John Oliver slams ‘white supremacist history of America’ taught in schools – Boston.com

As the well-worn aphorism goes, those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. That was the general thesis laid out by John Oliver on Sunday’s episode of “Last Week Tonight” as he examined how a whitewashed history curriculum in U.S. schools can lead to ignorance and a lack of understanding for generations.

Oliver picked out a few prime examples of historical events that are largely ignored in schools, specifically the Tulsa race massacre of 1921 and “the only coup d’etat ever to take place on American soil,” in which a white supremacist mob killed the elected representatives of Wilmington, N.C. — some of whom were Black — and installed their own government. In the latter example, history textbooks long painted the fairly elected Black officials and a Black newspaper described as “radical” as the instigators in the massacre, which was initially called a “race riot.”

Oliver also looked at how slavery has been described in textbooks both past and present. In one clip, an Alabama teacher read from the textbook she was taught with as a child, in which slaves are alternately described as either “good workers and very obedient” or “lazy, disobedient, and sometimes vicious.”

“Those passages were in the standard Alabama history textbook into the ’70s,” Oliver said. “So people who read them and may have been shaped by their content are now in their 50s doing things like running businesses or — I don’t know — holding elected office.”

In another video, a passage from a current Texas history textbook described slaves as being brought to the state to “do chores.”

“I don’t think we should describe slave labor as ‘chores.‘” Boston University faculty member Ibram X. Kendi said in the clip.

Oliver’s overall point was best encapsulated in a video clip of a Texas parent who opposed the state updating its curriculum. In the clip, the man says the main thing he wants his children to learn in school is that “the worst day in America beats the best day in any other country.”

Oliver said that teaching American exceptionalism ignores those for whom that statement wasn’t true or isn’t true.

“While I understand any parent wanting their kids to be taught something inspiring, what he’s essentially asking for there is for his kids to be misinformed. And that’s not going to serve them well when they grow up. It’s not going to serve any of us well.

“Ignoring the history that you don’t like is not a victimless act,” Oliver continued. “And a history of America that ignores white supremacy is a white supremacist history of America.”