How did they vote?

This morning, the Illinois Senate voted 37 to 18 to pass HB 5707, a completely unnecessary proposal sponsored by State Representative Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago) and State Senator Heather Steans (D-Chicago). 

This legislation constitutes nothing more than a reiteration of the Bullying Prevention Task Force recommendations that are available to all schools on the ISBE website.  Moreover, the fact that the bill’s sponsors and the ACLU have refused to ensure the rights of students and school employees to opt-out of “programming” and “training” that promote ideas that conflict with their personal and/or religious beliefs reveals the real goal, which is to use public education to promote unproven, non-factual beliefs about the nature and morality of homosexuality and “transgenderism.”  

Click HERE to see how your state senator voted on this legislation, or look at the graphic below.  Unfortunately, Republican Karen McConnaughay (South Elgin) voted for this subversive bill.

The bill will soon go to Governor Patrick Quinn, who is expected to sign it into law.

UGLY-HEAD-REARING ALERT

Two years ago, yet another “anti-bullying” law (HB 5290) was defeated in the Illinois Senate. It has now been resurrected by one of Springfield’s most troubling homosexual activist lawmakers, State Representative Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago) as HB 5707.

Particular Illinois lawmakers seem to believe that it’s not possible for the government to do enough to eradicate beliefs with which they disagree—including the moral, philosophical, and political beliefs of other people’s children. The beliefs these lawmakers seek to eradicate are conservative beliefs on issues related to homosexuality and gender confusion.

Cassidy’s resurrected bill is not centrally about ending bullying, which is a goal all decent people share. Illinois already has a more than ample anti-bullying law, which passed in June, 2010 and was followed up with over 100 pages of implementation recommendations that appear on the Illinois State Board of Education website.

No, this bill is centrally about using government resources to advance the non-factual Leftist assumption that conservative morals beliefs are the hateful, ignorant cause of bullying.

Take ACTION:  Click HERE to contact your representative and urge him/her to oppose HB 5707.  

The last time this politically motivated bill came around, the bill’s sponsors were asked (by even some potential Democratic supporters) to include an opt-out provision that would allow students and staff members to opt-out of any presentations that would espouse non-factual beliefs about the nature and morality of homosexuality that violated their consciences. IFI agreed to remain neutral on the bill, if this wording were added:

No student or school employee shall be required to attend or participate in any anti-bullying program, activity, or assembly that infringes upon free expression or contradicts personal or religious beliefs.

Liberal sponsors of the bill refused to toss even that shard of a bone to conservatives.

Here’s an excerpt from a piece I wrote two years ago when the previous incarnation of this bill was proposed:

Cassidy stated that this additional law is needed because 3 school districts (out of over 900) have no policy and 20 do not have “adequate” bullying policy. What she failed to make clear during floor debates is that the 3 school districts that don’t have bullying policy are already in violation of existing law, so HB 5290 is unnecessary.

Furthermore, HB 5290…would do nothing about the 20 school districts that have—in Cassidy’s view—“inadequate” policy. If these 20 districts have bullying policy, they are in compliance with existing law.

To illustrate that “anti-bullying” programs that address homosexuality or gender confusion (aka “gender identity” or “gender expression”) are centrally about promoting “progressive” notions about homosexuality, just replace “sexual orientation” (a Leftist rhetorical creation) with another condition constituted by subjective feelings and volitional sexual acts.

Everyone knows that teenage girls who are promiscuous are often called ugly names. No decent person wants promiscuous girls bullied, so why don’t anti-bullying laws and school policies include promiscuity in their list of conditions for which students may not be bullied? Why don’t teachers show films in which promiscuity is portrayed positively? Why don’t schools invite speakers who affirm a sexually promiscuous identity to come talk to students about how bad it felt to be bullied in high school for their promiscuity? Why don’t they have “youth programming” in which promiscuity is affirmed? Why don’t teachers have students read and perform plays in which promiscuity is celebrated and disapproval of it is portrayed as ignorant, bigoted, hateful, provincialism—all in the service of ending bullying?

In addition to the indoctrination aspects of current “anti-bullying” efforts, there would be substantial costs associated with adopting the following recommendations in this bill:

• creating, implementing, and maintaining procedures for in-school anonymous reporting of alleged bullying incidents
• creating and implementing student “training programs,” “restorative measures,” and/or “social and emotional skill-building” exercises
• creating and implementing personnel training
• collecting, maintaining, analyzing, and reporting to the State Board of Education data related to the prevalence of bullying
• “reevaluating,” “reassessing,” “reviewing,” and “revising” (whew) school policy every two years  

Eight years ago, a purportedly “Catholic” colleague of mine in the writing center at Deerfield High School told me that she was so sure that conservative moral beliefs about homosexuality were wrong that she doesn’t think they should be allowed to be spoken in schools even as “progressive” views are espoused.

And Freeport, Maine public high school English teacher Rich Robinson said this about bullying:

Bullying happens when one feels threatened physically or emotionally….[I]f “you” cause a gay kid to feel “less than” because of his/her sexuality and the expressions [and by expressions, Robinson means volitional behaviors] that will naturally result, then I say “you” are a bully and need to be called out. This is what it means to protect kids.

In the view of “progressives,” if student A says something that makes student B who identifies as homosexual feel “less than,” then student A is a bully.

That, my friends, is what liberal lawmakers and “educators” believe and seek to impose through laws and curricula.

While you’re going about the business of opposing this bill, please ask both proponents of this bill as well as your local school administrators and board members this question:

If in a classroom or cafeteria discussion, a student were to state that homosexual attraction is disordered, or that homosexual acts are immoral, or that Illinois should not have legalized same-sex “marriage,” or that homosexual couples should not be permitted to adopt, is it possible under the wording of existing law that this student could be accused of bullying?

The question is not whether sponsors Kelly Cassidy, Greg Harris (D-Chicago), or Camille Lilly (D-Chicago) thinks it would happen, but rather whether it’s possible that it could happen.

And while you’re in a civic engagement mood, please send an email to your local high school and middle school superintendents, principals, and school board members asking these two easy-to-answer questions:

1. In the classroom, are teachers permitted to express their support for the legalization of same-sex “marriage” or adoption by homosexuals?
2. In the classroom, are teachers permitted to express their opposition to the legalization of same-sex “marriage” or adoption by homosexuals?

If they answer “no” to both questions, ask them how they communicate that message to teachers. If you get a response, please send it to IFI.

Become a monthly supporter of IFI.  Click HERE for more information.

IFI readers, please, whether you have children in schools or not, take seriously the assault on the minds and consciences of students, and take action against the newly amended and completely unnecessary anti-bullying bill: HB 5290.

IFI has requested that a provision be added that would guarantee students and school employees the right to opt out of any programs or activities that promote ideas that conflict with their personal or religious beliefs. If such a provision were added, IFI has agreed to adopt a neutral position on the bill, but so far the bill’s sponsors and the ACLU have steadfastly refused to add an opt-out provision.

It has already passed in the House. Please contact your state senator and ask him or her to oppose the bill unless this opt-out provision is included:

No student or school employee will be required to attend or participate in any anti-bullying program, activity, or assembly that infringes upon free expression or contradicts personal or religious beliefs.

Listening to the audio of the House floor debate on HB 5290 was an illuminating and frustrating experience. Here are some of the illuminating and frustrating excerpts from that debate in which the bill’s chief sponsor, State Representative Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago) was questioned:

Rep. Mike Bost (R-Murphysboro):

If someone has a different belief than you and they explain that belief and express their belief, and express it in a hard way, but doesn’t put a hand on the person, could that be considered bullying?

Rep. Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago):

I don’t believe it does. This would have to rise to the level of harassment and torment.

Rep. Bost:

But what is torment to you and harassment might not be torment to me and harassment.

Rep. Cassidy:

A single statement, I don’t think, can be reasonably predicted to have the following outcome. There is no reasonable person under any standard of law that would say one statement, one single statement that “I disagree with you” would put me at fear of physical harm. So, I don’t believe that your situation would rise to that level. Bullying is about behavior, not belief.

What Cassidy “thinks” and “believes” about how this law would be applied in schools is hardly reassuring.

In addition, she is either ignorant of the text of the existing law or deceitful. The law passed in 2010 does not define bullying as only “harassment,” “torment,” or being in “fear of physical harm” as Cassidy implies in her response to Bost. The law defines bullying as any severe or pervasive physical or verbal act or conduct, including communications made in writing or electronically that can be reasonably expected to place the student in fear of their person or property, cause a substantial detrimental effect to their physical or mental health, or substantially interfere with their academic performance or ability to participate in school activities.  

Since the law does not state — as it should — that bullying acts must be severe and pervasive, a single act, including a verbal act, could be construed as constituting bullying. In addition, a single verbal act that is expected to interfere with academic performance or a student’s ability to participate in school activities could be construed as bullying even if it does not constitute harassment or torment, or “put a student in fear of physical harm.”

It should have been obvious to Cassidy that Bost was not asking if students would be permitted to say literally, “I disagree with you.” He was asking if a student who expresses ideas or beliefs that another student finds offensive could be accused of bullying.

For example, if a student were to say in a classroom discussion or to her friends in the cafeteria, “Homosexual acts are perverted,” or “Gays shouldn’t be allowed to adopt,” or “When men have sex with men, they degrade themselves,” could she be accused of bullying? Could someone claim that those verbal acts caused a “detrimental effect to his mental health”?

Bost’s questioning continued:

Rep. Bost:

What does your bill add to this [existing anti-bullying] law?

Rep. Cassidy:

The underlying [existing] law required that school districts adopt policy on bullying. We have not had compliance statewide and many of the schools have very minimal policies…This [bill] defines what a policy on bullying would look like….There are 3 school districts with no policy at all and over 20 with inadequate policies—one-line policies at best.”

According to Cassidy, 20 schools have “inadequate” bullying policy, but the law passed in 2010 does not mandate any particular policy formulation, so perhaps the very liberal Task Force and Cassidy may not view the policies of these 20 unnamed school districts as adequate, but as long as they have even a one-sentence policy, they’re in compliance with the law. Moreover, no one provided any evidence that these schools’ bullying policies have been problematic. To reiterate, there are about 879 public school districts in Illinois and dozens more non-public, non-sectarian schools to which existing law applies. Of those, only 3 districts, according to Cassidy, have not complied with the law.

State Representative Dennis Reboletti (R-Elmhurst) suggested that the Illinois State Board of Education(ISBE) should be working with the districts that have no policy, rather than passing yet another law. He suggested that the judgment of “inadequacy” seems subjective and the decisions regarding “adequacy” are best left to communities and their elected school boards.

Bost’s question about what HB 5290 adds to current existing law is critical. Despite Cassidy’s obfuscation to the contrary, HB 5290 adds nothing. No school is required to adopt any of HB 5290’s recommendations.

Furthermore, a comparison of the recommendations that HB 5290 makes to the recommendations that the Task Force made and posted  on the ISBE website over a year ago reveals that they’re virtually identical.

State Rep. Lou Lang (D-Skokie) asked Cassidy if the State Board of Education has made “an effort with those 23 school districts to resolve those issues [no or inadequate bullying policy]. Cassidy responded awkwardly in the passive voice: “The desire was to have a more fully defined guideline.”

First, as already discussed, the guidelines in HB 5290 are not more fully defined. They are the same as the guidelines provided by the Task Force.

Second, who precisely is the person or persons whose identity Cassidy craftily concealed by using the passive voice. Who exactly desired “to have a more fully defined guideline for the school districts”? Suspicious minds would guess that the desirers were Cassidy; the homosexual activist groups Equality Illinois and the Illinois Safe Schools Alliance; and the ACLU of Illinois.

Cassidy claimed during the floor debate that she “hears very often from parents,” presumably about bullying issues. How many parents over the past year since the Task Force published their bullying policy recommendations have contacted Cassidy? Did Cassidy verify their stories with their school districts? Did the parents who contacted Cassidy identify their school’s bullying policy as the problem? Did Cassidy ascertain whether these parents live in one of the 23 districts that purportedly have no or inadequate bullying policy? Did Cassidy ask these parents if they had addressed the issue with their principals, superintendents, and school boards? Did Cassidy point these parents to the Task Force’s non-mandatory recommendations, which HB 5290’s non-mandatory recommendations merely restate?

The fact that HB 5290’s recommendations are virtually identical to the Task Force’s recommendations raises a few issues:

• If HB 5290 proposes nothing new, why waste time creating and debating it?
• If HB 5290 mandates nothing, how is it different from a resolution?
• The Illinois State Bullying Prevention Task Force has already issued and posted its recommendations in a 106-page document (about which I have written). Since the Task Force has already issued its recommendations, why are multiple homosexual activist organizations pushing for the passage of HB 5290 if not to establish a beachhead from which to launch their next attack on local control?  The next step will be to make all of their non-mandatory “recommendations” mandatory. The next step will require students and school personnel to attend indoctrination sessions—I mean, “programming” and “training”—that will promote “progressive” views on homosexuality, gender confusion, and cross-dressing.
• If any administrators have contacted Cassidy or other lawmakers requesting further guidance, did the lawmakers direct them to the Task Force’s recommendations, which are posted on the Illinois State Board of Education’s website and are essentially identical to HB 5290?

Imagine we’re playing the childhood game of “Red Light, Green Light.” Homosexual activists and their ideological allies see conservatives with their backs turned away from the game and know they have the green light. Some will career wildly toward their goal of total societal transformation, while others take baby steps, hoping no one will notice until it’s too late.  

Don’t be fooled again. HB 5290 is not about bullying prevention. If we’re going to allow this unnecessary, partisan bill to pass, at least make sure it includes an opt-out for students and school employees. 

Take ACTION:  Click HERE to contact your senator and urge him/her to oppose this unnecessary bullying bill.

Part I of this two-part article about Illinois’ new “enumerated” school anti-bullying law and its attendant Task Force exposed the bias and lack of diversity of the Task Force as well as the troubling recommendations made by it.

106-page Task Force recommendations refer to” broader cultural systemic issues of power, privilege and oppression,” “homophobia,” and “underlying power imbalances.” For the uninitiated, this language may sound benign or even positive, but those familiar with the jargon of the “teaching for social justice” movement will recognize the troubling ideas concealed beneath the deceitfully reassuring rhetoric.

The goals of the Task Force are consistent with the mission of the organization that created the law: the Illinois Safe Schools Alliance (ISSA). ISSA is a homosexual activist organization that was originally an affiliate of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN). ISSA’s anti-bullying law was created specifically to add the terms “sexual orientation,” “gender identity,” and “gender expression” to existing law, which in turn would provide liberal assumptions about homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder an even greater foothold in Illinois schools.

The Task Force recommends “all schools in Illinois immediately embark on a journey of complete school transformation,” which means all public and private schools in Illinois. Current law applies only to public schools and non-sectarian, that is, non-religious private schools, but the Task Force calls for an amendment to the existing law so that it would apply to religious private schools as well.

The Task Force recommendations include indoctrination plans for students, teachers, administrators, all school employees (e.g., maintenance workers, bus drivers, cafeteria workers), and future teachers enrolled in college and university teacher-preparation programs.

The Task Force asserts that “complete school transformation cannot be accomplished without adequate commitment, time, and resources,” stating that “nothing less than the complete overhaul of the education system in Illinois” will suffice, and that “the state of Illinois fully fund pilot projects to collect and evaluate data on the efficacy of the proposed school transformation model.”

Their recommendations include this troubling suggestion: “Many changes will need to be made to state laws, ISBE regulations and school policies.”

Many community members feel helpless to stop the usurpation of public education by liberal ideologues hell-bent on using taxpayer resources to advance their moral and political beliefs, but there are things taxpayers can and should do:

1. Email your local school administrators and request the following information:

a. Ask for detailed information about any “bullying prevention” activities that are planned for students.

b. Ask for detailed information about any “bullying-prevention” training (i.e., professional development) that is planned for administrators, teachers, and staff.

c. Ask if any of the “bullying-prevention” activities that are planned for any of these groups specifically mention “sexual orientation,” “gender-identity” (i.e., Gender Identity Disorder), or “gender-expression” (i.e., cross-dressing).

d. Request copies of any resources that will be used in “bullying-prevention” training for students, teachers, administrators, and staff.

2. If your administration is uncooperative, file Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to access the information. FOIA requests are easy to file and cost-free for the first fifty pages of documents. Every Illinois school district has a FOIA officer who by law must be identified on the district’s website. Your district’s FOIA officer can provide instructions on how to file a FOIA. Click here and go to page 56 for a sample FOIA request. Taxpayers should be making use of FOIA requests. They provide invaluable (and often surprising) information about what takes place behind the scenes in schools.

3. Finally, tell your children’s teachers that under no circumstance is your child to be exposed to any resources or activities that mention “sexual orientation,” “gender identity,” or “gender expression.” Tell them that you will provide “bullying-prevention” instruction at home. And ask them to notify you prior to any activities or presentations that address “sexual orientation,” “gender identity,” or “gender expression,” so that you can opt your child out.

IFI is urging our readers to research how your school districts are implementing the Illinois Prevent School Violence Act (PSVA). Please do this if you’re a taxpayer. You don’t have to have students enrolled in school. All taxpayers are subsidizing what takes place in our public schools; and today’s students are tomorrow’s culture-makers. We all have a stake in public education.

We cannot afford to sit around fretting and whining about the corruption of public education by liberal ideologues who have transformed education into indoctrination. Please email your schools, and if anything troubling turns up, send the information and documentation to IFI. We would love to share with IFI readers what’s taking place in particular school districts around the state.

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Beware of the schoolyard – jihad, not so much

When I was a kid, I got bullied fairly frequently because I was short. So my parents enrolled me in a judo class. After a few unexpected flips in the hallways, the bullies left me alone. Confronting bullies helps build character.

There are times, of course, when judo won’t work and the best strategy is to avoid the jerks or sic a teacher or principal on them. Almost everybody has a story. But now, bullying has become a federal issue.

Rep. Jackie Speier is on a crusade to use the U.S. government to stamp out bullying in America. The Northern California Democrat wants to deny federal funds to schools that won’t keep a tally of bullying incidents against special-needs children. In other words, the federal government is going to whip local schools into line using its vast fiscal powers. It’s a politically correct form of bullying. To oppose this abuse of power implies you actually want these poor kids to be harassed.

I’m not sure where the Constitution legitimates such a sweeping directive, but it’s probably in one of the penumbras emanating from the Preamble’s General Welfare Clause. Once you create giant Washington bureaucracies, you can use the clause to justify almost anything – from forcing poison light bulbs down our throats to dictating schoolyard behavior.

Every so often, this power is put to good purpose, as when Sen. Jesse Helms used a similar threat to prevent schools from kicking out the Boy Scouts. But he was defending the Scouts’ constitutional rights, not creating a vehicle for social engineering. The real solution is to get rid of the oxymoronic Department of Education, not to empower this Jimmy Carter creation in hopes of advancing conservative ideals. It creates too many bullies.

Ms. Speier’s new school-bullying idea mirrors President Obama’s recent interest in the subject. On March 10, he held an “anti-bullying” conference at the White House. Besides “safe schools czar” Kevin Jennings, invitees included anti-Christian homosexual activist Dan Savage, who attained some fame in 2000 for claiming to have licked the doorknobs of pro-family Republican candidate Gary Bauer’s office in hopes of giving Mr. Bauer the flu. Now that’s the kind of participant we should have at every anti-bullying conference, if only as a role model.

As Illinois Family Institute writer Laurie Higgins relates, “Savage said the conference was ‘of tremendous symbolic importance’ but also complained, ‘What was never addressed is when the parents are the bullies.'”

Coming next: federal mandates for “parent education”?

The government, under the auspices of three federal agencies, has created a website dedicated to ending bullying. Paraphrasing Mrs. Higgins, here’s the site’s underlying philosophy: 1) Homosexual behavior is equivalent to race, 2) any kind of sex is morally positive, and 3) expressing any conservative moral beliefs leads to bullying. What a neat formula for suppressing dissent.

Speaking of bullying, Ms. Speier was in rare form along with other Democrats on March 10 at Rep. Peter King’s Homeland Security Committee’s hearing on radicalization of U.S. Muslims.

She rebuked the committee for focusing on Islamic terror instead of expanding it to “Christian” terrorist groups such as the Ku Klux Klan or the violent anti-abortion group Army of God, and she assailed some witnesses.

Melvin Bledsoe, whose son Carlos was recruited into Islam and has been charged with murdering one soldier and wounding another on June 1, 2009, at a U.S. military recruiting center in Arkansas, was having none of it. He shot back:

“I’m wondering how did [the lawmakers] get on the commission to speak about some of the things they’re speaking about.” As for radical Muslims, he added, “We’re worried about stepping on their toes, and they’re talking about stamping us out.”

The day before the hearing, Ms. Speier laid into Mr. King, calling him a racist.

“This is one member’s bias that he is now putting forth as the policy of this country, and there are going to be many of us who will shout out and call him out on abusing his role as chair and abusing the Congress of the United States for whatever his personal bias is,” Ms. Speier told the San Francisco Chronicle. “To pinpoint Muslims as if they’re the only category – it’s wrong, it’s discriminatory, it’s racist and inappropriate.”

Then she delivered this non sequitur: “Hearings aren’t supposed to be judged before they’re held. They’re supposed to be illuminating.”

Say what? Well, as an editor friend of mine often said, “Why does everything have to make sense?”

Given Ms. Speier’s fiery demeanor toward anyone who conveys the idea that radical Islam is more of a threat than, say, a Baptist ladies knitting club, it’s no wonder Los Angeles County Sheriff Leroy D. Baca almost fell over himself praising Islam as a religion of peace and unloading nuggets like this:

“The Muslim community is no less or no more important than others, as no one can predict with complete accuracy who and what will pose the next threat against our nation.”

As I said, watch out for those ladies and their knitting needles. OK, that’s not fair. Ms. Speier and Sheriff Baca were talking about groups that actually commit violence. But given the threat we face, the moral equivalence is still stunning.

Another witness Ms. Speier bullied was moderate Muslim Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, chairman of the American Islamic Forum, who at considerable personal risk warned the committee that most Americans are unaware of the extent of homegrown Muslim extremism.

Ms. Speier questioned Dr. Jasser’s right to speak for Muslims and noted that although she attended a Catholic church every Sunday, she herself would not be qualified to address the church’s pedophile priest scandal. Yes, she said that. You can’t make this stuff up. Liberals will outdo your wildest stereotypes.

In the space of a few minutes, Ms. Speier trashed her own church, assailed brave witnesses and committed moral equivalence by invoking “Christian” terrorism as if it were as big a threat to America as the ongoing jihad.

She probably means well. Bullies are bad business. And perhaps she is well-qualified to take on the school bullying issue. It takes one – well, you know the rest.