The American Media: Pandering to Bias and Ignorance

[Judi Lynn]

December 21, 2015
The American Media: Pandering to Bias and Ignorance

by Walter Brasch

The Texas board of education didn’t find anything wrong with a world geography textbook that said slaves from Africa were workers, but that immigrants from northern Europe were indentured servants.

This is the same school board that five years ago demanded that textbooks emphasize that slavery was only a side issue to the cause of the civil war, and that Republican achievements be emphasized in political science and civics textbooks.

For good measure, the officials also wanted a “fair and balanced” look at evolution versus intelligent design or creationism, and that global warming is only a theory, overlooking substantial and significant scientific evidence.

Because Texas adopts textbooks for the entire state, and there is minimal local choice, publishers tend to publish what Texas wants. The geography book had a 100,000 sale in Texas alone. However, McGraw-Hill, under a firestorm of protest from educators and parents, is modifying the text—African slaves will no longer be “workers” but slaves in the next printing.

More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/12/21/the-american-media-pandering-to-bias-and-ignorance/

[daybranch]

1. In Kentucky there are over 90 confederate monuments but less than a handful of Union monuments

Kentucky never seceded and most of its soldiers fought for the Union. yet their schools taught states rights rather than slavery as the reason for the war. This hogwash persists to this day, because the rich in Kentucky, the former slave owners, continue to control the writing of history and the building of monuments. Keeping people ignorant and religious has always been a way of justifying slavery and unfairness. It is great to understand that pandering to bias and ignorance occurs, but it is more important to ask why it occurs and what we can do about it to build a more just society.
Today you have a media controlled by the rich trying to shut out the logical words of a candidate dedicated to restoring democracy. It is up to us to recognize this and prevent the pandering to bias and ignorance that is going on today. Of course not letting opposing views be told is instituting ignorance, is it not? Your point is well made but you have a chance to reduce the ignorance perpetrated by the rich by supporting Bernie and complaining about their attempts to deny press coverage. Go Bernie- the candidate for democracy!

[Nitram]

2. Is this OP considering a Texas school board a part of the American media?

I would have put that under American education.