New California Law

[bollier]

Recently, lawmakers in California passed a law stating that schools must teach the achievements of the GLBT community and their contributions to society (the governor still has 12 days to veto it, though). I think that this is a relatively interesting development! What are your thoughts?

Here is the article I read:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43648772/ns/us_news/  

[airforce_freak6678]

While I am in the GSA, bi myself, and have many LGBT friends, I dont think this is a good idea... make it an elective like women's history or black history, not a requirement. Not only will parents see it as it (being LGBT) being pushed on their children (mostly the bigoted parents but a surprising number of parents in general will view it this way) but it is not that important, dont get me wrong the LGBT community has lots of history and lots of great people associated with it, but it shouldn't be focused on as a requirement, just like black history, and women's history, and well any other history short of world/U.S.(or what ever country applies to you) history. I don't think it is a good move politically or otherwise. It seems like people would become more bigoted because of this.  

[Silver Sage-General]

I agree. Everyone's different but most people are alike in that they hate being forced into something.  

[kittycross]

I think it depends a lot on how it is taught.
Women's, Black and other minority studies aren't generally taught in public schools (with the exception of possibly a Martin Luther King Day explanation) and have to be taken as electives or alternative to core classes in college.

If LGBT, women and ethnic minorities people are included in regular history and social studies programs as regular people maybe we can start being treated more like regular people.

There will be people that resent not getting pure White Man History, but then there are people who resent getting MLK Day off. People object to learning about the civil war and WWII as well but such teachings are no less important for their content regarding minorities.  

[Taeryyn]

While I don't think LGBT achievements and history should be hush-hush or glossed over, I don't know if enacting a law forcing it to be taught is really the right way to go about it, either.

Like Kittycross said, it will depend on how it's taught. I hope they're just going to maybe integrate a few bits (or details) into the existing history or social studies curriculum, rather than dedicate entire units (or mandatory classes) to the subject.  

[Toker Rockett]

I think everything should be taught. History in public schools is a joke. Kids end up going to college with a blank slate and it's harmful for students who want to pursue history, anthropology, or sociology majors.

Don't sugar coat s**t. If parents have an issue, they can take it up with congress. Leave the school board alone. Kids suffer enough with terrible education. Blacks, gays, trans, Native Americans and women should be included in history classes and it should be core.

What I mean by all of this is that all people's parts in history should be taught in one class. World history should have everything in it and American history should include the things that Native Americans, Blacks, Gays, Lesbians and Transgenders have done. Have it all taught in one class.  

[Wear Sunscreen]

airforce_freak6678

While I am in the GSA, bi myself, and have many LGBT friends, I dont think this is a good idea... make it an elective like women's history or black history, not a requirement. Not only will parents see it as it (being LGBT) being pushed on their children (mostly the bigoted parents but a surprising number of parents in general will view it this way) but it is not that important, dont get me wrong the LGBT community has lots of history and lots of great people associated with it, but it shouldn't be focused on as a requirement, just like black history, and women's history, and well any other history short of world/U.S.(or what ever country applies to you) history. I don't think it is a good move politically or otherwise. It seems like people would become more bigoted because of this.

I strongly disagree.

First of all, the fact that some parents would see it as forcing homosexuality on their children should not be a concern of the education system. All sorts of things are controversial, that doesn't mean we should stop teaching them. For example, Evolution. Schools need to be teachign all of the facts - even the ones that some people don't like.

Second, where do you get off saying that LGBT history isn't important, the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant School of Neocolonialism and Orientalism? The Western canon is not a story of a bunch of rich white men - that's just how its been taught for years. With the sort of attitude that LGBT people don't really accomplish things, it'll stay that way.
Think of it this way, would you rather it be taught:

Oscar Wilde was a great, white author from England who died in France.

Or:

Oscar Wilde was a great author. He was also a social reformer in that he pushed for acceptance of male homosexuality in Victorian society.  

[SkyCore]

I'd say gay history deserves at least as much attention in schools as the civil rights movement gets.

our country was founded on the ideal that we all deserve equal rights, and over the centuries we are slowly getting to the point were that might actually happen. I think its important for students to learn about everyone that's had to fight for there rights be it Blacks, Women or Gays.  

[Esiris]

Here's why the law is a good thing- we get to read about European-descended Fair-skinned Christian Straight Men all the time. We read about George Washington and his wife Martha. We read about Pierre Curie, Louis Pasteur and Alexander Bell- and we know about their wives.

We also read about Friedrich Wilhelm August Heinrich Ferdinand Von Steuben who turned our backwater farmers into a force that fended off one of the best standing armies of Europe. But we don't ever learn in school that he was chased from Prussia for being gay and came to the Land of the Free in order to live his life- a country that wouldn't exist today if it weren't for his contribution.

People need to know that our world isn't built exclusively by White Straight Christian Men- that the blood, sweat and tears of minorities are just as important- the brief mentions of other people who don't fit that form doesn't do our world, our country, our history, or our minds justice.

The sooner we teach that the people with the most privilege aren't the only ones who contributed to our world, the sooner we'll see real equality.

History has set the record a little too straight.  

[Skye Volt]

Hmm I already learned some of this stuff in my Psychology, Government and 21st Century America classes . . . It was taught well enough. I'm not sure that there IS a wrong way to approach it (other than being creepy, or inappropriate about it). Though, I went to an Alternative school... so all my classes were kick a**! xD

I don't see a problem with it being worked into the main curriculum.