Quote :

"but just as it can be pointed out in passing that a black man designed the District of Columbia"

pierre l'enfant? thought he was a white frenchman

7/17/2011 11:21:44 PM

sorry I got confosed, the name I thought of was "Toussaint L'Ouverture" but he was the leader of the Haitian Revolution around that time, and the man I thought of was actually Benjamin Banneker, who was notable for a few things but could not (it turns out) have helped L'Enfant (whom I had completely forgotten about) save his plans for DC: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Benjamin_Banneker#Plan_of_the_City_of_Washington

and now I am embarred
seriously, it's like saying we defeated the Communazis in World War II

7/18/2011 12:23:26 AM

^^^I think it was your shithead comment that lead to my shithead reply. I've given my reasonable argument. Its reasonable to some and not reasonable to others. That's why it's an "argument."

7/18/2011 9:20:08 AM

Quote :

"Are you kidding me? I've been one of the biggest defenders of gay people on this forum. I just don't think it's essential to delve into a person's sexual orientation unless it's relevant to the actual piece of history. I definitely think the gay rights movement should be covered, but we don't need a chapter dedicated on gay historical figures. "

agreed and i feel the same way about black history and black history month. i thinks it's unfair to single out one minority group to celebrate. its either all or nothing.

7/18/2011 9:40:08 AM

Well we know black history isn't going away.

7/18/2011 9:43:33 AM

Quote :

"I think it was your shithead comment that lead to my shithead reply. I've given my reasonable argument. Its reasonable to some and not reasonable to others. That's why it's an "argument.""

lol you don't know what an argument is, how adorable

7/18/2011 9:56:42 AM

Alan Turing probably would have kept producing quality work for another 30 years if it he weren't persecuted for being gay. In his case, his gayness is pretty much essential to understanding why his career was cut short. Also, the history of gay folks, just like that of black folks, is a history of oppression and it's impossible to end oppression if we don't study, understand, and remind ourselves of it.

[Edited on July 18, 2011 at 10:42 AM. Reason : .]

7/18/2011 10:40:41 AM

Quote :

"Well we know black history isn't going away."

Hey when you posted this were you shaking your fist at the sky

7/18/2011 12:48:42 PM

Quote :

"I definitely think the gay rights movement should be covered, but we don't need a chapter dedicated on gay historical figures"

That's not the way it's done. The study of gay historical figures will be integrated into the curriculum, just like black history is now. My textbooks never had a "black history chapter." Instead they included discussion of blacks, other minorities, and women as part of the narrative of history.

And most people suck at history anyway so it hardly matters

7/19/2011 3:13:04 PM

^
Yeah I'd have absolutely no problem with that. I didn't really read the first post well enough to be honest.

Quote :

"Before the Assembly vote, Perez pointed to a few contributions of gay people, including Friedrich von Steuben, one of George Washington's military advisers who fled Prussia after he was hounded as a homosexual."

Things like this and Alan Turing are fine, because their sexual orientation is relevant to the events covered.

Quote :

"And most people suck at history anyway so it hardly matters"

Mostly because of horribly boring history books and teachers.

[Edited on July 19, 2011 at 3:21 PM. Reason : .]

7/19/2011 3:20:12 PM

Quote :

"My hastily arrived at opinion is that it's just a shitty thing to exclude on purpose. Teaching a history course and don't happen to touch on gay history because it doesn't matter to the time period/topics covered? Fine. Teaching a history course and purposefully leaving out relevant gay stuff? Probably not fine."

are they leaving out the history, or are they just not saying "oh, so and so was gay"? There's a big difference.

Quote :

"When you have a group of people pushing the narrative that the gays are a struggling, bitter, worthless demographic, it helps to merely point out great people who happened to be gay to combat this. "

That's fine. History class isn't the place for that.

Quote :

"I guess there's stuff like Stonewall riots in NY and the Milk election/assignation in CA."

You mean the Milk assassination that had NOTHING to do with his sexuality, no matter how many revisionist history movies are made about it.



but really, learning that Turing was gay made no difference to me. zero. It sounds like this shit is just some bullshit devised to make some people feel better about themselves with zero enhancing effect on the education of kids

7/19/2011 3:22:25 PM

I dunno, when I found out Oscar Wilde was gay, his writing style all of a sudden made more sense to me.

7/19/2011 3:56:37 PM

^HA This.

7/19/2011 4:09:56 PM