• blewit@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    The ā€œexpertā€ quoted was an unidentified Reddit user! Nowhere in the article was it stated what was being taught. This isnā€™t an article for information, itā€™s just an attempt to fan the flames of division.

    Not saying I agree or not with whatā€™s happening in (surprise) Florida. Just saying nothing in this article provides for discussion or critical thinking about the topic.

    ā€œItā€™s evil more than it is stupid,ā€ said a Reddit user discussing the Guardian article, while another lamented the forces enabling this and anti-environmental policy planning like Project 2025 as ā€œdoing the bidding of oil companies.ā€

    • grte@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      The Florida Department of Education has approved screening videos that deny the Earthā€™s changing climate to schoolchildren in the state, according to the Guardian.

      Animations from Prager University Foundation, a conservative group that pushes untruths about sustainable energy and the warming of the planet, will now be a part of the public school curriculum in Florida.

      Seems like it says what was being taught right at the start?

      They also quote a researcher at Kansas State University and itā€™s kind of weird you glossed over that entirely to focus on the reddit user.

      • AssholeDestroyer@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        From Motherjones

        While no school district has announced plans to show any of PragerUā€™s videos, NPR reports, thereā€™s nothing to stop teachers from independently airing the material. As a Florida Department of Education spokesperson said in a statement, the material aligns with Floridaā€™s revised civics and government standards.

      • blewit@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Not glossing over it. The first sentence is ā€œaccording to the Guardian,ā€ but doesnā€™t actually share what was being taught. Are they properly evaluating the material? Canā€™t know, they didnā€™t state what was being shared.

        Second sentence is not clarifying what is being shown, just that it comes from an organization that has an agenda.

        All Iā€™m saying here is this article is very heavy in divisiveness and absent with specific details. That should raise concern.

        I click on the article to see what craziness Florida is doing now. I didnā€™t learn that from the article. There are plenty of links available from Prager U on the internet. Iā€™d like to have seen exactly what are in those animations being shown to the kids. At best this is sloppy reporting not sharing those links.

        • grte@lemmy.ca
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          1 year ago

          They explicitly state that they are showing PragerU videos as educational material in public school. Itā€™s as plain as day. All their videos are on youtube if you want to go look specifically at what they are showing.

          • blewit@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            All Iā€™m saying is if someone says to me ā€œkids are being shown bad stuffā€ Iā€™d like to be able to see for myself what they are being shown to make my own decision. Just saying ā€œitā€™s stuff thatā€™s made by these people who have an agendaā€ isnā€™t sufficient, in my opinion. Because it is so easy to link to the stuff as you rightfully point out, that it wasnā€™t makes me question the integrity of the reporting.

            I donā€™t have an agenda. In fact, I suspect weā€™re on the same side of the debate. Iā€™m in favor of critical thinking and Iā€™m certainly not denying global warming/climate change or whatever we are calling it. To be clear: if these kids are being taught it is a hoax, thatā€™s bad in my opinion.

            But news should be informing us. And this article fails to provide us the information we need to arm ourselves against climate change deniers. All it does is say ā€œFlorida badā€ and ā€œPrager U bad.ā€ It doesnā€™t give us the details to educate us and arm us with facts. That approach to persuasion, on either side of the topic, should concern all of us.

            • SkyezOpen@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              If youā€™re trying to claim neutrality while complaining that a news article is being uncharitable to prageru, youā€™re either extremely uninformed or extremely disingenuous.

              • blewit@lemm.ee
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                1 year ago

                Sorry, Iā€™m clearly doing a terrible job making my point.

                So instead, I just did a quick search. If the person writing the article included this information I would never had said anything.

                Hereā€™s the animation produced by PragerU and enforced for the Florida schoolā€™s curriculum:

                https://www.prageru.com/video/poland-anias-energy-crisis

                And hereā€™s a more thorough article with facts and details, that does beyond calling a Reddit user and expert for a clickbait headline:

                https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2023/08/prageru-climate-skeptic-science-florida-education/

                My issue was with the article, not the position. It wasnā€™t informing. It was pandering. After watching the video I am better informed about the counterpoint to my own beliefs.

                And donā€™t listen to me, a random Lemmy user, but my take was that it was a terrible argument and I was offended by it. I worry that this is what is being promoted as material suitable for educational purposes.

                • Im14abeer@midwest.social
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                  1 year ago

                  Iā€™m not sure why youā€™re being so heavily downvoted, youā€™re absolutely right. Neither the Yahoo article nor the Guardian article itā€™s based on did the legwork to back up the premise. To drown out the misinformation, journalists need to bring the facts, else they leave the narrative open to bad faith criticism. I donā€™t see where youā€™ve advocated for the morons in the least, just asked that journalistā€™s do their jobs.

            • grte@lemmy.ca
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              1 year ago

              No, you are honestly wilding out over this. The article was fine and you are in a contrarian overdrive in a way that makes me think you arenā€™t being entirely forthright.

              • dhork@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                I kinda agree with the guy here. I am not going to give a dumb article a pass just because I agree with its conclusions. Any ā€œnewsā€ article that quotes a random Redditor as an expert is trash.

                • Unaware7013@kbin.social
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                  1 year ago

                  You (and @blewit) could just click where it says 'The Guardian and read the source article if you donā€™t think a reddit or is a good source (which it isnā€™t, which is why you can read supporting articles they linkā€¦). Hereā€™s a decent portion of the guardian article is below, but itā€™s clear that PragerU is pushing objectively false propaganda to children, both downplaying the impact that current policies have on the environment and (to no oneā€™s surprise) comparing the people who rightly fight against climate change to Nazis (instead of the people attempting to eradicate trans people like the Nazis actually did):

                  Videos that compare climate activists to Nazis, portray solar and wind energy as environmentally ruinous and claim that current global heating is part of natural long-term cycles will be made available to young schoolchildren in Florida, after the state approved their use in its public school curriculum.

                  Slickly-made animations by the Prager University Foundation, a conservative group that produces materials on science, history, gender and other topics widely criticized as distorting the truth, will be allowed to be shown to children in kindergarten to fifth grade after being adopted by Floridaā€™s department of education.

                  Teachers who use the materials ā€œwill not be reprimanded, cannot be pushed back on about it, we are approved on the curriculumā€, said Jill Simonian, director of outreach at PragerU Kids, the youth arm of the organization. ā€œMore states are following. Florida ā€“ Iā€™m applauding. This is step in the right direction.ā€

                  ā€¦

                  In one of the videos allowed by Florida, a girl in Poland called Ania is shown questioning the need to transition away from coal, a key driver of the climate crisis, to renewables. Her parents tell her that the planet has heated up and cooled since prehistoric times, even without the burning of fossil fuels.

                  Ania clashes with friends who want swift action on the climate crisis and starts a blog in which she raises doubts about switching to renewable energy and frets as her community is plunged into destitution without coal. ā€œRenewable energy sources donā€™t contribute much energy,ā€ the video states. ā€œUnlike coal, energy from the wind or sun is unreliable, expensive and difficult to store.ā€

                  The video concludes by raising the specter of Nazi Germany, with Aniaā€™s grandfather praising her stand against people concerned about climate change by comparing it to the Warsaw uprising. ā€œThrough her familyā€™s stories, Ania is realizing that fighting oppression is risky and that it always takes courage,ā€ the voiceover states.

                  Other approved videos have similar themes, with one showing two children, Leo and Layla, being told by their scientist uncle, Will, about the supposed inadequacies of renewable energy. ā€œWind and solar just arenā€™t powerful enough to power the modern world, the energy from them isnā€™t dense or robust enough,ā€ says Will, as a bird is shown falling dead from the sky after being hit by the blades of a wind turbine. ā€œWindmills kill so many birds,ā€ Will adds, mournfully.

                  A further video extols the benefits of plastics ā€“ which come from a byproduct of oil and gas production and are now found strewn in the air, the oceans, the mountains and even in the placentas of unborn babies ā€“ as being superior to killing animals for their body parts, with Leo commenting he prefers having a plastic bicycle helmet to wearing a turtle shell on his head. Leo Baekeland, the Belgian chemist known for the invention of Bakelite, is shown in the video declaring that ā€œfossil fuels are cheap and plentiful, thank goodness!ā€

                  • dhork@lemmy.world
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                    1 year ago

                    You donā€™t get it. I agree with all that stuff you wrote, Iā€™m not arguing any of that. But quoting a random Redditor in any way in a news article that is not about Reddit is dumb, and contributes to the dumbing down of news. For all we know, that ā€œReddit Userā€ is probably a bot. The article would have been much better if they left it out entirely.

                • grte@lemmy.ca
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                  1 year ago

                  It didnā€™t quote the Redditor as an expert. That was an opinion section. The quoted expert in the article was the Kansas university researcher.

                • SkyezOpen@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Itā€™s objectively true that Prager is a christofascist that uses his platform to whitewash history including slavery and colonialism, and demonize any progressive beliefs. Itā€™s propaganda.

                  • PowerCrazy@lemmy.ml
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                    1 year ago

                    Sure I agree. Did the article provide evidence of that? Or did it take that as a premise? It also isnā€™t saying anything anything that is unique about PragerU, except that the materials can be shown in Florida schools. A ton of shitty propaganda can be shown in Florida as well as other states. Iā€™m pretty sure that PragerU material can be shown in most states schools, but if there is an example of a state that doesnā€™t allowed PragerU Iā€™d love to see how they word it.

            • TheForkOfDamocles@beehaw.org
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              1 year ago

              I think The Guardian is right not to share the actual bullshit. The article would just be another example of TMZ or Entertainment Tonight if they just flung the lies all over. I know where to find Pā€Uā€ if I want to see it. I donā€™t think The Guardian needs to submit its readers to more crap in the article.

    • GarbageShoot [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      1 year ago

      Article sounds stupid, but so is complaining about ā€œfanning the flames of divisionā€ in the context of writing criticism of a thinktank-made curriculum