Florida’s Stop Woke Law: What We Can Learn From Inherit The Wind

16th April 2023

Florida’s ‘Stop Woke’ law and what we can learn from the 1960 film ‘Inherit the Wind’. By Richard Schertzer.

Everyone is afraid of change but I never thought I would see this from this generation in this day and age. If you are not aware, Governor Ron DeSantis has signed into law which prohibits any instruction on race relations that would imply that any person’s status, whether oppressed or privileged, in the United States would be determined by their race, religion or sex.

Banning the teaching of something that is basically history is something that touched a nerve with me because it seems the conservatives are afraid of knowing or hearing something that might “offend” their sensibility.

This action reminds me of a movie from 1960 entitled Inherit the Wind. It was directed by Stanley Kramer and was a fictionalized account of the 1925 Scopes “Monkey” Trial, where a high school teacher named John T. Scopes was arrested for violating the state of Tennessee’s Butler Act which outlawed the teaching of human evolution or Darwinism.

Scopes was defended by his lawyer Clarence Darrow while William Jennings Bryan stood for the prosecution.

Dick York plays Bertram T. Cates, whose character is based upon John T. Scopes, Spencer Tracy plays a fictionalized version of Darrow named Henry Drummond while Fredric March portrays Matthew Harrison Brady who is a fictionalized version of Jennings Bryan.

It seems so silly that, in the film, Cates is arrested, berated and humiliated in front of the public simply for teaching a theory to high school students. The conservative mob is so quick to publicly lynch him that they want him run out of town for attempting to teach something beyond anyone else’s comprehension.

Drummond attempts to fight for the right for Cates to “be différent” and in the same vein it seems that the right to think is on trial in the film the same way said right is at risk with this new woke ban put into place. It’s insane that people can place a ban on learning history.

Here is a little FYI for the people that are triggered reading this article. The theory of evolution and critical race theory are just what they say they are: theories. Just because they are theories does that mean that we should stop teaching the Big Bang Theory in Science and Astronomy class? No, it doesn’t.

If a theory, not conspiracy, is supported by enough sufficient evidence and context clues with a good reasoning behind it that excludes any anecdotal evidence, then there is a basis for teaching it in schools.

I’ll leave you all with the quote saying that he who troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind.

Florida’s ‘Stop Woke’ law and what we can learn from the 1960 film ‘Inherit the Wind’. By Richard Schertzer.

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