From the Archives: Arlington schools need history bridge (1996)

This article appeared in The Washington Times on December 4, 1996, under the headline "Arlington schools need history bridge." At the time, I was serving on the Social Studies Advisory Committee for the Arlington County Public Schools. The committee monitored and made recommendations about the teaching of history, government, economics, sociology, and other social sciences in elementary, middle, and high schools.

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In his 1978 essay, "Teaching History Backwards," Ernest Lefever noted that "most high school seniors probably know more about ancient Greece and Rome and the voyages of Columbus than about the recent events that have shaped the outlook of their parents."

Mr. Lefever went on to say that learning history "is vital for any people. It is especially so for the United States, which is a democracy, a superpower, and the leader of the free world. The exercise of U.S. power and influence or the failure to exercise it has global reverberations. A responsible American citizen must understand this and must also be aware of the external dangers that threaten our freedom or that of our allies."

Rick Sincere and Ernest Lefever

The global scene has changed tremendously in the past 20 years - symbolized vividly by the fall of the Berlin Wall - but this perspective is still valid today.

To address the problem of how the recent past affects our present more saliently than the distant past, even while schools often fail to teach about recent events, Mr. Lefever suggested "teaching history backwards," starting with the past 30 years, then moving on to more distant developments that have affected the United States and world affairs.

For the past several years, the Social Studies Advisory Committee has recommended that the Arlington Public Schools add a fourth year of social studies to the required high school curriculum.

Specifically, we have recommended that a second year of world history be offered in grade 10, largely to compensate for the phenomenon that many of us have experienced - one year of world history is simply too short to cover all of the developments in the 20th century. We commonly experience this as "not getting past World War II" in a typical history course.

Arlington schools now face an additional problem: The new state Standards of Learning require an assessment at grade 11, which may become a barrier to graduation, just like the "literacy passport." We felt that something should be done to prepare our students for that test in a way that also would fulfill our long-held desire for a fourth required course in social studies.

In response, the curriculum development staff has recommended a new 10th-grade course called "The World Since `The War to End All Wars.'" This staff proposal, which has been forwarded to the School Board for final approval by Superintendent Arthur Gosling, meets the criteria set by the Social Studies Advisory Committee. The course is precisely what our committee members had in mind when we made our repeated recommendations for a fourth year of social studies. As envisioned, it combines history, geography and political science and brings students up to date in regard to the important events and trends of our own era.

A course like this builds a conceptual bridge to the 21st century and helps students find a common language to communicate with their parents and grandparents, who lived through these events and trends.

Some parents and students object to this change in the curriculum - which would begin in the 1998-1999 school year - because it reduces elective opportunities for students, particularly art or music courses. True, the number of electives available during 10th grade would fall from three to two, but the negative impact - if there is any at all - would fall on students taking social studies electives, primarily psychology (359 students), sociology (173), advanced placement European history (143) and economics (25). Out of 1,100 10th-grade students, only a few dozen - if any at all - would have to forgo art or music classes.

One reason the School Board is considering this curriculum change now is precisely to give fair warning to parents and middle school students that in two years they will have to meet this new requirement, and that they should plot out their course of electives with this in mind. Those desiring to take art, music or advanced placement European history can plan on taking them in later grades, or can use one of the other two 10th-grade elective slots for these courses.

If the Virginia Board of Education makes the 11th-grade social studies assessment a barrier to graduation, but the School Board fails to make this curriculum change, we could face major problems down the road. Should any Arlington students fail the test because no preparation was available in 10th grade, our whole school system will be poorer for it.

In designing this new course and considering all other options, the staff aimed for minimal disruption to the current curriculum, as well as the lowest cost to taxpayers.

The new 20th century history course is being added to the high school program of studies with almost surgical precision, designed to meet both state-mandated requirements and the desire of Arlingtonians to prepare our students from the classes of 2001 and beyond to be better, more informed citizens.

* The writer is co-chairman of the Social Studies Advisory Committee for Arlington Public Schools.

From the Archives: 'The state should punish violence - and nothing else' (1991)

To my surprise, a sentence in this letter to the editor was quoted in a book by Peter McWilliams, Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do: The Absurdity of Consensual Crimes in a Free Society. It took me quite some time to identify and locate the source of the quotation ("There is no right not to be offended by words, actions or symbols."), which appeared on the editorial page of The Washington Times on August 22, 1991. This may be the only time I have discussed masturbation (onanism, self-pleasure) and adult cinemas (a 20th century institution, now largely forgotten) in a mainstream publication.

The state should punish violence - and nothing else
22 August 1991 - The Washington Times

In your sympathetic Aug. 13 editorial about Paul Reubens, "The secret sin of Pee-wee Herman," you assert that so-called "victimless" crimes such as prostitution, pornography and drug use depend for their "victimless" status upon a narrow view of what it means to "hurt."

Your argument that the law exists to preserve and protect public order may be largely correct, but it begs the question as to whether public order is protected by laying traps for adults who expose their sexual organs in a darkened movie theater.

In a free society, standards of public morality can be measured only by whether physical coercion - violence against persons or property - occurs. There is no right not to be offended by words, actions or symbols. Otherwise, if a majority or vociferous minority found crucifixes offensive, the state would be closing down Catholic churches as a threat to public morality.

Similarly, if a majority felt the Korean ownership of convenience stores violated neighborhood standards of ethnic purity, the government could be enlisted to deny business licenses to recent immigrants. The only legitimate purpose of government is to protect individuals from coercive violence, not to initiate such coercion itself.

Pee-wee Herman's alleged "crime" took place on private property (the South Trail Cinema) after paying an entry fee for the express purpose of obtaining some measure of sexual gratification by watching erotic films. Under those circumstances, any person on the premises fully understands the nature of the business and what might be encountered there.

Neither the owners of the theater nor its patrons are likely to be offended by masturbation in a darkened auditorium. Patrons of an erotic cinema could hardly be offended by the sight of life-size genitalia when larger-than-life examples loomed before them on the screen.

There was no public disorder, no incitement to riot, no complaint from passers-by. Pee-wee Herman was arrested for doing in a private cinema what he certainly would be free to do without fear of reprisal in his (or the theater owner's) private home.

Unless, of course, masturbation is itself illegal in Florida. Come to think of it, that is not so hard to imagine at all. In any case, all such laws are clear violations of personal autonomy, their enforcement is an affront to human dignity and they should be repealed without delay.

RICHARD E. SINCERE JR.
Chairman
Libertarian Party of Virginia
Arlington

Social Media Mischief at The Washington Times?

The Washington Times has an article on its web site about Thursday's Capitol Hill hearing on Don't Ask Don't Tell, the now-repealed policy that prohibits the service of open and honest gay and lesbian Americans in the military.

The headline and subhead read:

Services OK with ending ‘don’t ask’
No ‘push-back,’ brass reports to Capitol Hill

The first paragraph says:

Preparations for repealing the military’s ban on openly homosexual service members have proceeded very well — even among Marines, who have not demonstrated any resistance, the Marine Corps commandant testified Thursday.

If you click to share the story on Facebook, however, the headline reads:

Lawmaker skeptical of repeal of 'don't ask' - Washington Times

And the excerpted first paragraph, designed to appear on Facebook's feed, says:

The chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said on Thursday that he is troubled by the rushed way the Obama administration is moving to repeal the ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the U.S. military.

Similarly, if you click to share on Twitter, you get this retweet:

RT @washtimes Congress skeptical of repeal of military's gay ban - Washington Times http://bit.ly/i1eqHq

However, if you click on a different Twitter icon, you get this:

Services OK with ending 'don't ask' - Washington Times http://t.co/la0otOW via @AddThis

(Note that the shortened URLs are different in the two different Tweets.)

And if you click on a different Facebook button, you get this:

Services OK with ending 'don't ask' - Washington Times
Preparations for repealing the military's ban on openly homosexual service members have proceeded very well — even among Marines, who have not demonstrated any resistance, the Marine Corps commandant testified Thursday.

Confused? I was.

It looks like somebody at the Washington Times -- I don't know who, but it's certainly not the reporter who wrote the story, Shaun Waterman -- is attempting to put a spin on the story through social media that is not borne out by the actual report itself.

I just noticed this by chance.  An important question to ask is, does the Washington Times do this with other articles, or is this a one-off phenomenon?  What are the ethics of changing the headline and the emphasis of a story when spreading it through social media sites?  Is this worthy of criticism?

Your thoughts are welcome in the comments space, below.

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Seasonal Silliness

Seeing the editorial pages of the Washington Times and Washington Post in agreement is a rare thing. Even rarer is to see an editorial on the same day, in the same location on the page, in each newspaper making the same point.

The issue in question was the decision by bureaucrats in Fairfax County, Virginia, to require that individuals and churches who feed the homeless must have health-department-approved, commercial-quality kitchens, or else be subject to civil penalties. The reasoning, apparently, was that it is better for people to go hungry than to risk food poisoning (as if the alternative, dumpster diving, is e coli-free).

Here's how the Washington Times put it in its December 1 editorial (titled "C'mon, Fairfax County"):

What's really happening here is the bureaucratization of charity. County officials have spotted inconsistent application of a law -- and they can't stand it. They see that churches and grandmas are allowed to donate below the regulatory radar, whereas others are not. So, per small minds and hobgoblins and all that, the Gradgrinds in Fairfax want the same rules to apply to everyone.

That's logically consistent, but unfriendly to spontaneous charity and common sense. The goal of homeless shelters continues to be a simple one: Feeding people who need to be fed. Let's not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Meanwhile, at the OP (that's what Timesers and old Washington Star scribes call the Washington Post, "the Other Paper"), news has reached the editorial writers that Fairfax has already reconsidered. The editorial ("Food Folly," also on December 1) said:

WHEN FAIRFAX officials tried to put the kibosh on donations of home-cooked food to homeless shelters, they didn't figure they would get egg on their faces. Thankfully, though, common sense prevailed, and a worthwhile program to help the homeless will be allowed to continue....

The policy was overturned when Gerald E. Connolly (D), chairman of the Board of Supervisors, recognized its absurdity. No doubt he did not relish that Fairfax had become a national laughingstock....

We have no doubt that the zealous officials in this case were well-intentioned. But it is worrisome that they didn't realize that the very thing they said they were protecting -- the public health -- was undermined by their actions....

Halfway across the country, in Chicago, city officials reached a supremely silly decision: Prohibiting the marketing of the new movie called "The Nativity Story" from the annual Christkindlmarket (that's "Christ child market" in German). The purported reason? Promoting a film with a religious theme is "too commercial" for a public space filled with vendors hawking trinkets, gifts, food, and Christmas decorations.

Here's what the Chicago Tribune editorial page had to say, calling the action "a clumsy attempt at political correctness":

The city refused to allow film clips from "The Nativity Story," a movie that depicts the biblical story of Mary, Joseph and the birth of Jesus. The filmmaker also was dropped as an event sponsor. Officials say the movie is too commercial.

Too commercial? In a downtown market where capitalism is in full throttle? That's like saying the Nativity display itself (and there is one, by the way, in the plaza) is too religious.

Veronica Resa, spokeswoman for the office of special events, told the Tribune earlier this week: "This particular incident is about a movie studio aggressively marketing a movie and trying to sell tickets to that movie."

Jim Law, the city's executive director of special events, initially called this a sensitivity issue for festival-goers. He said that showing scenes from the movie would be "insensitive to the many people of different faiths." That's people of different faiths who knowingly and willingly attend a traditional Christmas festival that includes carolers and a "holiday" tree, as well as an Islamic crescent and a Jewish menorah.

There are still 22 shopping days 'til Christmas. Stay tuned for more seasonal silliness. It's bound to happen.