Collateral damage in war on parents
IT’S war. And our kids are cannon fodder. Amid a national struggle waged by parents for control over their kids’ hearts and minds, the New Jersey chapter of the country’s largest teachers union posted an ad to YouTube that paints conservative parents as radical “extremists” and bookbanners bent on contaminating their own children with racism, sexism and homo- and transphobia.
“When extremists start attacking our schools, that’s not who we are,” the video’s narrator intones, while the screen flips back and forth between colorful, cheery photos of teachers with students and sinister-looking black-and-white images of evil parents.
“People who only want to fight to score political points should take that somewhere else.”
A leftist sham
But this brazen effort by a leftist organization to bash concerned adults while seizing influence over kids is a sham based on falsehoods. It’s the same way recent headlines have stated — wrongly — that Texas schools were banning both Anne Frank’s diary — and the Bible because of conservatives.
In fact, some parents, likely liberals, have complained about sex, slavery, bestiality, torture and other elements of the Christian Bible.
Others have taken issue not with the beloved diary written by Holocaust victim Anne Frank, but by a more recent “graphic adaptation” of the tome, which highlights her post-pubescent fascination with homosexuality.
These books were among those that were required by a policy enacted by a Dallas-area school district to be reviewed mainly for their age-appropriateness before being returned to school-library shelves and classrooms.
The teachers’ ad states that “Don’t Say Gay” legislation — a recent Florida measure deliberately misnamed by foes — has been proposed in Jersey.
In reality, that law is aimed at preventing only the youngest children from being indoctrinated into concepts of gender identity and sexual orientation that they may not yet be ready to consider.
When did schools morph from centers of learning into places in which mature ideas of sex and politics are shoved down students’ throats?
It is the clear intent of the New Jersey chapter of the National Education Association to wrest control over schoolchildren from their parents in service of a woke agenda. This doesn’t sit well with the Building Education for Students Together organization, whose executive director, Laura Zorc, told the Daily Caller that the teachers union is “defaming parents as ‘extremists’ for standing up for their children.”
She added, “New Jersey’s parents deserve better than this NJEA slander. Standing up for your children is not a political point, it is a parent’s responsibility.”
Yet in today’s climate, parents have an uphill struggle addressing what’s being taught within classroom walls.
In a mid-July speech, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, the nation’s second-biggest educators union, blasted conservative politicians for their efforts on behalf of parents to win control over education.
“While extremist politicians are trying to drive a wedge between parents and teachers by banning books, censoring curriculum and politicizing public education, we’re focused on investing in public schools and the essential knowledge and skills students need,” Weingarten said.
Why let reality interfere with a good conservative-maiming?
Some victories
The most depressing part of this cultural conflagration is that children are getting caught in the middle of this battle for and against grown-up concepts, and there’s no end in sight.
Yet parents are scoring some victories.
In addition to Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who in March signed the Parental Rights in Education Law, Virginia’s GOP Gov. Glenn Youngkin campaigned successfully on a platform slamming the teaching of “critical race theory.” In April, he signed into law a measure allowing school parents throughout the state to review and opt out their children from any educational material containing “sexually explicit content.”
Around the country, many progressive school-board members who’ve promoted curricula heavy on race theory and sexuality have been getting voted out of office in local elections. To this, I say — good! Children should not be sexualized and politicized before they are ready in an insane adult plot to mold their minds.
Let them grow up.