In addition to pulling the plug on a well-repsected ethnic studies curriculum, they are now banning books. BANNING BOOKS! I personally hope every family in Tucson goes out and buys/reads each of the horribly dangerous books that TUSD is removing from schools, at the insistence of a state government afraid of its own shadow. Some of the banned titles include: The Tempest and Rethinking Columbus.
Salon has the article here: http://www.salon.com/2012/01/13/whos_afraid_of_the_tempest/singleton/
And the Tucson Citizen: http://tucsoncitizen.com/three-sonorans/2012/01/13/did-you-know-even-shakespeare-got-banned-from-tusd-with-mas-ruling/
Here's another article: http://rt.com/usa/news/arizona-history-mexican-studies-845/
BANNED BOOKS WEEK 2012: September 30 through October 6
Huffington Post piece on book banning: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/roberta-stevens/yes-there-is-still-book-b_b_738679.html
For a little background on book banning in education, start here: http://712educators.about.com/cs/bannedbooks/a/bookbanning.htm
Justice Brennan's comments in the case of Texas v Johnson, 1989:
"Recognizing that the right to differ is the centerpiece of our First Amendment freedoms, a government cannot mandate by fiat a feeling of unity in its citizens."
“If there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that the Government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.”
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