Re-writing History in Texas and Iran

by Julie Jigsawnovich


Iran's Education Minister set up a committee to eliminate kings from textbooks. That's a lot of kings! Iran's history goes back thousands of years!  Would the Minister like to pretend it only goes back to 1979? The ancient Iranian king, Soroush (Cyrus), wrote the first human rights document. Now the Education Minister wants to delete him altogether? http://www.iranian.com/main/2010/apr/removing-kings-history

The Texas School Board is considering removing Thomas Jefferson from the list of Enlightenment thinkers.  Jefferson was a strong proponent of the separation of church and state, in addition to drafting the American Declaration of Independence!  This is only one of many changes being considered.  The vote on changes is in May. http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/04/20104933515560979.html

These proposed removals surely recall the character in George Orwell's book, 1984, whose job was to constantly remove anything and anyone from books and media that did not support propaganda currently put forth by Big Brother.  Will the book, 1984, itself is removed someday? --Julie Jigsawnovich