She Treads Softly: Lies My Liberal Teacher Told Me

Wednesday, May 22, 2024

Lies My Liberal Teacher Told Me

Lies My Liberal Teacher Told Me by Wilfred Reilly
6/11/24; 272 pages
Broadside Books

Lies My Liberal Teacher Told Me: Debunking the False Narratives Defining America's School Curricula by Wilfred Reilly is a very highly recommended examination of ten falsehoods that are being perpetrated in many school curricula today. The false assertions from American history books are all taken on using an empirical analysis of the data that exposes the truth about some of America's most controversial topics.He uses critical thinking skills along with facts and data from a vast amount of research, all annotated with additional notes afterward, rather than relying on feelings and myths.

Dr. Wilfred Reilly is a Associate professor of Political Science at Kentucky State University. He has a Ph.D. in Political Science from Southern Illinois University and a J.D. from the University of Illinois College of Law. The ten lies he takes on are: slavery was unique to America; the 'Red Scare' caught no communists; Native Americans were all peaceful; hippies, the sexual revolution, and the Vietnam War; lynchings and slaves as three-fifths a person; European colonialism was a bad thing; using nukes to end WWII was bad; white flight is racist; the 'Southern Strategy'; and the continuing oppression narrative (CON).

This is an excellent, well-written and well-researched exploration of the topics that certainly exposes the lies being presented as facts in American academia and education. It will most certainly create controversy and hurt feelings for those who won't actually read the book and critically review the research presented. Logic, using the Socratic method, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation, used to be a course taken by most college students but is seemingly lacking today. As someone who went through the public school system and college many years ago, was in the education field, reads all the time, and investigates everything before jumping in with an opinion, Dr. Reilly's analysis is both thorough and refreshing.

Thanks to Broadside Books for providing me with an advance reader's copy via Edelweiss. My review is voluntary and expresses my honest opinion.

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John Updike's six rules for reviewing:

1. Try to understand what the author wished to do, and do not blame him for not achieving what he did not attempt.

2. Give him enough direct quotation--at least one extended passage--of the book's prose so the review's reader can form his own impression, can get his own taste.

3. Confirm your description of the book with quotation from the book, if only phrase-long, rather than proceeding by fuzzy precis.

4. Go easy on plot summary, and do not give away the ending.

5. If the book is judged deficient, cite a successful example along the same lines, from the author's oeuvre or elsewhere. Try to understand the failure. Sure it's his and not yours?

To these concrete five might be added a vaguer sixth, having to do with maintaining a chemical purity in the reaction between product and appraiser.....Review the book, not the reputation.... Better to praise and share than blame and ban. The communion between reviewer and his public is based upon the presumption of certain possible joys in reading, and all our discriminations should curve toward that end.