This cartoon is from 1925. Way to make progress, Tennessee!
Good news for people who don’t know shit about dick: You can now teach science in Tennessee! The state legislature has passed a bill saying that if “science” “teachers” don’t personally believe in evolution or climate change, they’re free to represent them to students as kooky conjecture. Because forcing teachers to teach science is a form of fascism! Or socialism! I don’t know the difference, I took political science in Tennessee.
It’s possible that Tennessee legislators, who to be fair did take math in Tennessee, got confused and thought it was 1912, 13 years before the Scopes Trial in that very same state started the process of undermining laws against teaching evolution. Or maybe Tennessee is finally chafing under the yoke of science, and rebelling against the obligation to live in the same reality as the rest of us. If it’s the latter, I’m hoping for some very entertaining new laws as the legislators continue to snap. Next on the docket in Tennessee:
- Biology teachers who don’t believe in premarital sex are free to teach students that animals have tiny but elegant weddings before they breed.
- History teachers with elaborate conspiracy theories may spend up to 12 weeks of the semester doing nothing but screening the Zapruder film over and over and chain-smoking.
- Writing teachers may opt for phonetic spelling, and are not required to mention the existence of socialist tome The Dictionary.
- Literature teachers are free to teach that Shakespeare was actually Francis Bacon. Ha ha, just kidding! Who the hell are THOSE guys?
