If you think you're done being outraged by the educational f**kery happening in Florida, you may want to sit down for this.
New guidelines from the Florida Board of Education will require students be taught about the "benefits" that enslaved people enjoyed as a result of slavery. The new academic standards were approved this week; the guidelines say teachers must tell students about duties performed by slaves, which sound like job titles you'd find on indeed.com (minus the brutality) including "painting," "tailoring," "domestic service," and "transportation." The forced work is described in the guidelines as having provided "personal benefits" to slaves.
The Florida Education Association has called the changes a "big step backward." Unfortunately, "a big step backward" is kind of implied on anything related to education in Florida at the current moment.
Related: Is Picking Cotton Really the Best Way to Teach Kids About Slavery?
Vice President Kamala Harris weighed in on the controversy, pulling no punches when she spoke at a national convention for Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc. this week.
Related: Airbnb Will No Longer Let Weirdos List Homes Where Enslaved People Once Lived
Harris said that new guidelines are an "attempt to gaslight us," People reports. Harris went on to say this kind of teaching to middle school students, part of a broader "anti-woke" movement in the state, is revisionist history. "They insult us in an attempt to gaslight us, and we will not stand for it," the vice president said.
Related: If a Slavery Video Game Doesn't Convince You Racism Is Alive and Well, Nothing Will
Personally, we'd love to see this settled in one of those cage matches that tech moguls seem to want these days. It's likely that Harris would rip Ron DeSantis to shreds, but it's probably more true that our veep is much too classy to ever go for something like that.
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