though, really, that book, itself, would be the opposing viewpoint to just about every other history out there.)
And… I read further, and that’s exactly what they come ’round to after being hammered.
Sadly this is another example of an educator showing their history ignorance.
No, it’s an example of their ‘expert’ arrogance. They think they have are so highly educated (teachers have, in aggregate, the absolute worst scores on any sort of ‘profession’ in college) that they can sneer down at the plebes and simply order them into obedience.
BTW, we played Southlake in sports when I was a kid. That was the “nicer” area north of the Metroplex.
Well, now…
Waterloo was not the “turning point” in the defeat of Napoleon. It was the penultimate battle. The “turning point” was the Russian Army stopping the invasion at the Battle of Tarutino, leading to the disastrous retreat through the winter.
Just as the Battle of the Bulge was the penultimate (major) battle in the defeat of Hitler – but the turning point was the Battle of Britain. Or the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the penultimate events (not battles) in the defeat of Imperial Japan – but the turning point was the Battle of Midway.
GWB says: See what I mean! 😉
Just why should the “infamous” Alex Jones not have A say in what his child is being taught?
Note the indefinite article – “A” meaning “one of many.” Not “THE” meaning “one and only.”
Of course, the “educators” believe that there should be THE one and only view – THEIRS.
Unless they are home schooling, every parent should have A say in what their children are being taught. If what they are being taught is intolerable to them, and they cannot convince enough other parents to agree with them, they should have the EQUALLY FUNDED option to remove their children from that system and send them elsewhere and/or teach them at home.
ROP says: “An opposing view might not be a Holocaust denier, but pro-Holocaust. Maybe import an Imam from Iran. Or someone from the Taliban.”
Which we now have aplenty in the country thanks to biden Afgan imports
We the People need to really examine in the classroom what trash and falsehoods are being indoctrinated into our children. Then promptly get the “educator’s” fired and out the door.
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