culture war 
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SOURCE: Chronicle of Higher Education
6/8/2022
Anti-CRT Legislation at Fever Pitch in States
Suzanne Nossel of PEN America argues that legislation that dictates what can be taught is at "the top of the pyramid" in terms of the broad array of threats to free speech on campuses.
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SOURCE: Jacobin
5/24/2022
School Privatizers are Carrying the Culture War Banner
Moral panics are proving useful for a right-wing agenda of undermining public trust in public education; America's oligarchs are stoking them, argues a school social worker.
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SOURCE: Made By History at the Washington Post
5/24/2022
The CRT and "Don't Say Gay" Panics Aren't About Controlling Public Schools, but Destroying Them
by Adam Laats
In the 1920s, the KKK sought to strengthen and control the public schools as vehicles to teach their version of "100% Americanism"; today's culture warriors hope to undermine trust in schools as a way to defund and privatize them.
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SOURCE: American Historical Association
5/18/2022
Historians on Teaching with Integrity in the Face of "Gag Laws"
Leonard Moore, Katharina Matro, Julia Brookins, Kathleen Hilliard, James Grossman, Hasan Kwame Jeffries, and James Sweet describe how their ability to examine the past honestly and students' freedom to learn support democracy.
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SOURCE: Texas Tribune
5/17/2022
Texas Librarians Face Harassment as they Navigate Book Bans
While some librarians in the state have been fired for refusing to comply with bans, many others have or are contemplating quitting over political interference with their work and social media harassment.
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SOURCE: The Nation
5/19/2021
When a Right-Wing Attack on Textbooks Was Stopped
by Jonathan Zimmerman
A McCarthy-era attack on a leading civics textbook fell short because of both organized resistance and the unpopularity of the ideas behind the ban. Supporters of academic freedom today can potentially draw on both of those elements, too.
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SOURCE: The Guardian
5/16/2022
Calling Culture War a "Distraction" Mistakes its Meaning
by Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò
The right is fighting to make sure that one group's values are more influential than any others'. It's impossible to separate this from material politics, and the left needs to connect its values to changing the way people live.
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SOURCE: CNN
4/12/2022
Social-Emotional Learning Doesn't Have to be a Culture War Wedge Issue
by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela
Why are efforts at teaching empathy and emotional self-regulation being treated as left-wing indoctrination?
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SOURCE: PEN America
4/28/2022
With Educational Gag Orders, The Vagueness is the Point
The failure of states to offer precise guidance for which lessons are acceptable and which aren't suggests that "divisive concepts" laws and other legislation are intended to chill teachers' ability to discuss politically sensitive subjects.
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SOURCE: Chronicle of Higher Education
4/26/2022
How "Divisive Concepts" Laws are Targeting Universities
A survey of recent legislation affecting the teaching of "divisive concepts" in history and other courses, plus changes to what kinds of diversity trainings are required or permitted in multiple states.
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SOURCE: Truthout
4/25/2022
The Dark Money Behind KBJ Attacks Is Coming for Public Schools
by Alyssa Bowen
"Dark Money" organizations allow a small group of elite families to use their wealth to control the content of education around the country.
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SOURCE: The Bulwark
4/20/2022
Tucker Carlson Heralds Yet Another "Crisis of Masculinity"
by Mona Charen
Tucker Carlson's recent examination of testicular tanning as a boost to manliness shows the need for societies to support pathways to male expression that don't lead to violence or painful sunburns.
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SOURCE: Vice
4/13/2022
The Far Right is "Doxxing" More School Officials they Claim are "Groomers"
Online calls for violence against teachers and school staff suggest that the right's portrayal of LGBTQ adults as inherent threats to children will soon generate a body count.
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SOURCE: Washington Post
4/17/2022
The Next Front of the Culture War? Your Public Library
"Conservative activists in several states, including Texas, Montana and Louisiana have joined forces with like-minded officials to dissolve libraries’ governing bodies, rewrite or delete censorship protections, and remove books outside of official challenge procedures."
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SOURCE: Florida Today
4/17/2022
CRT Not What You've Been Told, Florida Professor Tells Public
Michael Butler, author of two books on the civil rights struggle in Florida, told an audience that the controversy was being stoked to prevent constructive public debate by folding all historical discussion of racism into a "frightening, dangerous, scary" term.
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SOURCE: Iowa Starting Line
4/17/2022
Why Iowa Students are Walking Out in Protest
Restrictions on "divisive concepts" are among the legislative developments that make Iowa high school students fear their educations are being treated as a political football.
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SOURCE: Nature
4/12/2022
Campus CRT Battles Recall 1920s Evolution Fight
by Adam Laats
Faculty and teachers who want to fight back against the Critical Race Theory panic can take the high ground by stressing the importance of quality research and teaching, if the 1920s are a guide.
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SOURCE: The Nation
3/30/2022
Nationwide, Faculty Fight for Academic Freedom
by Ellen Schrecker
"When they act collectively, professors have the power to protect academic freedom and the desire to teach the truth. Let us hope they also have the will."
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SOURCE: HuffPost
3/31/2022
Black Students Caught in Middle of American Culture Wars
"Black youth say they feel squarely in the crosshairs of the latest culture wars engulfing America’s schools — seeing themselves as collateral damage in a political firestorm."
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SOURCE: PEN America
3/28/2022
A Tip Sheet for Changing the Conversation about Educational Gag Orders in Your Community
"Your message is strongest when you can affirm what most people already believe about students’ right to learn."
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