By Diane Roberts
Donald Trump was perfectly serious when he said he “loves the poorly educated.”
Authoritarians always love the poorly educated and the mis-educated. The well-educated, the readers, the questioners, those who demand evidence, gather facts, and trust verifiable information (as opposed to propaganda) are a threat.
Aspirants to dictatorhood know the first play is destroy education. Nip that critical thinking in the bud.
The Trumpist floor sample is New College of Florida, now a sad shadow of a once-distinguished, deeply beloved honors college, raped and pillaged by Ron DeSantis, over-paid college president Richard Corcoran, and under-qualified trustee Christopher Rufo, all in the name of fighting a phantom they call “woke.”
Distinguished faculty have fled, admissions standards diminished, and costs per student are higher.
Not surprisingly, the college has fallen 24 places in U.S. News and World Report’s rankings.
Taking a wild guess here: Could it be because of dim bulb moves such as admitting academically unprepared jocks recruited from Christian schools and offering a course on the dangers of “woke,” taught by a Tucker Carlson-endorsed British commentator and right-wing comedian?
This is what you have to look forward to, America.
Rufo, who spread the dangerous nonsense about Black folks barbecuing cats in Ohio, has been summoned to Mar-a-Lago to discuss how best to cripple American higher education.
Universities embracing diversity and inclusion or teaching courses deemed insufficiently deferential to the “great” white men of the western world could lose all federal funding.
Ignorance will reign; ignorance is the point.
Florida leads
As ever, Florida leads the way down the path to censorship and institutional stupidity.
State university boards of trustees have recently forced colleges to cut subjects that used to be part of the general education core curriculum.
The trustees axed 432 of 571 courses at Florida State, including classes in women’s cinema, African American history, issues in religion and sociology, and anything with “gender” or “race” in the title — anything that, as DeSantis and his henchpersons in the Florida Legislature claim, contains “unproven, speculative or exploratory content.”
The definition of “unproven, speculative or exploratory”? Whatever DeSantis and his pet reactionaries say it is.
The courses haven’t been removed completely: You can still take many of them as electives, but you can’t get gen. ed. credit for them.
That means many students will miss out on a chance to explore different perspectives on the world and expand their understanding of what it is to be human.
America, like Florida, is walking backward into its future.
A bunch of Texas book vigilantes calling themselves a “citizens’ committee” had “Colonization and the Wampanoag Story” by Linda Coombs, a Native American historian, placed in the fiction section of their local public libraries.
It seems Coombs’ well-researched account how the arrival of Europeans affected native peoples didn’t match white folks’ preferred image of Pilgrims and Indians happily feasting on turkey before they settle down to an afternoon of football and online shopping.
Librarians, educators, and historians raised a ruckus, and the book was eventually returned to the nonfiction shelf where it belongs.
Starting fires
But for every small victory against ignorance and spite, MAGA’s education arsonists start 100 more fires: attacking college classes here, banning books there, promoting the Bible as a public-school text.
As if this weren’t sufficiently damaging, Donald Trump wants to abolish the Department of Education.
MAGAs do not realize — or do not care — that it funds early education projects, language learning initiatives, and programs for disabled and special-needs kids.
In addition, DOE’s civil rights office enforces laws preventing school violence and prohibiting discrimination on the grounds of race, ethnicity, religion, and disability, administers Pell Grants and student loans, sponsors apprenticeship programs, and grants money to Title I schools.
Without federal funding, the low-income students they serve will suffer.
To carry out his demolition plans, Trump has named former WWE CEO Linda McMahon to head DOE.
Her qualifications include lying about holding a degree in education and participating in one of WWE’s fake fights in which she pretended to have been drugged by her husband so he could have sex with a model-turned-wrestler, then waking up just in time to kick him in the crotch.
She’s being sued by five former employees who claim she, along with other WWE executives, knew they were sexually assaulted repeatedly by their supervisor.
Just the kind of person you want overseeing the safety and educational achievement of America’s youth.
Vivek Ramaswamy, one of Trump’s fantasy “government efficiency” honchos, loves the idea of blowing up DOE. He accuses public schools of encouraging kids to change gender and wants teachers’ unions to be abolished.
Along with increasingly unhinged billionaire Elon Musk, Ramaswamy wants to slash up to $2 trillion from the federal budget.
No one outside of Mar-a-Lago or your local psychiatric hospital takes those numbers seriously, but what do you want to bet the DOGE boys propose slashing a couple of hundred million here and a couple of million there from medical and scientific research — much of it done at universities?
‘The enemy’
Vice President-elect J.D. Vance has declared, “Professors are the enemy.”
He’s quoting Richard Nixon.
Vance went to Yale, Trump to Penn, and both Ramaswamy and DeSantis hold degrees from Yale and Harvard, but you don’t have to graduate from an Ivy to get a world-class education. You can get one at plenty of state universities — assuming the politicians and their hand-picked trustees stop trying to regulate thought.
Like reactionaries from Nixon to Reagan to Bush 43 and beyond, Trump’s bully-boy brain trust claim schools and colleges “indoctrinate” students into caring about social justice, seducing them into Marxism, feminism, and environmentalism.
Yet they emerged from their supposedly left-leaning institutions unscathed by progressivism, untroubled by empathy, and disinclined to critical thinking.
What are they so afraid of?
Education is not supposed to make you comfortable; it’s not meant to reinforce what you think you already know. Education should challenge you, disturb you, and maybe even present possibilities you never knew existed.
But instead of shining an ever-brighter light on our world, the Trumpists want to make it narrower, nastier, and darker.
Diane Roberts is an 8th-generation Floridian, born and bred in Tallahassee. Educated at Florida State University and Oxford University in England, she has been writing for newspapers since 1983, when she began producing columns on the legislature for the Florida Flambeau. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the Times of London, the Guardian, the Washington Post, the Oxford American, and Flamingo. She has been a member of the Editorial Board of the St. Petersburg Times–back when that was the Tampa Bay Times’s name–and a long-time columnist for the paper in both its iterations. She was a commentator on NPR for 22 years and continues to contribute radio essays and opinion pieces to the BBC. Roberts is also the author of four books.
JC says
Of course Diane Roberts jumped the gun as usual. As someone who got their degree here in Florida, the Florida College system has so full of wasteful classes that it is bloated. On top of the borderline scam that I think are the majority of AA classes where the colleges can make more money off of people (direct or indirectly through student loans via taxpayer money). It seems Diane’s beef is there’s less classes that can make someone turn liberal/progressive.
When I was in college about 15 years ago, all the leftest went to the Liberal Arts/English schools. The conservatives more went into business school or nursing or trades.
Laurel says
JC: That’s interesting, because the trades cannot find workers. Go ask any of them.
Michael J Cocchiola says
Floriduh is number one in the nation in book burning—oops, I meant banning. Coincidentally, Floriduh is 47th among the 50 states in SAT scores. DeSantis has successfully dumbed down the state, and there’s surely more to come. The good news is that the state can only fall three more places to hit the bottom of the dumbass barrel. It shouldn’t take much time.
Pierre Tristam says
You were right the first time Mike: little difference between book banning and burning when the aim is identical. But in fairness to DeSantistan, Florida’s cave-dwelling SAT scores long predate the current administration.
Michael J Cocchiola says
O.k., but DeSatan has had plenty of time to address the issue. His response? Burn books, demonize public schools and degrade state colleges and universities. It’s on him, now.
Sherry says
Thank You Diane!
See maga cult members. . . Diane is most certainly not going anywhere! Like Pierre, she will continue to “Speak Truth to Power”!
“Off With Her Head”. . . Right??? LOL! LOL! LOL!
Atwp says
Many people of color continue to vote for Republicans. They are trying to erase any contributions people of color made to this country. They are trying to resurrect Jim Crowe again. There will be a fight. We will see what happens. Anything good white people did is always magnified, any good thing people of color does is not reported or minimized.
Doug says
It’s unbelievable that you didn’t mention your alma mater, Florida State, Diane Roberts. Clearly, FSU can do no wrong in your eyes. You picked a poor article to write about, but this is typical these days, as journalists seem to think fairness is optional.
Michael J Cocchiola says
Yeah, Doug. Just like Fox News “journalists” Jesse Watters, Laura Ingraham, Peter Hegseth, Sean Hannity, Dana Perino, Bret Baier, Harris Faulkner and Maria Bartiromo
Fair and balanced… Bull sh*t!
What Else Is New says
We Flaglerlive readers are fortunate Pierre has given space for an opinion piece written by highly respected Diane Roberts offering the truth about education in Florida. Thanks to Ron DeSantis, higher education has taken a beating as has elementary and secondary education. Slash and burn is Ron’s mantra aided by sycophants. Shameful actions by DeSantis and Florida legislators serve to lower expectations for quality education. As a retired educator, I grieve for students who are being lead down the path of Republican required ignorance.
Samuel L. Bronkowitz says
Just for reference, here’s the consequences of this. FSCJ in jacksonville has declared thanks to the legislature that the following classes aren’t appropriate for general education requirements:
AMH 2092 African American History and Culture (from African origins to 1877)
AMH 2093 African American History and Culture (from 1877 to the present)
ANT 2410 Cultural Anthropology
ANT 2511 Introduction to Physical-Biological Anthropology
HUM 2410 Humanities of Asia
HUM 2450 Humanities in the Americas
INP 1390 Human Relations in Business and Industry
SYG 2010 Social Problems
SYG 2430 Marriage and Family
WST 2010 Introduction to Women’s Studies
These are appropriate if you “adjust the content”:
AMH 2020 United States History from 1877 to Present
AML 2010 American Literature: Colonial Times to 1900
AML 2020 American Literature: 1865 to Present
ARH 2000 Art Appreciation
ARH 2050 Art History Prehistory to 15th Century
DAN 2100 Dance in the Humanities
ENG 2100 Film Studies
ENL 2012 English Literature through 18th Century
ENL 2022 British Literature since 18th Century
ESC 1000 Earth and Space Science
HUM 2210 Humanities: Prehistory to the 15th Century
HUM 2230 Humanities: Mainstreams of Cultures, 14th to 19th Century
HUM 2250 Humanities: 20th and 21st Century Cultural Perspectives
LAH 2000 History of Latin America
LIT 2100 Great Ideas in World Literature
MCB 2010 Microbiology
PHI 2600 Moral and Political Philosophy
PHI 2603 Introduction to Applied Ethics
POS 2112 State and Local Government
PSC 1341 Physical Science
REL 2000 Religion in Humanities
REL 2300 World Religions
SYG 2000 Introductory Sociology
WOH 1012 World History to 1500
WHO 1022 World History Since 1500
The consistent complaint about these classes from the florida legislature is that the learning outcomes and course descriptions are out of alignment with the state. Having taught some of the science classes listed here, that means that they discuss things like nonwhite scientists, climate change, and perhaps the relationship between the church and scientific oppression from 200 AD through the 1700s.
Alex says
When people vote for the unqualified and he appoints unqualified it goes hand and hand on how the MAGA can destroy the USA for Putin.
Laurel says
Unfortunately, Roberts is dead on correct. Authoritarian leaders have always tried to remove the “intelligentsia” first. That’s what happened in Cuba. The first Cubans to leave Cuba were the educated. I’ve met some. The educated are harder to control, as are the middle class. So, dumb ’em down and keep them too busy to think, and keep ’em in debt.
Our public school system is being degraded instead of improved. Vouchers are given out to those who are desirable, even if they can afford private schools. The private schools can turn away who they want, so the public suffers. What the MAGAs don’t seem to comprehend is that the educated not only advance society, they work and pay into it with purchasing power. What kind of society would we have if a large portion of it cannot buy necessities? How does that effect businesses?
Trump did say “I love the poorly educated.” Why do you figure? When people are educated, they make a better salary. They have purchasing power and pay taxes. The whole system benefits. If you cut education, as Trump likes, it is detrimental to society, but, again, the dumbed down are easier to control. Religion is another great way to control people.
Trump doesn’t give a damn about society, he cares only for himself, and being an authoritarian leader suits his ego just fine, at your expense. DeSantis is well underway with making Florida being one of the states to embrace Project 2025.
If you voted for these two, you are complicit. Enjoy, and get ready to cover their asses until you can’t take it anymore.
Ed P says
I was once criticized by Pierre for using the US News and World Report as a reference for a point. Now it’s a good source? Rankings?
The federal department of education as we recognize it today was created in 1979.
I wonder how any of us got our educations prior. I had my first undergraduate degree my 1976 and masters degree by 1978. Dang it. So that must be my problem for not falling in lock step with the posting community.
Today, the majority of universities/colleges professors’ hold nearly a 17 to 1 liberal to conservative ratio, I would reverse the question and ask Dianne Roberts what her fear is?
Change is uncomfortable and unsettling to most people. There has to be some friction/ force to move an object. How do the naysayers, to the possible changes on the horizon,“just know” these changes are bad. Is the educational system is failing?
What’s the alternative? The last 45 years haven’t produced the results you desire, why would the next 45 if there isn’t a sea change?
Our founding fathers were disrupters.
I will finish with asking how and why anyone would justify the cost of higher education today? The costs have outpaced inflation by double or even triple over the past few decades. Ask who has been running these institutions of higher education.
Ray W, says
Hello Ed P.
Yes, our founding fathers were disrupters. They disrupted a monarchical despotism of a king who ignored their pleas for justice, and they built a constitutional scheme of government based on the separation of limited powers, individual rights and the rule of law. They did not venerate liars, and they did not revere the vengeful.
Laurel says
As another child of the 50’s – 70’s would say: Right on, man!
Laurel says
Ray W.: Perfectly stated!
Brian says
Poor poor Diane Roberts, where have you been? We haven’t heard from you since you and your left-wing shill cronies were smacked in the face on election day. Glad to see that you haven’t lost that edge for bitching and moaning. The overwhelming majority of the country is breathing a sigh of relief that our current shuffling, stuttering, stumblebum Moron in Chief will soon be out to pasture with his sidekick The Cackler. I hope that you can survive in that “narrow, dark” place. Don’t be a stranger!
Joe D says
To BRIAN:
“Overwhelming Majority” of voters backing Trump???
Where are you getting YOUR FACTS?!? CLEARLY off the top of your uninformed head.
The final count for the popular vote was Trump 49.9% and Harris 48.3%….that’s a win by only 1.6%….HARDLY OVERWHELMING, in fact the only two US popular elections CLOSER than this one (according to CNN) were the Great Depression and at the start of World War II.
All the Trump voters that wanted to PUNISH the Biden/Harris administration for high food and gas prices ( which they had no direct control of, and the border issues, SADLY are going to be wondering what happened about 18 months in to the TRUMP 2.0 term, when his MAGA policies undo the US economy, isolate us from generations of World Allies, and create a crisis of government it could take DECADES to repair, if EVER! I CERTAINLY hope I’m wrong , for the sake of my children and grandchildren, but given past and recent Trumpian behavior, I don’t think I am.
I’m marking my calendar for 18 months in, to do a personal Trump REASSESSMENT …again, I PRAY that I’m wrong.
Laurel says
Brian: You mean that “narrow, dark place” between Trump’s lips and the microphone?
My God, he’s so gross, but people want to *shake it up*, so they are getting what they voted for.
Eeeeeww.
Bob says
Thank you for defending the basic human right of free inquiry. Every time DeSantis lauds his Free State of Florida, my hypocrisy alarm deafens me. But I think he is about to learn that we do have the courage to be free and will not surrender to petty, would-be tyrants…bless his little heart.
PDE says
Ed P, you wrote the following sentence in your comment:
“Today, the majority of universities/colleges professors’ hold nearly a 17 to 1 liberal to conservative ratio,………”
Please provide a legitimate and verifiable source of your information.
Ed P says
PDE…..Try google
And no, Al Gore did not say he invented the internet.
PDE says
Ed P, I asked you for a legitimate and creditable source for your information – you suggested google.
I went to google and discovered that your ‘source’ for your claim that liberal college professors outnumber conservative professors by 17 to 1 was an opinion published in a ‘letter to the editor’ in an obscure regional newspaper called kpc news.
Then, despite searching google extensively I found no other actual proof of your 17 to 1 claim from any other nationally reputable or creditably recognized news source.
And what does Al Gore and the internet have to do with any of this?
Sherry says
Hi PDE,
Just a warning. . . asking for “credible facts” from some maga cult members means trolling will come your way.
Ed P says
PDE,
Let me start by stating that when anyone posting here, that is not in lock step with the community, they are regularly pressed to provide credible facts while numerous other posts that may even be outlandishly wild are ignored. Kind of a double standard. Hell, when I correct the facts in someone’s post, Sherry says I’m trolling. Were you trolling?
Second, you are correct in the fact that I took a path of “creative” reasoning because there are not any recent 2023/2024 survey confirming my claim nor disproving it as well.
Please, indulge me and follow my rational and I’m sure you or maybe someone will correct me if I’m too far into the weeds.
Larger, established colleges and universities are absolutely left leaning.
No questions. Smaller religious/military colleges have a higher percentage of right leaning professors (not necessarily a majority)and their head counts is smaller in comparison. Harvard 2400 professors- Brigham Young 1600.
Harvard liberal faculty outnumbered conservatives 82-1 back in 2022. BYU has about 45% liberal professors. Extreme examples.
Most Ivey league schools would be predominantly liberal along with most state colleges and universities. It is widely reported that over 60 percent of all professors surveyed from over 500 institutions were liberal back in 2018 with an accelerating trend line. A 12 to 1 liberal to conservative ratio was reported.
The trend suggests to me that today there are indeed more liberal professors than 6 years ago and the lopsided head count in the larger institutions exacerbates the 12 to 1 ratio.
Now I am probably over/under by a few decimal points but the fact is that secondary education is dominated by liberals. My claim of 17 to 1 is not outrageous and in my opinion reasonably accurate.
Sherry says
Good Morning PDE! Defensive, angry, emotional trolling right on schedule. . . sorry!
Wishing you peace, love and joy in this wonderful holiday season!
Ed P says
Sherry,
Who trolling now?
May I repeat, sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me”
By the way PDE asked me to provide my thought process, so that’s trolling?
joe says
This is sadly a pretty accurate description of the authoritarian era we are about to enter:
“It is one of the everlasting quirks of humankind’s time on this earth that many of the bad ones, the ones who are responsible for the deaths and misery of millions, are not big, famous, showy generals, or the elected or unelected leaders of nations, but rather milktoasty little functionaries who sit at desks and execute their ugly, murderous plans out of sight of the public. They are not elected to office. They don’t earn rank during long military careers and time in battle. They are, evermore, contemptible miscreants like Stephen Miller, little people who are given power because their morals match the lying, heartless, fascist men who appoint them.
Miller went on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” and told slavering host Maria Bartiromo that on Inauguration Day, his master, Donald Trump, plans to “issue a series of executive orders that seal the border shut and begin the largest deportation operation in American history.”
PDE says
Ed P, I am not a troll, and never have been.
However, when someone uses an OPINION that they read somewhere else in a letter to the editor and then presents it as a FACT like you did (17 to 1), I want to know the source of the information because when I read it my BS meter starts buzzing as a result.
Now you’ve replied with more ‘facts’ about the ratio of liberal professors to conservative professors, yet again with no verifiable / creditable sources for your information.
So, I cannot continue to indulge you while you continue to post statistics that so far appear to be questionable at best.
And just for the record, I’m not a left wing liberal – I’m a centrist that leans left who was astounded by the ignorance & stupidity of the American voters who sent trump back to the White House. And that fact alone speaks loudly about the corrosive decline of logical and rational thinking in our nation.
The next four years are not going to end well, if they ever end at all.
Ed P says
PDE.
Just wondering if you can provide any credible reference points for your last sentence.
The fact is opinions are just that opinions. Our perceptions are our realities. Doesn’t make them right or wrong.
But for someone who professes to be above the fray, your willingness to predict the future is at best interesting and indicates that you might be a bit more closed minded then you may think.
And if you think it’s important to prove my 17 to 1 ratio wrong, why didn’t you? I’m willing to admit I’m wrong.
Sherry says
Thank You PDE! I’m right there with you! Happy Holidays!