Trump To Put Trigger Warnings On The Smithsonian To Protect MAGA Snowflakes
Can't have the rubes learning things about stuff.
It has been three weeks since the Trump administration dropped a 162-page compilation of whining and white grievance examining the Smithsonian’s inability to present American history in a way that conforms to the Disney cartoon that apparently runs through Donald Trump’s noggin when he imagines any of America’s past. A cartoon that probably looks a lot like Song of the South, only it is set in an enclave called the Trump Plantation, where the main house is a gaudy, gilded 40-story building, Uncle Remus’s stories all end with him saying how much he loves Trump, and all the female sharecroppers wear thongs and have giant honkers.
The report had come a year after Trump initiated an effort to pressure the museum to get rid of anything that smacked of “anti-American ideology” or didn’t celebrate America being the bestest, most awesomest country in the history of forever. But on Friday he announced he’d figured out a measure he can take to save America’s children from exposure to all the Smithsonian’s communist subversion: Trigger warnings!
More specifically, the president released an executive order directing the Secretary of the Interior to put up signs along the walkways outside the museum that explain why visitors are wasting their time visiting it.
But first, the bullshit:
The Report demonstrates that the Smithsonian leadership does not present American history as a shared national inheritance to be taught and celebrated, but instead views American history as a “prime tool” to advance ideas of social justice and the radical transformation of our society.
The order goes on to say that Smithsonian leadership can’t be trusted to “tell America’s story with honesty and gratitude.”
Then Trump directs his lackeys to put up signage that informs visitors of the report’s findings and
shall notify visitors that the Museum exhibits should be renovated consistent with the findings in the Report and direct visitors to locations and resources for accurate information regarding America’s history.
Imagine going to the Museum of American History and seeing signs from the government telling you to go somewhere else to learn about America’s real history. Presumably after that John Candy wanders out from behind a sign to tell you, Sorry, folks, museum’s closed. Moose out front shoulda told you.
The president is also upset that in the year of America’s 250th birthday, the Smithsonian isn’t revering the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence enough, so there need to be signs informing people that the Museum is presenting inaccurate information. It’s not clear if they mean inaccurate information about the signers or if whoever wrote the order is trying to guilt-trip the museum: The Founding Fathers are very, very disappointed in you.
Ha ha, we’re kidding, we know. It’s about telling anyone the Founders owned slaves. Can’t have people thinking they might have been real people with all sorts of moral faults and not perfect beams of light.
This is the second time in a week there has been news about the Trump administration’s efforts to make sure American history only makes us feel all sugary and gooey inside. Last week, in the dead of night in Philadelphia, the National Park Service swapped out some informative panels at the site of George Washington’s home there.
The old panels had talked about the horrors of slavery as seen through the eyes of nine of Washington’s slave who had worked in the house. The new panels de-emphasize slavery and seeks to excuse George Washington by mentioning that he was “privately” uncomfortable with slavery, but also, what are you gonna do? Maintaining his fortune depended on using all that free labor. We wouldn’t want the guy to have been poor, would we?
[NYT / White House]
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Ok. Let's put fancy looking signs outside the White House warning that an authoritarian liar and sex offender lives there.
"Now class, here we see the famous painting of George Washington crossing the Delaware. Can anyone tell me, was George Washington an Admiral, or a General? Yes, Suzie?"
"He must have been a General, because an Admiral would know not to stand up in a fucking rowboat."