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Did Gov. DeSantis Get the ‘Stop Woke Act’ Wrong?
When I saw that the court’s Judge Walker rejected key parts of the “Stop Woke Act”(Individual Freedom Act) in Florida, I assumed that he was just another Leftist judge attacking the Conservative legislation. But then I saw that he was responding to a lawsuit brought by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) on behalf of a faculty member, a student, and a student group. FIRE is a highly regarded organization that champions free speech. You can review their lawsuit here. FIRE stated that the act was unconstitutional in that it disallowed free speech on public college campuses.
Judge Walker’s blistering criticism referred to the work of George Orwell:
‘In this case, the State of Florida lays the cornerstone of its own Ministry of Truth under the guise of the Individual Freedom Act, declaring which viewpoints shall be orthodox and which shall be verboten in its university classrooms,’ Walker wrote.
‘[T]he First Amendment does not permit the State of Florida to muzzle its university professors, impose its own orthodoxy of viewpoints, and cast us all into the dark,’ Walker concluded.
The legislation was intended to bring a halt to curricula that ignored or defied traditional teaching of values and subjects, since universities were condemning traditional education and providing Marxist and socialist content to students. The judge, in his objection, said that the state could provide educational curriculum, but explained that there is no precedent for the State of Florida’s assertion that the state “has an unfettered right to prohibit professors from expressing viewpoints with which it disagrees.”
It’s important to note FIRE’s position in this lawsuit:
FIRE’s suit is limited to higher education and does not take a position on the truth of the prohibited concepts of race and sex. Rather, FIRE takes the viewpoint-neutral approach that faculty retain the right to give an opinion—whether that opinion supports or opposes the prohibited concepts in the Stop WOKE Act….
For those of us who believe the university has corrupted education by distorting content and attacking traditional viewpoints, this ruling creates a few dilemmas:
- How do we return our universities to teaching an appropriate curriculum?
- How do we limit the propaganda being taught without violating the constitution?
- Is there a way to ensure that at least a balanced curriculum is offered to students?
- Was the writing of the “Stop Woke” Act insufficient to meet the state’s agenda?
Is this ruling a message that the universities can’t be stopped in their march to destroy the foundations of the United States?
You can read the “Stop Woke Act” here.
Published in Education
I understand it’s related to CRT, but muddying the water is putting it mildly. Song of the South?!? After all of that dust kicked up above in Zafar’s and Gary’s comments, are they arguing for or against compelling, as a condition of employment or education, radical identitarian beliefs right here in 2022 (as opposed to 1876, 1946, 1976, etc)? Are they arguing for or against the banning of that compulsion?
If they were being lied to about things that actually happen, wouldn’t it be a lot easier to pile up stacks of bodies? Or at least to find people who can identify someone who is suddenly and mysteriously missing?
The point of the offshoot discussion is somebody else brought up Song of the South and asked if it might ever be re-released.
Some words I don’t think I’ve written before: give The New York Times some credit–right there on the op-ed page, John McWhorter brought up the orchestra situation to argue that it was ultimately irrelevant. He finished the article with, “#SoWhite? #SoWhat?”
Gary I could be mistaken but I think you’re the first person to bring it up.
You’re right; it’s a misposting from the Disney Awakens thread. There, Occupant CDN brought it up, and Kedavis and I argued about it. When Kedavis and I started arguing here, I responded to him as if we were still in the same discussion. My mistake. But the two threads do have a strong overlap.
EDIT: Zafar had nothing to do with it.
I don’t really think you can compel belief, at best you can compel lip service. True about wokeness, true about American exceptionalism, true about belief in God, true about anything. The proposed law bans compulsion – but is it in response to anybody anywhere including ‘compel belief in X’ in their curriculum?
(Whether ‘professed belief’ should be a condition of employment – I would trend not, though I understand that there are different views on that. I think it’s an invitation to hypocrisy, and by its nature corrupting.)
Similarly: trying to compel belief through education is an invitation to hypocrisy. Education should (and this just is my opinion) be about making people think rather than making people believe.
I reckon education should address the issue of race/racism better and smarter (by placing it in the context of the majoritarian instinct common to all human cultures) rather than not at all. I do not think that education on this issue should be constrained by ensuring everybody feels comfortable or anybody feels uncomfortable.
Yup, we’ve all been there, but Zafar usually has something to do with it. ;D
Ok, but you can compel someone to profess belief or to act on a belief. If it hasn’t actually happened – then no harm no foul.
I don’t think the Stop Woke Act stops education concerning race/racism, nor does it seek everyone’s comfort. It bans compelling some very specific things. Those specific things are consistent with the rest of antidiscrimination law.
Of course it’s happened. Some religious schools require teachers to profess beliefs before they hire them. And to act as if they believe in a certain set of rules as a condition of ongoing employment.
Whether “woke schools” require a similar profession of belief I don’t know.
How can anybody compel a belief? It’s just not possible.
Arguable. Courtesy comment #84, some quibbles:
Stretching it. If someone grew up in Saudi culture it’s pretty likely that they’re sexist. At least unconsciously. We’re supposed to pretend that people aren’t influenced by the environment they grow up in?
Necessarily? Meaning it may be?
Don’t open doors for ladies?
Get rid of affirmative action. (This is the hidden hook, btw.)
So teachers can teach this stuff but have to pretend they don’t believe in any of it?
Honestly, it seems like virtue signalling back.
So you’re for letting the wokesters use public schooling and hiring to compel speech as a condition of employment or education and you’re against conservatives from stopping them from doing it? I didn’t see where the Stop Woke Act prevents private religious schools from claiming exemption.
I am not convinced that wokesters are actually doing this. I suspect that the law is a big virtue signal to Conservatives – iow its objective is politics rather than policy.
The point is that one can compel profession of a belief, nobody can compel a genuine belief.
One can also compel that one not compel profession of a belief.* And even compel not instructing towards that belief. I think that’s what the act is intended to do.
*That is, the state can compel teachers not to compel students to state that they are “oppressors” or “victims” based on skin color.
It happens to my own kids up here in Chicago. They go to public high school. In some classes debate is more robust than I had expected. In other classes anti-woke gets bad grades beliefs expressed gets bad grades.
I also know it works that way in hiring up here in Chicago too. I’ve seen it happen. How widespread? How on the nose? I don’t know. I just know that it does happen.
Yeah, I already said this. I don’t understand why you keep bringing it up.
Okay. Voice of experience. I bow.
Do you think this law, if passed by some miracle in Illinois, would change this?
Have your children been asked to state that (if white) they’re oppressors or (if black) oppressed?
(Also, how’s Goshen looking now, not that I’m pushy about it or anything….)
Hiring in the public system?
Has this reduced the diversity of those hired? Or is it just a different orthodoxy that’s currently ascendent?
Answers:
I don’t know.
Yes, but not directly in those words. Not in the form of some pledge or anything like that. There was a class where those concepts must be cited and affirmed in order to get a good grade yes but also to avoid being dressed down in class.
Which class? And how do you mean ‘dressed down’? Like a personal attack, or was it about not knowing the concept? If the former I’m appalled.
Answers:
Haven’t had direct experience with public hiring, but yes of course I think so.
Don’t know about racial diversity impacts, but also don’t care. Actually I do know a lityle. DEI is official company policy now where I work. Aka quotas. I don’t know what the quotas are or even if there’s an explicit number or policy – it’s even worse because teh default policy is to favor by protected identity group[s regardless of the numbers achieved at the company.
I honestly don’t care about ascendant orthodoxy enough to compel my own orthodoxy. I even recognize that there will be a dominant orthodoxy and that that it’s not inherently wrong to consider that. However, the specific things mentioned in the Stop Woke Act I believe to be inherently wrong regardless, and I believe banning those specific things is entirely consistent with current Constitutional law surrounding discrimination and speech.
“Dressed down” generally means subjected to public (at least within the classroom/school/company…) criticism and ridicule.
History, English.
Subject to interrogation by teacher and class on concepts on which there is no “right” answer, or I should say no objective answer. I’m not opposed to trial of ideas by combat – I’m a conservative after all – but two points: high school is not the place for that specific kind of interrogation and nowhere is it right to condition employment or education on a particular outcome on matters subject to beliefs about good/right/justice/truth especially if doing so increases the racist/racialist ranks. It’s in our constitution to reject those kinds of decisions on the basis of race or sex.
No, I meant ideological diversity – a diversity of political viewpoints.
Meaning, was there ever a time when it was normal for the public system to have teachers who believed in traditional family values (however defined) and teachers who were communists and teachers who were libertarian and teachers who believed in American Exceptionalism and teachers who thought that was bunk, etc.
[Edited to add: I can’t believe I left out teachers who were openly straight and those who were openly gay…though that’s perhaps being tendentious?]
Or was there always some orthodoxy or the other that was reflected in who was hired and the Overton Window for the views that could be expressed?
I guess I’m just wondering if that orthodoxy has changed and this is reflected in what they do/do not consider, the people they hire, etc.
Fair enough.
?
Especially not by the teacher of a student.
Even if it doesn’t.
Should that be extended to ideology?
I think I see. I don’t have any direct knowledge I suppose, but it used to be that racism was background. Well, maybe not racism but certainly bias, bigotry. Then we had the Civil Rights movement. Seems to me that any overt bias bigotry was gone pretty quickly. Now it’s coming back, but from the unexpected direction of the the protected classes (not exactly unexpected by conservatives).
I’m not talking about orthodoxy on whether the Pilgrims were good or not, whether the land was stolen or not whether Columbus treated the natives badly, fairly, or just about par for all societies and time periods. I’m talking about teaching and compelling ideas about whiteness or blackness and collective guilt.
I might argue that even if you’re going to teach that Columbus was “bad,” it should not be taught that he was UNIQUELY bad, or even that at the time such “badness” was not actually widespread.
And, European/American slave traders didn’t just cruise into Africa and start grabbing black people. The black people were typically sold to them by other black people, to whom slavery was also normal at that time. (And in some parts of Africa is still practiced today, perhaps mostly in muslim parts of Africa.)
Sure, but hiring black people didn’t make the teachers’ room automatically more ideologically diverse. “Race” is not a reasonable proxy for ideology.
Does that have to do with the curriculum or with what teachers believe?
CRT includes that specifically.
Appropriate to what?
As to influencing them, maybe governments should get out of the business of funding them.
We don’t.
Not likely. But maybe we need Separation of Education and State.
Sounds like it. I’m surprised and disappointed that DeSantis would countenance such action. Now I’ll go read the comments. Maybe somebody will relieve my disappointment.
This would be important, but that’s not what the lawsuit claims. However, there is this on page 23 of 93:
I don’t see a problem with inviting students to discuss their privilege, but compelling them to discuss their privilege could be a problem. Even more so if this is in a required course in which students are required to “deconstruct…and rank themselves…” What the remedy would be is less clear, but it’s something that the state of Florida should be interested in.
Requiring that type of participation would seem to be getting close to requiring a loyalty oath from students. I think there is a legal history about loyalty oath requirements that goes back to the McCarthy days.
I’m not convinced that a “discussion of privilege” would not be based on toxic assumptions such as that only white students have it.