Did Florida's philistines win one over David this time?
In Florida, a classically minded principal at a charter school was reportedly fired over a renaissance art history lesson featuring Michelangelo's famous sculpture of the Biblical figure of David.
Outrage from the left followed. The marble statue, of course, is rendered as a classical nude, and reportedly, two kids' parents complained, one of them calling it "pornography."
According to NPR:
Every year, sixth-grade students at Tallahassee Classical School have been taught and shown a picture of Michelangelo's "David" statue, but this month, things went awry — sparking an apology letter to parents, an emergency school board meeting and a principal's resignation.
...
The squabble had been brewing for weeks in the K-12 charter school in Leon County, Fla., after students in a sixth-grade art history class were taught about the Renaissance. Alongside the Michelangelo sculpture, the lesson included images of the paintings "The Creation of Adam" and "Birth of Venus."
At the heart of the anger was that, unlike in years past, parents were not informed of the artwork ahead of time. Hope Carrasquilla, who had been principal at Tallahassee Classical for about nine months, said an email notifying parents had been written, but the administration accidently forgot to send it.
"I made the assumption that the letter went out, and I didn't follow up on it," she told NPR. "It is my responsibility to make sure these things happen, but honestly we did not have to send out a letter regarding Renaissance art."
Boom! Principal booted, and the left pounced.
For them, it was not the least bit surprising to hear that story from that state they call Floriduh. Seems the philistines got one on David this time.
In the minds of the left, what can one expect of those uncouth, Trump-voting, DeSantis-voting, Bible-thumping, art barbarians in Floriduh, home of the banned books?
Without getting the facts, the left had a field day, starting with attacks on Florida's governor and his many voters for this as yet unclear story:
Now, in Desantis’s ‘Free State of Florida,’ you get fired as a Principal if one of your art teachers shows the class a picture of Michelangelo’s David. https://t.co/SxyIt1vGm5
— Ron Filipkowski ЁЯЗ║ЁЯЗж (@RonFilipkowski) March 23, 2023
.
— Marko Silberhand (@MarkoSilberhand) March 23, 2023
OMG,
who would have thought it could get any worse ?
But Desantis's Florida is going to be worse than Trump's America . . .
Unbelievable !
ЁЯТа ЁЯШа ЁЯТа pic.twitter.com/s27dHcXoiw
Shout out to @RonDeSantisFL @FLGOPMajority Y’all need to do some traveling.
— lisa S MarieтШоя╕П (@frequentbuyer1) March 23, 2023
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts.”
Mark Twain pic.twitter.com/QREDVfAlz4
Ron DeSantis: All of the Bibles in Florida will be revised immediately to reflect the fact that Adam and Eve were fully clothed in the Garden of Eden at all times.
— urban myths, legends (@urbanmyths) March 23, 2023
OH FFS! Is this for real? Nothing but a bunch of uneducated backwards cousin-f**kers here in FloriDuh.
— #FascistDeSantis (@SuzeSoFlo) March 23, 2023
Some bozos tied it to Florida's law on not teaching sexuality to children under the age of 8, which we knew would happen:
Ok. If it keeps them from reading books that describe and have pics of how to have sex…this is fine.
— Jeni from the farm (@jenifromthefarm) March 23, 2023
Some used it to attack charter schools:
I feel bad for the principal but it’s a charter school. You reap why you sow, charter school supporters. Ironic that this sculpture is the trigger in a “classical” school.
— ЁЯЗ║ЁЯЗ╕SansComicSansЁЯЗ║ЁЯЗ╕ (@Sans_comic_sans) March 24, 2023
The Italians, reading this story from abroad, were justifiably and perhaps innocently upset, given that they love their cultural heritage and appreciate their nation's many masterpieces, and have no problems showing children statues like Michelangelo's David. Statues like these, with masterly renderings of the human form in all its beauty, have been a way of life for Italians since the days of the Romans. Inconveniently for the left, they just elected a conservative leader. But they offered this generous-hearted response.
According to the Associated Press:
ROME — The Florence museum housing Michelangelo’s Renaissance masterpiece the “David” invited parents and students from a Florida charter school to visit after complaints about a lesson featuring the statue forced the principal to resign.
Florence Mayor Dario Nardella also tweeted an invitation for the principal to visit so he can personally honor her. Confusing art with pornography was “ridiculous,” Nardella said.
The incredulous Italian response highlights how the U.S. culture wars are often perceived in Europe, where despite a rise in right-wing sentiment and governance, the Renaissance and its masterpieces, even its naked ones, are generally free of controversy.
Only the lefty doofuses at the Vatican cover up those statues, the better to please Iran's mullahs when the mullahs come calling. That actually happened once, and the Italians were not impressed. Maybe that's why they elected a rightwinger.
In any case, the Italians can be excused for only responding to what they read in the news. The leftists? Not so much.
Fact is, lots is not known about this story of why the principal was asked to resign over the David statue lesson. The school said it was a matter of notifying parents about the statue, and rightly, the principal said they weren't, but she added they shouldn't need to be on that. Can't disagree with that, given that it was a charter school focused on the classics of Western Civilization, by some reports affiliated with Hillsdale College. A school like that would be unlikely to attract uncultured troglodytes outraged about naked statues. Were the kids too young to be shown this without endless giggling and pointing? Probably not, they were sixth graders. Could the lesson have been mishandled with kids sliding into porn talk or something of that nature? That could be possible. Were there other issues with why the principal was asked to leave and why she said she didn't want to come back? Easily -- the school said so itself, without elaborating.
Bottom line there is that the story doesn't entirely make sense but serves as a vehicle for leftists to place all their anti-DeSantis sentiment, hate for chartered schools, and loathing of Florida's anti-grooming law on display and whip up sentiment against those things.
We guarantee you that wokester public schools do not teach about the treasures of Western heritage such as the statue of David's Michelangelo; they like to break those things actually.
But instead of getting the facts on the puzzling case, the left has launched in, attempting to hang the local controversy around the neck of Florida's governor, who had nothing to do with any of this and which may be about something entirely different from how the report was framed.
Odds are that the facts will come out, from either the parents or the school or by some other means, and it won't be like these leftists claimed it was, and they will look stupid.
But for now, they're out there being jackasses, trying to take DeSantis, charter schools, and conservative voters down with this controversy.
Image: Picryl // public domain