UK schools avoid teaching Holocaust [updated]
Update: It appears that the article I cited was not entirely accurate. The educational report from the UK mentioned these types of problems, but this was not seen as a trend.
People do not have a right not to be offended. One of the negative aspects of progressive society is the lengths it will go to to prevent anyone from getting offended by anything. It’s largely a reactionary measure. In the past as well as currently, the freedom of speech has been used to to promote ideas distasteful to many. People have been criticized about their religion, their race, their sex and their sexuality. In a modern, progressive, pluralistic society, we want everyone to feel welcome. We want minorities to feel that society as a whole will not persecute you based on who you are. It’s a noble idea and one I support. However, this respect for individuals can be extended too far to respect for irrational beliefs. Fear of offending anyone, especially those who have been or are being persecuted, can create an unhealthy society, where deference to people’s sensibilities takes precedence over truth.
In the United Kingdom, some schools have ceased teaching about the Holocaust in order to prevent offending Muslims.
Schools are dropping the Holocaust from history lessons to avoid offending Muslim pupils, a Governmentbacked study has revealed.
It found some teachers are reluctant to cover the atrocity for fear of upsetting students whose beliefs include Holocaust denial.
There is also resistance to tackling the 11th century Crusades - where Christians fought Muslim armies for control of Jerusalem - because lessons often contradict what is taught in local mosques.
Not only are these schools doing their students a disservice, by not teaching their students about an important event in history, they’re doing the opposite of educating. The sole reason that our modern societies are able to be so tolerant of other cultures, peoples and beliefs is because of education. Education allows us to learn about different times, different places, and different people. Through education we get to experience, by proxy, the experiences of others. This allows us to understand situations and places outside of our own narrow, limited point-of-view.
Beyond that, if knowledge were only pursued when it offended no one, we would never get very far at all. Learning about astronomy would offend those who believed the Earth was at the center of the universe, teaching about medicine would offend Christian Scientists. Teaching psychology would offend Scientologists, and of course, teaching about geography and biology offends Creationists.
“… the same department deliberately avoided teaching the Crusades at Key Stage 3 (11- to 14-year-olds) because their balanced treatment of the topic would have challenged what was taught in some local mosques.”A third school found itself ’strongly challenged by some Christian parents for their treatment of the Arab-Israeli conflict-and the history of the state of Israel that did not accord with the teachings of their denomination’.
The report concluded: “In particular settings, teachers of history are unwilling to challenge highly contentious or charged versions of history in which pupils are steeped at home, in their community or in a place of worship.”
Deferring to the sensibilities of a minority, prevents the rest of the students (not to mention the minority themselves) of getting a good education. Criticizing the beliefs of Christians or Muslims, or at least arguing against positions that have no basis in reality, is not intolerance, it’s promoting education and critical thinking. If we just back down, and avoid teaching certain areas of study altogether, then they’ve won. Not only have their religious beliefs encroached on the rights of others, they’ve lessened the power of what knowledge can do in regards to minimizing superstition, and bigotry, and in promoting tolerance. The very things progressive societies stand for.
Chris McGovern, history education adviser to the former Tory government, said: “History is not a vehicle for promoting political correctness. Children must have access to knowledge of these controversial subjects, whether palatable or unpalatable.”
Education should be in the business of removing irrational and superstitious beliefs from societies. How can we expect to end Holocaust denial, if we’re tacitly endorsing it by not teaching the truth? Where are we as a society when we’re more concerned with political correctness than educating our children? Education is our first line of defense against intolerance, superstition and hatred. By not standing up to those promoting these ideas, we’re letting them grow. And if we keep letting it grow, it will eat away the foundations of society.
(via Pharyngula)
Mike’s Weekly Skeptic Rant has a more colorful response.
