Arizona restricts Multicultural teachings

Arizona has become the battle ground for a new civil rights movement. Thousands of protesters and supporters both in state and out have voiced their opinions on this controversial issue. But now the fight is being taken to the doors of Arizona's class rooms.

Legislator's are now targeting Multicultural studies in schools and have restricted the teaching of such ethnically educational classes such as African-American Studies, Hispanic/Latino studies, and Asian-American studies. State Schools Superintendent Tom Horne told CNN's "American Morning" on Thursday that the legislation is "designed to get schools to teach kids to treat each other as individuals and not on the basis of what race they were born into." he continues to say that when students took part in these classes they became more enraged because the curriculum depicted various acts of oppression and degradation on behalf of the US on a particular ethnic race.

Parents of students at local Arizona schools have protested this new restriction of learning while U.N. human rights experts criticized the legislation, saying "everyone has the right to seek and develop cultural knowledge and to know and understand his or her own culture and that of others through education and information." Horne said the state's social studies standards "require all kids to learn about all different cultures." He said they "shouldn't be ghettoized into certain cultures where they learn only about the culture of the race they have been born into. That's contrary to American values" (CNN.com)

It is this writers opinion that this form of legislation will only make the gap wider amongst native Arizonian's and their local school's, local and state governments. If such studies are to be restricted then all forms of history and social studies must be restricted as well. Our great country has a rich and deep culture with its good and bad historical facts and stories. But, we must not turn and bow our heads in shame for it. We must learn that all countries and cultures world wide have done similar things but it is the present in which we live in now so that we may reach a brighter future and the restricting of such courses hinders our progress as a nation.

I sincerely hope that the state of Arizona will be able to one day look back on such actions like these and move forward as one state for the peeople.

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