Today we're diving into a hot topic brewing in Miami, Florida. It seems
the celebration of Black History Month at iprep Academy is stirring up some controversy.
But here's the kicker. Parents are being asked to sign permission slips for their
children to participate in educational programming related to Black History Month. Yep, you
heard that right. Learning about Black history is so dangerous you need a permission
slip to participate In a time where discussions about parental rights and education are heating
up, this move has sparked concern among parents and school officials alike. So
grab your popcorn because we're about to unpack the drama surrounding this unexpected permission slip
saga. This story was from Patch dot Com in Miami, published February eighth,
twenty twenty four. As usual, I'm going to have a lot to
talk about, but I thought i'd hand it off to Kelly first. What
are your thoughts? Kelly? Oh, I have so many thoughts about this.
So first off, what's next? We're going to need parental permission to
learn algae because you know that was invented by Arabs, spread around by Arabs.
We're going to need permission to learn about the Great Wall of China or
the history of India. Do we need permission to teach Jewish history? I'm
really curious here where are we going to draw this line? Land? What
if I don't want my kids to learn anything about French history? No Napoleon,
right, Can I, as a parent opt out of my yeahs out
of that. I don't want to know. I don't want to learn about
short nerds. You know, a lot a lot of science is done by
brown people and by Asian people, So am I going to have to give
him permission to learn science as well? And you know that guy that invented
the computer, that Babbage guy, he was a foreigner too, So maybe
I need to give permission to teach computer sciences. This is ridiculous. It's
like, I don't I don't even know how to react to something so silly,
except that the school doesn't know how to react to it either. That
was the crazy thing about it. And I think we'll get into more of
that. I think Cross Examiner are probably going to talk about more of that.
But let's pass it over to Helen and see what she has to say.
First, okay. So we talked about lgb quya discrimination. So it's
the fun. Let's add some racism to the ship bag everybody. So here
we are. And I am really glad that the Department of Education in Miami
Dade and some parents were like, hey, not cool, this is not
okay. I think that's really really important because yes, this you have to
follow the law, which is understandable. But learning about black history, which
is American history, is too sensitive because it might make somebody uncomfortable. Like
I have problems with that a lot because I learned about terrible things that happened
when I went to history class and I turned out. Okay, everybody,
so you can feel bad, it'll be fine, you know, like get
an emotional support will It'll be great. So and I have said on the
show before, and I was saying again, I am very glad that my
kids are now out of the Florida school system before everything went to crap,
because I don't have to sit there and wonder if this comes into my counting.
You'd be like do I have to worry? Like if I want my
kids to like learn black history, I have to sign a goddamn note.
It was just like they're like sensitive topics. Would I was growing up,
if there was a sense of topic that was going to come up, like
especially when I had to deal with sexual nature, they would just tell parents,
Hey, we're going to be teaching you know, you know reproduction.
You know I'm going through puberty. Do you If you're going to opt out
for your child not to take this class, you can do that, but
also understand that you're we're going to give extra work for your you know,
some other like you're not going to get the videos, but you will be
learning the same info, just not in a graphic way. Basically, that's
when I was in Catholic school, y'all. So so now that people are
just like, well, it's Black History Month, let's talk about black history,
the tragedies and the triumphs of both. Let's have that conversation, they're
like, yeah, no, this might make my kids feel bad, and
let's write a note home to make sure that we you know, how this
thing's going to work. And there's more nuance to this conversation and more going
on with this article, but we're going to talk more about that. I'm
going to shoot it over to Eli and talk about how this shitty is all
kinds of silly. So I did kind of wonder somewhat to your point as
well. You talked about they have to follow the law, and I did
wonder a little bit, is maybe there's so much going on in the legal
landscape of education in Florida right now that iprep Academy is just like, let's
just make sure that we're doing this correctly. But I think I think it
it was a bad choice to I don't think it was necessary to make this
a better safe than sorry for you know, this particular topic, just for
teaching black history. It does seem like the Florida Department of Education is trying
to separate themselves from it a little bit and rightly so. The article cites
the department as claiming that, uh direct quote, any insinuation that students need
permission to study African American history is a lie, and even some other things
we're talking about this week on this show that doesn't seem completely consistent with the
reality of Florida right now. But like you said, Kelly, like why
can like you know, you mentioned Great Wall of China and you know,
algebra things. Why can they teach about ancient Babylon, Ancient China, Egypt,
just like it's any other lesson or the Holocaust even without special permission.
But actual significant people in American history require special permission to learn about just because
they were black. This whole idea is just absolutely insane and pugmentation, like
opinion matters, so and that's really that's all. It's seems the defining variable.
And I kind of like, I wonder, like, was this just
a school's attempt to make sure they're falling within the confines of their ever changing
you know, whatever is going on in their education laws. But it's it's
I just don't think this was the right time to play it safe in that
way across What do you think, Well, it's there's a couple of facets
here from a legal perspective. So first of all, let's be clear,
this is a public school, so it's called eeprep Academy. That threw me
for a loop. I'm like, who cares. If it's a private school,
they can do whatever they want as far as they handle a curriculum.
But apparently it's a magnet school in Florida, so they're dealing with you know,
elite kids here. But I actually want to start at the end of
the story and quote what you quoted, Eli, which was where the Florida
Department of Education said that this was a vote media driven lie and that any
insinuation that they need a permission to study African American history is absolute false.
I want to break down that statement because I believe this is double speak.
What they said here is any insinuation that students need permission to study African American
history is absolutely false. But that's not what the permission permission slip was for.
The permission slip was for being taught of African American history. So I'm
wondering, Hey, if they're saying students can study African American history all they
want, but if you're going to attend a presentation on it where you are
taught African American history, then you need a permission slip, which that was
never denied by the Department of Education. I've not found a story where they
said, oh, they said, we don't need these slips anymore. In
fact, I found a copy of the slip and on the slip in case
we're wondering, because the story talks about, oh, yes, we are
practicing self defense a lot of school systems are doing this now. So we
have a Holocaust survivor, we're going to have permission slip there, Permission slip
there. If somebody from outside of the school is going to come and give
a presentation, this permission slip I'm going to read straight from it entitled is
Black History Month presentations and readings types of guests that may attend the activity or
event, And it says student readers, dancers and presenters, etc. These
were students in the school presenting to their fellow students. That's what this was.
This was not an outside company that you need a permission slip for.
This wasn't a survivor of some of traumatic event. This was students talking to
their fellow students in an organized fashion, and they demanded a permission slip.
So technically what the government said is true that you don't need a permission slip
to study African American history. But I think I've yet to see a correction
issue to say you don't need a permission to be taught African American history.
So that's point number one. It reminds me of you know that double speak
of a famous skit that was on Stated Night Live back in the eighties,
written by Al Franken, and it talks to this exact point, and it's
about President Carter drinks radioactive pepsi and grows to be like ninety nine feet tall.
And there's a press conference and the reporter says, is it true that
the president is over one hundred feet tall? And the press secretary says,
no, absolutely not. That's outrageous assertion, that slander and I will not
stand for such lives to be spread. And then the worses follow up,
is the president over ninety feet tall? No comment? That's what they're doing
here, is like this is a media driven lie. And then people ask
these follows up, follow up, and it's silence. They haven't withdrawn the
slips. So that's the other thing. I have a lot more to talk
about, obviously, to go on fu silly it is and it's not.
It is not like I do think it's silly because I like, when I
was growing up, I just learned black history as part of my curriculum,
Like there was no noe sent my parents' house and be like, your kid's
gonna learn history? Do you get to opt out? Like that didn't happen?
And now I'm like, I'm like, really, it's like, is
this what we're coming to people? Anyway? I'm sorry, they're gonna history
was George Washington Carver and that was it. Well, don't forget all you
got to why by the way, Oh yeah, we need we need we
need a new Harriet Tubman for an underground railroad to hate to help people like
Helen escape out of Florida. That's what I do. These do. So
one other quick observing before reminded me of something Kelly. It's this sort of
bs where the government. The last episode we talked about them putting up a
bill to criminalize basically people existing and then sort of letting that die quietly.
This where they're saying this is a media driven lie and then there's silence and
they don't retract the permission slip and all that stuff. It reminds me very
much of the patterns of lies that we see coming from Christian conservatives in the
government throughout history, where they lie through a mission. And the example I
want to give I did a podcast a while ago on the McDonald's hop coffee
case, and one of the things I found was Reagan giving a speech in
support of tort reform, and he was speaking to Atra, this American Tort
Reform Association trying to push through and it's a real bad idea. When you
hear tort reform is real bad. It's basically saying, we want to take
away your right to sue people when they injure you. That's what it means.
But in this speech, he said, Hey, there was this guy
and he was making a phone call in a phone booth when a drunk driver
crashed into the phone booth and he sued. Guess who he sued. He
sued the phone company. Isn't that outrageous? And everybody applauded and like,
oh, yeah, we need tort reform. That's crazy. What didn't Reagan,
who was president at the time, he said this, What didn't he
tell you that the phone company had had dozens of reports of cars hitting that
phone both in that exact location, that the phone booth had been damaged and
not repaired, and the man could not get out of the phone booth.
Multiple witnesses and he testified that they saw him seeing this drunk driver coming for
the phone booth. He tried to get out of the door and he couldn't.
There were many many effects like that that Reagan left out. This is
what the Conservatives, Christians and government do. They tell the truth and leave
out all the relevant shit. So they're saying, you don't need a permission
slip to study, but yeah, you need a permission slip to be taught.
And it's all because it's about black people and we don't like that.
Sorry, that's my rand. I just can't stand it when people lie so
blatantly and the press does not call him on their bullshit. What are your
thoughts, Kelly, Yeah, I you know, that kind of off topic,
but that reminded me of a case that's going on right now. I
think it was in Tennessee where a minister is being sued or being harassed by
the city with zoning violations because he let homeless people stay at his church.
Right, and then when you started, well, when you look into the
whole things that the church was in the back of a literally in the back
of a game arcade. It was a back room in the game arcade.
He was letting people use propane stoves. They had opened fires in the back.
There was there was no escape route. If a fire started, the
people would have been locked inside. Right, so he went to but but
the media puts it out as oh, minister has homeless people and now he's
being harassed by the city. And again, you know, we're missing all
the details here that and I think we're seeing some of that here definitely.
Also, I thought, and the first thing that hit me, and it
was something we talked about in another story earlier this week, is these overbroad
They did this overbroad language in some of these bills, and I could see
where this school district might be a little afraid about what they are teaching and
may and the state Education Board could be right telling the truth. We're not
for seeing anybody to sign these permission slips, but the school board is thinking,
wow, if we don't sign these permission slips, we might end up
getting sued. Even though the state board is telling us we don't have to
do them, we better do it anyway just to cover our butts. Right,
We have no reporting that says that the state board actually told the school
that I want to be clear on that. I I agree that that may
be what's going on here. There's no reporting I could find that said that
that spokesperson that mouth that got up and said this is a media like,
what is it? What is it? What is it? What does our
world come to when it's acceptable for a press secretary to get in front and
say this is a media spread lie, rather than putting up a chart that
says, here's the actual rules. We have contacted this person. They shouldn't
do this. They have retracted it. That's not what they said. That's
what an adult in the room would do, is to say, oh,
yeah, it was a misunderstanding, here's the problem. Nope, they just
said media spread lie. The president is not over one hundred feet tall.
That's outrageous and well ear about you know, you never know who's going to
get offended by what. And I had a thought kind of related to what
I said, like I wonder if I prep academy just like, you know
what, if we don't like do something ahead of time, somebody is going
to get offended. Somebody is going to raise this thing, somebody is going
to do something to make this more difficult for us in the long run if
we don't just like come out right out and say, if you don't want
your kids to learn about black history, this is your chance to tell us
right now, and then they won't. But they had to do it in
this backward sort of way to be like now, so it looks like now
you have to give permission because we want to later be able to say,
no, you gave us permission to teach this. We said, you gave
a written consent for your children to learn this. Lesson maybe the fact that
that that attitude's even in the air, the fact that it even occurs to
them to think, oh, we're talking about black history. That's risky.
That says everything that they even have that thought well the band because because a
lot of books that got banned were about minority you know, minority populations.
This I don't I'm not surprised that this was a step. I don't agree
with it, but I'm not surprised because they're basically like, as I was
saying, like, you know, somebody will make a stink, and maybe
if we do this we can avoid some of it. You know, but
the perspected up and here you're talking about it would I left to realize really
poignant point, right, And I left because I'm getting inside of my mind.
I'm thinking, hey, let's avoid offending somebody by doing something that's really
offensive. Right. Still, I think Kelly is dead on. I actually
made notes about this. I wasn't sure if I was going to bring it
up, but since Kelly did, I do want to point this out.
So from a legal perspective, if this was the actual policy, which we
have not heard that it is not. We haven't heard that it is,
it would be most likely held to be unconstitutional. And it reminded me of
Chief Justice Warren's opinion in Brown versus Board of Education, which I have spouted
on time and time again. But I think it's a beautiful a Supreme Court
opinion. Everybody should go read it. It's very very short, and it
was a unanimous court for a reason. And the basic holding of Brown is
separate but equal is wrong because the reason that you are separated is obvious to
the children. And it's not because the blacks don't want to be with the
whites. It's because the whites don't want to be with the blacks. And
when the law upholds that prejudice, it has a tendency to denigrate or deteriorate
your ability to be educated in school. And I would hold the same thing
here. There's a reason the kids in these schools would know, Oh,
I need a permission slip to learn about Black History Month? Where's my permission
slip for White History Year? I don't have to have one of those.
And they're smart enough to pick up on that, and they will get the
same inferiority complex that Warren wrote about back in the sixties and why we don't
give the government the power to do that to kids. So I agree entirely
with you, Kelly. This is like, that's a good point. No,
that's a good point because like we're if you're like, you know,
a Jewish kid or a black kid, or a queer kid and whatever it
is in school, do you get a permission slip? Do you have to
go to your parents and like, hey, I don't I don't want to
learn about, you know, the Revolutionary War? You know, like I
want to opt out of that. Do I get to do that now?
And like that's that's to have a conversation that we're having. And it's because
this is racist everybody, by the way, I know, shocking, but
but like I want to read this boat. This quote by doctor Stephen Gallen
was in the article as so where do we draw the line as it relates
to these areas are consistent with instruction. Doctor Steveh Gallen's a board member,
and he also added, we entered stand that at the school district, we
have to follow law, but we have to clarify about what the intent of
the law is. What happens when a parent fails to sign the concept form?
Is that student excluded from this experience? Is that student is excluded from
instruction like these are This is how we get into these like you know,
sort of debates and you know, what does what's the parents want? And
I am sorry, like our education instructors administrators are already stressed. Friend,
then and if a parent fails to sign a permissions slip, do you have
to track them down and be like do you want your kid to learn about
black history? Like it's it's it's dumb, it's done a ministered and I
don't like it. And let's not let's not forget where it comes from.
Let's not forget where this comes from. The history here is, let's be
clear about the history. Obama gets elected, white people freak out, we
get MAGA as a racist reaction, we get January sixth, which is a
religiously inspired race riot at its core. This is what we're dealing with.
And then we get the press, the conservative express screaming about critical race theory,
which is kind of evaporated out of the zeitgeist over the last couple of
months. But that's where this comes from. This is a child of that
entire process to say, and now it's going to hit the streets in real
ways where we're saying, Okay, teaching you about black history is dangerous,
so we need your parents to give you permission. Why is it dangerous because
you because our precious little white peak kids might somehow feel guilty because this smells
like critical race theory. That's where this all comes from. And that's all
sort of missed in this coverage because it comes down to, well, do
we need to consent form or not. The fact that the school even thought
that that might be needed comes from this entire conservative game plan to put racism
back into the nation's oxygen, and unfortunately they've succeeded in that