# I pit the Houston Independent School District **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 25, 2016, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624 "2016-05-25T03:29:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/141 "2016-05-31T01:52:07Z")
> [@Procrustus](#): > > Any reason to think the people making these decisions did not consider these arguments in reaching their conclusions? I’m sure reasonable minds can differ about particular school names, but **I’m content to let the good people in charge hash it out as best they can**. Please watch [this](https://www.facebook.com/lanierwatchdog/videos/273697292970277/) and re-assess the good people and their intentions. I’ll let you be the judge of how “healthy” this debate has been. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/142 "2016-05-31T03:20:47Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > What matters, as I pointed out and you ignored, is that those are tax dollars being wasted on political correctness instead of education. Wow, you must have been absolutely frothing at the mouth at the waste of tax dollars devoted to renaming Washington National Airport after Ronald Reagan. Hell, renaming the associated Metro stop alone cost hundreds of thousands, and the cost to state highway systems, etc., for updating the signage was way more than that. I bet you’re pretty pissed off at the thought of those tax dollars being wasted on political correctness instead of transportation, aren’t you, **Clothahump**? > [@Clothahump](#): > > Who said anything about honoring it? :dubious: Really? You weren’t aware that having a school named after an individual is generally considered a form of honoring that individual? The common expression “named in honor of” didn’t tip you off? ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/143 "2016-05-31T13:59:34Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I see a distinction between people who happened to be Confederates, like Lanier and arguably Reagan, and people whose claim to fame is being a Confederate, like Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee. > > Davis, for example, has no particular connection to Houston. He was born in Kentucky and lived in Louisiana and Mississippi. He served in the Mexican War but so did a lot of other people. He was a cabinet official but you don’t see Houston schools being named after William Marcy or Caleb Cushing. No, the only reason why somebody would name a Houston school after Jefferson Davis is because he was the Confederate President. I did say Lanier and Reagan, not Dowling, Davis, Lee or Jackson. I understand why they’re doing the latter 4. There are really two questions here- should they rename the schools? In two of the cases, nobody’s made a good argument why they SHOULD rename them, other than “white men, former Confederates, ergo BAD.” when in fact, there’s a county, a high school in Austin, one of the major office buildings of the Texas state capitol complex, named after Reagan, and a statue on the UT campus, none of which are being renamed or moved. The other ones who were named for people specifically on the basis of their Confederate accomplishments- yes, it is valid to rename those. The second question is more whether it’s worth the cost and effort to actually rename them, independent of the worth of renaming them. Just because it’s valid to rename them, doesn’t mean it’s worth the money or trouble to do so. That’s what I’m questioning as being worth the money. Maybe if it was part of a bond issue, then it would be a different story. Then the public would get to decide if nearly 2 million bucks would go to this purpose, and we’d see how they feel about that. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/144 "2016-05-31T15:17:15Z")
> [@bump](#): > > There are really two questions here- should they rename the schools? In two of the cases, nobody’s made a good argument why they SHOULD rename them, other than “white men, former Confederates, ergo BAD.” when in fact, there’s a county, a high school in Austin, one of the major office buildings of the Texas state capitol complex, named after Reagan, and a statue on the UT campus, none of which are being renamed or moved. The other ones who were named for people specifically on the basis of their Confederate accomplishments- yes, it is valid to rename those. > > The second question is more whether it’s worth the cost and effort to actually rename them, independent of the worth of renaming them. Just because it’s valid to rename them, doesn’t mean it’s worth the money or trouble to do so. That’s what I’m questioning as being worth the money. It’s wasting taxpayer money on political correctness. There is no reason to change the names. Thousands of kids have been through those schools and weren’t traumatized by having them named after Confederates. But I guess in today’s era of whiny libs needing safe spaces and crap like that, wasting taxpayer money is okay as long as we feeeeeeel good about it, right? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/145 "2016-05-31T15:22:43Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > There is no reason to change the names. And for the 37th time, there is every reason to change some of the names. No public building (hell, anything) in the United States should be named in honor of a traitor. Period. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/146 "2016-05-31T15:41:45Z")
Conservative correctness. [How Texas Teaches History](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/22/opinion/how-texas-teaches-history.html) > [@](#): > > But it will take more than that to fix the way slavery is taught in Texas textbooks. In 2010, the Texas Board of Education [approved a social studies curriculum](http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/13/education/13texas.html?version=meter+at+1&module=meter-Links&pgtype=article&contentId=&mediaId=&referrer=&priority=true&action=click&contentCollection=meter-links-click) that promotes capitalism and Republican political philosophies. The curriculum guidelines prompted many concerns, including that new textbooks would downplay slavery as the cause of the Civil War. From the link in the quote. > [@](#): > > AUSTIN, Tex. — After three days of turbulent meetings, the Texas Board of Education on Friday approved a social studies curriculum that will put a conservative stamp on history and economics textbooks, stressing the superiority of American capitalism, questioning the Founding Fathers’ commitment to a purely secular government and presenting Republican political philosophies in a more positive light. > > The vote was 10 to 5 along party lines, with all the Republicans on the board voting for it. [Texas officials: Schools should teach that slavery was ‘side issue’ to Civil War](https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/150-years-later-schools-are-still-a-battlefield-for-interpreting-civil-war/2015/07/05/e8fbd57e-2001-11e5-bf41-c23f5d3face1_story.html) > [@](#): > > Five million public school students in Texas will begin using new social studies textbooks this fall based on state academic standards that barely address racial segregation. **The state’s guidelines for teaching American history also do not mention the Ku Klux Klan or Jim Crow laws.** > > And when it comes to the Civil War, children are supposed to learn that the conflict was caused by “sectionalism, states’ rights and slavery” — written deliberately in that order to telegraph slavery’s secondary role in driving the conflict, according to some members of the state board of education. So how much will it cost to replace all those textbooks? How much damage is caused by teaching a right wing version of politically correct history? [Company Apologizes for Texas Textbook Calling Slaves ‘Workers’: 'We Made a Mistake](http://www.newsweek.com/company-behind-texas-textbook-calling-slaves-workers-apologizes-we-made-380168) Mistake? Someone made the deliberate _choice_ to call slaves “workers” despite the facts of history. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/147 "2016-05-31T16:04:44Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > It’s wasting taxpayer money on political correctness. There is no reason to change the names. Thousands of kids have been through those schools and weren’t traumatized by having them named after Confederates. They may not have been traumatized, but that doesn’t mean there are no negative effects. If, every day, a kid goes to a school named after someone who believed that the kid is not fully human, and it becomes ingrained in that kid’s head that his/her school honors a man who didn’t believe that people like the kid are fully human or worthy of decent treatment, then it might have some effect on how that kid views society and authority around him. Isn’t it possible that this could have some negative effect on the way a child views the legitimacy of authority figures? Maybe not trauma-levels, but might it lower by just a tad the respect that this child has for local institutions and authority figures like teachers, school administrators, and police officers? > [@](#): > > But I guess in today’s era of whiny libs needing safe spaces and crap like that, wasting taxpayer money is okay as long as we feeeeeeel good about it, right? If I’m right about the above, and the remaining legacies of white supremacy like honoring white supremacists actually has some effect on children, then it sounds like a pretty decent use of money to me. If, on average, a child has X% less respect for teachers, administrators, and cops because he sees them honoring people who believed that the child was less than human, then that might possibly lead to some Y% of an increase in the likelihood of failing out of school, and Z% of an increase in likelihood of committing crimes, which would probably be much more expensive to society than the cost of renaming schools. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/148 "2016-05-31T16:27:10Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > So how much will it cost to replace all those textbooks? All those textbooks _in multiple states_. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/149 "2016-05-31T16:34:23Z")
I see it like deNazification. After WWII, we spent a lot of money and time and resources removing nearly every trace and remnant of Nazi authority in Germany. Imagine if we had won the war but hadn’t gone to this effort of deNazification – imagine if modern German Jews (and other ethnicities within Germany) grew up going to Hitler or Himmler high school, driving down Goebbels street, and similar… isn’t it possible that those Jews and others would grow up with less respect and trust in authorities like teachers, administrators, cops, and the like? Mightn’t that have some negative impact on some of the decisions that these kids make? I see this as a continuing part of the incredibly and tragically slow (but still absolutely necessary) process of de-Confederization, and de-White-Supremacification. It’s absolutely entirely logical and reasonable for black Americans to view the antebellum South, the Confederate South, and even the Jim Crow South, and their leaders, in the same way that German Jews see Nazi Germany and its leaders. If our society won’t spend a little effort to change these things that still honor those that are reasonable viewed by black Americans as monstrous, then we’re sending a message to the black members of our society that their views are irrelevant, however reasonable and logical they are. ---
**Author:** ![Grey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b782af/32.png) [@Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/150 "2016-05-31T16:59:58Z")
Apparently [HISD is considered wealthy](http://www.houstonisd.org/site/default.aspx?PageType=3&ModuleInstanceID=211566&ViewID=7b97f7ed-8e5e-4120-848f-a8b4987d588f&RenderLoc=0&FlexDataID=173834&PageID=147658) - in so far as the state government recaputring ~$100 million from their budget. > [@](#): > > Though nearly 80 percent of HISD students come from low-income families, the district is considered property-wealthy under the state’s current funding formula because of rising property values throughout the city. The projected deficit was previously $107 million, but those rising property values have reduced that amount to $95 million. It would seem their annual [budget](http://www.houstonisd.org/site/default.aspx?PageType=14&DomainID=8008&PageID=127782&ModuleInstanceID=181569&ViewID=1e008a8a-8e8a-4ca0-9472-a8f4a723a4a7&IsMoreExpandedView=True) is ~2500 million making the name change come in at 0.06% You can argue their priorities but foot stomping about wastefulness might be better directed to other parts of their budget. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/151 "2016-05-31T17:12:34Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > Has it now been determined by the Peanut Gallery that defense of a 19-year-old poet who later disavowed slavery and the Civil War is the hallmark of a racist? > > How far into the liberal black hole of ignorance shall we wade, cap’n? I linked [an article](http://www.texasmonthly.com/the-daily-post/renaming-schools-named-confederates-take-hard-look-replacements/) questioning the removal of Sidney Lanier (and his replacement by ex-Mayor Bob Lanier). Where are the posters coming out against Sidney? I haven’t noticed any. _Personally,_ I don’t dislike Dick Dowling. He did a lot for Houston & did not \*start \*the war. Yes, he succeeded in battle & I understand anyone wanting to remove his name from their school. And from Dowling Avenue–it runs through a black neighborhood & was named to offend. (Some have proposed changing it to “Emancipation Avenue” but I prefer “Lightnin’ Hopkins Boulevard.” Fifth Ward was the Houston Bluesman’s main stomping ground.) Houston’s PTB didn’t want to use Sam Houston’s name back then–because he was an enemy of secession. But–Robert E Lee, traitor with a snow-white reputation? Nutcase Stonewall Jackson? Jefferson Davis–generally disliked by most Southerners, too? Let them live on in the history books. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/152 "2016-05-31T18:01:28Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > Mistake? Someone made the deliberate _choice_ to call slaves “workers” despite the facts of history. That’s State Board of Education stuff… a notorious gang of imbeciles if there ever was one. ISTR that they elected some (likely senile) crazy old woman who’s a creationist and holds all manner of other dumb-ass beliefs. They’re the ones who decide on the state portion of the curricula, the accepted list of textbooks, and the like. Local school districts have their choice of the approved books, and how to go about teaching each grade level, etc… but the real stupid stuff is at the state level. Personally, I attribute it to setting the board up as a body of popularly elected people from specific geographic districts. It virtually guarantees that the rural parts of the state will elect people who should BE in special ed, not making decisions about it, purely on the basis that these clowns are Republicans and conservatives, not because they’re specialists in education, or smart enough to know that the world’s not actually flat, or that cavemen didn’t herd mammoths riding T-Rexes. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/153 "2016-05-31T18:45:30Z")
> **[The Awakening. Presention \[sic\] by Dick Dowling Klan No. 25, Port Arthur,...](http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/cph.3a52267/)** > > 1 photographic print. > [@](#): > > Dick Dowling Klan No. 25, Port Arthur, Tex. [1924] [http://capitolwords.org/date/2002/10/21/E1943-3\_on-the-75th-anniversary-of-jefferson-davis-high-sc/](http://capitolwords.org/date/2002/10/21/E1943-3_on-the-75th-anniversary-of-jefferson-davis-high-sc/) > [@](#): > > [Jefferson Davis High School] Opened on November 2, 1926, [http://exhibits.library.rice.edu/exhibits/show/dick-dowling/afterlives-of-dick-dowling/5](http://exhibits.library.rice.edu/exhibits/show/dick-dowling/afterlives-of-dick-dowling/5) > [@](#): > > In the fall of 1968, the same year in which Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, the Houston Independent School District also opened Richard W. “Dick” Dowling Middle School on the southside of Houston. Dowling joined other, older schools in the city named after Confederate leaders, like Jefferson Davis High School and Jackson Middle School (named after Stonewall Jackson). But this latest decision by the predominantly conservative school board to name a new school after a Confederate symbolized both the subtle and overt resistance of many Houstonians to the growing gains of the Civil Rights movement, like court-ordered school desegregation and the election of Houstonian Barbara Jordan as the first African American to serve in the state legislature since Reconstruction, two years before Dowling Middle School opened its doors (Items 509, 510, and 511). ---
**Author:** ![Pashnish\_Ewing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8797f3/32.png) [@Pashnish\_Ewing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pashnish_Ewing)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/154 "2016-05-31T21:01:45Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > Please watch [this](https://www.facebook.com/lanierwatchdog/videos/273697292970277/) and re-assess the good people and their intentions. I felt like cheering at the end. What exactly am I supposed to re-assess? ---
**Author:** ![Doyle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doyle/32/439_2.png) [@Doyle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doyle)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/155 "2016-05-31T21:08:57Z")
God, I hate agreeing with Clothahump. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/156 "2016-05-31T21:12:24Z")
> [@bump](#): > > cavemen didn’t herd mammoths riding T-Rexes. But wouldn’t you be a lot happier if you thought they did? ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/157 "2016-05-31T21:19:49Z")
> [@Doyle](#): > > God, I hate agreeing with Clothahump. He’s not worth the damage to your soul. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/158 "2016-05-31T21:40:37Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > It’s wasting taxpayer money on political correctness. There is no reason to change the names. Still waiting to hear you confirm that you’re equally pissed off about taxpayer expenditures on the unnecessary name change of Washington National Airport to Reagan National, and/or the petitions to change street names in Quebec named after Nazis. Or, if you’re **not** equally pissed off about those other examples of wasting taxpayer money on political correctness, let’s hear you explain why you think the situations are not analogous to the HISD decision. ---
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/159 "2016-05-31T23:28:59Z")
> [@Pashnish\_Ewing](#): > > I felt like cheering at the end. What exactly am I supposed to re-assess? The grammar, for one. But also the incoherent trash vomiting from that woman’s mouth. It that brings you to your knees, then congratulations. You’re the downfall of society. Good day, common filth. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624/160 "2016-05-31T23:30:59Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Still waiting to hear you confirm that you’re equally pissed off about taxpayer expenditures on the unnecessary name change of Washington National Airport to Reagan National, and/or the petitions to change street names in Quebec named after Nazis. > > Or, if you’re **not** equally pissed off about those other examples of wasting taxpayer money on political correctness, let’s hear you explain why you think the situations are not analogous to the HISD decision. He answered this [already](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=19363743&postcount=69). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-houston-independent-school-district/755624.md?page=9)