Cynics Unlimited

It’s January 15 which means many Americans had the day off to “celebrate” Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Creating a national holiday of Dr. King’s birthday is arguably the greatest olive branch offered to African-Americans by the US Government since passing the Civil Rights Act (ironically the holiday bill was signed by Ronald Reagan, whose antagonistic relationship with blacks and willingness to appeal to pre-civil rights sentiment is well documented).

Unfortunately, like most holidays, the significance of MLK day seems lost on many who claim to celebrate it or at least get the day off work/school. NBC recently published an article demonstrating just how little some Americans know about Dr King –

In a recent survey of college students on U.S. civic literacy, more than 81 percent knew that the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was expressing hope for “racial justice and brotherhood” in his historic “I Have a Dream” speech.
That’s the good news.
Most of the rest surveyed thought King was advocating the abolition of slavery.

Only 100 years off … Pretty shocking. The article goes on to discuss whether lack of knowledge about MLK’s legacy can be related to the rejuvenated focus on standardized testing in schools –

In many schools across the country, teachers say social studies has taken a back seat under the federal No Child Left Behind law, which stresses math and reading. Squeezing history into the curriculum can be difficult, educators say, and taking time out of a scheduled lesson to use a federal holiday — even King’s — as a teaching moment can be tough.

This suggestion seems unlikely, given that North American schools have long been notorious for not teaching children history beyond names and dates of the most surface events. In a 1998 Canadian survey published by the Dominion Institute, only 41% of respondents obtained a passing grade in a 15-question quiz about major Canadian military events from WW1 to the formation of U.N. Peacekeeping forces. The pass rate drops to 26% for respondents aged 18-34.

• Only 17 percent of respondents aged 18 to 34 correctly identified conscription as the topic of a 1942 national plebiscite, compared to twice as many Canadians aged 55 and older (37%)
• In response to an open-ended question, one in three (36%) correctly identified the battle of Vimy Ridge as “Canada’s most famous single victory in the First World War, consisting of the capture of a key ridge on the Western Front”
• 43 percent accurately identified Halifax as the site of a massive munitions explosion during WWI, while another 3 percent correctly identified the province of Nova Scotia, bringing the total proportion of correct responses to just less than half (46%).

Only the symbolism of the Remembrance Day poppy was correctly identified by a strong majority of survey respondents (79%). Surface symbolism and commercialism also appear to drive public knowledge of religious holidays like Christmas and Easter.

The main inference from these observations seems to be that a holiday cannot substitute for year-round historical and religious education about important events. Of course Cynics Unlimited would never advocate revoking a day off work; however, social studies should not be left to the mass media and periodic holidays that are more likely to be spent playing video games or visiting friends.