Day By Day© by Chris Muir.

May 24, 2006

PC Goes to the Next Level in Michigan Schools

Things are going too far:

In perhaps a well-intentioned, but pernicious example of political correctness, the Michigan Department of Education is attempting to ban the "America" and "American" from our public schools. Even though the word "America" appears in the department's own civics and government benchmarks, the department's style protocol for the Michigan Education Assessment Program requires that "America" and "Americans" be expunged from our testing and grade level expectations. Last week, the department ordered that our hard-working teachers not utter the words.

Why?

The Department of Education asserts that "Americans" includes Mexicans, Canadians and others in the Western Hemisphere, so referring to U.S. residents as Americans is inappropriate. In the department's view, "America" happens to include South, Central and North America. Accordingly, when referring to the colonial period, the state bureaucracy requires teachers to refer to "the colonies of North America" or "North Americans." After the American Revolution, the nation is called the United States (not of America).

Last I heard, Canadians would rather wither away and die before being referred to as Americans. (Heck, those who sneak over from Mexico don't even want to be Americans, even while working here and accepting free education and medical care). How about all of the other citizens from around the world who call people from the United States "Americans"? How does the Michigan school system plan to educate them regarding the appropriate term?

This is absolute garbage. Banning the terms America and Americans from usage in Michigan schools isn't educational, nor does it make a heck of a lot of sense. When people worldwide hear the word America, they don't think of Mexico, Canada, or any of the Central American or South American countries. They think of the United States of AMERICA -- where millions of people have come throughout our nearly 300-year history in search of a better life. And even if citizens from other countries don't like us, they still think of us as Americans...perhaps with the qualifier "ugly" in front of it.

But what else can one expect from a public school system that has been hijacked by PC moonbats who seem to be more concerned with nitpicky phrasing than actually improving educational standards?

And what about national pride? Oh right, I forgot. National pride is not allowed in the PC universe.

I wonder how long it will take for other school systems around the country to adopt this policy?

Crossposted to Lifelike Pundits.