december 27th 2002 - daily mail

21 year old Rap artiste Niomi McLean-Daley, who performs under the pseudonym of Ms Dynamite, attacked the teaching of history in English schools. She complained about being taught about the Holocaust for nine weeks while the history of ancient Egypt and black scientists was ignored. She explained: “We learned about black history for about a week. In that week, we learned that black people were slaves.”

Talking to the BBC’s Newsnight she also claimed: “I feel that Britain is still an extremely racist country.” The singer also deplored the fact that the cabinet is mainly made up of middleclass white men.

Editor's comment: As my Granddad would have said, does she want bloody jam on it? The Guardianista majority in the teaching profession has used the teaching of history to spread the anti-patriotic worldview among pupils as much as it can and they have clearly succeeded with Miss McLean-Daley. To expect them to teach kids the 2,700+ years of Egyptian history from the first to the thirty first dynasties as well is a bit much.

I remember well the barely disguised glee with which our trendy lefty history teacher held forth about the evils of the English slave traders to our largely Asian and Afro-Caribbean class. Only after leaving school did I learn that my country had been the first to ban this trade and the only one to fight vigorously to stamp it out, still later, I learned that the vast majority of the slaves were not “stolen” but sold by other Black Africans or by Muslim traders. This knowledge came too late for my classmates who had had the message that the “English are racists” well drilled into their heads.

The teaching of history in England’s schools could, and should, focus on giving all the children a sense of shared nationhood, whatever their racial or religious background. It should concentrate on giving them an idea of England’s place in history and their place in England.