It started in Florida and now the disgusting attack on Black History has spread to Arkansas.
A week ago, right before the first day of class for many schools in Arkansas, the state’s education department announced that it would not grant credit for the AP African American history class.
This came as a shock and left districts scrambling to figure out how to react to the state’s decision.
There’s no masking what conservative Republicans are doing in their efforts to continue the culture war that no one but them is seeking to fight.
And removing AP African American History while keeping the AP European history class intact is further proof of their heinous actions to eliminate Black history under the guise of fighting an alleged indoctrination that doesn’t exist.
“Let’s be clear – the continued, state-level attacks on Black history are undemocratic and regressive,” said NAACP president and chief executive officer Derrick Johnson to The Guardian. “The sad reality is that these politicians are determined to neglect our nation’s youth in service of their own political agendas.”
The political agenda is clear.
First target voting rights and then attack health care and education, something Republicans are gleefully doing across red states.
After Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee’s LEARNS Act (Literacy, Empowerment, Accountability, Readiness, Networking and Safety) became law, the attack on education officially began, placing topics such as race, gender and sexual orientation in their sights. Deeming them subjects of indoctrination (which they’re obviously not) and pushing their favorite target of CRT, a graduate level course not taught in high schools, to the forefront, the war on education has emerged in Arkansas.
“Arkansas law contains provisions regarding prohibited topics. Without clarity, we cannot approve a pilot that may unintentionally put a teacher at risk of violating [state] law,” wrote the department in a statement.
Yet they waited until the day school started to remove the course. Coincidence? After the current wave of oppression flooding through the South, I doubt it.
At this point, everyone with a conscience knows these efforts are attempts at whitewashing education of diverse topics and independent thinking. The elimination of DEI budgets and departments in education in Florida and Texas is further proof of their egregious and racist scheme.
And the leaders of these hateful attacks know it too.
So while students, teachers, librarians and the NAACP have spoken out, there has been relatively no response from the world of sports. And that’s a problem for athletes, teams, conferences and leagues could forge a powerful response to the directed attacks that affect Black athletes across all sports.
I previously wrote on how sports needs to stand up to the fascist regime of Ron DeSantis in Florida, yet outside of Disney and the NBPA speaking out against the Magic’s direct donation to a DeSantis Super PAC, the sports industry has remained relatively mum on what these states are doing.
Leaders in college football have more energy to fight against NIL than they do to protect the very players impacted by these discriminatory laws that are flying through Republican-led state legislatures.
I understand the precarious position schools in these states are in for if they dare to speak out, the petty, spiteful and vindictive Republican politicians like DeSantis will threaten their budgets and jobs.
But at this point, their actions will only intensify if they continue to remain unchecked.
And sports has the power to do just that.
Black athletes, who are most affected by these ridiculous laws, could refuse to play for the University of Arkansas. It worked at the University of Missouri in 2015, where the football team, coaches included, threatened not to play a game over racist incidents at the school. That would have cost the university a reported $1 million, so the school quickly took action and the president eventually resigned.
Students and student-athletes at all levels can band together and protest these acts of discrimination being committed by politicians whose sole purpose is to whitewash and suppress.
In Florida, the education department wrote a letter to the College Board, the nonprofit that oversees AP courses, stating that the AP Black History course violated state law and “lacked educational value”.
That alone should be enough for Black athletes to speak up.
Regardless of location, teams and athletes have the ability to fight back against the Jim Crow revival that’s quickly flourishing and spreading in the South.
On Thursday afternoon, school districts across Arkansas took a stand.
Six districts defied the state’s decision to defund and discredit AP African American studies. In the Little Rock School District, six schools said they would continue to offer the course and maintain the same grading process as other AP classes.
One school, eStem High School, even said they will award the school’s first Medal of Historical Pursuit and Valor to students who complete the AP course.
The united districts are also exploring ways to cover test costs since the state said it would no longer do so.
These schools believe that education needs to be free of biased political control. Now it’s time for sports to add its support to the fight against the divisive and discriminatory faux crusade on education.
All it needs to do is get off the bench and get in the game.
