The George Dawson Middle School in the Carroll Independent School District in Texas is named for a man who was enslaved, learned to read at the age of 98, and died at 103.
The school board is now reviewing whether Dawson’s biography should be read by students at the school. After all, its references to slavery and segregation might defy the state law against teaching “critical race theory.”
When Dawson’s book was published, it was hailed as an inspiring story. Its title: “Life Is So Good.”
A book about the grandson of a slave who learned to read when he was 98 years old is currently under review for use in the school named after him in Southlake.
The book, “Life is So Good,” tells the story of George Dawson’s life, from segregation and the civil rights movement to learning to read at 98. It’s one of about 10 under review by Carroll ISD….
Dawson gained worldwide attention for his 2000 memoir and was profiled on the Discovery Channel, Oprah, Nightline, and in People magazine. A grandson of slaves, he become a face for literacy before his death in 2001 at age 103.
The district insists that the book has not been banned…yet.
Others in the district say it has already been banned and the “administrative discussion” is a cover.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Will they redact the name on the sign in front of the school? (Ie, black out the Blackman)
“Black out the Black”
Simply REDACT
Black out his story
Suff’ring and glory
Title
“Critical Deface Theory”
Better yet
Critical Erase Theory
Critical Erase Theory (CET)
To counter CRT
Employ the CET
Redact the black
Bring oldays back
And set the white man free
Next School Boards are going to start pull books off the shelves that deal with:
1. Native American History and the impacts of what happen to them when the European took over this continent..
2. Hispanic History that tell the story of how they were/are treated as second class citizens.
3. Asian American History illustrating how they were used to build the transcontinental railroad, or the Japanese Americans put in concentration camps during the Second World War.
4. The history about the Irish that were sold off as slaves by Queen Victoria
The list is endless that might get be removed from the public school and general public libraries because some is afraid to hurt someone else’s feelings.
Truth hurts at times but truth can always help to make things right. People like Abbott, DeSantis, Trump, etc. do not want to make things right. For these people and those like them that firmly believe that “The Truth is What I Say It Is.” and do not do anything to undermine how they feel about they truth. We would not want their feels hurt.
Isn’t it odd that when I was a kid we were taught that ‘we’ were free to express ideas, however the ‘Russians’ controlled their population with ‘official propaganda’ and would censor anything that didn’t meet the test. So, why have we adopted the presumed former Russian model?
The Russians tightly controlled thought and speech. People like Solzhenitsyn and millions of others were sent to hard labor camps for speaking critically of their Great Leader. Putin has stamped out all independent media and controls state TV and the press.
https://www.mintpressnews.com/western-media-bias-makes-israel-war-possible/281831/
Not to mention, of course, Ukraine.
Daedalus,
You will never drag me into your attack on Israel. I don’t approve of everything they do; I disagree with some things they do. But as an American Jew (secular) with a long memory, I know that over the years Israel has repeatedly sought peace with its neighbors and repeated been rejected. It was forced to militarize for its survival since its Arab antagonists would like to exterminate it. Believe what you will: I stand by Israel because I know the history of anti-Semitism, I know about the pogroms and genocide, I know why Israel matters. I also know that real peace between Israel would mean technical and cultural exchanges that would be a huge benefit to the Arab world. It would mean desalinization plants, making deserts into farms. It would be transformative. I want peace, and peace will never happen if people demonize the only democratic state in the Middle East.
Diane, you surely know that the Zionist movement began well before WWII. You must know about the ‘founding father’, Werner Herzog (a lover of Wagnerian Operas). You also know that some of the main critics of Israel in the United States are Jews.
Choosing to support Israeli Apartheid and the killing of Palestinian kids is your right. But, that puts you on record. You cannot blame it on the Germans, or the fact that you identify as ‘Jewish’. It’s your choice.
‘Israel has sought peace with it’s neighbors?” Really? Israel did a ‘preemptive strike’ in 1968, That’s a ‘war crime’ an doesn’t indicate a seeking of peace. Israel allowed the ‘settlements’ to proliferate (international crime) and ‘kettled’ Gaza. Israel bomed the Gaza International Airport to the ground, destroyed their water facilities, and ‘mowed the grass’ every now and then, all International War Crimes.
Just because you are an ‘ethnic’ Jew, doesn’t in any way excuse you from your position on Israel. You have many other options that could preserve not only your ‘ethnicity’ but, as well, you ancient ethic of tolerance.
But, this is very much a side issue. I did, however, want to point out that we all see through a rather murky glass, darkly. The goal is to clarify that glass, and that involves dealing with our own personal flaws.
Daedalus,
You surely know that the persecution of Jews long predates the Holocaust. I remember visiting York in England and learning about the herding of all the city’s Jews into a building, which was set on fire and all the Jews were burned to death. The massacres of Jews was a frequent occurrence over the past millennium. Maybe you didn’t know that. Ferdinand andIsabella funded Columbus’ trip of exploration. They also expelled all the Jews from Spain. Those who stayed converted to Catholicism or pretended to. They were called Marranos. Oh, don’t forget the Inquisition, where Jews were tortured because they were Jews. Throughout the millennium, Jews were accused of drinking the blood of Christian children, known as “the blood libel.” Wherever Jews lived in Europe, they lived in terror of massacres and pogroms. My father’s village in Poland, Lomza, had many Jews. Those who didn’t migrate to America, like my grandfather, were slaughtered. My mother’s family came from Bessarabia (now Moldava). She remembered hiding under the floorboards of her grandfather’s bakery when the Cossacks came into town, looking for women and girls to rape. She left in 1914. Every Jew in her town was slaughtered.
This 1000-year plus histor of Jew hatred was the background of the Zionist idea. Jews needed a land that was their own, where they would not be a persecuted minority. Jews have always lived in Palestine. The return to Palestine was a chance to create a society where Jews would no longer be persecuted.
There were many opportunities to create peace, but the new state was treated by its large and powerful neighbors as an abomination. It was invaded repeatedly. The PLO and Hezbollah have never abandoned their dream of extinguishing the state of Israel and expelling all the Jews. You have no sympathy for the families whose children were killed by bombs in pizza parlors or on buses or in markets.
I wish for peace. I long for a normal existence between Israel and its neighbors.
Everyone would benefit.
Daedalus,
Do me a favor and stop talking about my religion. You don’t know what you are talking about and I find your comments stupid and offensive.
Mind your own business, Daedalus. Israel is the only refuge for the Jewish people. At the time of the Holocaust, Hitler offered to send Jews to any country that would take them. No one wanted them. Read the story of the ship “St. Louis,” which carried nearly 1,000 Jews. The ship came to the U.S., where they were turned away. No one wanted them.
If the Arabs wanted peace with Israel, there would be peace in the Middle East.
Now, stop writing about my people. I am a secular Jew. I am not a Zionist. But I know from history that the Jews need I’m one place on earth where they won’t be expelled.
I don’t know if any critics of Trump or Biden who were arrested. I wasn’t.
Assange?
Reblogged this on Ned Hamson's Second Line View of the News.