RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://spectatorworld.com/topic/saving-childrens-books-wokeness/

There is something deeply sinister happening in the world of children’s literature. Whereas the children’s section at your local library or bookstore was once filled with fables and fairy tales, it’s now filled with titles like The Hips on the Drag Queen Go Swish, Swish, Swish and Race Cars: A Children’s Book About White Privilege and How Mommas Love Their Babies featuring wholesome lines like “Some mommas dance all night long in special shoes. It’s hard work!” The illustrations accompanying that page are an outdoor shot of a strip club at night, with glowing neon lights and a woman protesting for fair wages for strippers.

This is a recent tweet from the author:

Other children’s book writers, those who want to write what was once considered appropriate for kids, are stymied. One aspiring writer told me, “I’ve been in the query process the last two months and I cannot believe how many agents are requesting LGBTQ children’s books.”

Another aspiring author echoed her remarks, shedding light on the inner workings of the process, “The agents and publishers ARE the gatekeepers, making sure the books that are being published are aligned with the current agenda. If you aren’t familiar with it, check out this site. It is a summary of the twitter posts by agents and editors about their manuscript wishlists. Some are so transparent, they will state they only want LGBTQ+ stories, or demand a book set in WWI, ‘but make it queer.’ Some agents have stated they will only accept books on climate change until they have a cohort of writers defending the environment. It is deflating and concerning and frustrating, both as a teacher and as a YA historical fiction writer. The YA historicals that are being published often pervert the history to force a queer romance.”

https://spectatorworld.com/topic/university-austin-spark-new-enlightenment/

The University of Austin, America’s newest university, was launched this month. I am one of five founders, because I am convinced that higher education is at considerable risk. A new ideology — sometimes called social justice, and revealed in numerous ways, but most succinctly called “woke” — is taking a huge toll on the free exchange of ideas.

Safe spaces and trigger warnings are demanded by students, and many faculty as well, rather than recognizing that challenge, risk, and discomfort create strength of will, and wisdom. Instead of being the adults in the room, scared and hapless administrators capitulate to their demands.

We are told that borrowing from other cultures is inherently predatory — “cultural appropriation” — rather than being one of the most ancient ways that humans have expanded our repertoire, making connections between both people and ideas. We are asked to believe anew in original sin, this one based on skin color. Faculty and students who step outside of the new orthodoxy risk being ridiculed, shouted at, even chased off campus. Tenure means nothing when a mob is at the door. The very concepts of objective reality and merit are taken to be offensive at best, outdated and untrue at worst.

These are instantiations of a self-limiting ideology that mocks the very premises of America’s founding documents, and of the mottos of many established universities as well. Harvard proclaims veritas; Yale adds lux to the mix. But there is little truth in the woke ideology, and little light.

These manifestations of the new ideology are a caricature of deep thought, from the naivete of the beliefs to the insistence that they not be questioned. But there are forces older and yet more influential in play, which for decades have bent research and curriculum to their will.

https://amgreatness.com/2021/11/19/racial-essentialism-has-no-place-in-education/

In the public schools of Evanston, Illinois, they came for the 14-year-old son of parents of Congolese and African-Amercian descent. He had foolishly harbored a desire to one day become a lawyer. They told him, sorry, not gonna happen. Systemic racism, see? You’re less able. Injured. Please harbor no such dreams. Whitey still has his boot on your back.

His mother Ndona Muboyayi told her story to a writer from The Atlantic. She went to teachers to ask, is this true? The answer in so many words was, yes. And that won’t be changing. She was appalled.

Forbidden thoughts are actionable. In post-election high dudgeon, New York Times columnist Gail Collins described blowback to racial essentialism in Virginia schools this way: “. . . given Republicans’ crazed howling about teaching the history of racism in America, voters were being misled in the way they were being urged to think there was something wrong with the schools.” 

Similarly, an old and dear friend, long a progressive, wrote to me of recent schools-based revolt: “a handful of hysterical parents, whipped up by political campaigns, cannot and must not be allowed to dictate policy. 

But as Muboyayi told The Atlantic’s Conor Friedersdorf, “Of course I want my children to know about slavery and Jim Crow. But I want it to be balanced out with the rest of the truth. They’re not taught about Black people who accomplished things in spite of white supremacy; or about the Black people today who got ahead, built things, achieved things; and those who had opportunities that their ancestors fought for.”

Chicago public schools, too, are in the front lines of the racial pity parade that progressives need in order to feel whole. CPS declares that in 2020 one of “multiple traumatic crises” affecting families, one for which it must correct on a daily and deep basis, is “lasting legacies of systemic racism.” 

Chicago public schools believe a big problem for underachievers is the pigmentation of students who, on the whole, do better. Which includes whites. And so the CPS website features a video called “Whiteness” from noted consultant Glenn E. Singleton. It’s a word salad of racialized NuSpeak.

“Whiteness” includes gems such as this one:

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/columbia-journalism-school-to-hire-a-director-of-diversity-equity-and-inclusion/

Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism is hiring a Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) to incorporate anti-racism initiatives into the school’s curricula.

The responsibilities of the role include: “a review of the school’s policies and expectations on DEI, possible sessions on running an inclusive classroom, defusing volatile classroom situations, presenting sensitive material, avoiding triggering language, discussions of DEI in the news, anti-racism lectures and workshops, a review of best practices on DEI in the profession and required readings.”

At the end of the year, the director will be required to conduct a survey of graduating students, full-time faculty, adjuncts, and staff to assess the impact of the DEI initiatives on the campus.

The director is also expected to “implement a self-study of Deans and department heads and their actions and observations related to DEI.” The director will also be tasked with creating a “code of ethics on DEI” for the Journalism School, that all faculty, staff, and students must comply with.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/11/editorializing-hamas-richard-l-cravatts/

When Elmer Davis, director of FDR’s Office of War Information, observed that   “. . . you cannot do much with people who are convinced that they are the sole authorized custodians of Truth and that whoever differs from them is ipso facto wrong” he may well have been speaking about those well-meaning, but misguided college students who rail against a world in which their dreams of social justice for the oppressed and weak are not being realized, despite their best efforts.

That same tendentious behavior now seems to be exploited by editors of college newspapers who have purposely violated the central purpose of journalism and have allowed one ideology, not facts and alternate opinions, to hijack the editorial composition of their publications and purge their respective newspapers of any content—news or opinion—that contradicts a pro-Palestinian narrative and would provide a defense of Israel.

The latest example of this social justice advocacy parading as journalism was in full display in a November 9th editorial, “In support of Students for Justice in Palestine,” written by the Editorial Board of The Daily Campus, the University of Connecticut’s student newspaper.

“The UConn Students for Justice in Palestine held a rally last week to bring attention to injustices in Palestine,” the editorial read, and “[s]peakers discussed the oppression and violence experienced by the Palestinian people, the connection of our university to such injustices and the role of community members in supporting Palestine’s fight for freedom.”

Troubling to the editors, apparently, was the fact that UConn Hillel “also held a demonstration nearby in direct opposition to the ideas behind UConn SJP;” in other words, Hillel attempted to provide a balance to debate by presenting its own views and facts relevant to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

https://abigailshrier.substack.com/p/how-activist-teachers-recruit-kids

Incensed parents now make news almost daily, objecting to radical material taught in their children’s public schools. But little insight has been provided into the mindset and tactics of activist teachers themselves. That may now be changing, thanks to leaked audio from a meeting of California’s largest teacher’s union.

Last month, the California Teachers Association (CTA) held a conference advising teachers on best practices for subverting parents, conservative communities and school principals on issues of gender identity and sexual orientation. Speakers went so far as to tout their surveillance of students’ Google searches, internet activity, and hallway conversations in order to target sixth graders for personal invitations to LGBTQ clubs, while actively concealing these clubs’ membership rolls from participants’ parents.

Documents and audio files recently sent to me, and authenticated by three conference participants, permitted a rare insight into the CTA’s sold-out event in Palm Springs, held from October 29-31, 2021. The “2021 LGBTQ+ Issues Conference, Beyond the Binary: Identity & Imagining Possibilities,” provided best practices workshops that encouraged teachers to “have the courage to create a safe environment that fosters bravery to explore sexual orientation, gender identity and expression,” according to the precis of a talk given by fifth grade teacher, C. Scott Miller

“How We Run a ‘GSA’ in Conservative Communities”

 Several of the workshops advised teachers on the creation of middle school LGBTQ clubs (commonly known as “Gay-Straight Alliance” clubs or “GSA”).  One workshop—“Queering in the Middle”—focused “on what practices have worked for successful middle school GSAs and children at this age developmentally.”

But what makes for a successful LGBTQ middle school club? What to do about meddlesome parents who don’t want their middle schoolers participating in such a club? What if parents ask a club leader—point blank—if their child is a member?

“Because we are not official—we have no club rosters, we keep no records,” Buena Vista Middle School teacher and LGBTQ-club leader, Lori Caldeira, states on an audio clip sent to me by a conference attendee. “In fact, sometimes we don’t really want to keep records because if parents get upset that their kids are coming? We’re like, ‘Yeah, I don’t know. Maybe they came?’ You know, we would never want a kid to get in trouble for attending if their parents are upset.”

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/kindergarten-students-in-connecticut-learn-about-being-transgender-in-line-with-social-justice-standards/

Elementary school students in West Hartford, Conn. public schools are being forced to undergo “social emotional learning through an equity lens” as district officials have reportedly told parents they may not opt-out of the curriculum, which aims to teach students a set of “social justice standards.”

Parents from the district contacted the non-profit Parents Defending Education to share concerns over materials being used to teach elementary students about group identities, including transgender content being taught to kindergarten students. 

One parent raised a red flag about When Aidan Became a Brother, a book being taught to fourth grade students that the parent described as “full on gender theory” which is teaching students that the sex you’re assigned at birth is “wrong.”

“When Aidan was born, everyone thought he was a girl. His parents gave him a pretty name, his room looked like a girl’s room, and he wore clothes that other girls liked wearing,” the description of the book reads. “After he realized he was a trans boy, Aidan and his parents fixed the parts of his life that didn’t fit anymore, and he settled happily into his new life.”

When Aidan’s parents announce they’re having a second child, Aidan “wants to do everything he can to make things right for his new sibling from the beginning” including choosing the best name and picking out the right decor and clothes. The book asks what “making things right” actually means. 

Another fourth-grade mentor text is a book about pronouns called They She HE Me; Free to Be! 

The lessons are supposed to teach students in kindergarten through fifth grade about social justice standards including identity, diversity, justice and action.

The “identity” standard includes texts that teach students about transgender people and the use of preferred pronouns, including the inclusive singular “they.”

A mentor text for kindergarten students is Introducing Teddy which tells the story about a character and his teddy, Thomas. Thomas says, “I’ve always known that I’m a girl teddy, not a boy teddy. I wish my name was Tilly, not Thomas.” Another text for the kindergarten age group is Let’s Talk About Race.

Meanwhile, a first grade texts include Jacob’s New Dress, a story about a boy who wants to wear a dress to school and Are You a Boy or Are You a Girl?, a book about a character who “prefers not to tell other children whether they are a boy or a girl.” 

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/11/racist-crt-lessons-poison-public-school-classrooms-joseph-klein/

PEN America claims it is committed “to protect free expression in the United States and worldwide.” But PEN has taken a radical left turn in defending the teaching of critical race theory concepts even to elementary and secondary school students. PEN believes that bills introduced in at least 24 state legislatures against such racially divisive teaching are akin to censorship in violation of the teachers’ First Amendment rights. 

“These bills appear designed to chill academic and educational discussions and impose government dictates on teaching and learning. In short: They are educational gag orders,” PEN stated in its introduction to a report entitled “Educational Gag Orders: Legislative Restrictions on the Freedom to Read, Learn, and Teach.”

Far from legitimately defending free expression under the First Amendment, PEN is defending racially charged indoctrination of impressionable public school students as young as four or five years old. It is the students whose constitutional rights are being violated when they are pressured in class to internalize dogma that pits race against race and to even recite such racially charged rhetoric in front of other students.

K-12 teachers are perfectly free to advocate for critical race theory on social media and in whatever discussions they may have with other adults outside of the classroom. But the courts have not accorded educators the same freedom to force feed lesson plans based on critical race theory precepts upon elementary and secondary public school pupils.

These pupils are a captive audience. As one federal Court of Appeals decision put it, “Children who attend school because they must ought not be subject to teachers’ idiosyncratic perspectives.” The educators are not entitled under the Constitution “to present personal views to captive audiences against the instructions of elected officials.”

Under America’s federalist system, state elected officials have the authority to regulate public school education within their jurisdictions, including setting reasonable limits on public school curricula. State legislators can certainly use this authority to pass laws shielding children from being indoctrinated in public school classrooms, where they are captive audiences, with racial group identity ideology. Applicable statewide laws preempt left wing local school board decisions that are in direct conflict with those laws.