DeSantis mandates lessons on communism for high school students

[ThatRobGuy]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/05/10/florida-victims-of-communism-day/

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) signed a bill into law Monday establishing a new state holiday known as “Victims of Communism Day” on which public schools are required to teach students about communist regimes.


The law states that starting next year “Victims of Communism Day” will be observed by public schools on Nov. 7. On that day, high-schoolers will receive lessons in their U.S. government classes about the “atrocities” that have been imposed by communist governments.

DeSantis said during a news conference that the day is meant to “to honor the more than 100 million people who have fallen victim to communist regimes across the world.”

“We want to make sure that every year, folks in Florida — but particularly our students — will learn about the evils of communism, the dictators who have led communist regimes and the hundreds of millions of individuals who have suffered and continue to suffer under the weight of this discredited ideology,” he said.


Some are questioning how sincere his motives are...and it's a fair critique.

I think he's gotten pretty good at trolling his political rivals over the past few years...this feels like sort of a trolling-effort on his part where he's trying to sucker-in his political opponents into defending communism in efforts to simply oppose him.

I'll be interested to see how many elected democrats or left-leaning publications take the bait on this one.

If they were smart, they'd simply say "yeah, we agree with you on this one, communism sucks"...as that would not only improve their standing among Florida moderates, but would also take the wind out of his sails with regards to his strategy on this one.

We'll see which way they go on this one.

As far as state-level elected officials go, it looks like they haven't taken the bait as the votes were unanimous

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

'BUT IT"S NOT TRUE COMMUNISM!"

 

[wing2000]

Will there be a lesson plan addressing the root causes of revolution in many Latin American countries?

....starting with Batista's Cuba. Communism sucks. But so did colonial capitalism.

 

[Tanj]

A state holiday in which students are mandated by the government to have lessons on ideology.

Firstly, hands up any student, or indeed anyone, that would consider doing this a holiday.
Secondly, It's going to take days to unpack the irony in full.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

'BUT IT"S NOT TRUE COMMUNISM!"

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Will there be a lesson plan addressing the root causes of revolution in many Latin America?

....starting with Batista's Cuba. Communism sucks. But so did colonial capitalism.

Actually, we did learn about that in my 12th grade world government class...granted, that's going back 20 years at this point, so not sure what they're teaching these days.

I think the distinction between the two systems (with regards to abuses of power) is that under one system it's indicative of a flaw, in the other system, it's basically a feature.

You can find numerous example of successful market economies that were able to keep abuses of power to a minimum to counterbalance the bad ones. The same can't be said about communistic economies, those have pretty much always led to abuses of power and gross violations of rights.

 

[Hans Blaster]

From the title, I thought (at first) he was going to feed them Soviet propaganda or something.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

A state holiday in which students are mandated by the government to have lessons on ideology.
...
It's going to take days to unpack the irony in full.

Assuming you're referring to the fact that he's made efforts to keep other ideologies out of schools?

I would say one has to make the distinction between promotion of an ideology vs. education about the effects of an ideology.

For instance, one can have a holocaust remembrance day holiday (Jan 27th), or Juneteenth, in order to educate people about the bad effects of an ideology, that's not the same as promotion.

EX: If I say "McDonald's is terrible" that doesn't mean I'm promoting a "pro-Burger King" viewpoint.

 

[Sparagmos]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/05/10/florida-victims-of-communism-day/

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) signed a bill into law Monday establishing a new state holiday known as “Victims of Communism Day” on which public schools are required to teach students about communist regimes.


The law states that starting next year “Victims of Communism Day” will be observed by public schools on Nov. 7. On that day, high-schoolers will receive lessons in their U.S. government classes about the “atrocities” that have been imposed by communist governments.

DeSantis said during a news conference that the day is meant to “to honor the more than 100 million people who have fallen victim to communist regimes across the world.”

“We want to make sure that every year, folks in Florida — but particularly our students — will learn about the evils of communism, the dictators who have led communist regimes and the hundreds of millions of individuals who have suffered and continue to suffer under the weight of this discredited ideology,” he said.


Some are questioning how sincere his motives are...and it's a fair critique.

I think he's gotten pretty good at trolling his political rivals over the past few years...this feels like sort of a trolling-effort on his part where he's trying to sucker-in his political opponents into defending communism in efforts to simply oppose him.

I'll be interested to see how many elected democrats or left-leaning publications take the bait on this one.

If they were smart, they'd simply say "yeah, we agree with you on this one, communism sucks"...as that would not only improve their standing among Florida moderates, but would also take the wind out of his sails with regards to his strategy on this one.

We'll see which way they go on this one.

As far as state-level elected officials go, it looks like they haven't taken the bait as the votes were unanimous
View attachment 315897

Lol this is hilarious. Probably just make kids more curious about communism.

 

[Tanj]

Assuming you're referring to the fact that he's made efforts to keep other ideologies out of schools?

nope.

For instance, one can have a holocaust remembrance day holiday (Jan 27th), or Juneteenth

Are students mandated on those days to sit in class rooms and receive "education" on them?

in order to educate people about the bad effects of an ideology, that's not the same as promotion.

The same way North Korean children are educated about the bad effects of capitalism, or the way Hitler Youth worked, or the way any awful, authoritarian regime has indoctrinated it's children about the evils of X.

EX: If I say "McDonald's is terrible" that doesn't mean I'm promoting a "pro-Burger King" viewpoint.

Were students mandated to sit in a class room and get lessons on it? Did you declare it a state holiday?

 

[friend of]

Only communists would be against educating the youth on the follies of that system.

 

[Pommer]

Any form of republican government that lasts long enough always turns into a ponzi-scheme.
It’s baked into our DNA to fight and dominate one another; but there’s a time and a place. Government is not that place, though that’s where we are now.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Any form of republican government that lasts long enough always turns into a ponzi-scheme.
It’s baked into our DNA to fight and dominate one another; but there’s a time and a place. Government is not that place, though that’s where we are now.

That's not always true...

Charlie Baker and Larry Hogan are republican governors in the northeast and they don't play the same kinds of games the southern republican governors do.

 

[Fantine]

It seems that it isn't the economic models--capitalism, socialism, communism--that are the biggest problem.

They become problematical when the leaders of these countries are fascists. Dictatorial. Authoritarian. Often they pose as "populists" before the axe falls and they show their true colors of oppression and dehumanization.

We see this in countries like Sweden and Denmark and other western European countries, thriving under the economic model of socialism because their leaders embrace democracy. Socialism fails when leaders are ruthless dictators as in Venezuela.

Sadly, America has a number of 'leaders' posing as "populists" who have dark, sinister motives to oppress. We need to see these rogues for who they are and show them the gate. Whether they are left or right wing, capitalist or socialist, they will harm us, and we will suffer.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

We see this in countries like Sweden and Denmark and other western European countries, thriving under the economic model of socialism because their leaders embrace democracy. Socialism fails when leaders are ruthless dictators as in Venezuela.

They're not employing the economic model of socialism, they're employing capitalism with the addition of a welfare state. People use them interchangeably these days, but they are very different things.

...which is why the prime minister of Denmark even made a it a point to make a clarification when speaking at Harvard.

They become problematical when the leaders of these countries are fascists. Dictatorial. Authoritarian. Often they pose as "populists" before the axe falls and they show their true colors of oppression and dehumanization.

The problem is that they always end up being that way in communistic systems, as to where in capitalistic market economies, it could go either way.

For instance, for every Pinochet who greatly abused their power under market economies, or the instances of US corporations meddling in central American affairs, you can find countries with market economies like the Nordic countries and Canada who have not succumbed to those types of outcomes.

With communism, there's yet to be a good outcome. Those countries have succumbed to those outcomes every time.

As the saying goes "capitalism isn't a great system, it's just the least terrible".

I'd rather take my chances on a system that only fails 1/3 of the time vs. a system that fails 100% of the time.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Only communists would be against educating the youth on the follies of that system.

I guess to be fair...nobody wants the follies of their own systems taught.

Have you ever tried explaining the flaws with veganism to a vegan?

I think DeSantis is trolling a bit here...and to be honest, I can't blame him for trying, the strategy is working with regards to rallying support for his base.

He knows that mainstream leftists will oppose him on anything where he's attacking an ideology that's synonymous with the the left (at least in terms of public perception)

So the game is "I'll trash talk this bad thing that a small percentage of my opponents promote, knowing that my opponents will trying to find a way to quasi-defend it simply to oppose me"

I disagree with DeSantis on over half of the major issues...but I'll give credit where it's due. He knows how to play certain opponents like a fiddle, and he's a much better strategist than Trump.

 

[Pommer]

That's not always true...

Charlie Baker and Larry Hogan are republican governors in the northeast and they don't play the same kinds of games the southern republican governors do.

Even smaller “r” republican.

 

[Tanj]

Only communists would be against educating the youth on the follies of that system.

On the other hand, they'd be right on board with declaring an "I hate ideology X" issue a State holiday except for students who are mandated to sit in class and learn about it. It is, apparently, right out of their play book.

The irony runs deep on this one.

 

[FireDragon76]

I'm opposed to this because it won't involve talking about the historical contingencies surrounding the emergence of communist ideologies in those aformentioned countries, such as colonialism.

They're not employing the economic model of socialism, they're employing capitalism with the addition of a welfare state. People use them interchangeably these days, but they are very different things.

Sweden and Denmark only have those as a political compromise. Both countries have had a strong Left during the postwar era. Capitalists did not devise social welfare out of the goodness of their heart. In fact, over a century ago Scandinavian countries had large amounts of wealth inequality and low living standards.

 

[Goonie]

Are they going to start every anti-communist class with the 'Bellamy ' salute and the Pledge of Allegiance?