-By Warner Todd Huston
Once again, the New York Department of Education is in the word-banning business and is telling schools to ban dozens of words from use in the class room and on tests. And why are they banning the words? Because they might make kids “feel” bad. But, worse, some of the banned words would actually prevent learning!
One of the banned words, for instance is “slavery.” OK, so how do we discuss all of American history before the close of the Civil War if we are not allowed to use the word “slavery” in front of school kids? Just as bad, the words “war” and “religion” are also banned. There goes the rest of human history.
But maybe even worse, the DOE has banned the word “terrorism.” So, how do we teach what happened on 9/11?… Ah, I know, we tell kids that George Bush did it and America is evil to those poor, poor Muslims, that’s how.
NY Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott said the Dept. of Ed isn’t “an outlier” and not being PC in the banning of words and that schools all across America do it (as if that makes it right).
“So we’re not an outlier in being politically correct. This is just making sure that test makers are sensitive in the development of their tests,” Walcott said to the media in New York City.
A glance at the list below makes a liar of Mr. Walcott.
Here is a complete list of the banned words courtesy of CBS New York:
- Abuse (physical, sexual, emotional, or psychological)
- Alcohol (beer and liquor), tobacco, or drugs
- Birthday celebrations (and birthdays)
- Bodily functions
- Cancer (and other diseases)
- Catastrophes/disasters (tsunamis and hurricanes)
- Celebrities
- Children dealing with serious issues
- Cigarettes (and other smoking paraphernalia)
- Computers in the home (acceptable in a school or library setting)
- Crime
- Death and disease
- Divorce
- Evolution
- Expensive gifts, vacations, and prizes
- Gambling involving money
- Halloween
- Homelessness
- Homes with swimming pools
- Hunting
- Junk food
- In-depth discussions of sports that require prior knowledge
- Loss of employment
- Nuclear weapons
- Occult topics (i.e. fortune-telling)
- Parapsychology
- Politics
- Pornography
- Poverty
- Rap Music
- Religion
- Religious holidays and festivals (including but not limited to Christmas, Yom Kippur, and Ramadan)
- Rock-and-Roll music
- Running away
- Sex
- Slavery
- Terrorism
- Television and video games (excessive use)
- Traumatic material (including material that may be particularly upsetting such as animal shelters)
- Vermin (rats and roaches)
- Violence
- War and bloodshed
- Weapons (guns, knives, etc.)
- Witchcraft, sorcery, etc.
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“The only end of writing is to enable the reader better to enjoy life, or better to endure it.”
–Samuel Johnson
Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer. He has been writing opinion editorials and social criticism since early 2001 and before that he wrote articles on U.S. history for several small American magazines. His political columns are featured on many websites such as Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com, BigHollywood.com, and BigJournalism.com, as well as RightWingNews.com, MrConservative.com, CanadaFreePress.com, StoptheACLU.com, Wizbang.com, among many, many others. Mr. Huston is also endlessly amused that one of his articles formed the basis of an article in Germany’s Der Spiegel Magazine in 2008.
For a full bio, please CLICK HERE.
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