Censorship » Conservative Christian Groups
One conservative Christian group in Texas that has been tremendously influential in textbook censorship is Educational Research Analysts. Concerned Christian parents Mel and Norma Gabler founded it over 40 years ago.1
Diane Ravitch, well-known educator and author of The Language Police, a renowned exposé of textbook censorship, describes the extent of the Gablers’ influence: “Since the 1960s, any publisher that expected to win adoption of their textbooks in Texas had to anticipate that the Gablers would review the contents and values in their books and teachers’ guides on a line-by-line basis. Knowing this, publishers engaged in self-censorship to head off possible confrontations with such conservative critics.”2
Although Mel Gabler died in 2004 and Norma Gabler has retired, their organization, under the direction of their protégé Neal Frey, still wields enormous influence. For example, “In 2004, both publishers and the Texas board of education agreed to a proposal, at Frey’s urging, that clearly defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman in health textbooks.”3
Even their critics acknowledge the influence of the Gablers’ organization. The National Center for Science Education, an organization that defends teaching evolution in public schools, condemns the Gablers “as the most effective textbooks censors in the country. This couple has been promoting their narrow fundamentalist views for over twenty years by criticizing and influencing the removal of textbooks that contain material opposed to their views.”4
The Gablers’ method for exerting conservative influence was to use their state’s public textbook adoption hearings to vocalize their objections to the textbooks being considered for use in Texas. These hearings offer private citizens the opportunity to raise objections about textbooks, to which the publishers must publicly respond. Trying to avoid controversy in order to sell books, the publishers would often comply with the Gablers’ demands. Ironically, the Gablers’ organization no longer testifies at these adoption hearings because, according to their website, “Lowering our voice and working under opponents’ radar gets better results.”5
Learn about the liberal and special interest groups involved in textbook censorship.
1 See their website at www.textbookreviews.org.
2 Diane Ravitch, The Language Police (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003), p. 105.
3 Sean Cavanagh, “Chapter & Verse,” Teacher Magazine (January/February 2006), p. 29.
4 Steven Schafersman, “Censorship of Evolution in Texas,” National Center for Science Education Resource, Vol. III, No. 4 (Fall 1982), p. 30.
5 See http://www.textbookreviews.org/QandA.htm.