The Virginia Education Association whipped the commonwealth’s Senate Democrats into opposing a Victims of Communism commemoration bill due to its “anti-Asian” sentiments, demonstrating the union’s historical ignorance, woke ideology, and educational incompetence.
In recent weeks, Democrats in the Virginia Senate and the commonwealth’s teachers union have shown they see history as a tool to promote racial ideology, not as a means to understand the past. A few days after defeating an Indian American nominee based on the ludicrous claim that she associates with white supremacists, Democrats in a Senate committee managed to offend Asian Americans and victims of communism. The incident provides additional proof of the problems plaguing the commonwealth’s school system.
The latest controversy occurred when Democrats on a Senate committee voted along party lines to keep a House-passed measure locked in the committee. The bill would have required the governor to issue a proclamation declaring every Nov. 7 as Victims of Communism Day, and it would have instructed public K-12 schools to observe the day by commemorating and honoring those who lost their lives under communist regimes.
Lawmakers showed little sympathy for the approximately 100 million people killed by communist states. If that were not bad enough, the worst insult came via the lawmakers’ stated reason for opposing action on this seemingly unobjectionable measure.
The Virginia Education Association, which represents public school teachers, said it opposed the measure because it was “concerned that this bill would subject Asian American students to anti-Asian sentiments,” citing the fact that eastern Asia contains four out of the five remaining communist regimes — all except Cuba.
Some would argue that Democrats have always obeyed the political orders of the teachers unions. But the fact that they did so to oppose a resolution honoring 100 million people who died under communism shows the Democrats will blindly follow the teachers unions into their ideological destruction of historical education. Yet, in many ways, ignoring those murdered by communist regimes does not tell half of the story.
The teachers union said it opposed the bill because commemorating the victims of communism could arouse anti-Asian sentiments. In other words, the union’s leadership believes its members — Virginia public school teachers — cannot teach K-12 students how to differentiate between the atrocities committed by corrupt communist regimes — whether the current Chinese Communist Party, the old Soviet Union, or the Castro regime in Cuba — and the innocent people living under those regimes.
The fact that the teachers union believes Virginia public educators cannot teach the history of communist regimes without arousing anti-Asian bias shows a stunning lack of faith in its own members. Why any teacher in the commonwealth would want to remain associated with an organization that apparently considers its employees so incompetent is beyond me.
If the Virginia Education Association truly wants to fight bias against Asians, it can do so much closer to home. In Fairfax County, the school board eliminated a test-based admissions process for the county’s prestigious Thomas Jefferson High School. Instead of solely admitting students based on merit, the school board has now attempted to rig the process to reduce the number of Asian American students attending the school — all in the name of “equity.”
Ironically enough, this divisiveness — pitting one group against another in a zero-sum game, all under the guise of “equity” — echoes the beliefs and tactics of communist regimes. The left’s focus on getting people to confess their “sins” against “equity” in some respects brings to mind the “struggle sessions” of China’s Cultural Revolution. These struggle sessions forced dissidents to ingest the party’s lies in an effort to confuse them about history and truth and to humiliate them for their sins against the state’s pseudo-religious doctrines.
After years of learning loss due to the pandemic, Virginia’s students need to make up lost ground with quality education. They need competent teachers willing to inform them about the lessons of history and an educational establishment focused on improving their minds and skill sets, rather than indoctrinating them in woke ideology.
The Senate’s failure to approve the anti-communism bill shows just how badly some Democratic lawmakers in Richmond are undermining the commonwealth’s kids.
