Editorial

The state attacks its young people: Why? Of what are the state legislature, the majority on the State Board of Education, the governor, the secretary of state and attorney general afraid? What fears of losing power and control motivate them to institutionalize infantilization and its consequences of infanticide and stunted growth, all threats to the wholeness, wellness, and maturity of our nation? Why do they act unconstitutionally, against recognized modes of child development, with ignorance of the history and books they anti-democratically and inhumanely seek to ban?

This essay builds on my recent writing in Publishers Weekly and elsewhere on book banning as “the new illiteracy” and my testimony in the American Civil Liberties Union case suing a Missouri school district for its unconstitutional removal of books.

The Ohio State University forces me to continue my series of public accounting for its series of leadership failures, threats to health and safety on and off campus, and irresponsibility to its neighbors—both homeowners and student renters. Slogans about safety and health proliferate. Actions do not.

Contrary to off-the-record comments by OSU’s Bricker Hall senior administration, my always-fact-based writing gives me no pleasure. (The President’s Office refuses even to acknowledge receipt of my efforts to communicate with Kristina Johnson when I ask them to do so, an overt discourtesy.) They do not understand that constructive criticism is not a contradiction in terms. This only reinforces their insularity and long-time disrespect to students, staff, faculty, neighbors, and the media—in other words, their public. OSU ignores legal Freedom of Information Act requests for public information; its “spokespersons” do not answer questions. This decades-old pattern should provoke widespread alarm and demands for reform.

The Ohio State University forces me to continue my series of public accounting for its series of leadership failures, threats to health and safety on and off campus, and irresponsibility to its neighbors—both homeowners and student renters. Slogans about safety and health proliferate. Actions do not.

Contrary to off-the-record comments by OSU’s Bricker Hall senior administration, my always-fact-based writing gives me no pleasure. (The President’s Office refuses even to acknowledge receipt of my efforts to communicate with Kristina Johnson when I ask them to do so, an overt discourtesy.) They do not understand that constructive criticism is not a contradiction in terms. This only reinforces their insularity and long-time disrespect to students, staff, faculty, neighbors, and the media—in other words, their public. OSU ignores legal Freedom of Information Act requests for public information; its “spokespersons” do not answer questions. This decades-old pattern should provoke widespread alarm and demands for reform.

The combined promotions of what is effectively a nondebate over critical race theory and the 1620, 1776, and 1836 “projects” of alternative, anti-factual, and literally white-washed American history lead to rants and screeds from attention-seeking, wannabe presidential candidates and other Republican politicians. Unsurprisingly, they begin by echoing the “former guy.” (See Donald J.

The combined promotions of what is effectively a nondebate over critical race theory and the 1620, 1776, and 1836 “projects” of alternative, anti-factual, and literally white-washed American history lead to rants and screeds from attention-seeking, wannabe presidential candidates and other Republican politicians. Unsurprisingly, they begin by echoing the “former guy.” (See Donald J.

Chairwoman Walters:

The rump (as in Trump) of the unDemocratic Party of Ohio acted anti-democratically in endorsing Tim Ryan for U.S. Senate with no input from the party membership.

You underscore your contradictory, hypocritical, and anti-democratic actions by not endorsing candidates among the party faithful in the Governors and State Supreme Court races, and only in the Morgan Harper vs. Tim Ryan primary contest. This accompanies your underpublicized decision to conduct joint-fund-raising with Ryan and not Harper, with no voice for the Party “faithful,” for whom you have no respect.

No reason, principles, fairness, or respect for the Party or any others stops a small unelected cabal from acting against a black, female, progressive, young candidate who is more intelligent, better informed, and more articulate than your "old boy" choice of Tim Ryan.

Historians know well that the past is always a battleground. It never stands by itself. History as practiced, studied, and taught is inescapably part of the contest to control the present and promote alternative visions of the future. That needs no argument or documentation. (For a good recent statement, see Jake Silverman, “The 1619 Project and the Long Battle Over U.S. History.”)

Today is different. The uneven and unequal contest between fact and truth on one hand, and fiction, fabrication, and lies, on the other, is uniquely exacerbated and challenging to our historical moment.

Competing projects

Much of today’s nondebate is encapsulated in the false competition over the “origins” of the American experience—as if there were a single point of origin—supposedly between the Pulitzer Prize-winning, ground-breaking 1619 Project led by the New York Times’ (and now Howard University’s) Nicole Hannah-Jones and colleagues, and the alternative contentions of the 1620, 1776, and Texas’ own 1836 Patriotic Education projects.

Both the United States and Canada experience unusually widespread struggles over their pasts. Today, the North American neighbors reveal both similarities and differences in their national debates over the continuing relevance and conflicting meanings of their histories. Racial policies and relationships—past and present—are central to these discussions and sometimes acrimonious debates. Comparing Canadian and U.S. attitudes, responses, and proposed policies tells us much about the challenges of democracy as well as the active role of the past in the present. Historians have a special opportunity, indeed a responsibility to contribute.

Today’s largely incoherent and distorted clashes over teaching about race—teaching the inclusive, factual history of the United States as opposed to a largely fictionalized version—are unusual in instructive ways.

This year’s effective nondebate over the radically distorted and misrepresented critical race theory is a stunning indictment of contemporary American print and broadcast journalism. (On the nondebate over the Second Big Lie, see links to my essays below.) The failing crosses political and ideological lines; local and national coverage; and different media platforms.

When New York Times opinion editor Kathleen Kingsbury published her case for “guest essays” replacing OpEds(April 27, 2021), she did not include “fact-based” among her “principles.” Her standards—cogent argument, logical thought, compelling rhetoric—however, are not requirements for all opinion writers. They do not apply to regular columnists and especially “conservative” writers. Is this requirement only for “guests”?