For years, there’s been a fair amount of carping about the so-called “culture wars” in America without much explanation as to the parties involved or what was at stake. For the layperson, it was pretty easy to break it down to a battle between “smart” and “stupid” and while no one seemed to stand up for the stupid side, the seemingly one-sided brawl somehow still raged on. The fact is that over the past decade and change the sabers have been rattling, the pistol magazines have been loaded with hollow point rounds, and the brass knuckles have been sized and fitted for a real fight. After years of “Wolf!” being cried, the culture wars are upon us.

For example, the Texas School Board has caught the new fever that’s spreading this great land, turning it into a battlefield.

The name of this epidemic?

Showing your true colors.

Now that we’re all becoming more honest with one another in regards to how we actually feel about each other and the direction our nation is headed, some very ugly lines are being drawn in the sand that are far beyond the typical Left vs. Right or Republican vs. Democrat tribal mentality we once fostered. Gone are the attempts to cowtow to those who desire our children to be truly educated, enlightened young people. Why ineptly raise the future of this country when you can successfully raise the future of an ideology?

Some people’s personal truth is that they would prefer to misrepresent greater truths. Texan schoolchildren will soon be taught that American “imperialism” was actually “expansionism”, tempering what was intended to be a strong word that belied a strong truth about our history. It is now important for these young minds to learn of the importance of the Conservative resurgence of the past 30 years as if there has been an unfair representation of Liberal politics in the history books. The Christian Right will now have its place in the history books because apparently there was an embassy in every other cultural frontier besides porn.

The American slave trade will soon be referred to as “Atlantic Triangular Trade”. Kinda takes the wind out of the sails, doesn’t it? That term almost makes slavery sound like a bipartisan Senate bill that we’d all be in favor of. It’s also a complete and utter defeat of the point of history – documenting our successes and failures as accurately as possible so as to maintain a proper account of what to do and not do in the future. How will history reflect on this school board’s decision to further blur the lines of what was and wasn’t important. It’s interesting that this group also sought to downplay the role of Thomas Jefferson in establishing our country. Considering that they argued teaching the concept of “separation of church and state”, one would (wrongly) assume that they would avoid diminishing the historical contributions of a Founding Father who was also a man of faith.

There are some of you who may feel that this is a “Texas thing” and you would be understandably wrong. With over 4.7 million students under its authority, this school board will be printing these revisions to history at a cost that allows them to cheaply sell these textbooks and their questionable content to other states and cities. Imagine, some day soon, participating in an argument with a college graduate who suggests that you’re exaggerating by calling the Atlantic triangular trade “slavery”. Imagine a discussion about the Founding Fathers that omits Jefferson. It’s bad enough we’ve relegated the man to the $2 bill. Dare we add insult to injury by shrinking him down to an historical footnote?

This is a warning to self-professed smart people, actual smart people, a shot across the bow to those who used to be smart, who associate with smart people, who have aspirations of being smart one day, who would love to have a smart spouse or smart children. The storm is coming. My brethren, the stupid have grown quite sick of us and our egos, our coffee drinks, our books, and the fact that we prefer to use napkins instead of the fronts of our shirts. They’re learning from us, evolving to a point that they now realize that while we are smarter, they outnumber us. They’ve also grasped that we don’t replicate like the robots they’ve perceived us to be but actually in the same manner as they do. Those children in Texas aren’t the offspring of just dumb people, they’re the future of all of us. If this is truly the beginning of the culture wars, the enemy has made its first move not at us, but our children. And our kids weren’t that smart in the first place.