New lessons also teach “irresponsible citizenship” includes breaking laws. Meanwhile civil rights leaders and enslaved people who fled for freedom were arrested.
ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. — Students head back to school this month in Florida will be learning a new approach to African American history.
You may have heard concerns about lessons claiming that enslaved people benefited from slavery, but historians are concerned about more than just that.
Dr. Michael Butler is a Flagler College professor who has combed through Florida’s new African American history standards which some say whitewash difficult topics.
He wrote a book about life after racial integration and says Florida led the nation in per capita lynchings for 50 years – between 1880 and 1930. However, the word “lynching” is mentioned just once int he new 200-page curriculum.
Butler also said pointed to a lesson which teaches that “responsible citizenship” included obeying laws, and that a “irresponsible citizenship” includes breaking laws.
Yet Civil Rights icons Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks were arrested for their peaceful protests, and enslaved people who fled to freedom were breaking the law.
“I don’t want to say all teachers are concerned about this, but for those who really want to teach history honestly, they are finding it more and more difficult to do that because of external circumstances,” Butler said.
One element of the new state standards included the lesson that some slaves people benefited from slavery. After that lesson was criticized, state officials and two of the people who created the curriculum sent us a list of 16 exmaples. First Coast News researched those examples,. Of the 16 listed, more than half were never enslaved.
One of the 16 was Betty Washington Lewis who was a white slaveowner.
Another was John Henry who is the hero of a folk ballad, but even the National Park Service says his story is more legend than history. Still the state says John Henry benefitted from being enslaved.
Another example provided by the state of a slave who benefitted from slavery was social activist Ned Cobb. However, he was never enslaved. He was born ini 1885, after the Civil War.
“Teachers are going to have a very serious challenge on their hands trying in any way, shape or form to present human bondage in the US as in anyway beneficial,” Butler said.
This past weekend, Governor Desantis defended the curriculum to NBC News Sunday, saying the standards are not political. The Florida Education Commissioner also defended the new standards, saying in a tweet, “Florida is focuses on teaching true and accurate African American history.”