Texas is the second largest buyer of school textbooks in the US and, unfortunately for the nation, the power to approve and reject textbooks is vested in the hands of a small State Board of Education, which is dominated by the Texas Taliban, that frightening brand of Texas politicos who are committed to making the law of (their) God the law of the land. The publishers frequently cave in to pressure from the Texas Taliban, and edit and revise their textbooks to appease them, since they can't afford to have their books rejected from the Texas market. The result is that the Texas Taliban affect the content of textbooks in dozens of other states.
Currently, the Texas Taliban are waging war on biology textbooks, and already some of the publishers are caving, as discussed in this article. The "Discovery [sic] Institute" is an organization devoted to reviving creationism as a "scientific" theory, which they've renamed "Intelligent Design." That the theory of "Intelligent Design" generates no testable claims, and that no papers defending it have been published in peer-reviewed scientific journals is not thought to be a problem by the Texas Taliban, since, of course, they're not the least bit interested in science, and are quite interested in promoting their particular brand of religious belief.
What can be done? To start, I'd urge anyone with children in public schools ANYWHERE to contact Holt, Rinehart to demand that their biology textbooks reflect the existing scientific consensus about the theory of evolution. Here is information on the latest dispute courtesy of the heroic Texas Freedom Network:
"After the first public hearing on Biology textbooks, publishers had two weeks to respond to oral and written comments submitted by the public. Textbook publisher Holt, Rinehart & Winston caved to pressure by creationist censors attempting to weaken the study of evolution in the Biology textbooks. Holt made changes at the request of the Discovery Institute, the Seattle-based organization promoting the teaching of “Intelligent Design” nationwide. The changes include a paragraph in the chapter review recommending students use the Internet to research “alternatives” to evolution and the origin of life.
The overwhelming majority of expert testimony at the hearing called for
accurately presenting proven scientific evidence on evolution - in Biology
textbooks, but the threat of having a textbook rejected by the radical
right element on the State Board of Education (SBOE) seems to have
persuaded Holt, Rinehart & Winston to cave to political pressure.
"CONTACT HOLT, RINEHART AND WINSTON TODAY to demand that
this change be removed. They must hear from mainstream Texans in force.
"Call, email or write Michael Brawley, [email protected], 800-242-5479 1175
N. Stemmons Fwy., Lewisville, TX 75067.
I"n the textbook ‘Biology’ by Johnson and Raven, the chapter review
question on p. 271 was changed from:
"20. Finding and Communicating Information. Use the media center or
Internet resources to learn about the condition on Earth that scientist
think existed before life formed. Identify which compounds Miller and Urey
formed in their experiment…
to:
20. Finding and Communicating Information. Use the media center or
Internet resources to study hypotheses for the origin of life that are
alternatives to the hypotheses proposed by Oparin and Lerman. Analyze,
review, and critique either Oparin’s or Lerman’s hypothesis as presented
in your textbook along with one alternative hypothesis that you discover
in your research."
What will be next? Medical textbooks that recommend students search the Internet for alternate cures?
A nice thing about the Texas Taliban is that they actually publish their "criteria" for evaluating school textbooks. You can read them (and weep) at the web site of Mel and Norma Gabler, a kindly looking couple who have done more than anyone to try to undermine public education in Texas. They do catch the occasional error in school textbooks, but the errors they want to add (about law, about history, about science, about economics) are just breathtaking.
Remember, this isn't just a Texas issue, since the textbooks selected by the Texas State Board of Education are likely to end up in the classrooms of children from Michigan to Florida to Oregon.
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