Gina Peddy, the Carroll school district’s executive director of curriculum and instruction made a comment to teachers about presenting “opposing” perspectives on the Holocaust. The comments come after the passage of Texas House Bill 3979 which surrounds the curriculum presented to public school students in Texas. The bill requires that educators present opposing viewpoints when discussing “currently controversial issues of public policy or social affairs”.
“As you go through, just try to remember the concepts of [house bill] 3979, and make sure that if, if you have a book on the Holocaust that you have one that has an opposing, that has other perspectives”, said Peddy.
An updated version of the law will go into effect in December with the passage of Senate Bill 3. This bill was amended to remove language which would have explicitly referenced writings in the school curriculum relating to slavery, the civil rights movement, the Indian Removal Act, the U.S. labor movement, and references to other marginalized groups and U.S. historic events.
This is a clear example of the whitewashing of the atrocities committed by the Nazis and other reactionaries by presenting “opposing” perspectives and omitting historical facts which should otherwise be uncontroversial. Under the guise of presenting varying viewpoints and free speech this is merely an act to distort the historical record and promote ignorance in the Carroll Texas public school system.