After the United Nations was exposed last year indoctrinating vulnerable Arab children at UN schools to wage jihad on Jews, the scandal-plagued global body is now meddling in the selection of textbooks for American students. And that is just the tip of the iceberg.
Of course, in America, school textbook selection has traditionally been a responsibility of individual teachers, schools, or perhaps a local school district elected and controlled by the community. Yet as the UN increasingly seeks more control and influence across every area of life, education and the minds of children are just the latest target — albeit an extremely important one for the furtherance of the UN’s controversial Agenda 2030 for global governance.
In fact, through the UN “education” agency UNESCO, the global body is seeking to dictate school textbook content to promote its agenda globally. And top UN officials regularly brag about seeking to shape the attitudes, values, ethics, and even spirituality of children worldwide.
The UN brouhaha involving textbooks in the United States began as a simple local matter that would not have attracted attention even one state over. On November 29, a student’s mother complained to local school-district officials about a social studies book being used in Norwalk public schools. The book in question, known as The Connecticut Adventure, came under fire for what critics called a “paternalistic,” “simplistic,” and “insensitive” comment on slavery in the state’s history.
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The relevant section of the book reads: “Compared to other colonies, Connecticut did not have many slaves. Some people owned one or two slaves. They often cared for and protected them like members of the family. They taught them to be Christian, and sometimes to read and write.”
Less than a week after the complaint, local officials announced that the book would no longer be used. “The portion of the textbook minimizes the impact and implications of slavery from the perspective of many constituents in the Norwalk community,” wrote Norwalk Public Schools Chief Academic Officer Michael Conner in a letter addressed to parents.
Meanwhile, the publisher promptly announced revisions to the relevant sections of the book.
And that should have been the end of it. But it was not.
Somewhere along the line, a team of self-styled UN “human-rights experts” caught wind of the story, and decided to try to exploit yet another local issue to justify the UN outfit’s existence, to demonize America, and to meddle in what should have been a local matter for local elected officials.
“The chapter discussing the history of slavery in Connecticut is a distortion of the true nature of enslavement,” fumed Ricardo Sunga, a self-styled “human rights expert” who, despite not being African, leads the UN “Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent.” That paternalistic outfit was established by the dictator-controlled UN “Human Rights” Council to supposedly stand up for Africans and their descendants, as if they needed special UN protection.
In a press release posted on the UN News Center and the website of UN human rights chief Zeid Hussein, a prince of an Islamic dictatorship, Sunga instructed local American school officials as if he were in charge. “These deeply offensive texts should be replaced with accurate depictions of history which convey the message of the inherent dignity and equality of all human beings,” Sunga was quoted as saying, adding that textbooks the UN disagrees with “may lead to racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, Afrophobia and related intolerance.”
In a bit of irony, instead of choosing an African to run the UN Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent, the UN chose Sunga III from the Philippines, a country that surveys show is one of the most racist countries in the world. The same UN outfit last year visited America to demand reparations for slavery, more infringements on the constitutionally protected rights to self-defense and to keep and bear arms, an end to voter ID laws, and much more.
It was not clear why the UN could not find an African or at least a person of African descent to lead the UN Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent. The outfit’s previous boss, Mireille Fanon-Mendes-France, is from France, though at least she reportedly had an African ancestor on one side of the family. Critics said the lack of African leaders for the African group might reflect institutional UN bigotry.
But if the non-African leaders of the UN African group want to find real terror aimed at Africans, they can look much closer to their own offices. Indeed, if actions speak louder than words, the UN’s alleged concern for “People of African Descent” is something of a cruel joke. Non-stop scandals on the systematic rape and exploitation of children in Africa by UN “peace” troops have been swirling around the controversial organization for decades.
In one African town, for instance, a survey cited by BBC revealed that eight out of 10 underage girls admitted to being regularly raped and sexually abused by UN troops. Separately, UN troops killed potentially tens of thousands of Haitians via carelessly spreading cholera recently, then claimed immunity. UN forces and their proxies have also mercilessly slaughtered and terrorized African civilians amid efforts to enforce submission to communist or Islamist strongmen.
When it comes to Africa, the UN and its oftentimes brutal “peacekeeping” forces have become infamous for terrorizing and abusing Africans, for extreme corruption, and for other lawlessness. Yet rather than cleaning up its own house, the UN prefers to demonize America, where its armies of self-styled “experts” always have a lot to say about alleged racism.
For example, in July, following the murder of five Dallas police officers by at least one racist “black power” activist who said he hated whites, the UN put out an official press release touting “black lives matter” and blasting American law enforcement for “structural racism.” The UN’s “experts” on “people of African descent” — the same bureaucrats attacking local school officials in Connecticut — also called for prosecuting and punishing local police officers involved in two fatal shootings, before investigations were even complete.
“We call for prompt independent investigations to ensure the perpetrators are prosecuted and punished,” declared Sunga III, seemingly unaware that multiple independent investigations were ongoing. The UN bureaucrat might also have been unaware that, in America, at least, decisions on whether to prosecute people are generally taken after investigations have been completed. Decisions on whether to punish, meanwhile, are made by a jury, after a court case featuring due process of law, constitutional protections that under most UN member states would be inconceivable.
But on textbooks, at least, it is not just Americans under UN attack over what is taught (or not) in school: Africans are also under fire by the UN for choosing textbooks the UN dislikes. In Africa and beyond, school children and the textbooks they read are being targeted, in particular, by the communist-controlled UN “education” agency known as UNESCO.
Just last month, UNESCO issued a “Global Education Monitoring” report blasting education authorities in Uganda, Kenya, Algeria, Zimbabwe, and other nations because they chose textbooks that allegedly show women in “traditional roles,” including “housework.” The report also complains that school textbooks used in Africa do not sufficiently promote “global citizenship,” homosexuality, lesbianism, bisexuality, transgenderism, global-warming alarmism, and more.
The UN even argues that private schools must be made to submit as a requirement of what it calls “international law.” UNESCO also has a radical scheme known as the “World Core Curriculum” that its minions hope to impose on schools around the world, along with everything from pseudo-history and quack reading schemes to programs for the sexualization of children.
Where the UN does directly control education, though, its lessons range far from promoting equality, peace, and goodwill toward others. As The New American reported last year, UN schools run by the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and funded by U.S. taxpayers were caught on video brainwashing Arab children to glorify terrorism and wage constant war against their Jewish neighbors. In the documentary “The UNRWA Road to Terror: Palestinian Classroom Incitement” released last year by a pro-Israel watchdog group, UN schools were even exposed offering military-style jihad training to young Arab children.
“The thing to understand is that these schools, they’ve developed a full-scale military-training system,” said David Bedein, director of the group behind the documentary exposing UN schools. “How many people realize that there’s military training going on in these camps? It’s not even just hate education, it’s war education. The education for the last 16 years, the school system has been devoted to indoctrinating children to make war on the Jews.”
With each press release attacking the United States, America’s system of limited constitutional government, and the liberties of the American people, the UN further delegitimizes itself. The latest brouhaha over textbooks in a Connecticut school district, of all things, is a perfect example. In fact, the whole situation illustrated why local control works well and centralized control is undesirable and dangerous: An offensive segment was found in a school book, the matter was raised by a parent at a local school district meeting, and then the book was removed from use after a week-long probe.
Imagine how much harder such an effort would be, if not impossible, if the selection of school textbooks was actually a state, federal, or even UN responsibility. Plus, if the UN and its largely dictatorial member regimes succeed in dictating textbook content and selections, consider the extreme and violent ideologies of the member regimes that would be making the decisions — hard-line Islamists, communists, mass-murderers, genocidal war lords, and others would all have a say in what little Johnny learns at school, while parents would have virtually none.
Instead of focusing on school textbooks in the United States, the UN might spend more time worrying about what it will do if and when U.S. taxpayers get fed up and quit providing the estimated $10 billion annually. Right now, leading members of Congress are working on plans to defund the UN. Other lawmakers, citing attacks on American freedom and allies, are working on the American Sovereignty Restoration Act to end U.S. membership in the UN altogether.
Americans seeking an American exit from the UN, or an Amexit, can be thankful that the UN continues to provide more reasons to pursue a U.S. withdrawal on an almost daily basis. But despite the absurdity of the dictators club meddling in a local Connecticut school district’s book selections, the UN is no laughing matter. For the sake of liberty, it should be shut down.
Alex Newman is co-author of Crimes of the Educators, and a correspondent for The New American, covering economics, education, politics, and more. Follow him on Twitter @ALEXNEWMAN_JOU. He can be reached at: [email protected]
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