US executive order - Schools

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Here we go, a new EO regarding schools.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/ending-radical-indoctrination-in-k-12-schooling/

"Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling
EXECUTIVE ORDER
January 29, 2025"

"Section 1. Purpose and Policy. Parents trust America’s schools to provide their children with a rigorous education and to instill a patriotic admiration for our incredible Nation and the values for which we stand.
In recent years, however, parents have witnessed schools indoctrinate their children in radical, anti-American ideologies while deliberately blocking parental oversight. Such an environment operates as an echo chamber, in which students are forced to accept these ideologies without question or critical examination. In many cases, innocent children are compelled to adopt identities as either victims or oppressors solely based on their skin color and other immutable characteristics. In other instances, young men and women are made to question whether they were born in the wrong body and whether to view their parents and their reality as enemies to be blamed. These practices not only erode critical thinking but also sow division, confusion, and distrust, which undermine the very foundations of personal identity and family unity."

I’m English and a lifelong socialist, though I haven’t voted Labour since they got on the trans bandwagon. They haven’t been left-wing for a long time, but they seemed the best of a bad lot until then.

I love the clear statements in these latest EOs. In all other areas I would probably oppose Trump.

The ‘love America’ stuff doesn’t bother me. Americans have always had this hand-on-heart patriotism that looks mainly harmless. I don’t like them invading other countries, but then I didn’t like Blair invading Iraq either.

Yeah, I managed not to say that! And I haven’t found out - dc goes somewhere else!

@OneAmberFinch I fully agree about Peter Thiel, and have found it interesting how he has stepped back out of the limelight. I fully expect him to storm back. But between him and Musk and Kevin Roberts and Trump himself, the Pharma fightback and a galaxy of tech billionaires of various political views it's all going to get a bit Godzilla Versus King Kong, and there will be many unforeseeable distractions.

Meanwhile a little sensible re-setting of things that were harming women, children, and society at large, is welcome

I don't know if he's gone into more detail elsewhere, but there's definitely a thing with atheists converting to Catholicism - the standup comic Jen Fulwiler is a good example, and she's very open about her own experience - where they basically convert themselves. They're looking for some deeper meaning in their lives, and, maybe by accident, find something in Catholic doctrine or tradition that really resonates with them.

Reminds me of something Pope Benedict once said - he was a very accomplished theologian of course, but he said ultimately the only really compelling arguments the church had created for itself were the lives of the saints and the art the church had produced. It's an aesthetic choice as much as anything.

I feel that religion in the modern West is doomed to be a minority interest, but it's fascinating that where it does take root, it's people discovering it in a spontaneous grassroots way, and it's got very little to do with the institutional churches.

Honestly, we should just say it. And insist that a History teacher is present just in case any of the other teachers need a little explanation of what that means. What the hell are they teaching children if they think compelled speech is ok?

The post is way back upthread but I agreed with @SporadicMincePieMuncher that some bits of this definitely come over as over-the-top rah rah patriotism, but that is honestly much more common on this side of the Atlantic (though maybe not as much as that EO suggests).

Executive Orders are related to federal entities. Where they conflict with a law encoded in different states they have no power. They only affect things directly controlled by the federal government and only then if the EO doesn't conflict with something already codified by Congress into a law. Some of Trump's EOs have already conflicted with the law - e.g. the firing of the inspectors general, which legally has to be done on a case by case basis through congress - and that will undoubtedly go through the courts though it may be that enough Republicans will develop spines and stand up to it (I doubt this).

@SeaBaseAlpha

And in fact, whilst I agree that blind faith in your country is not a good thing, I am also getting fed up with being made to feel guilty and embarrassed by the left about everything the UK does. If I am forced to choose one or the other I would rather have the positivity of patriotism than the po-faced apologists.

There's a difference between 'patriotism' and 'nationalism' and I suspect that discomfort some people are feeling is sensing the balance is tipping more to the 'nationalism' side.

That seems to be what progressive people say though even with something as simple as flying a flag, or a political figure saying they think their country is great.

It's hard to know what wouldn't be tipping over into nationalism for them.

I'm GC but this EO fills me with alarm because it has included criticism of a huge amount of the history curriculum and wants to replace it with nationalistic bunkum.

I'd support it fully if it were just GC.

But I can't get behind it with the history curriculum thrown in too, and I think it has been worded in a way where people like me who support those parts of the curriculum that develop critical thinking are forced into opposing the GC part too and being accused of not being patriotic/ supporting the trans agenda.

No, there is a huge resentment in white nationalist "Christian" circles about critical race theory being taught in schools, and this order targets the teaching of the history of the slave trade, the horrors of slavery, and slavery/ abolition as a cause of the Civil War, the development of Jim Crow, lynching - the systematic oppression of black citizens even after their personhood was acknowledged.

It's basically taking the Florida miseducation model and applying it to the entire country.

While it's very possible that individual states can just thumb their noses at trump and continue to teach history (as opposed to the nonsense trump wants), this EO is a strong indication that the mobs that marched through Charlottesville a few years ago have the ear of the president.

The federal model of the US, with individual states having a lot of rights, makes it significantly different from the US. I personally would not choose to live in a red state, nor would I send a DD off to university in a red state. Living in a blue state makes me far more comfortable as a woman, even though it comes with it a good deal that I disagree with.

Sometimes you have to oppose the greater (worse?) of two evils. To me that means being far more concerned about the emphasis on history teaching and the erasure of the black experience, and seeing in those elements a clear indication of the rise of outright Nazism here (I'm in the US).

...significantly different from the UK (not US).

Yes, the effects on history etc are going to be appalling. I've put 3 kids through American schools in a liberal area and honestly, 90% of what Chris Rufo et al say is complete rubbish. They want textbook committees like Texas, mustn't make anyone feel bad by talking about slavery or Ruby Bridges. It's all about creating a climate of suspicion and having teachers informed on.

65% of all native Americans who voted did so for Trump.

An executive order is a directive from the President to the Executive Branch of the US federal government. The Executive branch is by far the largest of the 3 branches of government, and employs more than 4 million people. This is Trump telling the federal Department of Education that schools which violate this directive will be denied federal funding. Most schools receive federal funding and would not be able to operate without it, so will have to comply with the directive.

An executive order doesn't affect other countries, which is why we Americans got such a laugh at Keir Starmer coming out indignantly against the Gulf of America executive order. It wasn't about him. It was aimed at the Energy Department mostly.

There are limits to what EOs can do. It has to be a power the president has in the first place, and it's not sure that this will stand. Some of Trump's orders this week were blatant overreach and designed to go to the courts, such as the attempted pause on federal money. (Congress has the power of the purse, and the money had been duly appropriated. A judge ruled Trump doesn't have the right to stop that.) It may represent a First Amendment violation because it dictates teacher speech. There's going to be a lot of lawsuits.

Traditionally, federal control over education has been limited. Trump previously even wanted to close the Department of Eduction because he believed it was a hotbed of ideology. That department has only existed since 1979; before that, it was part of Health, Education, and Welfare. To be quite honest this attempt to seize federal control over what is taught strikes me as hypocritical when for years, the Republican Party screamed states' rights and opposed efforts such as Common Core.

mathanxiety can you point to where the EO prevents the teaching of slavery etc? I can’t see it, but it may be that, without a US perspective, it isn’t so obvious (or I’m being stupid!)

@knitnerd90 To be quite honest this attempt to seize federal control over what is taught strikes me as hypocritical when for years, the Republican Party screamed states' rights and opposed efforts such as Common Core.

I think it's fair to say that the current administration shares not much more than a name with the party of a few years ago!

I've been reading and digesting all the comments in the different threads about the 3 EOs that cover gender identity.

This is the one that I can't quite get my head around. The other two EOs were great, every word.

Perhaps what I'm struggling with is my lack of true understanding about American patriotism. On the face of it, embedding American values in schools is the same as the UK embedding British values. But I can't shake the feeling that this part of the EO reads like a MAGA indoctrination and blind faith in Republicanism. I can't work out where the line is between the common or garden flag-flying American household (of which there will be Democrats and Republicans) and the political right demanding what is effectively the mirror of communist totalitarianism.

Regarding CRT, thank you to everyone who commented on this. My head has swung from "it needs to be a separate EO" and back again multiple times when reading the comments. I've settled (I think) on it making sense to have it all together because the whole lot is so intermingled under the umbrella of being progressive. The Pride Progress flag demonstrates this perfectly. Social justice is a package of ideological thinking that hooks in individual causes and twists their originally intended meaning - challenging racism, sexism, homophobia etc is obviously a good thing, but teaching people they are in some kind of oppression-based scoring system is not e.g. that you're more oppressed if you're a black, lesbian woman than if you're a white, straight man. Watching neurodiversity get swallowed up in the progress movement really illustrates the damage that can be done by this interweaving. I left an autism parents' group because I got fed up of the constant talk of oppression (any mention of resilience was "ableist") but woven into all of it was autism as an "identity", with trans identity also discussed. There was no concern from the group that there was a disproportionate leaning towards their children being gender questioning - the leader of the group has a child who identifies as the opposite sex and there were several other children possibly heading that way (my own daughter was gender questioning at the time that I was in the group).

Hopefully journalists are getting ready to challenge Bridget Phillipson about her current inaction on weeding transactivism out of British schools.

This ⬆️⬆️⬆️ Also on the social justice that she and Becky Francis are bringing into the curriculum. I don't profess to have an answer about how all children can be on a level playing field when it comes to education outcomes, but I'm not sure which bit was broken. Perhaps I'm looking at it through my white privilege (🙃), but I thought we had a balance that was about right e.g. with free school meals and breakfast clubs and Learning Support Assistants.
Yes, SEN funding is stretched and there is inadequate provision for many children as a result of that, but surely the money that is being spent reshuffling the curriculum to be more progressive could have gone into this and any other areas of need in the existing set-up. I'm sure there are areas of the curriculum that can be improved (an example that stands out to me is English in primary schools - it's become technical and joyless) but it doesn't need to be a social justice tool.

I don't think it does prevent teaching about slavery - that's an unavoidable part of American history (as it is of British history). I think what it does is attempt to avoid framing it in such a way that young white children are made to feel guilty for the actions of their ancestors. TBH I'm not sure how much of that goes on as my DS was only in the American system for the last three years of high school and graduated high school in 2005.

Flying flags is simple patriotism. Neither is passive events like parades and football games.

In nationalism, the people of that country are conditioned to think it (and they) and superior to other countries and people. They might consider themselves as one, united, against a common enemy. Any slight or criticism towards the country isn't received well.

Take that as you will, but I'd say the US is sliding into nationalism.

@knitnerd90

Traditionally, federal control over education has been limited. Trump previously even wanted to close the Department of Eduction because he believed it was a hotbed of ideology. That department has only existed since 1979; before that, it was part of Health, Education, and Welfare. To be quite honest this attempt to seize federal control over what is taught strikes me as hypocritical when for years, the Republican Party screamed states' rights and opposed efforts such as Common Core.

Rep. Thomas Massie has introduced a bill to eliminate the Department of Education.

x.com/repthomasmassie/status/1885344942622425292?s=61&t=3wYru9P_J0h74BXKFXAfmw

I broadly agree with this, but also, hasn't the US been banging the drum of being superior to other countries and people for decades?

It's pretty common that Americans will take the view that America is the greatest country with the best democracy.

And they will think that based on the idea that there is something fundamentally great and important about foundational American values. Those being the things you see if their foundational documents "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal".

So it's not that it's just, we're so amazing, because - there is a strong link between living out, as a nation, certain principles, and their sense of themselves as great.

For a lot of Americans MLK's ideas about "The content of their character" also fall into that category.

It's a POV with some blind spots, potentially, but it also seems protective to me, because of the content of their sense of what is fundamental to being an American.

Way better than the antiracism CRT stuff which is completely toxic.

@LifeExperience good to have the background, from your post it looks like EOs do have the weight to change things

Cynical Theories - Helen Pluckrose, James Lindsay is an excellent read. Subtitled: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity-and Why This Harms Everybody