Professor Glenn Reynold’s book, An Army of Davids, has constantly been in the back of my mind whenever I am engaging in fighting Common Core. It was in my mind as I sat at the messaging and PR table for We Will Not Conform. The opposition to Common Core are an Army of Davids. The replay of We Will Not Conform event is tonight, by the way. For those of you unfamiliar with Glenn Reynolds, a.k.a. the Blogfather, visit Instapundit. I do. Every morning.
Anyway, as a blogger, I know the power of social media and the well placed headline or turn of phrase. I know how to take apart a narrative put forth by the other side. This gave me an edge in debating supporters. I use the term debate lightly. It was never debate on the standards for them. It was a debate on me. This is a crucial point. Common Core supporters did not defend the standards, they attacked the opposition. They tried to smear and demonize teachers, parents, grandparents and students from all walks of life and it has backfired in epic style.
Even now, in this Politico piece, they biggest cheerleaders still can’t make a statement without slighting the opposition. They claim it is only emotion they are fighting with their “facts”. Well, that’s partly true. Opposition has passion and emotion on their side. After all, groups like the Chamber of Commerce are referring to our kids as ‘Human Capital’. Did they think that was going to be a Public Relation plus? The CCSSO’s Carissa Miller continues to slight parents, just look at the comment in the Politico article:
“There’s a whole group of people out there who are reasonable and want to talk about a good education for their children. Those are the people we want to reach,” said Carissa Miller, deputy executive director of the Council of Chief State School Officers, which helped write the standards.
“reasonable”. Meaning parents who oppose a fundamentally flawed experiment of sub par standards coupled with high stakes testing and intrusive data collection are unreasonable?
The D.C. Trade groups (CCSSO and NGA), The Gates Foundation, the powers that be who drove the Common Core into existence didn’t take into account one very crucial thing in their grand scheme: There is no one on the planet who does research better than a ticked off parent.
The Common Core supporters “facts” are really a set of well devised talking points which have been debunked time and again.
“The Common Core is so bad, you don’t have to lie,” said Erin Tuttle, co-founder of Hoosiers Against Common Core. “If you can’t prove what you’re saying, if you can’t back it up with a document or a source, you shouldn’t put it out there.”
Erin Tuttle is spot on and, ironically, the documents or interviews often used to back up opposition arguments are given by or authored by the supporters themselves. In effect, supporters are arguing with themselves, but opposition are the ‘crazy’ ones?
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