…and this is a 
Yesterday, I disagreed with Phil Plait — I didn't think the suggestion by Texas educators to remove a requirement to mention Neil Armstrong was that bad. However, that was because I presumed that they were making a reasonable pedagogical argument, that the state board shouldn't micromanage how the details of social studies were taught.
I was wrong. I was very wrong. They're suggesting this change and others because they're batshagging mad.
On day one of hearings in Austin, disagreements flare over the importance that should be given to civil rights leaders including Cesar Chavez and Thurgood Marshall.
On the other side some members are looking at adding mentions of people like Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh to the curriculum.
Neil Armstrong is being defenestrated, but they want to stuff in Rush Limbaugh? Never mind my unjustified assumption that the Texas BOE discussions were academic conversations about what was the best and most useful material for their children to learn — it's insanity, instead.
Education
Comments
Posted by: Qwerty
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September 22, 2009 7:38 PM
I wonder if they'll use Rush as a symbol of Republican hypocrisy. Preach and teach for years that drug abuse is wrong, but excuse and become silent on the issue when you get hooked. Yea, tell the whole Rush Limbaugh story and I'd be okay with it, but I doubt that's what they want to do.
And don't leave out Chavez or Thurgood!
Posted by: 386sx
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September 22, 2009 7:41 PM
Could it be that some of them are moonwalk deniers? Nahhhh, that would be loony.
Posted by: The Science Pundit
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September 22, 2009 7:42 PM
Neil Armstrong only walked on the moon. Rush Lameburger is the voice of his generation. This substitution seems reasonable to me.
Posted by: DrivenB4U
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September 22, 2009 7:44 PM
I'm here in Austin, take it from me - TSBOE is all kinds of fukked up.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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September 22, 2009 7:45 PM
Do we know what they have against Neil Armstrong?
Posted by: LRA
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September 22, 2009 7:48 PM
Yes, but we have deep-fried bacon here in Texas. That's right. Bacon, deep-fried.
Posted by: Qwerty
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September 22, 2009 7:48 PM
From the CBS website: "...if you leave out a point of view then your diminishing what children learn."
I agree, but shouldn't it read "then you're diminishing what children learn?"
Apparently, the writers at this station were educated in Texas.
Posted by: Qwerty
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September 22, 2009 7:51 PM
LRA - Does the deep fried bacon come with chocolate like it does at the Minnesota State Fair?
Hell, I remember a second-class cook in the Navy who always deep fried the bacon. The deep fryer can do it in a minute, but it does ruin the fat for cooking anything else.
Posted by: marc buhler
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September 22, 2009 7:52 PM
I was sooo frustrated last night, wanting to post a comment on the Zomg Its Criss thread about Huffpo having mentioned that thread and the vid, so I did the sign-up thing from home but never got a confirm email to activate the darn thing.
Later I tried to sign up again and it flags my home email as "not available" any more. I have no idea what went wrong, but I seem to have stepped into a trap and can not see a way around it.
Now I have managed to sign into TypePad (not the one I started last night) from my work so am testing this here.
I hate the spammer who made this happen more than I hate fundies now!
Posted by: Sili
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September 22, 2009 7:57 PM
No, no, no, no, No!
How can you be an atheist archbishop if you don't insist that your every word is infallible? We can't have you going around admitting to errors like this. What kind of signal is that sending?! Learn to frame for fuck's sake! (And to Moonbit: learn to fuck for frame's sake!)
Posted by: Qwerty
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September 22, 2009 7:58 PM
Gee, PZ, are you trying to educate me by using the word "defenestrated." I had to look it up! What's wrong with good old Anglo-Saxon words like "giving Armstrong the heave-ho?"
You sciency guys and you love affair with words of Latin origin! Disgusting!
Posted by: Qwerty
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September 22, 2009 8:00 PM
That should read "your love affair with words of Latin origin."
After criticizing CBS for using "your" instead of the appropriate "you're." *hangs head in shame*
Posted by: DSpohn
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September 22, 2009 8:02 PM
C'mon PZ, haven't you been paying attention? Have you forgotten Don McLeroy's attempt to get Intelligent Design into our high school biology textbooks. We have no end of loonies down here in the Lone Star State.
Posted by: Dustman
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September 22, 2009 8:17 PM
"The deep fryer can do it in a minute, but it does ruin the fat for cooking anything else."
I think you mean enhance, not ruin.
Posted by: raven
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September 22, 2009 8:23 PM
Forget the narcotics. You left out the sex tourism jaunt to the Dominican Republic. The DR is a known place for people to go to have sex with children. The trip where he got caught with V..iagra, not in his name on the way back through customs.
IIRC, he has also been married and divorced 3 times.
Pretty classic picture of fundie xian morality.
Posted by: Pygmy Loris
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September 22, 2009 8:24 PM
W.T.F? Rush. Limbaugh. I'm stunned. I had heard the TSBOE hearings were a big boatload of crazy, but really. A radio talk show host is more important that the first (or second) person to set foot on the freaking moon!? Damn. That's some super, industrial strength crazy.
Posted by: skeptical scientist
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September 22, 2009 8:26 PM
Which is crazier: batshagging madness or batshit insanity?
Posted by: Mike Haubrich, FCD
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September 22, 2009 8:26 PM
Okay - so Texas can't legally secede without a shootin' war, contrary to Future Pres. Chuck Norris's claims. But can we just give it to them? The reason that Texas fought for independence from Mexico was because the settlers didn't tink, among other things, that the government of Mexico was providing educational opportunities. That was in 1836, and now they are busy spitting on Stephen Austin's Sam Houston's and Davy Crockett's graves by completely fucking it up?
Better yet, it's about time that the schoolbook publishers stopped writing our textbooks to conform to the SBOE. They have the technology to do it.
Posted by: AnneH
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September 22, 2009 8:28 PM
Defenestrate is a great word- (quotes from wikipedia)
"Latin de (from; out of) and fenestra (window or opening)"
"Historically, the word defenestration was used to refer to an act of political dissent"
If I knew how, I'd set up a poll with the question:
Should we defenestrate the TSBOE?
_ yes
_ no
(Make that a first floor window. I don't want to harm anybody, not even stupid people.)
Posted by: 386sx
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September 22, 2009 8:41 PM
http://www.star-telegram.com/texas/story/1617232.html
Some of the proposed changes in the social studies standards, known as Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills, include referring to the United States as a republic instead of a democracy...
Get it? Republic. Republican. Get it? Hahhahaaaaahahaha.
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/2009/08/07/0807socialstudies.html
There are now references in the standards to the U.S. as a "democratic republic," rather than just a "democracy." Some of the reviewers, including a former vice chairman of the Texas Republican Party, had suggested changing terms such "democratic values" to "republican values" because the country is republic as well as a democracy.
Anybody catch that? Republican. Republic. Get it?Hahahhahaaahaaahaha.
Posted by: 386sx
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September 22, 2009 8:48 PM
By the way, in case anybody is curious about why the U.S. is a republic but not a democracy, it's because God's laws are supreme, and they cannot be changed, you know, like they could be in a democracy.
http://www.wallbuilders.com/LIBissuesArticles.asp?id=111
Posted by: truthspeaker
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September 22, 2009 9:01 PM
Technically, it is more correct to refer to the US as a democratic republic, or, particularly in the case of the early US where only property-owning males could vote, just a republic.
But somehow I doubt educating students about how our government works is their real goal.
Posted by: 386sx
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September 22, 2009 9:10 PM
But somehow I doubt educating students about how our government works is their real goal.
I think their not so hidden goal is to teach that the U.S. is a Christian nation and that the Bbile is the law of the land.
That, and "Republic" sounds a lot like "Republican"!(Childish and simple though that may seem.)
Posted by: MAJeff, OM
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September 22, 2009 9:29 PM
I was wrong. I was very wrong. They're suggesting this change and others because they're batshagging mad.
A general rule when dealing with the Texas BOE should be: Never give the benefit of the doubt.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM
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September 22, 2009 9:34 PM
Barney Frank didn't
Posted by: herdDad
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September 22, 2009 9:40 PM
I think it's awesome that PZ admitted he was wrong. I don't think you'd see that on any of the fundie sites (not because they're right). That's pretty much the difference between a scientist or skeptic versus a fundie that forces the issue to fit their predetermined ideas. Cheers to PZ!
Posted by: R. Schauer
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September 22, 2009 9:44 PM
For the TSBOE regarding history and for you all I can strongly recommend this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rise_and_Fall_of_the_Great_Powers
...as a former history teacher Kennedy summarizes and synthesizes very well. Well written and insightful historical read regarding what we all need to know.
Rush??? WTF does he have to do with anything!
Posted by: bonze
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September 22, 2009 10:00 PM
They're probably all pissy about including Armstrong because he declined to swear on the bible that he had gone to the moon.
Posted by: Utakata
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September 22, 2009 10:10 PM
Maybe I'm out to lunch. Maybe I'm off-topic...
...but speaking of Rush Limbaugh, I look at my lot in life (which somewhere between homelessness and McDonalds). I look at my wallet (or lack there of). And I look at the my influence (which is non-existant)...and I wonder if could write, speak and spew out right wing crap all day, I may of been a very wealthy person. And a very influential person which moves national politics no matter how wrong and hate mongering I am. And now who gets my name written childrens' history books...
...wow, just wow.
Posted by: Brian
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September 22, 2009 10:20 PM
On one hand, Thurgood Marshall. On the other hand, Newt Gingrich. @(#*$!&....
I admit that I made the exact same mistake as PZ, and thought Phil Plait was overstating the case. I too have learned my lesson.
That lesson, being of course, tha--ALL HAIL THE HYPNOTOAD
Posted by: R. Schauer
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September 22, 2009 10:26 PM
Utakata
Don't worry...The babble in psalms says, "The meek shall inherit the Earth!"
...after the Rapture, that was supposed to have happen yesterday. Things be lookin' good, man!
Posted by: AJ Milne
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September 22, 2009 10:33 PM
Man...
In an odd coincidence, both my (not especially old) children have been absolutely fascinated with space programs--and especially the Apollo program of late--both the hardware and the people. I just finished (about five minutes ago) yet another endless exposition on just why the Saturn V was so bloody huge when it was ultimately just getting that tiny little lunar lander to the lunar surface, that relatively small capsule and service module into lunar orbit... And browsing Google images on the laptop at bedtime, finding shots of liftoffs, rockets--especially putting the big beasts together, crews...
And in a happy moment of serendipity, my daughter's science teacher happened to have a beautiful Saturn V/Apollo mission configuration model that breaks apart in all the right places that you can even show them the whole deal, stage by stage--pop off the first stage, show 'em the second doing its thing--pop that off, show the third--pop off the escape tower, pop the command module out, spin it around, stick it onto the LM, mime just those headed for Luna... the ascent stage even pops off the LM, the service module off the CM... you can show them the whole thing back to spashdown. Borrowed it this very eve, at a curriculum night, brought it home, did exactly that... Even the little guy, whose attention span does have its limits, still, hardly took his eyes off it for the whole thing.
And of special interest, here: my daughter especially wants to know the names that go with the photos, whatever I know about them. For a certain kind of mind, that's a huge part of what it's about, too, and why wouldn't it be? So I tell her about who did what on the mission, any colourful bits I know or remember and which occur to me... Michael Collins' fused vertebrae, how short they were, why they had to be, how competitive it was, how dangerous it was... and then what went wrong, who got killed, who almost did, and why... There's this incredible picture Collins took of the LM's ascent stage on its sway back up--something wonderfully evocative about that image--that little bug of a craft on its way back up to the next crazy rendezvous in lunar orbit... both kids keep asking to see that one again, especially, hear again: that's Collins behind the camera taking it--Aldrin and Armstrong are in that crazy little bug, on their way up and home...
My take: the Texas SBOE are just total fucking assholes, really. Like they really give a shit what's significant, what's interesting--like they even have a clue. Kids love this stuff because they can tell, and man, for that matter, who doesn't love it? I sure hope decent teachers make the effort anyway, get that stuff out there.
(/Mind you, I'll be happy to tell 'em about Gingrich, too... Just as soon as my very precocious daughter asks me: 'Hey Daddy... what's this here 'demagogue' word mean?'...)
Posted by: truebutnotuseful
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September 22, 2009 10:35 PM
truthspeaker wrote:
I thought we were an autonomous collective...
Posted by: llewelly
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September 22, 2009 11:03 PM
Nonsense. Obama was inaugurated on January 20, 2009. Ever since that day the USA has been a communist dictatorship, like the Third Reich.Posted by: «bønez_brigade»
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September 22, 2009 11:05 PM
"Yesterday, I disagreed with Phil Plait [...] I was wrong. I was very wrong."
Now, kiss the astronomer's Pyrex ring, and your sin will be atoned.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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September 22, 2009 11:36 PM
AnneH #19
The 30 Years War (1618-1648) is generally considered to have begun with the Second Defenestration of Prague.
Posted by: «bønez_brigade»
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September 22, 2009 11:51 PM
BTW, there's a poll (that's already going in the right direction):
http://www.livescience.com/space/090922-neil-armstrong-texas-textbooks.html
Posted by: Andyo
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September 23, 2009 3:26 AM
I think Buzz Aldrin needs to go and punch someone in the face.
Posted by: Utakata
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September 23, 2009 3:44 AM
Thanks R. Schauer @ 31...
...though I'm not I am comforted about by that. Since it is most likely our kindom of heaven consists of worm fodder. :(
Posted by: Stuart
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September 23, 2009 6:12 AM
P.Z.
You don't get it.. These douche bags think the
Moon landing was a hoax!
Posted by: Liveliest Crib
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September 23, 2009 6:27 AM
The Science Pundit:
Of course. Armstrong was just some nerdy, science geek from an old time no one cares about. But Rash Limbo is the King of Know Knothing Knation! :)
Qwerty:
The bloviations of Rash Limbo and his fellow Know Knothings are all different kinds of projection Always remember that they believe in a zero-sum world in which we would necessarily do unto them as they would do unto us. And keep in mind a few simple rules:
1. If a citizen of Know Knothing Knation accuses someone of something nefarious, it is because that citizen is himself engaging in that nefarious something.
2. If a citizen of Know Knothing Knation is concerned about the ill effects of certain behaviors or lifestyles on society, that citizen regularly engages in that behavior or lives that lifestyle.
3. If a citizen of Know Knothing Knation fears that non-Know Knothings will take away his freedoms when in political power, it is because that citizen would take away non-Know Knothings' freedoms if he were in power.
Posted by: Knockgoats
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September 23, 2009 6:39 AM
Obama was inaugurated on January 20, 2009. Ever since that day the USA has been a communist dictatorship ruled by an atheist Kenyan Muslim, like the Third Reich. -llewelly
I think you missed something out!
Posted by: Aquaria
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September 23, 2009 6:49 AM
I presumed that they were making a reasonable pedagogical argument, that the state board shouldn't micromanage how the details of social studies were taught.
PZ, PZ, PZ...
Never underestimate the stupidity and fondness for demagoguery of the TSBOE.
BTW, I'm reasonably sure that 1/2 the Republicans of the TSBOE wouldn't have been able to tell you what pedagogical meant before getting voted into office; the other 1/2 still don't know what it means. Half of the latter don't even know the word exists.
I'm probably being too generous to them, but that's the optimist in me.
Posted by: MartinL
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September 23, 2009 8:00 AM
Well... yes, the guy is definitely mad as apeshit.He's not "eccentric." If you don't regard killing someone and burning some churches as "eccentric", that is.
He is a convicted murderer, who spend the time from 1993 to 2009 in prison for murder of the guitar player of "Mayhem" and 3 cases of arson.
He has deep bindings into the extreme right and fascist scene.
Frankly, Vikernes is an all-round arsehole, who should be sunk in a Fjord as soon as possible.
Posted by: Uncle Glenny
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September 23, 2009 9:01 AM
BTW, I'm reasonably sure that 1/2 the Republicans of the TSBOE wouldn't have been able to tell you what pedagogical meant before getting voted into office; the other 1/2 still don't know what it means. Half of the latter don't even know the word exists.
No, I think quite a few of them know that it means something very evil and illegal.
Posted by: Jeff Eyges
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September 23, 2009 9:07 AM
Neil Armstrong is being defenestrated, but they want to stuff in Rush Limbaugh? Never mind my unjustified assumption that the Texas BOE discussions were academic conversations about what was the best and most useful material for their children to learn — it's insanity, instead.
PZ, I don't know why this took you by surprise. As others are saying - never give them the benefit of the doubt, and NEVER underestimate the level of their denial or insanity.
Good rule of thumb for fundie in general.
Posted by: raven
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September 23, 2009 10:55 AM
Deification of Rush and Sarah Palin are just the start. Evolution and The Big Bang are of course gone.
One of the "experts" is David Barton, the fake historian of the "xian nation" propaganda effort. A lot of his quotes attributed to the founding fathers have been shown to be forgeries.
I'm sure Jefferson, Madison, Paine, and all those other devout fundie xians will be in there. The Salem witch trials won't be. Nor the founding of Rhode Island by people fleeing religious persecution from the Puritans.
When you throw reason, logic, truth, and morality out the window, anything and everything is possible.
Texas is setting itself up as a National Sacrifice Area. Where we can see just how bad fundie xians with some political power can screw things up. Already they have a high teen age pregnancy rate, high child poverty rates, etc. and they are going up, not down with Abstinence only sex ed.
Posted by: DEstlund
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September 23, 2009 11:05 AM
Lest it be forgotten, Texas is seen by fundamentalists as their key inroad to national control. Because of this, there's a considerable amount of national focus on getting their 'kind' into positions of power here. The TSBOE is very important to them because of the massive numbers of books Texas needs gives TSBOE great influence over what will be published for the rest of the nation.
Be that as it may, don't buy for a second into the notion that Texans on the whole support this crazypants agenda. After all, we're still (slightly) better than Alabama on teaching something like biology in our classrooms!
Posted by: The Pint
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September 23, 2009 12:54 PM
@ AJ Milne #32
I assume you could also use Gingrinch as an example should your daughter ever ask what the word "asshat" means as well.
Posted by: Desert Son, OM
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September 23, 2009 2:17 PM
AJ Milne at #32,
Your beautiful post reminds me of my own fascination with, and sense of wonder about, the Apollo programs, and space science in general, that continues to this day, long after my childhood days have passed, and how grateful I am that such curiosity has remained in my life.
Space photographs, in particular, continue to astound me, and those of the Apollo series are among the best. The "Earthrise" image, Aldrin on the surface with Armstrong reflected in his visor, the footprint, the lunar landscape. I'm a huge fan of NASA's photo of the day website.
Thanks for your post; it was terrific.
No kings,
Robert