Now the problem is I'm not a lawyer or expert in reading laws or understanding how they would be interpreted. The bill aims to prevent the following kind of theories being taught, ones that say:
(A) any race is inherently superior or inferior to any other race;
(B) the United States is a fundamentally racist country;
(C) the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution of the United States is a fundamentally racist document;
(D) an individual's moral worth is determined by the race of the individual;
(E) an individual, by virtue of the race of the individual, is inherently racist or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously; or
(F) an individual, because of the race of the individual, bears responsibility for the actions committed by members of the race of the individual.
This sounds pretty good to me. B and C could be controversial in that those things were true in the past, but they seem to refer to the present tense. So the letter of the law is okay and the rest of the points are banning racist theories which is good, so the spirit of the law seems reasonable too. I don't see how this would be interpreted as banning the teaching of past racism like slavery or segregation or that massacre. But as I said I'm not an expert so I would be interested to know whether that's a real concern.
You realize that B and C would ban any discussion of the Dred Scott decision if read literally? Think about Stephen Douglas’ arguments in his debates —- we couldn’t discuss those either?
As I explicitly wrote, I don't realize that because from a lay person's reading, they are written in the present tense so it would not seem to ban any discussion or theory that the US was racist. Pretty hard to claim that it wasn't, surely.
So do you have a legal opinion or more informed reasoning that says the law would actually be interpreted differently, and would also ban discussion of past issues?
This is the first actual bill that comes up from those search results - https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/234...
Now the problem is I'm not a lawyer or expert in reading laws or understanding how they would be interpreted. The bill aims to prevent the following kind of theories being taught, ones that say:
(A) any race is inherently superior or inferior to any other race;
(B) the United States is a fundamentally racist country;
(C) the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution of the United States is a fundamentally racist document;
(D) an individual's moral worth is determined by the race of the individual;
(E) an individual, by virtue of the race of the individual, is inherently racist or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously; or
(F) an individual, because of the race of the individual, bears responsibility for the actions committed by members of the race of the individual.
This sounds pretty good to me. B and C could be controversial in that those things were true in the past, but they seem to refer to the present tense. So the letter of the law is okay and the rest of the points are banning racist theories which is good, so the spirit of the law seems reasonable too. I don't see how this would be interpreted as banning the teaching of past racism like slavery or segregation or that massacre. But as I said I'm not an expert so I would be interested to know whether that's a real concern.