Given the recent controversy over an NEA resolution to support same-sex marriage and continued efforts to promote acceptance of homosexuality, bi-sexualulity and transgenderism as school policy, it is important for parents, grandparents and taxpayers within the community to become more involved in their public school system.
Reading, Writing and Twisted Ideas
The public schools were created for all children, those who come from broken families and those who come from traditional families. The schools were made for children of all different religious backgrounds, including those who have no religious upbringing. But today you would start to wonder. Gay, lesbian or “transgendered” (the newest odd category) individuals have come into our public schools and have stolen the academic and religious freedom of our children. Rather than allow families to retain their religious liberty and to uphold their own particular moral beliefs, these activists intend force their sexual preferences on other people’s children.
Their effort to overpower the right of parents often starts by influencing political representatives, either statewide or on the local level. They may give donations to campaigns, winning the favor of elected officials (or those running for election), and then they try to attach their agenda to efforts for legitimate civil rights. By comparing their sexual lifestyle to race, and equating rejection of their sexual deviancy to racism — the new mantra being “racism, sexism, homophobia” — they gain sympathy which is quite misdirected and based on falsehood. Homosexuality, bisexuality and transgenderism are complex psychological conditions that may or may not be acted upon. Race is something inborn and inescapable: it is not a lifestyle choice. The Church quite rightly teaches that we should not discriminate against the condition of any person — whether it be race or sexual orientation. However, that does not make a chosen lifestyle into a civil right.
Their school-based campaign targets young children, even those in kindergarten. As a harbinger of things to come in America, British teacher groups are saying that even kindergarten is too old to start breaking children of the “homophobic” patterns they assimilated living at home with mom and dad — they need to start with preschoolers. The aim is to assimilate the minds of your children by erasing what religious or moral beliefs have been taught by you, their parents. They start by introducing same-sex-themed books into the library and slowly adding sexual identity activities such as “safe” clubs and “pride” parties. Soon select hallways are marked with pink triangles and ordinary days turned into special “witness” days when students are required to reflect upon homosexual, bisexual and transgender differences. School policies are changed to reflect same-sex equality and finally the curriculum itself is altered to suit the “sexual orientation” mission.
Don’t Think This Won’t Affect Your Kids
Activists do not care about academic empowerment or worry about the fact that many American students cannot pass a reading test. Math skills are not their concern, either. Their only desire is to impress their own ideology upon the young. They know that if they can get to children at an early age, they can override most parental lessons about sexual lifestyles. They know what many parents like to deny: that children are influenced by their teachers and sometimes more so than by their parents.
Parents who claim that they can teach morals at home while another, immoral, lesson is being taught at school completely forget the innocence and neediness of children. Children learn from both parents and teachers throughout their school years. And if their relationships with their own parents are tense, they may lean even more on teachers who may favor the destructive sexual behaviors that activists wish to normalize.
Children learn not just from their parents but from their community. They take in word and example. If they see students cross-dressing at school, they may at first find it amusing or unbelievable, but that visual reinforcement eventually will make it “normal” in their minds. This is what the gay activists want. Even with their parents reminding them that what they see in school does not reflect their family values, how can children balance that pressure and find the strength truly to embrace their own traditions when they are getting pulled both ways? Some children may be stronger than others and resist anything thrown at them, but the majority will not find resistance easy.
Working Within the System
Here are some tips to resist the advance of this insidious agenda in our public schools:
1. Vote. School-board members are elected officials and they they have the power to change curricula for the good or better. If you do not know the moral position of your school-board members, then it is your duty as a parent, grandparent or taxpayer to find out. Call the school-board member who has been sitting in that chair for 8 years. Call the parent or ex-teacher who is now running against the current member and find out who is the best candidate for the job. It can be intimidating at first, especially if you don’t know much about such things, but be polite and direct. Ask the candidates for the school board to spell out their position on the promotion of homosexuality in the public schools. Ask if they think transgenderism is appropriate in school. Are they in favor of hosting “pro-gay” events on school property? Basically, get the truth. Then vote for the better person.
2. Run for the board. Better than voting is to run for the school board yourself. Take your traditional family stance with you and think about what good you are doing for the children. If the board is made up entirely of pro-gay sponsors, know that your participation will be an uphill battle, but try to convince friends to run with you. Don’t do it alone. Seek out voters from conservative churches and make sure they realize why you are running: you want to see morals back in the school. You want abstinence programs for the children and equal treatment given to religious students who have every right to attend public school without being forced to learn things contrary to their religion.
3. Form a group. Do you know other parents who disagree with the local parent-teacher group? Do you know other moms and dads who are fed up with discrimination against Christians during the Christmas season? Find like-minded parents and ask them if they would like to form a parent group that would be involved in helping the school. If you can, make it official through the principal’s support. If the school does not welcome another parent group, do not lose heart, but run your group outside the school. As parents you can still monitor the school and make efforts to alert the community to any immoral events that the school may sponsor. Many schools will invite pro-gay speakers to give a talk or read a book to the students. Situations like that can be prevented if an active parent group were involved and asked the school officials not to host such events. If the school does not listen, then the group can take the matter to the community, notifying residents of what is really going on in their local school and how their tax dollars are being spent.
4. Make your concerns known. After you have researched the school-board members and learned their moral positions, let them know your position and give them a chance to recant. Some officials might “go with the flow” and merely say they are pro-gay when in fact they are not. If the official still holds a liberal position, make it public. Alert other parents and voters so that they can cast an educated vote. Many board members get elected by name alone. People don’t really know their views. Voters hear all the fluffy stuff — “I’ll help the financial needs of the school” or “I will do my best to help with math scores” — but rarely do they ask questions about moral issues. No one asks, “Do you consider literature that contains graphic sexual scenes appropriate for 9th-graders?” or “Do you think that cross-dressing should be allowed in the public schools?”
Parents need to know exactly what is being taught to their children. It is not the place of the public school system to use our money to teach things that go against our faith. Children from traditional families should not have to suffer discrimination when they attend their local school. School should be a healthy, happy environment for children, not a social engineering laboratory for gay activists.
© Copyright 2006 Catholic Exchange
Susan C. Stratton is a freelance writer, wife and mother in Maine. She runs Baby Bunny Memorial (www.babybunny.net) for parents who have lost a baby, and is currently chairperson of the Corinna Chapter of Maine Right to Life and editor of The Maine Journal.
