It's Friday, and something happened today that left me upset. I don't know if I'm just nerve-bare due to all of the science denial of gender ideology and paranoid of the apparent institutional capture, but I just have to say something.
I'm a high school science teacher, fighting the good fight. You may be familiar with my previous posts. Someday, when it is safe to do so, I may make a more formal post with links and resources related to what I'm going to be talking about, but for now the only incident-specific things I'm going to say are this:
-Students and parents are FAR more free to speak out than teachers and administrators are. If you are a student or parent, your words are important. Please don't hide away.
-I used to laugh at my father who worked in universities for complaining about what a hotbed of liberalism universities are. I still think he was being a crank at the time, as he worked in STEM and was only dredging up the most ridiculous stories from the most insular humanities departments at schools he had nothing to do with. Well, the university wokies are putting their hands on the shoulders of STEM now.
Just a little background, I'm a white lady who attended poor and diverse schools and has dedicated most of my career to working in similar schools where I have implemented instruction that supports minority students in understanding that they have a place at the table in STEM.
I get told to sit down and listen a lot. Which I do. But today science was framed as a western concept that needs to be decolonized. Not science education, but literally science. Dumbstruck, I continued to sit down and listen and ask for resources for my own education. I've got to take some time to digest these. Maybe I'm worrying about nothing. Maybe someone misspoke. The master post from me is probably going to have to come this summer because I can't deal right now.
I am aware of biases in science due to the grip of the white male masters of the universe on both history and luxury of time to fuck around in a lab, field, or a shed. I talk about these things in my classes. Some case studies directly deal with the unfolding of understanding and working around biases.
Today I brought up eugenics, lobotomies, forced sterilization, and nonconsensual experimentation on oppressed groups. Deficits in women's medicine. Deficits in appropriate health care for minorities. Unintentional non sequitur from other parties: Did you know, Darwin was a racist? This fact challenges the foundation of evolution.
I tried to check in what we were really talking about here to clarify. Is it that we should be aware of scientists' personal biases affecting what gets researched and how their biases affect analysis and collection of data? That's what is important to me. However, today it seems that there was a conflation of the scientist being a bad person with the science being bunk. Seeing as how the list of who is good and bad is fluid, that would mean what is good and bad science is also going to be whatever is convenient at the time.
I am so scared of the creeping crud that is postmodernism.
I am so scared that my students will not have equal access to a free and public education. The wealthy people who recognize that the wokey postmodern education is bullshit will make sure their children receive a normal and factual education.
And then I remember - the whole fucking system is so overloaded that on my end, there is very limited accountability. I can and will hold my own ground for as long as no one important notices.
Please somebody tell me I just misinterpreted something and that we're not using race relations as an excuse to dismantle facts.
Please somebody tell me I just misinterpreted something and that we're not using race relations as an excuse to dismantle facts.
I’ve long had this debate with others wishing to decolonize curricula and books or even entire libraries...
Here’s the thing: if by “decolonize” — they mean censorship and ripping pages out of history and then calling that “progress” — I’m calling that out as BS and also a grave disservice to those who these de-colonizers claim they are trying to protect.
Nothing good comes from problematizing science, knowledge, music, art, free speech or our history... Ripping pages out of history doesn’t make that history magically cease to exist... and burning all of society down to the bedrock and expecting something kinder, gentler and more enlightened to emerge from the ashes is like putting a frog in a blender and expecting a higher form of intelligent life to emerge from the lifeless goo.
I’ve seen debates all summer and longer — vilifying science and even math as white supremacist or “racist” — and I feel that’s a deep insult to Black scientists and mathematicians... there is a sneaky sort of racism with the “decolonize” programs and agenda — the hidden and unspoken comment being that math and science is somehow not accessible to Black or brown people — which is as racist as anyone could ever imagine really. Also — refusing to study or teach science, math and history or whatever else based on tiptoeing around feelings is a good way for those civilizations to fall behind in technology and science and not be able to compete on the world stage and as you rightfully point out — such “woke” policies being pushed at the public school level will mean that those who cannot afford private school will be deprived of even the opportunity to study these subjects — while kids from wealthy parents can sidestep all that and have their kids study in private schools and/or can also afford private tutors for their kids to become more competitive. The decolonizer campaign ends up sounding kind — but is actually cruel and potentially gives disadvantaged children the short end of the stick... again... and again... (in other words, this “woke” agenda actually upholds the status quo and helps none!) — and y’know — it doesn’t make it better if this is for supposedly noble reasons — the result is still the same whether openly racist or debilitating censorship of the curricula creeps in such that our STEM fields start getting watered down... if we end up with two systems — public schools who are more concerned with tiptoeing around activists feelings rather than educating our kids — and the other world of private school who ignores all this insanity and just gets on with it — I know who is going to be better equipped to compete for jobs and in life... and again, it’s the poor or disadvantaged who are stuck with the lesser and inferior “choice” that wasn’t even their choice to begin with!
There are dozens of examples where a regressive concept takes hold and people are lured into it by a false sense of security that they are “doing the right thing” and that we will all live in some magical utopia if we can only tightly control what other people and especially kids and young adults are allowed to know and learn — but nothing has ever come from such regressive reforms other than crushing censorship and also a growing groundswell of corruption because the elite of this world won’t live by the restrictions placed on the poor and disadvantaged...
Decolonizing (extreme censorship) of scientific facts, authors, scientists and subjects is a deeply regressive concept that has never helped any society advance... ironically since they are also against the collection of data and the scientific method — these people are unlikely to listen to statistics on how nations that attempted this approach did themselves no favors in remaining willfully ignorant of scientific facts or resistant towards objective reality. But the data is there if anyone wants to look — there are a surprising number of nations and civilizations that attempted this and always with the predictable results of knowledge being lost, of being less competitive on the world stage and of having less of an understanding of history and culture.
The solution to any “ist” or “phobe” belief is travel and discovery — its being able to talk freely about all issues and of history — not hiding in the dark or tearing pages out of history or heavily redacting textbooks to be sufficiently sensitive towards those who might be offended at what happened in the past. It is vital that we as humans can look at what is real and verifiable without the effort to censor everyone and to openly talk about the past — both the good bits and the bad bits. It’s how we truly progress... it’s how we learn — by learning from our mistakes.
As to those who want to say 4 + 4 = 5 — I feel I’d like to call the memory of Orwell to say that Big Brother would be so pleased with your progress towards brainwashing yourself to believe in completely untrue things... and as spook said, “logic is a pretty wreath of flowers that smells bad”... (silly Star Trek quote) — but my point is that anyone can argue fiercely for any number of completely illogical things and sound damn convincing! Look at TRA’s and their arguments! They’ve certainly hoodwinked a large section of society into believing stuff that is not backed by observable facts or science. The list of logical fallacies one can use to “prove” something is fantastically long — but that’s precisely why we still truly do need science, facts, the scientific method and logic — so we aren’t collectively conned continuously to believe in stupid things that aren’t even true. We need history to explore our past and to learn from our past wisdom as well as learning from our mistakes and we need science to help us continue to advance in understanding our own universe and existence and to continue to advance knowledge — and that gift — the gift of acquiring knowledge should be a gift that is open to everyone without restrictions or censorship.
Thanks for coming to my TED Talk and um... well yeah...
The tl;dr version here is that yes — it is important to still teach STEM to all and without restrictions or censure and without politics infiltrating curricula and watering it down.
if we end up with two systems — public schools who are more concerned with tiptoeing around activists feelings rather than educating our kids — and the other world of private school who ignores all this insanity and just gets on with it — I know who is going to be better equipped to compete for jobs and in life... and again, it’s the poor or disadvantaged who are stuck with the lesser and inferior “choice” that wasn’t even their choice to begin with!
We already have exactly this. But it's not public schools versus private schools.
It's usually public schools versus public schools. The school in one neighborhood is teaching math and science and literature and history: Specific content. The school in the other is teaching STEAM and "Humanities": Basically nothing.
Sometimes it's public schools versus charter schools. In most cities it's the charter schools that are the problem. "Progressive" charter schools are passing through students of color while offering no academic classes. The proof is in the inaccessibility to those students, after high school, of academic majors. But in some it's the reverse.
And very often it's track versus track, within the same school. Kids tracked into college prep classes get academic content while kids tracked into "mainstream" classes (which are actually remedial) are offered a "progressive" curriculum that does not involve homework or reading.
And by the way... this is happening in universities too. Universities are tracking college students now into academic and non-academic majors, and eliminating academic content from general education requisites. So two students can go to the same university and have very different experiences. One can end up writing a groundbreaking thesis by the time they graduate, while another can graduate through coursework that was probably never verified.
For the most part though, after college, graduate schools, law schools, medical schools and employers will not be tracking anyone. So that's when the doors close on students who don't have the concrete knowledge or social capital to procede into a profession.
This hit a chord with me and I'm glad to see that finally, someone else sees it.
The crappy high school I graduated from was converted into a charter some time after they lost their accreditation. Out went the single successful program they had that attracted students like me and also gave great opportunities to students not like me. In came a bunch of bullshit from a well-known asshole and his wife who thought they knew better.
The charter mostly had only black students from the community. He was accused of sex abuse of female students and staff, but y'know how that thing goes. I have a handful of teacher-friends who got their first year of teaching under their belt at that charter and while they themselves were not sexually abused, they said the whole program was a hot mess. These teachers were such admirable hard workers that I was inclined to believe their stories of erratic teaching assignment changes, hostile work environments, sudden overload of work, and students being completely ill-served by the curriculum and college counseling.
I also have a teacher friend who bailed on public education to join her friend in founding a STEM charter. It was insolvent in a year. Even with the best intentions, it's incredibly hard to establish something that provides a complete education.
Now that I'm teaching in a wealthier district, there's a different grift going on. Parents think if they fork over money to our competing charter, that they're getting better instruction. Over there they claim that every class is an AP class. First of all, that's not possible. The College Board would not allow that. Secondly, it's a diploma mill. Many of the students who graduate from there with glowing reviews come back after the first quarter of uni with their tail between their legs. I had one father at a back to school night confirm what I had heard from others. His eldest went there, and even though she was a good kid, she was unprepared. He felt like my school had prepared his other kids much more effectively.
Thank you for your TED talk!
I think this sort of philosophy is entirely insulting to my students. What of the black girls who held leadership roles in the engineering program I participated in as a general ed teacher? They more than adequately navigated western science concepts. So are they anomalies? Race traitors? Have some white ancestry? What exactly are some of these decolonizers implying here when they say math and science aren't accessible to black people?
So I've been working to make sure my students who see very little representation in science have their successes, feel empowered to continue through more difficult concepts and skills, while also exposing them to related career options.
I've also worked with a school site to help them stop tracking students in the most ridiculous of ways. I found out that a large proportion of the hispanic students were being tracked into the agriculture program which would delay their entrance into the two-year science requirement. As such many end up taking alternative science classes because it's weird to drop into a freshman class when you're older. My role was to help introduce a differentiated curriculum. Am I insane for helping them do this? Or should I just sit down and listen some more? God, I'm just so frustrated.
This is such an amazing post. I would like to add one little talked about fact. The US science education is lagging behind other countries in lower level education. Currently, the majority of science PhDs in the US are foreign born.
https://www.nber.org/digest/jul09/internationalization-us-doctorate-education
In 2003, doctorate recipients from outside the United States accounted for 50 percent of Ph.D.s awarded in the physical sciences, 67 percent in engineering, and 68 percent in economics.
Yes... we’ve already been falling behind! Many people already accept that as common knowledge — but I guarantee that if we continue along censorious anti-science lines that we can expect to be outpaced into irrelevance in the near future.
I feel for you and for the future of science. What happened to separating the art from the artist? ...This is wild, it's like people can't think properly anymore. If it had turned out that Nazis were behind the idea of Earth being round, that doesn't mean it's incorrect.
Oh my, so now the left is anti evolution? Wtf is happening here?
I'm so sorry you have to deal with this nonsense. I love reading your posts (although the nonsense you have to endure makes me angry) and I really want to know more about this. This almost sounds unbelievable.
Thank you so much for the encouragement!
I am stultified by the nonsense of it, and have a hard time believing in my interpretation of what I'm experiencing. Surely I'm misunderstanding!
But yeah, my basic take is on the right evolution is bad because it is at odds with creation stories, on the left it's bad because of how baddies used it incorrectly to support eugenics and racism. I can't win for losing!
The far left is becoming just as anti science as the far right earth is only 6,000 year old loony tunes Christians.
Queer Theory has seeped into the following: All the Humanities; the soft science->Sociology, Anthropology, Archeology and Ethnography; Evolutionary Biology and Psychology and finally Biology PhDs and MDs TRAs. They are attempting to Gaslight the whole Society that Biology is a spectrum.
I can't wait until this time frame is over.
I've added some flair for you, but please try and DIY from the options under the post title.
Thank you - The only other appropriate one I could think of is "Education" but my post is indeed exposing institutional capture, so what you chose is fine.
Oh I think you're on to something. Here is where I blame Foucault again, but that school of thought rejects Grand Narratives, which include not only religion and creation myths and the morality that they espouse, but the Enlightenment and the scientific method. It's all just a power struggle, the oppressed and the oppressor.
Related: this, uh, philosophy? point of view? is also used to criticize the idea of taxonomies and that categorizing people, animals, things, nature, etc. is an act of colonization and violence. Like how slave owners would categorize enslaved people and how that codified race and discrimination in the US. HOWEVER I've also seen this extended as a criticism of taxonomies in general, like why do we have Latin names for stuff in the natural world? Let's look at all of our categorizing critically and dismantle that, and library science, and etc etc.
Sounds hilarious, right? But I've seen it discussed seriously. Postmodernism/critical whatever theory is extremely disruptive and not just to the things that you might not like for good reasons; it aims to disrupt the whole shebang.
But I do feel that the TRA movement and this decolonize movement are closely related and both with ties back to postmodernism and the vilification of objective reality and verifiable facts...
Postmodernism does not vilify objective reality or verifiable facts. It's a mode of inquiry into how people make meaning. And it's actually very useful for understanding the turn against science we're seeing in many subcultures: from trans medicalists to people who believe empiricism is a form of colonialism.
I guarantee you these people don't understand the postmodernists texts they read or never read the texts. The problem here isn't postmodernism. It's just stupidity, moral panic and social contagion.
Oh — I didn’t mean to suggest that postmodernism itself was a vilification of objective reality. I very much feel that those who use postmodernism as an excuse for their strange objections to objective truth are wildly misinterpreting what they read or they never read a word of Foucault or any of the postmodernists, but still feel comfortable attributing that philosophy to them somehow.
Sorry — I should have made that more clear that the misreading of postmodernism results into some pretty bizarre interpretations which seems unconnected with who they seem to believe they are in agreement with... or rather pseudo-intellectuals tend to throw around these curious ideas and try their level best to sound all brainy... but it’s as if they are all reading from a script! Same identical phrases as if they were all coached by the same lunatics or something... really does feel like a secular religion!
olonialism.
I guarantee you these people don't understand the postmodernists texts they read or never read the texts. The problem here isn't postmodernism. It's just stupidity, moral panic and social contagion.
I agree with you on all that, though I also do know they believe that their philosophy is somehow grounded in some weighty movement... they all parrot the same lines and they obviously feel they are very clever — but then again, these are the same folks who believe lots and lots of nonsense stuff!
Thank you for this, I don't know much about this subject, so it's interesting to read other people's insights
Yes — you are correct that postmodernism has a lot to answer for and is basically the basis for doubting objective reality and elevating lived experience over verifiable facts...
(Edit: I really should distinguish between what pseudo-intellectuals believe vs what the actual philosophers like Foucault actually said and what they actually meant and how they are being wildly misinterpreted.)
But I think even Foucault would have said, “steady on there...” and looked at what is happening now as if we were insane... (well he would have used some french equivalent to indicate shock and confusion or whatever — not sure what their colloquial phrases are for, “oh c’mon!”...)
In any case — academics and people who want to just gaslight everyone into believing ONLY their version of the truth ™️ have been abusing and misreading Foucault for ages on basis of some very thin assumptions and extrapolations that fundamentally do not follow from what he was saying...
Aside from anything else, Foucault himself confessed in an interview that, as an academic — he realized people took him more seriously if he put in 10 or so percent of piffle — complete nonsense — that was purposefully contradictory and could literally mean anything or be open to interpretation... ergo — I don’t think his words are exactly great source material on which or rebuild a brave new society...
Thank you for articulating this! This philosophy prey's on people's desire not to be limited by categorization, but in the meantime destroys the very means by which we make sense of our world - taxonomy.