February 24, 2008 9:10 AM
Loudoun County Schools: what's the real story behind gay censorship charges?
[Though this is happening in my county, it has made national headlines. When I cover anything labeled Loudoun, it usually has political/educational overtones which affect families all over the country. As I mentioned, I used to cover California schools, lately I’ve been covering Massachusetts. That’s the work I do for pay. My research and work here is pro bono. Parents anywhere will find something to ponder in these posts.]
See also 2/27 follow-up The Tango Tangle Continues
and Propaganda in Children's Literature
I’m a week behind, but let’s catch up fast. The GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender) community is planning an invasion of the Loudoun County School Board meeting Tuesday night to protest Dr. Hatrick’s decision to withdraw the picture book And Tango Makes Three from the shelves of our school libraries and place them behind the librarian's desk to be checked out only by parents and teachers. For the scoop – from a liberal point of view – see the Washington Post: Two Guys and a Chick Set Off Tiff Over School Library Policy.
Fasten your seatbelts, Loudoun. As Betty Davis said in All About Eve, it's going to be a bumpy ride.
First, a little of my background: I lived and campaigned in the GLBT community in the 70s in San Francisco – Castro District, no less. Considered myself bi, went to the Gay Pride parade, enjoyed sticking “A Lesbian Was Here” purple stickers anywhere I could in Marin County. I so completely understand the in-your-face and utterly defensive, warlike spirit maintained by this small minority of the population.
One thing you need to know is that their time and energy is much greater than yours. They are often not encumbered with kids – these are the people like David/Daneen Weintraub. David, who considers himself (I am actually not clear on D/D’s sexuality, but going by how he represents himself) husband of Jonathan, watchdogs everything going on in our public schools, bombards our local paper – and the always-eager-to-skewer-and-misrepresent-the-traditional-rubes-in-Loudoun Washington Post (I mean, why is David Weintraub always the go-to guy for their stories?) – with material telling us how our kids should be educated.
Well, that is, how our kids should be educated in certain subjects. When parents at any Loudoun high school invite a humorous abstinence speaker for an assembly, David – who writes a blog called Equality Loudoun (and which I will not link because I don’t want to increase his traffic nor his Technorati rating) – is on it, spreading the word far and wide around the Beltway. Bloggers in Montgomery County – where for years traditionalists have been locked in a struggle with gay activists over the content of Family Life curriculum (that’s Sex Ed in the days when two syllables were adequate) – pick up the drumbeat and calls go out throughout the DC metropolitan for support from the GLBT community.
(read on by clicking below)
When I moved here from the Bay Area, I picked up immediately on these undercurrents. For three years I’d been covering the hijacking of California public schools by gay activists for Focus on the Family (I can almost hear D/D hissing as he reads this). Things had gotten so bad in Marin County that third graders from a school a couple miles from me were coming home asking their parents “What’s a fag?” and “Am I gay?” because a traveling GLBT theater group was given free access to perform at assemblies with no advance parental notification or consent. In fact, parental notification and consent had been summarily dismissed by school personnel who thought they knew better than parents what kids needed. At our local high school, every classroom had “NO Homophobia here” posted prominently front and center. And the classrooms were invaded periodically and spontaneously by Spectrum (Spectrum “hosts and collaborates with a variety of programs, groups and activities for the LGBT community, including Rainbow's End, a facilitated social and support group for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning youth ages 14-19 that meets weekly for fun, discussion, and support” – source here and note to parents: these groups are facilitated by GLBT adults) activists who were allowed to pass out sex “questionnaires” to students about every sexual deviation you could imagine.
See my 2001 Citizen article Gay School Days for more.
All of this was in the name of “acceptance” and “tolerance.”
Acceptance and tolerance are the buzz words used to defend what truly amounts to a very sophisticated propaganda campaign (more on propaganda this week). Anyone who questions the validity of anything gay activists want to place in public schools is, of course, not accepting or tolerant. They are homophobic.
In today’s culture, for an intelligent and caring person to be labeled homophobic is worse than being labeled homosexual. Think about it: who is most lovingly portrayed in TV, films, and movies today? Why, the wonderful, intelligent, witty and caring homosexual! Who couldn’t love the Fab Five on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy? I know I sure do.
And who is portrayed as Evil Incarnate? Anyone standing up for traditional values.
It’s a rough place to be. Just another reason why the vast majority of parents – who also have lots of stuff keeping them busier than the dozen Usual Suspects who dog the school board with complaints and campaign to get the GLBT school steamroller going in Loudoun – don’t show up.
I think Dr. Hatrick knows we’re here. He followed up a parent's complaint on a propagandistic picture book not by complete removal, but by removing it from general circulation, making it available only to teachers and parents.
The GLBT community has called this censorship and obviously decided it’s a Mountain to Die On. Funny: on the one hand, they say it’s an innocent book based on a true story about penguins. Obviously, from their frenzied focus on championing this book, there’s a lot more to it than that.
Memo to GLBT community: why not be authentic, like the GLBT community in Massachusetts (who've succeeded in mandating that teachers read even more blatantly propagandistic picture books in K-2 – a story I covered for a future issue of Citizen magazine)? Why try to hide your true agenda?
In another funny note: And Tango Makes Three is the "true" story of two inseparable male penguins who were given an egg by a sympathetic zookeeper to raise. The lesson we should learn from this one-in-a-billion story is that gay is okay.
But what of the fact that when presented with a female, one of those penguins left his male companion to bond with her? Why not a sequel to Tango?
What we poor, pathetic traditionalists may not understand is that while Gay is Okay, Ex-Gay is Not Okay. A sham, according to the GLBT community. Which is why they pressure and succeed in censoring anything having to do with counseling for the sexually ambivalent or those yearning to move into a heterosexual lifestyle. Those who succeed are supposedly fakes and phonies.
Did you know that though the National Education Association - that's right, folks - the professional organization of all you principals, teachers, and counselors - sponsors booths at their conventions by GLBT activist groups selling their school propaganda (all in the name of tolerance and diversity, mind you), they WILL NOT allow booths from groups with information on supporting those confused individuals who may have been experimenting and found their own true course to be different?
PFLAG is always welcome. PFOX cannot get a foot in the door.
This is a huge subject and I will be writing a lot more about it. I’m keeping it on MommyLife because I get a lot of traffic here. In fact, I may shut down my other blog and just go ahead and be my complete self here – as I always used to be. I think what I’ll do is use the Woman Sowing icon at the top to denote that this is a political post, and I will cut so you have to jump to read the rest – thus not monopolizing the whole page.
I will also head my posts about Loudoun with the name of our county. Though these are based on local news, most have political overtones which affect families all over the country. As I mentioned, I used to cover California schools, lately I’ve been covering Massachusetts. That’s the work I do for pay. This work I am doing for free.
I am sick of the bullying tactics of GLBT activist organizations and will continue to do my best to expose them and their agenda. For years I have seen pro-family groups and dedicated, loving parents put down as “intolerant,” “haters” because they haven’t fallen in line with the pro-gay propaganda agenda.
Another memo to the GLBT community: There is a difference between loving and accepting individuals for who they are and acquiescing to every demand a political machine makes. I have lived as a radical leftist and now as a more moderate and thoughtful conservative. I have never, ever seen the hatred and gnashing of teeth among conservatives that I do among leftists. I have never seen conservatives vilify and demonize people the way GLBTs do. I know there are at least two stupid and immature anti-Barbara Curtis websites. I have visited each only once and never told anyone about them because I would not want to drive traffic there. But I ask you, who is really listening and weighing and thinking about the best for children – placing principles above personalities - and who are the people who hate?
And btw, isn’t it kinda odd that the people screaming “Censorship!” over a picture book about gay adoption are the ones who try to shut down abstinence presentations, traditional sacred music and anything having to do with Christmas in the public schools?
I’ve seen the Real Censors/Haters dogging Keith Deltano’s abstinence presentations in this county. I saw them last fall at the LEAP meeting, schmoozing with School Board member John Stevens (who is now championing And Tango Makes Three – and of whom I shall have more to say tomorrow). I read their letters to the editor decrying any hint of Christian tradition in the public schools.
I will see them Tuesday night at the School Board meeting, where they have issued one of their Beltway Alerts for the GLBT community to show up - dressed in black and white. Like all parents, I have lots to keep me busy. In fact on Tuesday night, my six still-at-home kids are spread out between three commitments in two counties. How Tripp and I will handle this in a way that gets me to the School Board meeting remains a mystery, but I will do my best.
I do hope some of you reading this will come to the meeting also, or at least keep abreast of what is going on. Drop Dr. Hatrick and School Board members a line to let them know you appreciate Dr. H’s decision. A small minority of GLBTs all riled up can make a lot of noise.
Please let him know you appreciate his understanding the nuances involved in this conflict – and that it’s not as the GLBT community would like to claim, all Black and White.
Posted in Loudoun County, Public schools | Permalink
Comments
Barbara, I wish there was someone like you covering what's going on here in Houston. It's hard to know what battles are being fought when I don't have any kids in the schools, but I still think it's important to know. Even if my kids are at home, they are still affected by what all of their friends are being taught in school.
Keep spreading the word -- a lot of us are listening!
Posted by: Michelle Potter | February 24, 2008 12:45 PM
I fully support your decision to keep all your thoughts in one blog; I forget to visit the other one most of the time, but I love reading about what goes on politically and educationally around your area; it does give me food for thought and helps me keep my eyes open as we begin to thread the waters of the educational system here, in our neck of the woods.
I know some readers do not agree at all with your political views, but you can't please everyone every time (as we saw with the posts about your journey from evangelical to catholic) so, I suggest you take ownership of what you want to share here, according to where God is leading you, and let the readers decide if they want to read it or not. I don't think you should let some people decide what posts are welcome or not.
After all, your slogan does say "Montessori megamom serves up smorgasbord of parenting, cultural, political, and spiritual wisdom. Because she can".
So fire away, dear one!
The audience is listening.
Posted by: LadyLovas | February 24, 2008 3:54 PM
