THE REVOLUTIONARY TEACHERS

The 1924 Congress

It is in Paris that the congress of the extremist Federation of Secular Education will be held on August 5, 6 and 7. We will deal with the teaching of history, rational education (in the revolutionary sense of the word), and also, with regard to the "moral relationship", the merger projects with the National Union. The day before the Federation Congress, the annual meetings of young revolutionary teachers (youth groups) and revolutionary teachers (feminist groups of secular education) will take place. All these meetings will be held in the offices of the C. G. TU.

“The teaching of hatred
What revolutionary teachers call the teaching of hatred is quite simply patriotic education, and they have just published a long factum on this subject in the official bulletin of their Federation. They note sentences borrowed from various school textbooks which they accuse of patriotic force-feeding.” And here, for example, are some of the texts that these teachers absolutely condemn:

“Our homeland is the most humane of homelands. (Lavisse.)
This France, your homeland, you will love it with all your strength. You can be proud of her, because never was she so great and so glorious.” (Lavisse.)
“France will never again wage war, unless its life and honor are threatened as they were in 1914.” (Lavisse.)
Republican France, democratic France is working to shine a little more fraternity on less misery of everything, order. (Gauthier and Deschamps.)
“Serving one’s homeland is the only effective way to serve humanity.” (Mironneau.)

All this seems abominable to the Education Federation. She declares that the “evil is deep” and that “we must try to stop it”. What consoles her, a little, is that “thousands of teachers refuse to glorify war and try to open children’s minds to the notion of humanity.”

But more must be done, and the Federation will transmit to the workers' unions and avant-garde groups the list, by publishing house, of all the books containing "chauvinist" passages (we have just seen what she calls it that way). These groups will intervene with publishers to ask them to remove the incriminating texts, and, if the publishers refuse, their books will be boycotted. The publishing houses will thus be “hit at the sensitive point, the safe” and they will rework the boycotted works.
At the same time, Teaching International is preparing a book of “supranational” history from which revolutionary teachers will draw inspiration in their oral lessons.

JEAN LE MÉE.