On Wednesday, protesters gathered in Tallahassee, Florida, which is that state’s capital, in opposition to the stance from GOP Governor Ron DeSantis against an Advanced Placement (AP) course for high-schoolers teaching what is termed African American Studies.
The DeSantis administration earlier made a high-profile rejection of the course, clamoring — in the governor’s own words — against talking in class about concepts like queer identities, which describes sexual orientations and gender identities outside the heterosexual and cis norm. Although “queer” has a history as a derogatory term, it has since been reclaimed. It extends from there, though. According to the College Board, which is the organization responsible for AP courses, someone from the Florida Department of Education asked on a call for a definition of the word intersectionality — something they could look up on Google — and questioned whether the course would promote so-called “Black Panther thinking.” The idea that the College Board would be pushing teenagers into the ideology of the Black Panther Party is just ridiculous. What planet are these people in Florida government living on?
The ridiculousness of it, though, obviously functions as a smokescreen and an excuse for pushing back against teaching students about Black history and elements of the present-day experiences of Black Americans. Involved in this Wednesday’s demonstrations were civil rights leader Al Sharpton, Florida state Sen. Shevrin Jones (D), several other religious leaders, and the Florida chapter of the NAACP. The demonstrations included a protest march and a subsequent press conference outside the Capitol building. “Governor DeSantis is using his office to sanitize Black history from the education system,” Sharpton said ahead of the day’s displays of opposition. “He might call this a crusade, but everyone can clearly see this is a campaign tactic for him to run for president. He is sending a message that it is permissible to make racism state policy. Wednesday’s rally should send a clear message that you cannot politicize the education system or erase Black stories from American history.”
DeSantis was also responsible for essentially pushing a Black Democratic Congressman out of his seat in northern Florida and has separately helped enact legislation that if left standing would sharply restrict teaching and discussing concepts like white privilege in classrooms and even workplaces. It’s a trend across the Republican Party. Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), whose 2022 Democratic challenger Adam Frisch recently announced he is challenging her again in 2024, flipped out on Twitter after there was a performance before the Super Bowl of a song known as the Black National Anthem. That’s where these people are focusing — barely disguised (and sometimes, like with Trump, not even disguised) racism.
The College Board recently provided a comprehensive refutation of the Florida state government’s comments, including generally about the educational relevance of the course and more specifically about officials’ supposed impacts on putting the course together. Florida authorities offered thanks to the College Board for eliminating 19 specific topics from the disputed course — “none of which they ever asked us to remove, and most of which remain in the official framework,” as the organization explained it. Check out images of the protests in Tallahassee this Wednesday below:
— Mary Ellen Klas (@MaryEllenKlas) February 15, 2023
The Tallahassee March against DeSantis race, education , diversity policies, or as one marcher put it White supremacy, has begun. News conference with Al Sharpton at conclusion pic.twitter.com/8SfN1sfZPM
— james call (@CallTallahassee) February 15, 2023
