Is the Outrage Over Florida's Social Studies Standards on African American History Justified?

I was curious to see how bad the 2023 Florida Social Studies Standards are.

People can read the Standards for themselves.  Here they are: https://www.fldoe.org/core/fileparse.php/20653/urlt/6-4.pdf

To my surprise the standards generally are not bad, and much of the document is pretty good.

 

Here is the language that has created the furor:

 

“Examine the various duties and trades performed by slaves (e.g., agricultural work, painting, carpentry, tailoring, domestic service, blacksmithing, transportation).

Benchmark Clarifications: Clarification 1: Instruction includes how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”

 

This is extremely offensive, particularly since it implies that enslaved people, but for their enslavement, would not have had useful and marketable skills. 

 

The reality, as I understand it, is that people kidnapped from Africa already had skills they developed living in the communities into which they were born as free people, and many of them (if they lived long enough to do so) could pass along such skills to those born in America. This omission further implies that the kidnapped people were uncivilized savages who had reason to be grateful to their oppressors.

 

So the outrage – even if based on a single passage in the standards – is completely justified.

If Governor DeSantis were a serious elected official, he would have taken a half-hour to review the standards, would have seen the reason for the furor, and would have, at minimum, demanded that the omission I just noted be corrected.  But he is not a serious person, and his reaction and defense is just another reason that, just like the front-runner he seeks to replace as his Party's presidential standard bearer, he is not fit for the Presidency.