Florida could soon be teaching students about the \u201cdangers and evils of communism\u201d under proposed new academic standards that some argue amount to \u201cpropaganda\u201d and wrongly aim to rehabilitate the reputation of Sen. Joseph McCarthy, who pushed the \u201cRed Scare\u201d communist panic in the 1950s.<\/p>\n
The new standards for middle-and-high-school social studies classes stem from legislation (SB 1264) Gov. Ron DeSantis signed in 2024. The law mandates instruction on the \u201cconsequences of communism\u201d and aims to prepare students to \u201cwithstand indoctrination on Communism at colleges and universities.\u201d The Florida Department of Education drafted the proposed standards and released them publicly last week. The State Board of Education is to vote on them Nov. 13.<\/p>\n
The proposed standards cover 30 pages and more than 100 standards \u2014 benchmarks for what should be covered in class \u2014 including the death toll from communist regimes, how communist policies worsened people\u2019s quality of living and the \u201cdangers of pro-communist propaganda in entertainment and media industries.\u201d
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\nBut some experts worry about the state\u2019s treatment of McCarthy, who in the standards is listed alongside then-Congressman and Senator Richard Nixon and President Harry Truman as examples of \u201canti-communist politicians.\u201d The House Un-American Activities Committee, which investigated allegations of disloyalty and subversion, often in heavy-handed fashion, is described in the same way.<\/p>\n
McCarthy, a senator from 1947 to 1957, and the committee were later found to have falsely accused people and to have violated Americans\u2019 First Amendment rights. McCarthy\u2019s biography on the U.S. Senate website notes some of his accusations were deemed \u201ca fraud and a hoax\u201d and that he was censured by the Senate. David Oshinsky, a Pulitzer prize-winning historian at New York University and a McCarthy expert, called Florida\u2019s anti-communism standards disturbing. A self-described \u201canti-communist,\u201d Oshinsky said the standards overstate the impact McCarthy and the House committee had on combatting communism in the U.S.<\/p>\n
They held \u201cone-sided\u201d and \u201ccorrupt\u201d investigations and \u201cfailed miserably as anti-communist organizations.\u201d More than anything, they hurt responsible anti-communism efforts, said Oshinsky, author of \u201cA Conspiracy So Immense: The World of Joe McCarthy.\u201d He said the House committee and McCarthy were a \u201cjoke\u201d and \u201cthe bottom of the barrel\u201d in terms of honest investigations. But the standards suggest a different conclusion: that critics of McCarthy and the House committee overreached and undermined the fight against communism.<\/p>\n
Students will be required to learn that \u201cMcCarthyism\u201d was unfairly used as \u201can insult and shorthand for all anti-communism\u201d and that anti-communists were slandered through the use of terms like red-baiter and Red Scare. That worries Oshinsky. \u201cIf McCarthyism isn\u2019t a pejorative, what exactly is it? What are we talking about here? Are we going to have people in the classroom saying that he was right?\u201d he said. From 1961 to 1991, Florida law required 30 hours of instruction on the evils of communism and ways to fight it. The curriculum was later repealed by the Legislature, but it could now make a comeback in Florida classrooms.<\/p>\n
DeSantis signed the bill in Hialeah Gardens at a museum honoring veterans from the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba. \u201cWe will not allow our students to live in ignorance, nor be indoctrinated by Communist apologists in schools,\u201d he said in a statement released later. \u201cTo the contrary, we will ensure students in Florida are taught the truth about the evils and dangers of Communism.\u201d The education department did not respond to a request for comment about the standards or to questions about who helped write them.<\/p>\n
The proposed standards have sparked controversy among experts and lawmakers, with some arguing that they amount to propaganda and others seeing them as a necessary measure to educate students about the dangers of communism. As the State Board of Education prepares to vote on the standards, it remains to be seen how they will be received by the public and implemented in Florida classrooms.<\/p>\n
Q: What are the proposed standards for teaching communism in Florida schools?
\nA: The proposed standards cover 30 pages and more than 100 standards, including the death toll from communist regimes and the dangers of pro-communist propaganda.
\nQ: Who is Sen. Joseph McCarthy and why is he mentioned in the standards?
\nA: Sen. Joseph McCarthy was a senator from 1947 to 1957 who pushed the \u201cRed Scare\u201d communist panic in the 1950s. He is mentioned in the standards as an example of an anti-communist politician.
\nQ: What is the criticism of the standards?
\nA: Some experts argue that the standards overstate the impact of McCarthy and the House committee on combatting communism in the U.S. and that they amount to propaganda.
\nQ: How will the standards be implemented in Florida classrooms?
\nA: The standards will be implemented in middle-and-high-school social studies classes, and students will be required to learn about the dangers of communism and how to withstand indoctrination on communism at colleges and universities.
\nQ: What is the response from the DeSantis administration?
\nA: The DeSantis administration has stated that the standards are necessary to educate students about the evils and dangers of communism and to prevent indoctrination by communist apologists in schools.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Introduction to Florida’s Anti-Communism Curriculum Florida could soon be teaching students about the \u201cdangers and evils of communism\u201d under proposed new academic standards that some argue amount to \u201cpropaganda\u201d and wrongly aim to rehabilitate the reputation of Sen. Joseph McCarthy, who pushed the \u201cRed Scare\u201d communist panic in the 1950s. Background of the Legislation The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":21760,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-21758","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.sun-sentinel.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/SI5WAQXBDBLP4S4IUMZOL7JJ7Q.jpg?w=1400px&strip=all&w=1400&resize=1400,933&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21758"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21758"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21758\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21761,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21758\/revisions\/21761"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}