Shades of 1984 in Illinois

             Any of you that read the book 1984 are familiar with the “memory hole” where all politically incorrect previous history gets dumped and get replaced with Big Brother’s history de jour for today. Of course it may change tomorrow or the day after but that’s neither here nor there. The point is that if it doesn’t fit today’s new narrative it’s gone, never to be seen again.

            “Education” leaders in ‘the land of Lincoln” seem to be taking lessons from 1984. A recent article in The Unz Review. The article noted that: “Leaders in education, politics and other areas gathered in suburban Evanston Sunday to ask that the Illinois State Board of Education change the history curriculum at schools statewide, and temporarily halt instruction until an alternative is decided upon. At a news conference State Rep. LaShawn K. Ford said current history teachings lead to a racist society and overlook the contributions of women and minorities.” Have you heard this record before? If not then you have been asleep with Gulliver for the past twenty years!

            The article continued: “The state representative is sponsoring a bill that would require elementary schools to teach students about the civil rights movement.” A couple questions here–Ford wants school districts to remove present history curriculum that “unfairly communicates” history until a suitable alternative is developed.” And just how long would that take? You don’t write a new history book in ten days or even two weeks–or does Mr. Ford already have an alternative “history” book in mind that he can’t wait to spring on the poor kids in Illinois? And should that be the case you might wonder if his motive is ulterior?

            Another question–what will the new book he seems to want to teach the kids about the civil rights movement? Obviously not the real truth or he would not want it. The civil rights movement had lots of really suspicious characters involved with it. I’ve written about some of them in the past and their politics were, shall we say, very left of center. Obviously there were some very sincere people in the civil rights movement–but not all of them were, and, unfortunately the left of center ones got most of the publicity and their “solutions” got most of the publicity.

            In checking out Rep. Ford I came  up with an article on https://spectator.us for August 4th of this year. Along with the article was a picture of LaShawn Ford sitting right next to Bernie Sanders at some kind of meeting. The article noted: “But even after six-plus decades of enthusiastic reform, an Illinois Democrat has found a way to be original. On Sunday night, State Rep. LaShawn Ford delivered the well-trod complaint that history classes focus too much on the achievements of white men. The classes must change to deemphasize pale males and highlight the accomplishments of women and minority groups.” In other words, if you don’t like the history then just rewrite it and while you are doing that the kids in Illinois will be deprived of any history whatever. Besides, everyone knows that nothing worthwhile took place before the civil rights movement anyway–right?

            Years ago now, investigative reporter Alan Stang wrote a book called It’s Very Simple–The true story of civil rights. Amazon or some other used book place may still have copies. Check and see if you can find one. Mr. Stang is deceased now but in his day he did some penetrating investigation into several subjects and you can still find some of his stuff on the internet.

                If we are going to start teaching the kiddies all about civil rights then maybe we need to b