The following is a reprint of an editorial in The Daily Targum, the student newspaper for Rutgers University (and one of the longest-operating student newspapers in the country). Clearly, those (non-homosexual-activists) closest to the scene recognize that “gay” groups are cynically exploiting this tragedy – even before all the facts are in – to advance their political and cultural agenda. Per the usual, it’s all about the Homosexual Lobby (see this shockingly arrogant release redefining morality by the homosexual lobby Human Rights Campaign). Even homosexual- and “nonmonogamy” advocate Dan (‘Three-Way”) Savage [his blog HERE] is in on the act. (God help us if the twisted, Christian-hating Savage becomes a role model for America’s youth.) Stay tuned as we address Exodus International’s stunning and incredibly ill-timed capitulation on the Day of Truth. – Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.org
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Media exploits University tragedy
Editorial
By The Daily Targum
Published: Tuesday, October 5, 2010

The death of University student Tyler Clementi might have been properly mourned if it were not for the massive rallies and aggressive news coverage that altered the nature of the situation. The truth is that an 18-year-old boy killed himself – he was a student just like the rest of us, someone just trying to receive an education. Yet people’s relentless agendas took his death and turned it into a cause based on false pretenses.

A crowd of more than 20 people ended up lying outside the entrance of the Rutgers Student Center on the College Avenue campus the first night of the news breaking. The chants were, “We’re here. We’re queer. We want safety in our homes.” The mistake was that Clementi’s death should not have been turned into a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender protest for gay rights and safe spaces at the University. Robert O’Brien, Department of Anthropology assistant instructor, led the rally as he chanted, “Not safe in dorms, not safe at Rutgers.” Essentially, an angry mob fending for their rights turned the death of a young boy into a cause for “safe spaces” for gays across the University – all the while, these spaces already existed. We have groups across campus that deal with students’ psychological difficulties – 17 Seconds is one that deals with suicides – as well as groups that address their sexual orientation. We have these spaces, and the University community is diverse enough to provide students with whatever it is they need.

The focal point of Clementi’s tragic death should have been a boy’s inability to deal with the hardships of life. And yet the news and certain organizations picked this up and carried it into the ranks of general causes for major social groups – for their profit. Did Tyler really feel unsafe after all? Do we know the reason behind his suicide? Do we know if he, himself, would take part in the movement behind his death – the push for safe spaces?

It is disappointing that everyone from news to celebrities picked up the story. Actress Brittany Snow and actor Neil Patrick-Harris are just two of the many celebrities belittling Clementi’s death – forcing his remembrance into a cause rather than a proper mourning.

We did not know Tyler. It was barely three weeks into his first year at the University, and most of his neighbors in his residence hall barely knew him. Turning his death into a push for gay rights is a fallacy. Homosexuality is not the only reason for which people kill themselves. In this case, it might have pushed Clementi over the edge, but the fact that he was gay should by no means turn his death into a march for safe spaces. These groups want to be heard. They want the attention. They want their agendas to shine in the limelight.

Instead, we should address that the signs of a suicidal 18-year-old kid were unseen and went unnoticed, not “We want safety in our homes.” We have the safety, or as much of it as we together as a University community can in today’s world. What we need is to notice those of us who need help and help them. Entertainers stay away. O’Brien leave the issue alone. Let us – family, friends and the University together – mourn for Clementi, and just for him, rather than using him as a martyr for a cause that has yet to be proven.

Editor’s Note: Reader Discretion Is Advised

Two videos of a freshmen orientation presentation at Gustavus Adolphus College, a small Lutheran College in St. Peter, Minnesota, have come to light that expose the repugnant ideas and images that college students at a purportedly Christian college think are funny. I have a personal connection to this story: One of my daughters graduated from Gustavus six years ago.

We learned from her four years there that Gustavus is Christian in name only. In response to these videos, my daughter wrote this to me:

I suppose this should come as no surprise from a college that invited a transgender speaker to give the daily chapel message during National Coming Out Week over six years ago and that celebrates and affirms such behavior without even an acknowledgment that they are departing from a biblical understanding of sexuality.

The climate at Gustavus was predominantly secular in the classroom, in dorm life, and on sports teams with only the empty trappings of Christian tradition hanging on in the form of daily chapel services led by a chaplain who affirmed sexual deviance and other such “spiritual” activities.

The first video begins with a couple having sex in their dorm room (complete with sound effects) and joking about putting a hat on the door to warn the boy’s roommate to stay out — for the fourth time in one week.

Here are the dramatis personae of the next skit with which upperclassmen welcomed freshmen:

• Betty Birth Control who says, “Pop me in, so you don’t pop one out.”
• Captain Condom who says, “Use protection for your erection.”
• Sidekick Spermicide with Lube who, while in the arms of Captain Condom, says, “Together we make safer sex even better.”
• Waiting Wanda who says, “I need a ring before you can play with this thing,” (indicating her pelvic area).
• Vicki Vibrator who enters the stage buzzing and shouting, “You can play with this toy.”
• Libby Lube who says, “Caution, slippery when wet.”
• Nina Nuva (the vaginal contraceptive NuvaRing) who says, “Slide me in easy, and then you can please me.”
• Debbie Dildo who says, while dressed all in leather, “Sex can wait. Masturbate.”
• Premature Pete who runs in panting, groaning and holding his crotch. He is announced with these words: “Premature Pete is coming…”
• Right Hand Rick who says, “My right hand is my one-night stand,” while dropping a tissue on the floor.
• Billy Blueballs who enters with blue balls dangling from his crotch and says, “I never come.”
• Bushy Brenda who enters with a long, bushy, black beard hanging from her crotch and says indignantly, “I trim. I don’t mow.”
• Bondage Bob who says, “Tie me down, gets me up.”
• Porno Paul who says, “Surfin’ the net, gets my undies wet.”
• Role-Play Ryan who enters with a gigantic shepherd’s staff, which looks like a Christmas play prop. He says, “I’m pretty good with my wood.”
• Faking Fiona who says amidst panting and screaming, “And…you…might…think… I’m…coming…but…I’m… not.”

When this offensive and idiotic skit concludes, all the characters appear on stage to announce, “We’re the Sex Pistols. Welcome, Class of 2014!”

The second video begins with this whimsical rhyme: “Follow along and listen quite clear to learn of the wonderful world of the queer.” It again features ignorant, irresponsible upperclassmen, this time defining the terms lesbian, gay, pansexual, bi-curious, bisexual, transgender and transsexual for freshmen, explaining, for example, that lesbian women “make love quite beautifully,” and that the term “bi-curious” refers to “testin’ the waters, seein’ what’s attractive.” (This should help dispel the lie promoted by homosexualists that “sexual orientation” is biologically determined and fixed.)

Next a boy waxes romantic about his male lover and a girl proclaims, “I happen to be a lesbian — a big one. And my, oh my, I love it. All the women, the flowy hair, the sweet perfume, mmm, mmm. I like sex. I love sex.”

This spectacle — I mean, event — took place in an auditorium and was apparently on the college calendar, which means the students must have received administrative permission. Here are just a few questions I would pose to Gustavus administrators and trustees:

• Is this the kind of information that parents of Gustavus freshman want their children to receive?
• What kind of role do supposedly more mature upperclassmen have in the lives of younger students?
• Do any upperclassmen — who, by the way, are actually adults –or Gustavus administrators view modesty as a virtue to be respected and cultivated?
• Does anyone see how the exhibitionism, voyeurism, and promiscuity which this freshman orientation presentation embodies and promotes relate to the Tyler Clementi tragedy atRutgersUniversity?
• And how does their irresponsible and vulgar presentation created by upperclassmen for freshmen comport with Gustavus’ mission statement:

Gustavus Adolphus College is a church-related, residential liberal arts college firmly rooted in its Swedish and Lutheran heritage…. The College strives to balance educational tradition with innovation and to foster the development of values as an integral part of intellectual growth…. The College aspires to be a community of persons from diverse backgrounds who respect and affirm the dignity of all people. It is a community where a mature understanding of the Christian faith and lives of service are nurtured and students are encouraged to work toward a just and peaceful world.

The purpose of a Gustavus education is to help its students attain their full potential as persons…

• What values does this freshmen re-orientation presentation foster? Does it demonstrate respect for the dignity of people, or does it degrade people?
• Do Gustavus administrators actually believe this presentation is “firmly rooted” in the heritage of Martin Luther?
• Is sex sacred?
• Is sex for marriage?
• Is marriage a picture of Christ and the church?
• Does any Gustavus faculty member, administrator, or trustee serve God first? If so, how do they reconcile the ideas that Gustavus has for years promoted with the following ideas that the Gustavus community has apparently long forgotten:

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.

And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. (Rom. 1:24-32)

Do the upperclassmen recognize that one of the most important forms of diversity in life-philosophical diversity-is missing from their puerile production? There is no representation of the view that modesty matters. There is no representation of the view that pornography is evil and the use of it destructive to the moral imaginations, lives, and marriages of men and women. There is no representation of the view that homosexuality and sadomasochism are perversions.

Perhaps the key to this moral miasma can be found in the concluding soliloquy in which a boy says the following:

I have a fire inside me: a burning passion and a love for something beyond myself — a very real, yet intangible beauty that permeates every cell in my body. It’s my atheism.

I came to Gustavus a white, middle class, Lutheran boy, and I stand here before you as a white, middle class, atheist man.

Once fidelity to Scripture and submission to Christ take a back seat to satiation of human desire and reliance on human “wisdom,” sin prevails.

On more than one occasion, during my daughter’s freshman year — a decade ago — she had to sleep on a beanbag chair in a friend’s room because her roommate’s boyfriend was “sleeping over.” Since co-ed sleepovers violated dorm rules, and since we didn’t pay room and board fees so that my daughter could sleep in a beanbag chair, I suggested she talk to her resident assistant. My daughter’s response: “There’s no point: my RA has her boyfriend sleep over.”

Gustavus administrators and trustees should either make some dramatic changes in the Gustavus climate or strip from its mission statement any references to values, dignity, Christian faith, and its Lutheran heritage.

If you have any connection toGustavusAdolphusCollege, especially to parents who may be considering sending their children there and to alumni donors, please pass this article on to them.

The Daily Herald is featuring articles highlighting the annual Banned Book Week across America – Sept. 25 thru October 2 – and how our local libraries have special events to celebrate their “Freedom to Read” policies. Click HERE for The Daily Herald article.

Banned Book Week is a farce and an insult to the intelligence and goodwill of the taxpayers who pay for local public libraries and staff salaries. Neither the American Library Association [ALA] nor the local community library is a “governmental” agency. It is the taxpayers who own their community library and should have the freedom to determine the policies that regulate this community service institution. The ALA, a private, non-governmental group of associated librarians, has incrementally usurped the freedoms of clients – especially parents – to determine which books should be selected for their library shelves.

If anyone bans books, it is the radical American Library Association, which has run rough shod over our libraries for too many years and now solely determines which books are or are NOT ordered for display.

It has been proven that books that have been banned from library shelves are those that the ALA “selection process” does not allow. Example: Go to your local library and see how many books available are pro-homosexual propaganda and how many express a Christian or opposing point of view. Check out the religious books section. Do you see more books on cults, New Age, and non-Christian religions? So who’s censoring what and why?

Following is Mitchell Muncy’s article appearing in the Wall Street Journal in September, 2009, which in my opinion points a finger at who are the real “zealots, bigots and false patriots.”

Arlene Sawicki

Finding Censorship Where There Is None

By MITCHELL MUNCY

‘To you zealots and bigots and false patriots who live in fear of discourse. You screamers and banners and burners. . . .” These are the opening lines of the official Manifesto of Banned Books Week, which starts tomorrow. This annual “national celebration of the freedom to read” is led by the American Library Association (ALA) and co-sponsored by a number of professional associations and advocacy groups. Events and displays at “hundreds” of libraries and bookstores will “draw attention to the problem of censorship” in the U.S.

As the tone of the Manifesto suggests, the sponsors are more interested in confrontation than celebration. The Banned Books Week Readout in Chicago will feature “wildly successful” and “incredibly popular” authors who will “share their experiences as targets of censors.” The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression has produced posters, based on a graphic-novel adaptation of “Fahrenheit 451,” to help “publicize the hundreds of attacks on books that occur every year in the United States.” The ALA has launched an online U.S. “censorship map” to show how pervasive the threat is.

In the common-law tradition, censorship refers specifically to the government’s prior restraint on publication. None of the sponsors claim this has happened; the acts they have in mind are perpetrated by private citizens. Yet the cases on the map almost all involve ordinary people lodging complaints with school and library authorities. Before Banned Books Week began in 1982, such behavior was known as petitioning the government for a redress of grievances.

The problem of loose language aside, we can still ask whether books are banned in this country. The obvious answer is no, if banned means something like “made dangerous or difficult for the average person to obtain.” Many books that have drawn critics’ attention have been best sellers (the Harry Potter books and Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” trilogy), classics (“The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” and “To Kill a Mockingbird”), or the work of acclaimed authors (Toni Morrison and Margaret Atwood). If a book isn’t available at one library or bookstore, it’s certainly available at another. Not even the most committed civil libertarian demands that every book be immediately available everywhere on request-though in the age of Amazon that’s nearly the case.

The ALA would surely consider these objections irrelevant. Yet its case isn’t very compelling even on its own terms. One doubtful sign is the censorship map’s title, “Book Bans and Challenges, 2007-2009” (my emphasis). By this definition, censorship includes not only the actual removal of books, but complaints about books as well.

And it’s clear why complaints must be counted. In only 10% of the 186 cases on the map was a book permanently removed from a library. (If we add books removed from individual classrooms, we reach 16%.) If the criterion of book banning is that a book be banned-anywhere-the incidence of censorship drops about 90%. The ALA grants on its Web site that “most of the books featured during [Banned Books Week] were not banned.”

Moreover, to read the ALA’s own accounts, the petitioners, losing nearly six times out of seven, accepted the adverse judgments peaceably. Those “who live in fear of discourse,” as the Manifesto has it, were evidently satisfied with the opportunity to make their case. For the ALA, what makes them censors is that they spoke up at all: “True” patriots, presumably, would have kept quiet. Who, then, is afraid of discourse?

More telling is that 80% of challenges-and all but one removal-took place at schools. The remaining 20% of challenges, brought at public libraries, all concerned the exposure of children to possibly inappropriate material. The Manifesto indirectly acknowledges this: “You say you’re afraid for children . . . [but] ignorance is no armor.” (Could we agree to censor stale imagery?)

What inflames the ALA, in other words, are attempts by parents to guide their children’s education. One of the “frequently asked questions” on the ALA’s Web site is: “Can’t parents tell the librarian what material they don’t think children should have?” The Manifesto’s answer is clearly “no.”

There’s something odd about a national organization with a $54 million budget and 67,000 members reacting so zealously against a few unorganized, law-abiding parents whose efforts, by any sensible standard, are hopelessly ineffective. The ALA’s members have immeasurably more power than the “censors” they denounce to decide what books are available in our communities, but this power is so familiar it’s invisible. Why do parents’ public petitions constitute censorship, while librarians’ hidden verdicts do not? A spokesman for the ALA once tackled this question in the Boston Globe: “The selection criteria that librarians use may not always be what everybody wants. I don’t see that it’s a real problem.” Move along, folks, nothing to see here.

The ALA repeatedly emphasizes that public and school libraries are “government bodies.” Is Banned Books Week a celebration of free speech, or is it a way for government employees to bully ordinary citizens by stigmatizing those who complain (“bigots,” “false patriots,” “screamers,” “burners”)? They clearly hope future challenges simply won’t be brought. Does that make Banned Books Week an attempt at prior restraint on speech by the government-an act of censorship?

Early in 1774, Benjamin Franklin reported the British government’s harsh reaction to a petition he had presented on behalf of the Massachusetts Assembly: “Grievances cannot be redressed unless they are known; and they cannot be known but through complaints and petitions: If these are deemed as affronts, and the messengers punished as offenders, who will henceforth send petitions?” Franklin, the founder of American libraries, understood that threats to freedom are much more likely to come from those in power who won’t hear criticism than from private citizens who want a hearing.

Mr. Muncy is chief operating officer of the Institute for American Values. From 1996 to 2008, he was editor in chief of Spence Publishing.

Arlene Sawicki is a co-founder of VoteLifeAmerica.com. Arlene Sawicki is a long-time pro-life and pro-family advocate, defending and promoting traditional values. She served on the Board of Directors of the Chicago Archdiocesan Council of Catholic Women as Chairperson for Family Concerns, Morality in Media and Legislation.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) recently thanked Governor Patrick Quinn (D) for rejecting Title V federal funds for abstinence education and praised him for turning instead to the new federal program for funding comprehensive sex ed called the Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP).

According to Planned Parenthood it was “The recently passed health care reform law” that “created the first ever state-grant program from the federal government that funds comprehensive sex education” (emphasis added).

Whereas Title V abstinence education funds must be matched by the state at the rate of $3 from the state for every $4 of federal money, the Obama administration-created PREP program does not require state matching funds. The Obama administration has provided a financial incentive for states to use only comprehensive sex ed curricula.

In addition to the ACLU and Planned Parenthood, who else loves PREP? The National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) loves PREP, that’s who. How’s that for an unholy triumvirate: the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, and NARAL.

Here’s an almost amusing quote from “NARAL Pro-choice Virginia” regarding abstinence education: “We have to put ideology behind us and focus on promoting age-appropriate comprehensive medically accurate sex education for our youth.” Can any spokesperson for an anti-woman, anti-life, extremist organization like NARAL actually claim with a straight face that NARAL’s  views are non-ideological? And it’s certainly debatable whether sex ed resources from, for example, Planned Parenthood are non-ideological and age-appropriate.

NARAL’s panties were all in a bundle because Virginia Governor Robert McDonnell (R) rejected PREP. Virginia’s Governor McDonnell rejected PREP’s comprehensive sex education, while our own Governor Quinn rejected Title V abstinence education.

Twenty-nine states participated in the 2009 Title V abstinence education program, which provides states with federal block grants for state abstinence education programs. By the August 30, 2010 deadline, eight new states had applied for Title V funding while only five of the previous 29 declined. Illinois has the dubious honor of being one of the five.

Despite unpersuasive claims to the contrary, research has shown that abstinence education is at least as if not more effective than comprehensive sex ed as I outlined here in Feb. 2010.

Comprehensive sex ed promoters like Martha Kempner of the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) claim that abstinence programs like the one I discussed last Feb. are failures. As I wrote earlier:

Kempner declared that “Abstinence-only was an experiment and it failed.” Curiously, Ms. Kempner looked at the abstinence programs analyzed in this study, which have largely the same results as comprehensive sex ed programs–except that they better prepare students with a knowledge of STD-prevention–and she declares that only abstinence programs are failures.

I would argue that if abstinence programs are deemed a failure and worthy of defunding, then comprehensive sex ed programs, which in some studies have virtually the same results, should also be deemed a failure and defunded.

Moreover, abstinence education apparently reflects the values of a majority of Americans.

After significant public pressure, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recently released the results of their taxpayer-funded abstinence study: “The National Survey of Adolescents and Their Parents.”

This study produced a number of surprising and encouraging findings that abstinence education opponents would rather the public not read. Below are just a few of those findings. (In this study, “MKP” means the “Most Knowledgeable Parent.”):

• Approximately 70 percent of parents surveyed are opposed to pre-marital sex both in general and for their own adolescents.
• The majority of parents surveyed favor their adolescents receiving abstinence messages from multiple sources. Ordered from most preferred to least preferred, parents favored abstinence messages delivered at a place of worship (85 percent), a doctor’s office or health center (85 percent), school (83 percent), a community organization (71 percent), and the internet (55 percent).
• [T]he majority of adolescents surveyed oppose pre-marital sex in general and for themselves,
• Adolescents whose MKPs reported that they had previously participated in a class, program, or event that talked about waiting to have sex until marriage reported significantly more conservative views among their peers, even adjusting for the influence of other contributing factors such as age and household religiosity.

Although it’s too late now for Illinois to qualify for Title V abstinence education funds, it’s not too late to tell your children’s schools that you will homeschool your children for just their sex education.

Michael Patrick recently wrote (edited):

I read your excellent article ‘Joseph Farah is right about the homosexualist agenda…’ Thank you for publicizing the information from Laurie Higgins’ speech. The timing of your article was impeccable – inspired by the Holy Spirit – as far as I’m concerned. I have a horrible story to share with you. I’m hoping you will be moved by it to write a follow-up article.

The homosexualist agenda is not just infiltrating public schools. It’s infiltrating Catholic schools as well.

I’m one of several concerned Catholic parents whose children attend Sacred Heart Schools in Kingston, Massachusetts. Sacred Heart is made up of a high school, middle school, and elementary school, including pre-k. It’s not a diocesan school – it’s run by the Sisters of Divine Providence from Pittsburgh. They claim Sacred Heart is a Catholic school.

In May of this year, as the school year came to a close and two weeks before he graduated, a graduating senior at Sacred Heart High School decided to write an article in the student newspaper. The article is titled “Shedding light on Sacred Heart’s closet,” by Joe Nelson. [It can be seen, in PDF format, at the end of this column.]

The Sacred Heart High School administration approved the publication of the article in the school newspaper. The article directly contradicts Catholic teaching as it relates to issues of homosexuality, bisexuality, transgender behavior, God’s merciful love, and sin. The teacher moderator of the student newspaper, Scott Dalton, approved the publication of this article, as did the principal, John Enos. The school newspaper is distributed at school and not published on the Web. In general, most parents who send their children to Sacred Heart School have no idea this article was ever published.

Authorizing such an article filled with unsubstantiated propaganda – in the school newspaper – is particularly egregious because of the confusion it creates for the very children whom the school is obliged (pursuant to the Title III of the Code of Canon Law, 794 through 806) to educate and form in the Catholic faith.

We brought this concern to the attention of the principals of the high school and the elementary school. Their initial response was an avoidance strategy, refusing to meet with the parents. We were hoping they would assist us in correcting the erroneous information with the goal of providing correct information on Catholic teaching on these topics to the students who were exposed to the article (7th grade through 12th grade).

After three or four weeks of unanswered requests to meet with him, in June, concerned Catholic parents met with John Enos, the high school principal. Enos said the reason why he approved the publication of the article was that he was concerned about the ramifications of what would happen had he not approved the article (referring to possible claims of intolerance by the student author, or others). When asked, Enos said that, in hindsight, he wouldn’t change his position and he would approve a similar article again if presented the opportunity in the future. He also told the parents that the conversation he had with them was not to leave the room – a version of ‘What happens at Sacred Heart stays at Sacred Heart.’

A concerned parent spoke with the director of religious education, Chris Connolly, who claimed the newspaper article was just ‘not a big deal.’ The elementary school principal, Sister Ann Therese, initially refused to meet with concerned Catholic parents, but eventually acquiesced. She said the article should never have been published and it was wrong for Enos to have authorized the printing of the article. She also said that she was confident that after having spoken with Enos:

-She believed it was a mistake for the school to publish the article (which contradicts Enos’ explanation of why he authorized the article; not an unintentional error), and

-She was certain Enos would never authorize the publication of a similar article in the future (which contradicts what Enos told the parents who met with him – that he certainly would do it again).

Sister Ann Therese told the concerned Catholic parents that she had no authority to officially speak for the order. She suggested a meeting with the provincial director for the Sisters of Divine Providence, Sister Mary Francis Fletcher.

On July 19, 2010, concerned parents met with Sister. She basically told us that the order feels no mistake was made, supports the decision to publish the article, and sees no significant problem with its content. Shockingly, she claimed the article published in the student newspaper ‘was not encouraging immorality.’ The concerned parents were absolutely stunned by the order’s position, which, if it is not already clear to you, directly contradicts Sister Ann Therese’s (the elementary school principal’s) position on the moral appropriateness of the article (for grade 7 through 12).

Sister Mary Francis said the only thing she would do over if she could would be to ‘balance’ the article with the teaching of the Church on the subject of homosexuality. Similar to Enos, Sister said she would have no problem if the school published a similar article in the future.

Sister said she would be meeting with Enos and the administration to discuss how to address these issues, but she would not allow parental input into a plan for correcting the false information. This is in direct contradiction to Title III of Code of Canon Law, 796,

§2 There must be the closest cooperation between parents and the teachers to whom they entrust their children to be educated. …

She declined our specific requests to:

1. Publish a thorough correction in the student newspaper,

2. Publish a similar correction on the Web (in response to the fact that the controversy had been publicized on a blog, bringing scandal to Sacred Heart and the Church),

3. Schedule a presentation at the school to directly address the Catholic position regarding homosexuality, bisexuality, transgender behavior, etc.

4. Provide the teachers at Sacred Heart with a course on the Catechism to ensure their knowledge and understanding of the Catholic faith, and

5. Allow parents input into any plan for ensuring that a correction is made by the school.

We have sent Sister a number of e-mails requesting a written explanation of the administration’s plan to address the concerns raised by the parents. Sister has essentially ignored these requests; thus, parents will have no input into how to prevent this situation from happening at Sacred Heart in the future. Sister’s arrogant, dismissive and disinterested manner in which she has addressed our concerns and requests is disturbing.

As concerned parents, we requested that the administration respect our decision (and duty) to educate our children in a school committed to a true Catholic education. We are stunned and deeply saddened by all this. We feel a moral obligation not to support a school that calls itself Catholic but authorizes articles in the school newspaper that undermine the Catholic faith, marginalize Catholic teaching – easily available to anyone with a Catechism – treat parents with contempt, and marginalize parents for raising legitimate concerns over these published articles.

Years ago, we moved to Kingston for the purpose of someday being able to send our children to Sacred Heart Catholic School. For the past several years, we have sacrificed in order to send our children to this school. With the lack of leadership at the school and the failure to abide by Church teaching, and a demonstrated lack of commitment to the Catholic faith, we now feel morally obligated to shed light on the state of Catholicity the Sacred Heart School finds itself in.

Because Catholic parents ‘have … the duty … to choose [schools] which … can best promote the catholic education of their children’ (Canon 793), each of the concerned Catholic families has removed some or all of their children from the school. This has been a painful decision for us, but we feel we don’t have a choice.

A representative of the concerned parents met with Archdiocese of Boston Superintendent of Schools Mary Grassa O’Neill and Deputy Superintendent James Walsh. Strangely, they both claimed to be unaware of any gay agenda. The superintendant shockingly held the same position as Sister Mary Francis. The superintendant found nothing immoral about the article.

Just like Sister Mary Francis, Superintendent O’Neill said she thought it would have been better to ‘balance’ the article with the teaching of the Church on the subject of homosexuality. The superintendent and the deputy superintendent initially explained that the article was simply a misstep in a student newspaper and that the school was giving students who may have previously been ‘bullied’ a chance to vent.

Sounds to me like an agenda.

The superintendent has offered to go back to the school with our requests [listed above]. The superintendent said she is not sure how many of our demands she’ll be successful in obtaining for us. We are awaiting her report as to what, if anything, the school will be doing to correct the false information the students received in the newspaper article.

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) just released the information below, which must be disseminated in public high schools. In light of the astonishing HIV infection rates among men who have sex with men, all public high schools have an obligation to make students aware of these statistics, so that they understand fully how dangerous homosexual acts are.

IFI is urging all parents to send this information to their school administrators and health teachers and to ask whether health teachers are sharing this information with students.

“Gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) represent approximately 2% of the US population, yet are the population most severely affected by HIV and are the only risk group in which new HIV infections have been increasing steadily since the early 1990s. In 2006, MSM accounted for more than half (53%) of all new HIV infections in the United States, and MSM with a history of injection drug use (MSM-IDU) accounted for an additional 4% of new infections. At the end of 2006, more than half (53%) of all people living with HIV in the United States were MSM or MSM-IDU. Since the beginning of the US epidemic, MSM have consistently represented the largest percentage of persons diagnosed with AIDS and persons with an AIDS diagnosis who have died.”

New HIV Infections

• In 2006, more than 30,000 MSM and MSM-IDU were newly infected with HIV.
• Among all MSM, whites accounted for nearly half (46%) of new HIV infections in 2006. The largest number of new infections among white
• MSM occurred in those aged 30-39 years, followed by those aged 40-49 years.
• Among all black MSM, there were more new HIV infections (52%) among young black MSM (aged 13-29 years) than any other racial or ethnic age group of MSM in 2006. The number of new infections among young black MSM was nearly twice that of young white MSM and more than twice that of young Hispanic/Latino MSM.
• Among all Hispanic/Latino MSM in 2006, the largest number of new infections (43%) occurred in the youngest age group (13-29 years), though a substantial number of new HIV infections (35%) were among those aged 30-39 years.

HIV and AIDS Diagnoses and Deaths

• A recent CDC study found that in 2008 one in five (19%) MSM in 21 major US cities were infected with HIV, and nearly half (44%) were unaware of their infection….
• In 2007, MSM were 44 to 86 times as likely to be diagnosed with HIV compared with other men, and 40 to 77 times as likely as women.
• From 2005-2008, estimated diagnoses of HIV infection increased approximately 17% among MSM. This increase was likely due to a combination of factors: increases in new infections, increased testing, and diagnosis earlier in the course of infection; it may also have been due to uncertainty in statistical models….
• By the end of 2007, an estimated 282,542 MSM with an AIDS diagnosis had died in theUnited Statesand 5 dependent areas (emphasis added).

Source: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/msm/index.htm

Some of the most serious problems infecting public education emerge from the stranglehold that disciples of the “teaching for social justice” movement and the related social and political movement to normalize homosexual practice and Gender Identity Disorder (GID) have on academia.

The indefensible efforts to promote these partisan political theories and the simultaneous censorship of conservative resources reveal the hypocrisy of the commitments of public educators to diversity, to respect for parental rights and values, to critical thinking, and to intellectual inquiry.

Homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder

The increasingly ubiquitous propaganda coming from activist public “educators,” and organizations like Illinois Safe Schools Alliance; the National Education Association; the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network; the Southern Poverty Law Center’s educational division, “Teaching Tolerance“; and the American Library Association compel IFI to spend considerable amount of time addressing the problem of pro-homosexual advocacy in public education and necessitate extra vigilance and courage from parents.

Students are exposed to “progressive” views of homosexuality and GID (euphemistically referred to as “gender identity”) and cross-dressing (euphemistically referred to as “gender expression”) in many school contexts, including English, social studies, foreign language, theater/drama, and health/sex ed classes; assemblies; anti-bullying programs; and through teachers’ classroom comments.

Extracurricular clubs like gay-straight alliances and political action clubs (e.g., AWARE) organize activities like the Day of Silence, make announcements, hold fundraisers, and put up posters that promote “social justice” theory and the normalization of homosexuality during the school day.

The kinds of resources that activist teachers use in their efforts to use public education to change the moral and political views of other people’s children include newspaper and magazine articles; essays; plays (both read and performed); novels; picture books; films; guest speakers; classroom posters, banners, and stickers; and games.

Parents should be especially wary of anti-bullying activities, programs, resources, or curricula. “Anti-bullying” resources and policies are the Trojan Horses for secreting affirmative ideas about homosexuality and GID into public schools, including elementary schools.

To make matters worse, public educators engage in pervasive censorship of all resources that espouse conservative views of homosexual practice and GID. In so doing, they undermine the legitimacy of public education and transform education into indoctrination by violating school commitments to diversity, critical thinking, and intellectual inquiry.

Teaching for “Social Justice”

The second serious problem in public schools is commonly referred to as “teaching for social justice,” which shares some of the philosophical features of “Critical Theory,” “Critical Education Theory,” “Critical Pedagogy,” “Critical Race Theory,” and, within theological circles, “Black Liberation Theology.”

In broad terms, “teaching for social justice” is essentially repackaged socialism with its focus on economic redistribution. Social justice theory emphasizes redistribution of wealth and values uniformity of economic and social position over liberty. “Social justice” advocates seek to use the force of government to establish economic uniformity.

Its other dominant features pertain to race, gender, class, homosexuality, “gender identity,” and “gender expression.” Social justice theory encourages students to view the world through the divisive lens of identity politics that demarcates groups according to which group constitutes the “oppressors” and which the “oppressed.” Those who are identified as the “oppressors” need not have committed any acts of actual persecution or oppression, nor feel any sense of superiority toward or dislike of the supposed “oppressed” class. Social justice theory promotes the problematic idea that “institutional racism,” as opposed to actual acts of mistreatment of individuals by other individuals, is the cause of differing lots in life. Social justice theorists cultivate the racist, sexist, heterophobic stereotype that whites, males, and heterosexuals are automatically oppressors.

Devotees of Critical Pedagogy, that is “teachers of social justice,” present an imbalanced view of America and American history. They overemphasize America’s problems while de-emphasizing all that has made America great.

Former Marxist David Horowitz warns that,

Today the gravest threat to American public education comes from educators who would use the classroom to indoctrinate students from kindergarten through the 12th grade in radical ideology and political agendas.

Much of this indoctrination takes place under the banner of “social justice,” which is a short-hand for opposition to American traditions of individual justice and free market economics. Proponents of social justice teaching argue that American society is an inherently “oppressive” society that is “systemically” racist, “sexist” and “classist” and thus discriminates institutionally against women, non-whites, working Americans and the poor…. In recent years teaching for social justice has become a powerful movement in American schools of education…

Some of the influential Critical theorists are Paulo Freire, Howard Zinn, Maxine Greene, William (Bill Ayers), Peter McLaren, bell hooks, Henry Giroux, Jonathan Kozol, Lisa Delpit, Peggy McIntosh, Herbert Kohl , James Banks, and Cornel West.

The solution begins with us. Indulging our laziness and fear has resulted in vulnerable, impressionable young children being exposed to positive ideas about homosexuality and cross-dressing. And our ignorance and passivity have allowed those who hold distorted views of America to cultivate anti-American sentiments in our nation’s children.

Character Changes:

In order to effect change, we must cultivate those character traits required for the task at hand: courage, perseverance, and a willingness to endure persecution.

Scripture teaches that “Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matt. 5: 10, 11). Despite this clear teaching, many Christians retreat from even the mildest manifestations of persecution.

Informed Minds:

• Taxpayers need to skim the books, plays, essays, and articles their children are assigned and research the books and authors on the Internet.
• Request a detailed description of professional development opportunities that your school districts provide to teachers at taxpayer expense (e.g., late arrival day and Institute Day activities, conferences, seminars, and summer workshops), and request copies of any resources used during these professional development opportunities.
• Urge your church leaders to teach classes or workshops that help members understand the deceptive secular arguments used to normalize homosexuality. If church leaders are themselves ill-equipped, urge them to invite in guest speakers to teach such workshops.

Specific Suggestions for Parents:

• Notify K-8 teachers that under no circumstance is your child to be exposed to any resources or activities that mention homosexuality or Gender Identity Disorder. Ask them to agree in writing to your expectation, and if they won’t, ask for a change of teachers.
• Notify high school teachers that your child is not to be exposed to resources that address homosexuality, Gender Identity Disorder, or “teaching for social justice” unless equal time is spent studying resources that articulate conservative views on the subject.
• If teachers are using resources that espouse either implicitly or explicitly “social justice” ideas or debatable claims about homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder (including issues related to same-sex “marriage,” ), contact the teacher to request that they present resources that espouse alternative views on issues related to “social justice” theory, homosexuality, or Gender Identity Disorder.
• Call your children out of school on the Day of Silence if your school is permitting children to remain silent during class.
• Homeschool middle and high school students for health class.

Policy Changes:

• Ask your schools to create policy that requires teachers to spend equal time on and present equivalent resources from all perspectives on controversial issues. So, if an English teacher assigns The Laramie Project, he should be required to assign, for example, several essays, commentaries, or journal articles written by conservative scholars on the issue of homosexuality.
• Ask your schools to create policy that prohibits ideological litmus tests in hiring. Some school districts are attempting to ensure ideological uniformity among faculty and administrators via the interview process for new hires.
• Ask your schools to create policy that requires parental notification and “opt-in” options for controversial resources, including any that address homosexuality or Gender Identity Disorder.
• Ask your schools to create policy that requires ideological balance in the content of professional development opportunities. So, for example, if a district offers an Institute Day workshop on “teaching for social justice,” they should be required to offer a workshop in which teachers read and analyze criticism of “teaching for social justice.”
• Vigorously oppose the inclusion of the terms “sexual orientation,” “gender identity,” and “gender expression” in anti-discrimination and/or anti-bullying policies.

Broader Community Engagement:

• Taxpayers should make statements to, ask questions of, and run for school boards.
• When a curricular or policy problem is discovered, taxpayers should write letters to their local newspapers.
• Christians should urge their church leaders (e.g., priests, pastors, rabbis, elders, and deacons) to be involved in the schools in the communities in which they live. As citizens, church leaders have both a right and an obligation to participate in shaping a godly community, and they have an obligation to set examples for the men and women whom they lead.

Children in public schools today will very shortly be our culture-makers. If we care about the future health ofAmerica, we should participate in the effort to restore a proper understanding of the role of public educators and the scope of public education.

PURCELLVILLE, Va., Sept. 7/Christian Newswire/ — This week the fate of four homeschooling families will be decided in Botswana. The families, adherents to the Seventh Day Adventist Church, have been ordered by a judge to send their children to public school.

Despite the judges’ findings indicating that the children were cared for and that the parents took steps to provide for the education of their children, they still need to go to public school because Botswana has acceded to the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child (“UNCRC”).

The legal standard under the UNCRC is the “best interests of the child.” In other words, the state has the authority to determine how children should be raised and educated.

“HSLDA has warned about the danger of the UNCRC to homeschooling families. It gives almost unlimited powers to judges to decide how children should be raised,” said Mike Donnelly, Director of International Relations for HSLDA. “We are asking our 85,000 member families to contact the Botswana Embassy and Office of the President of Botswana to protect these families’ basic rights to decide what is best for their children,” he added.

The Botswana families are determined to continue homeschooling. “I must obey God. The schools here are corrupt and teach my children things that go against our faith and our values. I cannot allow them to go to these schools,” said Mr. Modimoothata, a retired technician and father of four teenagers. His wife Margaret is a senior project manager for Botswana railways.

“We find the behavior of the Botswana police and courts outrageous and hope that more responsible leadership will be applied to remedy this situation without undue trauma to these children,” said Leendert Van Oostrum, Director of The Pestalozzi Trust, a South Africa-based homeschooling legal defense organization that is representing the families.

For more information, read the HSLDA article “Homeschoolers Interrogated by Secret Police, Face Imprisonment.”

Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) is a 27-year-old, 85,000 member non-profit organization and the preeminent national association advocating the legal right of parents to homeschool their children.

Bullying in schools is a serious problem that must be addressed. In a misguided, poorly reasoned attempt to address it, Illinois legislators recently passed the disastrous “School Anti-Bullying Act” (SB 3266).

The problem of bullying did not necessitate any new state laws in that virtually every school in the state has more than adequate anti-bullying policy. The problem is not with a lack of policy, and the solution is certainly not this new, poorly constructed law.

For those who naively believe that “anti-bullying” policies, programs, and legislation are centrally about ending bullying, please note where and when Governor Pat Quinn signed into law the Illinois “School Anti-Bullying Act.” The symbolism of the time and place of the signing ceremony points to the real purpose of the legislation, which is to exploit legitimate anti-bullying sentiment and Illinois public schools to undermine traditional beliefs about the nature and morality of homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder. If this legislation were not a Trojan Horse for getting homosexuality-affirming resources into public schools and were truly about addressing all forms of bullying, why would Quinn sign it into law on the Sunday morning of the Chicago “gay pride” parade, and why hold the ceremony at Nettelhorst Elementary School — the Chicago elementary school that has marched in the “gay pride” parade for two years — which happens to be located in the homosexual neighborhood called Boystown?

SB 3266 was initiated by the homosexual advocacy group Illinois Safe Schools Alliance (ISSA), which grew out of the unholy alliance of the Chicago chapter of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) and the Coalition for Education on Sexual Orientation. According to the homosexual newspaper the Edge, “ISSA and its allies and predecessors worked more than a decade to get the legislation passed.” ISSA Executive Director Shannon Sullivan praised the passage of this legislation. You may recognize this name: Shannon Sullivan is the lesbian who has been working to introduce resources that affirm homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder to elementary school children in Oak Park.

Below are some excerpts from the actual text with the most problematic language emphasized:

Bullying on the basis of actual or perceived race, color, religion, sex, national origin, ancestry, age, marital status, physical or mental disability, military status, sexual orientation, gender-related identity or expression….

“Bullying” means any severe or pervasive physical or verbal act or conduct, including communications made in writing or electronically, directed toward a student or students that has or can be reasonably predicted to have the effect of one or more of the following:

…

causing a substantially detrimental effect on the student’s or students’ physical or mental health….

substantially interfering with the student’s or students’ academic performance; or substantially interfering with the student’s or students’ ability to participate in or benefit from the services, activities, or privileges provided by a school….

Bullying, as defined in this subsection (b), may take various forms, including without limitation one or more of the following: harassment, threats, intimidation, stalking, physical violence, sexual harassment, sexual violence, theft, public humiliation, destruction of property, or retaliation for asserting or alleging an act of bullying. This list is meant to be illustrative and non-exhaustive….

Each school district and non-public, non-sectarian elementary or secondary school shall create and maintain a policy on bullying, which policy must be filed with the State Board of Education.

This legislation is disastrous for two reasons.

First, it is disastrous because it is an “enumerated” law which means it includes the terms “sexual orientation” and “gender-related identity or expression” (i.e., “transgenderism,” “transsexuality,” and cross-dressing) in the list of conditions for which students cannot be bullied. Why, in a non-exhaustive list that omits other conditions for which students are bullied, would these two be specifically named? Do our legislators and the crafters of this legislation actually expect the public to believe that there are more students bullied for their same-sex attraction or cross-dressing than for being shy, socially awkward, impulsive, overweight, studious, or athletically challenged? And why not use the proper term for “gender-related identity or expression” which is Gender Identity Disorder (GID)?

The answer is that the motives behind both the inclusion of these particular terms as well as the refusal to use the correct term, GID, are wholly political. Those who proposed and promoted this legislation are seeking to end bullying based on “real or perceived” homosexuality or GID by transforming the moral and political views of students. This new law with its inclusion of the terms “sexual orientation” and “gender-related identity and expression” will be used to introduce resources that implicitly and explicitly affirm homosexuality and GID in even elementary schools and will be used to simultaneously censor resources that espouse traditional views.

Second, it is disastrous because of its ambiguity. For example, the bill identifies bullying as “any severe verbal conduct that can be reasonably predicted to cause a substantially detrimental effect on a student’s mental health.”

• How is the vague phrase “substantially detrimental effect” defined? If a teacher brought in two scholars to debate same-sex adoption and one of the conservative scholar’s arguments was that homosexual acts are inherently morally flawed, could a homosexual student claim that he experienced a substantially detrimental effect on his mental health? Or what if a classmate made such a point in a classroom discussion?
• Do athletic codes that prohibit genetic males from joining the girls’ swim team “substantially interfere” with the ability of a boy who has GID to “participate in the activities provided by the school”?
• What if a teacher in order to have students study both sides of the public debate on same-sex marriage assigned reading from conservative scholars or columnists that asserted that same-sex marriage should not be legalized because homosexual practice is not moral? Could a homosexual student claim that he was publicly humiliated?
• Does this new legislation render illegal a high school dress code that prohibits boys from wearing lipstick and dresses to school?
• If a school counselor were to provide a student or his parents with information about GID counseling, could that be considered gender identity discrimination or bullying if the student claimed the provision of such information humiliated him or had a detrimental effect on his health?
• If a school prohibited a boy with GID from using the girls’ bathrooms, could the school be found liable for violating this law?
• Does this require all public and private non-religious schools to create policy on bullying that specifically mentions “sexual orientation” and “gender-related identity and expression”?

Since the list of bases on which bullying is prohibited is deliberately “non-exhaustive,” what is the justification for the exclusion of other conditions for which students may be bullied? The current legislation gives examples from three broad categories of conditions but offers no reasons for the inclusion of some conditions and the exclusion of others:

1. Disorders (e.g., GID): Why does the bill include only one disorder (i.e., GID) while excluding other disorders, like Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), Attention Deficit Hyper-Active Disorder (ADHD), Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), anorexia, bulimia, and Aspberger’s Syndrome, all of which can lead to behaviors for which kids are bullied? And why does the bill not use the correct designation, Gender Identity Disorder, rather than the politically biased terms “gender-related identity and expression”? It seems likely that there are more students in public schools who are ridiculed for behaviors related to ADD, ADHD, or Aspberger’s Syndrome than there are students who are ridiculed for behaviors related to GID.

The inclusion of only this one psychological disorder and the failure to use the correct designation reflect the acceptance of particular assumptions regarding the nature and morality of cross-dressing that are controversial and unproven. The use of the politically biased phrase, “gender-related identity and expression” exposes the political nature of this bill and the influence of the “transgender”-affirming Illinois Safe Schools Alliance in the creation of this legislation.

2. Conditions centrally defined by impulses and volitional behavior that carry moral implications (e.g., “sexual orientation” and Gender Identity Disorder): Why does the bill exclude other behaviors that many consider immoral and for which kids may be bullied, like “sexting,” aggression, stealing, plagiarizing, drug use, and promiscuity? For example, students who use drugs are called “druggies” and “stoners,” and girls who are promiscuous are called “sluts” and “hos.” Obviously, schools no more need policy that specifically mentions homosexuality to protect homosexual students than they need policy that mentions promiscuity in order to protect promiscuous students.

The reason that no other conditions that are centrally defined by desire and volitional acts that many deem immoral are included is that the crafters of this legislation seek to use law to promote the unproven belief that homosexuality and GID are analogous to race. By including these conditions in a list of morally neutral conditions, they seek to reinforce implicitly their false assumption that homosexuality and GID are morally neutral. Indeed, the use of the political term “sexual orientation,” which embodies the ideas of biological determinism, immutability, and moral neutrality, rather than “homosexuality” further exposes the political nature of this legislation. When crafting their own policy, schools should replace “sexual orientation” with the less political term “homosexuality.” (Further, when replacing the term “sexual orientation,” there is no reason to add the term “bisexuality,” because no one is bullied for the heterosexual part of bisexuality.)

3. Conditions that carry no moral implications (e.g., race, sex, and disability): the crafters of this bill excluded other morally neutral conditions for which far more students are bullied, like obesity, nearsightedness, farsightedness, acne, speech impediments, shyness, social awkwardness, or lack of athletic ability. These omissions further reveal the political nature of this legislation.

Focus on the Family’s anti-bullying project, True Tolerance, warns against the inclusion of specific categories:

Listing certain categories creates a system ripe for reverse discrimination, sending the message that certain characteristics are more worthy of protection than others. Instead of bringing more peace and unity, this can politicize the school environment and introduce divisiveness among different groups of students and parents.

A more general, and therefore more inclusive, description would be far superior. It’s too bad Illinois legislators didn’t consider the apolitical, concise, and inclusive anti-bullying policy created by the Alliance Defense Fund.

The new Illinois law requires the creation of a fifteen-member Task Force whose responsibility it will be to make recommendations “for preventing and addressing bullying in schools in this State.” The Task Force is required by this bill to include a high school or college student who has been bullied. This student should be someone who has been bullied for characteristics such as race or disability that have no behavioral manifestations about which there is moral controversy.

The Task Force must also include representatives from organizations that address bullying. To avoid yet even more policy blunders, these representatives should be from organizations that are not centrally concerned with the partisan socio-political goal of normalizing homosexuality. To avoid the appearance of being a tool for the homosexual movement, the Task Force should exclude representatives from GLSEN and the Safe Schools Alliance or balance them with representatives from conservative organizations like IFI.

So far only twelve states, including, unfortunately, Illinois, have anti-bullying legislation that specifically mentions “sexual orientation” and “gender identity/expression.” The inclusion of these terms in anti-bullying policies and legislation allows homosexualists to use them as cultural battering rams to destroy First Amendment speech and religious protections. The central purpose of the inclusion of these terms in legislation and policy is not to protect homosexuals and “transgenders” but to censor the expression of traditional moral beliefs and ultimately eradicate them.

Below is a speech written by Dennis Prager that he recommends every American high school principal deliver at the start of the school year. In addition to encouraging you to read this remarkable speech, IFI is urging taxpayers to send this speech to their superintendents, principals, directors for curriculum and instruction, and every one of the members of their high schools’ boards of education. Then forward this article and our request to friends all over the state and the country.

We harbor no illusions: no principal will deliver this speech. But we hope that it will “raise the consciousness” of administrators and board members regarding the nature and consequences of the serious ideological and pedagogical problems infecting public education. We further hope it will make them aware that the citizens who pay their salaries are concerned. If schools adopted even some of the proposals Prager recommends, our schools would improve dramatically.

You can find the email addresses of your administrators and board members on your school district’s website. This should take no more than about ten minutes of your time. This is a small sacrifice that requires little in the way of time, effort, or courage.

If every school principal gave this speech at the beginning of the next school year, America would be a better place.

To the students and faculty of our high school:

I am your new principal, and honored to be so. There is no greater calling than to teach young people.

I would like to apprise you of some important changes coming to our school. I am making these changes because I am convinced that most of the ideas that have dominated public education in America have worked against you, against your teachers and against our country.

First, this school will no longer honor race or ethnicity. I could not care less if your racial makeup is black, brown, red, yellow or white. I could not care less if your origins are African, Latin American, Asian or European, or if your ancestors arrived here on the Mayflower or on slave ships.

The only identity I care about, the only one this school will recognize, is your individual identity — your character, your scholarship, your humanity. And the only national identity this school will care about is American. This is an American public school, and American public schools were created to make better Americans.

If you wish to affirm an ethnic, racial or religious identity through school, you will have to go elsewhere. We will end all ethnicity-, race- and non-American nationality-based celebrations. They undermine the motto of America, one of its three central values — e pluribus unum, “from many, one.” And this school will be guided by America’s values.

This includes all after-school clubs. I will not authorize clubs that divide students based on any identities. This includes race, language, religion, sexual orientation or whatever else may become in vogue in a society divided by political correctness.

Your clubs will be based on interests and passions, not blood, ethnic, racial or other physically defined ties. Those clubs just cultivate narcissism — an unhealthy preoccupation with the self — while the purpose of education is to get you to think beyond yourself. So we will have clubs that transport you to the wonders and glories of art, music, astronomy, languages you do not already speak, carpentry and more. If the only extracurricular activities you can imagine being interesting in are those based on ethnic, racial or sexual identity, that means that little outside of yourself really interests you.

Second, I am uninterested in whether English is your native language. My only interest in terms of language is that you leave this school speaking and writing English as fluently as possible. The English language has united America’s citizens for over 200 years, and it will unite us at this school. It is one of the indispensable reasons this country of immigrants has always come to be one country. And if you leave this school without excellent English language skills, I would be remiss in my duty to ensure that you will be prepared to successfully compete in the American job market. We will learn other languages here — it is deplorable that most Americans only speak English — but if you want classes taught in your native language rather than in English, this is not your school.

Third, because I regard learning as a sacred endeavor, everything in this school will reflect learning’s elevated status. This means, among other things, that you and your teachers will dress accordingly. Many people in our society dress more formally for Hollywood events than for church or school. These people have their priorities backward. Therefore, there will be a formal dress code at this school.

Fourth, no obscene language will be tolerated anywhere on this school’s property — whether in class, in the hallways or at athletic events. If you can’t speak without using the f-word, you can’t speak. By obscene language I mean the words banned by the Federal Communications Commission, plus epithets such as “Nigger,” even when used by one black student to address another black, or “bitch,” even when addressed by a girl to a girlfriend. It is my intent that by the time you leave this school, you will be among the few your age to instinctively distinguish between the elevated and the degraded, the holy and the obscene.

Fifth, we will end all self-esteem programs. In this school, self-esteem will be attained in only one way — the way people attained it until decided otherwise a generation ago — by earning it. One immediate consequence is that there will be one valedictorian, not eight.

Sixth, and last, I am reorienting the school toward academics and away from politics and propaganda. No more time will devoted to scaring you about smoking and caffeine, or terrifying you about sexual harassment or global warming. No more semesters will be devoted to condom wearing and teaching you to regard sexual relations as only or primarily a health issue. There will be no more attempts to convince you that you are a victim because you are not white, or not male, or not heterosexual or not Christian. We will have failed if any one of you graduates this school and does not consider him or herself inordinately lucky — to be alive and to be an American.

Now, please stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of our country. As many of you do not know the words, your teachers will hand them out to you.

Dennis Prager, one of America’s most respected radio talk show hosts, has been broadcasting in Los Angeles since 1982. Dennis Prager’s popular show became nationally syndicated in 1999 and airs live, Monday through Friday, 9am to 12pm (Pacific Time), 12pm to 3pm (Eastern) from his home station, KRLA.

Dennis Prager was a Fellow at Columbia University’s School of International Affairs, where he did graduate work at the Middle East and Russian Institutes. Dennis Prager was appointed by President Ronald Reagan to the U.S. Delegation to the Vienna Review Conference on the Helsinki Accords. He holds an honorary doctorate of law from Pepperdine University.

Dennis Prager has lectured on all 7 continents, in 45 U.S. states and in 9 of Canada’s 10 provinces. He has lectured in Russian in Russia, and in Hebrew in Israel. Hundreds of his lectures are available on tape at his website www.dennisprager.com.

Educators in Helena, Montanahave proposed a health curriculum that includes ideas so controversial that it is gaining national attention. Please read this article about what’s taking place in Montanabecause there are activist ideologues right here in Illinoiswho would like to see similar curricula in our elementary schools.

At a recent contentious school board meeting, one woman attempted to justify this curriculum by claiming that some families are not teaching this material to their own children. She expressed worry about “the kids whose parents never show up for school functions, who don’t talk to their kids at all, who provide no information, and possibly lead turbulent lives.”

Wow. Does she actually know families in her town who “don’t talk to their kids at all” and who “provide no information” and who “lead turbulent lives”? And does she actually think the solution to such an extreme family situation is to provide detailed, controversial information about sexual matters that are intimately entwined with personal belief systems, including religious belief systems, to all children?

Here are some of the ideas that this mother thinks will solve the ills that befall children raised in negligent families and that some public servants believe will improve the lives of all children (Italicized sections are quotes from theMontana health curriculum.)

Kindergarten:

Introduce basic reproductive body parts (penis, vagina, breast, nipples, testicles, scrotum, uterus)

No young child has any intrinsic or compelling need to know the anatomically correct terms for body parts related to sexual (or excretory) functions. Despite “progressive” declamations to the contrary, young children function quite well using colloquial terms that many parents find more charming, more euphonious, and less clinical. If communication is the point of language, “tush” seems to work as well as “buttocks.”

Do these language police object to parents using the word “noggin” instead of head; or “tummy” instead of abdomen or stomach; or “pointer” rather than “index finger”; or “peepers” instead of “eyes”? Are these pedagogues going to insist society use the correct term, “laryngeal prominence,” rather than the colloquial term, “Adam’s Apple”?

Recognize small children make many decisions, such as what clothes to wear, [or] which toys to play with…

For those unaccustomed to reading between the lines of subversive educational material, this is intended to prepare students to think affirmatively about “gender fluidity,” “gender identity,” or “gender non-conformity,” more accurately known as Gender Identity Disorder. In discussions of “gender identity,” I wonder if they will explain to children that it is disorder, and I wonder if they will explain to children that there is considerable scientific research proving that there are many real, measurable differences between boys and girls. I wonder if they will explain at any point in grades K-12 that amputating healthy penises or breasts and cross-dressing does not actually change the biological sex of the confused patient. After all, we wouldn’t want any child to think that his or her mother’s mastectomy has rendered her a man.

Recognize that family structures differ

“Family structures,” like the term “family diversity” is an umbrella term to secrete discussions of families led by homosexuals into the classroom without parents realizing. For those who mistakenly believe that these discussions are value-neutral, please note that discussions of diverse family structures do include families that are led by homosexuals while excluding families led by incestuous couples or polyamorous families. The reason for these exclusions is not that there are few of these family structures, but rather that the inclusion of them would serve to normalize structures that are viewed as immoral. So, the inclusion of families led by homosexuals reveals the presence of approval of homosexuality.

Grade 1:

Understand human beings can love people of the same gender & people of another gender.

This falls under the “Human Sexuality” category in the health curriculum, so it is clear that this statement refers to sexual and romantic love. It is equally clear that this statement embodies an implicit moral claim. Imagine if the statement were “Understand that human beings can love one person or more than one person at the same time,” or that it said “Understand that human beings can love people who are not blood-related and people who are close blood relations.”

Grade 2:

Understand making fun of people by calling them gay (e.g., “homo,” “fag,” “queer”) is disrespectful & hurtful.

No one should be called names, but why use homosexual epithets when there are so many conditions for which children are bullied? In addition, would teachers make clear during discussions of homosexual epithets that statements of moral disapproval of homosexual acts do not constitute bullying? Those parents of elementary school children who are successfully able to protect their children from images of and ideas about homosexuality should not have to worry about their public school exposing them to this serious sin.

Acknowledge that individuals & families have a variety of values as it pertains to sexual behaviors.

Really? At an age when many parents have not discussed sexual behaviors at all, schools are going to introduce sexual relativism?

Grade 3:

Demonstrate empathy and understanding towards families who have ended or are in the process of ending committed relationships.

The creators of this curriculum evidently concluded that teaching children to be empathic and understanding about divorce or the ending of committed relationships is more important than teaching children about the devastating impact of divorce on children. Many would argue that teaching children from a young age about the impact and legacy of divorce would better serve children and society than creating in children positive feelings about divorce. (As an aside, if a relationship is ending, it is not “committed.”)

Grade 4:

Define stereotype – the belief that all people of the same gender should behave the same way.

If the goal is simply to define stereotype, why choose gender? This is a stratagem for normalizing cross-dressing and other troubling manifestations of Gender Identity Disorder.

Grade 5:

Understand that sexual intercourse includes but is not limited to vaginal, oral, or anal penetration.

Have the designers of this curriculum entertained the possibility that there are students who have not heard about anal or oral sex (or whatever other forms of penetration these educators hope to introduce) by fifth grade, and therefore the school would be introducing them to new and potentially troubling ideas and practices?

Understand sexual orientation refers to a person’s physical and/or romantic attraction to an individual of the same and/or different gender, and is one part of ones’ personality.

“Sexual orientation” is a politically loaded term created by the homosexuality-affirming lobby to give disordered attraction and immoral behavior a patina of normality, heritability, and immutability. It is intended to reinforce the false comparison of homosexuality to race.

Grades 9-12:

Understand erotic images in art reflect society’s views about sexuality & help people understand sexuality.

Why do high school students need to understand erotic images in art? Most high school students never study non-erotic images in art. Why, in this decadent, post-modern society that is swimming in pornography, would “educators” think that public schools’ pedagogical task includes exposing students to more erotic imagery?

If the pedagogical goal is to help students better understand sexuality, why not expose them to both contemporary and historical thinkers on this issue to learn how societies throughout history have viewed sexuality?

If the goal is to help students better understand art, why not teach them about how Christianity has inspired much of the greatest art ever created from sculpture to architecture to painting to literature to music?

The woman who spoke in defense of this curriculum should be asked why any very young children, including those with negligent parents, need to be taught the technical names for sexual anatomy, or about gender non-conformity, or about families led by homosexuals, or about homosexual epithets, or about homosexual attraction, or about erotic art.

Presumptuous educators have expanded the purview of their jobs to encompass anything they want to teach. And the expansion pertains in large measure to “progressive,” value-laden, controversial subjects. There are all sorts of important subjects about which our schools could teach our children and which would be more suitable for public schools. For example, even many secular educators argue that biblical literacy is critical for a solid understanding of literature and history. Children should be taught more mythology and poetry, and more about the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. They could benefit from learning Latin. And how about modesty. I think society would be well served by inculcating children from young ages with the value of modesty.

Some believe that it is critical for children to know the developmental facts about fetal development before the age at which girls can conceive. They also want children to know what happens to a pre-born baby during abortion, prior to the age at which some girls may seek an abortion. And they want children to know about the possible emotional and physical risks of abortion before the age of fertility. Some parents don’t share this critical information, and therefore–according to progressive educators–it’s incumbent upon public schools to provide it. This information will likely be relevant to far greater numbers of students than will information about Gender Identity Disorder. I wonder if the Helena, Montana Board of Education would consider adding this information to their health curriculum.

Some families are failing to provide factual information about homosexuality. Parents are not telling their children that there is no science proving biological causation. They are not telling children that there are thousands of men and women who have renounced homosexuality and now live heterosexual lives. Parents are not telling their children about the astonishing rates of HIV infection among the group the Centers for Disease Control refers to as “men who have sex with men.” Many parents are not telling their children about the voluminous social science research that demonstrates that children fare best when raised by a mother and father. Since parents are failing to provide this factual information, perhaps public schools should.

Or perhaps presumptuous public educators should reduce the scope of their ambitions regarding what they teach other people’s children. They are robbing children of their innocence, undermining parental rights, and breaking down natural and good barriers of modesty before they even have a chance to develop.

Virtually every idea related to homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder that is presented to children in public schools today represents an unproven, non-factual philosophical, political, or moral assumption. Parents and other taxpayers who care about children, parental rights, the future health of this country, and truth must be vigilant about the resources to which their children are exposed and courageous and tenacious in opposing curricula like the one community members are boldly opposing in Montana. Be especially wary of health curricula and anti-bullying resources because those are the cunning means by which activist ideologues are bringing in homosexuality affirming resources to our elementary schools.

Written by Teri Paulson

Deficiencies in Public Education

I am a product of Illinois public schools. I was raised in the Wheaton area and attended public schools for 14 years, including a four-year degree at a public university. I paid attention in class. I studied. I got good grades. I learned what they had to teach. I only mention that because of the next thing I’m going to say: I did not learn what I needed to know to understand or appreciate my country, either its history or the principles upon which it was founded. And I did not learn what I needed to know to defend liberty and self-government.

I have learned more about my country and the tremendous truths upon which it was founded in the last few years than I learned in the first four decades of my life.

When Benjamin Franklin emerged from the long debates of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, he was asked, “Well doctor, what have we got? A republic or a monarchy?” He cryptically replied, “A republic, if you can keep it.” That was not a joke.

Our Founding Fathers believed that future generations of Americans would need three things in order to keep the republic they had created. Those three things were religion, morality, and knowledge. They were so convinced of this that they enacted legislation that embodied these principles that same year. The Northwest Ordinance states:

“Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.” [Emphasis added]

Our Founding Fathers believed that children needed to be educated and well-versed in these three things in order to preserve the freedom they had been given, and that America’s schools were to be the vehicle for that education. These beliefs were so strong in America’s early years that for some time thereafter state after state incorporated this same wording into their constitutions.

If their convictions were true, we are in deep trouble because we have already eliminated religion, and from what I have experienced in my children’s classes, morality and even knowledge are under attack.

I did not learn what I needed to know in order to maintain and defend the great freedoms I have inherited, and I’m afraid that our children are learning even less.

I’m the mother of two teenagers, both of whom attended a District 211 high school last year. Here are just a couple of the troubling experiences we encountered in just one class:

My son came home from the first day of school last year and told me that his social studies teacher had announced to the class that he was a passionate liberal and he hoped that there were a lot of conservative students in class because he liked to debate them. When I emailed this teacher to ask if my son had understood him correctly, I received an angry denial in return.

When I was in this teacher’s classroom for Parent Orientation Night last September, I noticed several posters on the walls: one of Malcolm X, four of organized labor, three posters of Che Guevara, and one of Chairman Mao. If these posters of historically important figures had been balanced with posters of historically important conservative figures, there would be no problem. But they were no posters of conservative men or women. This teacher’s posters clearly were not intended to educate students about history but to announce the philosophical and political viewpoints of the teacher — a paid public servant.

Like many teachers these days, this particular teacher shows a lot of videos in his class. Here are just a few:

• A film about a boy who was raised as a girl
• Walmart: The High Cost of Low Prices
• 30 Days: Straight Man in a Gay World
• Tough Guise (This is a film that claims that the media is controlled by rich, white men and American men are becoming more and more violent as a backlash against gains made by women and gays.)

Consider also, the following:

• Highland ParkHigh Schoolcancelled a girls’ basketball team trip to AZ because, according to the District 113 spokesperson, “the trip would not be aligned with our beliefs and values.” Whose beliefs and values? The students? The taxpayers or the educators? If that’s what’s happening on the basketball court, what is happening in the classroom?
• Former Weather Underground terrorist, Bill Ayers lectured students atNapervilleNorthHigh school and was invited to speak atHerseyHigh School.
• Students in a Freshman Honors class atHerseyHigh Schoolwere given a handout which blamed the Catholic Church for poverty in third world countries.
• The Things They Carried is a book taught in our District 15 junior high schools and manyIllinois high schools. It is an ugly anti-military novel about the Viet Nam War that declares, “A true war story is never moral…If a story seems moral, do not believe it…” There is no morality in war? Really? In one scene, a stereotypically deranged soldier dismembers a live baby water buffalo by shooting it apart piece by piece. Is that the image of military service we want to give our children? How terribly insulting to our courageous young men and women now fighting for us overseas!
• For the last four years, to commemorate Constitution Day, William Fremd High School has brought in speakers from only the ACLU to lecture students on the Constitution.
• The chapter on the Constitution in my son’s American history textbook was titled, “The Living Constitution.“
• My daughter’s 8th grade social studies book had a chapter on 911 and the recent rise of terrorism. The words ‘Muslim’ and ‘Islam’ were never used once.

Are our kids receiving the knowledge they need to become informed and responsible citizens capable of preserving freedom and self-government?

I don’t believe they are. It would appear that one whole side of the conversation is missing as conservative materials and thought are largely censored in our public schools. This shouldn’t be a fight between liberals and conservatives. We should all be able to agree that a good education includes both sides of controversial issues.

And then there is the third pillar of our founding fathers’ vision for public education: morality. Consider the following:

• The Glenbrook North High School spring musical this year had a cast of characters that included a gay drag queen, a stripper and a bi-sexual performance artist.
• PalatineHigh School,ElkGroveHigh SchoolandHighland ParkHigh Schoolhave all mounted a student production of the musical Urinetown.
• Three years ago theWheelingHigh Schoolstudent newspaper featured an article that declared oral sex to be the “new romantic norm” for casual dating.
• A North Shore student was offered the option of spending time in the detention room after his parents opted him out of viewing an R-rated movie that included Demi Moore giving herself an abortion with knitting needles.
• DeerfieldHigh Schoolhas a mandatory Freshman Advisory class in which homosexual, bi-sexual, and transgender upperclassmen discuss their sexual attractions with freshmen.
• Students in Glenbard North health classes were given a survey, which asked them how they knew they were heterosexual if they had never had a good same-sex lover?

What are we doing to our kids?

Contrary to our Founding Fathers’ belief that public schools should be in the business of building up morality, much of this seems specifically designed to tear it down-especially sexual morality-an area in which our kids are so very vulnerable.

Consider the books. Some of you may remember a few years ago when there was a controversy about obscene content in books used in District 214 English classes. I’m here to tell you that those same books can be found in high schools all acrossIllinois.

• Beloved is required reading in many junior and senior English classes. It’s a novel set in the time of slavery that hits you between the eyes in the very first chapter with multiple references to men engaging in sexual activity with cows. One of the reasons this book is so widely read in our schools is that it is included on the Advance Placement Suggested Reading List. This suggests to me that the lack of sound moral judgment has become epidemic among our educators. To add insult to injury, although Beloved is commonly taught in Senior Advance Placement English, it is written at a sixth-grade reading level…
• A book called The Perks of Being a Wallflower is about the ‘perks’ of being a voyeur to lots of teenagers having lots of sex. It appeared on a suggested reading list for gifted 7th graders in District 15 and is taught in manyIllinoishigh schools.
• Deerfield and Highland Park High Schools taught Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes whose cast of characters includes a black, homosexual, drag queen nurse with a heart of gold, and an Angel whose ‘activities’ would cause a porn star to blush.

Those are just three problem texts, but there are many more. Despite what they may think, teachers do not have the right to expose other people’s children to this kind of material.

Parents and other taxpayers are largely unaware that students are routinely being exposed to this kind of material at school. They are almost universally stunned when they actually read the content. Their first question is always, “Why? Why would teachers choose to give our kids this kind of material when there are so many other choices available?”

It is important to refute the lie that educators have used so successfully to frame this issue. They have wrongly identified community concerns with obscene or highly controversial resources as book banning or censorship. This is not about book banning or censorship. It’s about where to draw the line. Parents have a legitimate concern regarding the kind of materials chosen for their kids. This is a choice. Do we want educators to choose materials that inspire good character and elevate young minds or degrade them?

But if you have doubts, I implore you to read the challenged books yourself or excerpts from them. Decide for yourself if these are the best resources we can find to shape the minds and hearts of students.

I will close by saying that as concerned as I am about what is being taught in our classrooms, I’m nearly as grieved about what is not being taught. We sit on a mountain of wisdom accumulated over the ages and often at great sacrifice-wisdom from men like Plato, Augustine, Tocqueville, Burke, Madison, Hamilton, Jay, and Jefferson. In their stead, we give students gay drag queens, deranged soldiers, and men with cows. We sit on a veritable feast of true knowledge yet feed our kids crumbs. While most students graduate never having read Dante, Donne, Milton, or Austen, our best and brightest students almost invariably read Beloved. Public education is guilty of crimes of both commission and omission.

Abraham Lincoln said, “The philosophy of the classroom in one generation will be the philosophy of the government in the next.” Our nation is in trouble. Could it be that we are now beginning to reap an intellectual and cultural decline from the seeds sown for decades in the classrooms of America? What kind of government will the classrooms of today produce?

These are public schools.

This is our money.

These are our kids.

We are the public.

We can do better.

Examples of hypocrisy and viewpoint and religious discrimination are tumbling out of academia faster than I can keep track of. The latest is from the problem-ridden Universityof Illinois(U of I), or as I have come to think of it, the gang that couldn’t shoot straight (no pun intended).

U of I has fired adjunct professor, Dr. Kenneth Howell, who has taught for nine years in the Department of Religion. Most recently, he taught “Introduction to Catholicism” and “Modern Catholic Thought.” From all reports, it appears that Dr. Howell was fired essentially for being Catholic.

According to the News-Gazette, “One of his lectures in the introductory class on Catholicism focuses on the application of natural law theory to a social issue.” To help his students prepare for an exam, Dr. Howell, who is open with his students that he is Catholic, sent a lengthy email explaining what the Catholic doctrine of natural law would say about homosexual acts, including the following:

NML says that Morality must be a response to REALITY. In other words, sexual acts are only appropriate for people who are complementary, not the same. How do we know this? By looking at REALITY. Men and women are complementary in their anatomy, physiology, and psychology. Men and women are not interchangeable. So, a moral sexual act has to be between persons that are fitted for that act….Natural Moral Theory says that if we are to have healthy sexual lives, we must return to a connection between procreation and sex. Why? Because that is what is REAL. It is based on human sexual anatomy and physiology. Human sexuality is inherently unitive and procreative. If we encourage sexual relations that violate this basic meaning, we will end up denying something essential about our humanity, about our feminine and masculine nature.

Subsequently, a friend of a student in Dr. Howell’s class sent an email to the department chair, Robert McKim, accusing Dr. Howell of engaging in “‘hate speech,'” saying that “‘The courses at this institution should be geared to contribute to the public discourse and promote independent thought; not limit one’s worldview and ostracize people of a certain sexual orientation.'” This email resulted in Dr. Howell’s firing.

I have two questions for this student:

1. How would teaching Catholic (or Orthodox Jewish, or Muslim, or orthodox Protestant) beliefs on homosexuality undermine public discourse, inhibit independent thought, or ostracize those who self-identify as homosexual?
2. And how in his view could a professor teach these theological beliefs without undermining public discourse, inhibiting independent thought, or ostracizing homosexuals?

Let’s imagine that the Department of Religion has a faculty member who teaches a course on the doctrines of Islam, which hold that homosexuality is a sin; and let’s imagine further that he has the good fortune of having a book published on some aspect of Islam and on this book jacket, the professor is identified as a Muslim. As a result, his students would know that he likely believes that homosexuality is a sin. Would this professor be fired? And would such a firing constitute religious discrimination, which one would think would be prohibited by school anti-discrimination policy?

One tool in the cliche “toolbox” of activist ideologues currently ensconced in our ivory towers is to unilaterally change the definition of words and then enforce those unilateral redefinitions on society — redefinitions that conveniently disadvantage their philosophical opponents. So, redefine “hatred” to mean “moral beliefs with which I disagree” and then charge those who hold them with hatred. Voilà, sexual traditionalists become haters. So simple, so simplistic, so irrational — and yet so effective.

According to Ann Mester, associate dean for the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, “‘the e-mails sent by Dr. Howell violate university standards of inclusivity, which would then entitle us to have him discontinue his teaching arrangement with us.'” (In plain English, Mester’s tortured, obfuscatory rhetoric, “entitle us to have him discontinue his teaching arrangement,” means they can fire him.) Apparently these standards of “inclusivity” strictly exclude anyone who believes homosexual practice is immoral. One wonders if Dr. Howell would have been permitted to teach the Catholic views on homosexuality as long as he didn’t actually hold those views himself.

If professor A were to express her belief that adult consensual incest is immoral, would she be fired because her belief constitutes hatred of those involved in incest and therefore violate the university’s Orwellian policy of inclusivity?

If professor B were to express his belief that polyamory is immoral, would he be fired because his belief constitutes — in the university’s omniscient, omnipotent mind — hatred of polyamorists and therefore violates its standards of inclusivity?

Have U of I’s standards of “inclusivity” become the de facto arbiter of morality for the entire faculty, determining which moral beliefs about behaviors are acceptable and which are not? It might behoove the university to spell out which beliefs are included under their policy of inclusivity — and which are excluded — because some employees might foolishly assume that the university’s standards of inclusivity would include Catholics.

And how are these standards — standards that evidently require the firing of anyone who believes homosexual acts are immoral — reconciled with commitments to intellectual inquiry, critical thinking, and diversity? As conservatives are well aware, when it comes to the contentious topic of homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder, many “educational” institutions have become academic gulags, freely engaging in censorship and routinely violating their own commitments to intellectual inquiry, diversity, inclusivity, and tolerance.

In attempting to rationalize the teaching of obscene or thematically controversial resources, I have heard “educators” sanctimoniously declare that teachers must “challenge biases and assumptions” and that they must teach texts that address controversial issues in order to prepare students for the real world. Curiously, they never seem to feel obliged to present resources that challenge liberal biases and assumptions on homosexuality. And they never feel obliged to present resources that espouse conservative views on the controversies swirling around homosexuality in order to prepare students for the real world.

Ah, but these enemies of exclusion have a rationalization for their own hypocrisy. They redefine yet another term: safety. “Safety” conventionally understood by ordinary people and defined by dictionaries means “freedom from danger, risk or injury.” But to activist ideologues it means freedom from emotional discomfort. Using this freshly minted term, these “educators” argue that students who identify as homosexual “feel bad” when they encounter resources that express moral disapproval of homosexual acts, and if they feel bad, they’re unsafe.

The problem is that these “educators” couldn’t care less about the uncomfortable feelings of Orthodox Jews, Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, or secular conservatives who are regularly exposed to resources that identify their deeply held moral convictions about homosexual practice as homophobic, hateful, and intolerant.

Moreover, in a society — and especially an academic institution — that truly values diversity, intellectual inquiry, the exchange of ideas, debate and dialogue, and the First Amendment, we will encounter ideas that make us feel uncomfortable. The only way to ensure that no student feels bad is to engage in censorship of all resources that discuss contentious issues.

Here is an excerpt from U of I’s diversity commitment statement:

As a member of the University of Illinois community, I commit to supporting Inclusive Illinois.
I will encourage the expression of different voices, perspectives, and ideas.
I will challenge my own beliefs, opinions, and viewpoints.

How will the firing of Dr. Howell encourage the expression of different voices, perspectives, and ideas?

And how does his firing for teaching Catholic doctrine in a class about Catholic doctrine square with the university’s purported desire to encourage students to challenge their own beliefs, opinions, and viewpoints?

Whoever is responsible for creating these misbegotten “standards of inclusivity” or implementing them in such a misguided way as to exclude anyone whose moral views on homosexuality differ from the zeitgeist of the academy is guilty of the very crime with which conservatives are relentlessly charged. They are guilty of imposing their unproven, non-factual, faith-based moral assumptions on others.

The beliefs that homosexuality is morally equivalent to heterosexuality and that disapproval of homosexual acts inherently constitutes hatred of persons are neither objective facts, nor true. It is deeply troubling that this kind of provincialism and hypocrisy are allowed to persist at a public university subsidized by the taxes of diverse Illinoisans with diverse moral beliefs.

Read more:

Ill. prof. fired for teaching about Catholic beliefs in class on Catholicism (Alliance Defense Fund)

The E-Mail that Got Dr. Kenneth Howell Fired at U. of Illinois (Americans for Truth)

Caveat Emptor: Let the buyer beware. That’s one of the serious problems plaguing public schools: buyers–that would be taxpayers–rarely have any real sense of the product–that would be the teachers and administrators–that they’re “buying.”

I may be wrong, but I suspect that few Oak Park and River Forest High School (District 200) taxpayers know much about the pedagogical, political, and moral views of Dan Cohen, who is leaving Deerfield High School to become their English Department Chair (English Division Head).

Those taxpayers who subscribe to historical revisionism, critical pedagogy, critical race theory, and “teaching for social justice” (which is a euphemism for using public schools to promote grievance or racialist identity politics) will be over the moon with this hire. Those who revere former Weather Underground domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, Brazilian Marxist Paulo Freire, historical revisionist Howard Zinn, and racialist Glenn Singleton will likely have thrills going up their legs.

But those who find the views of these theorists flawed and those of any philosophical stripe who don’t believe tax dollars should be used to promote unproven and controversial political or moral beliefs in the classroom may be deeply troubled by the hiring of Dan Cohen.

While an English teacher atDeerfieldHigh School, Dan Cohen was a “progressive” activist extraordinaire. Here are just some of the programs he was involved in promoting and which he, if left unmonitored, just may implement in District 200.

• Dan Cohen introduced Peggy McIntosh‘s Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity” (SEED) curriculum to District 113, a curriculum that continues to bedevil the district to this day. As I’ve written before, SEED is a quintessential “social justice” curriculum that encourages both teachers and students to view the world through the divisive lens of identity politics, which separates the world into groups according to who are the purported oppressors and who the oppressed. This requires the stereotyping of people and robs minority students of a sense of agency in and responsibility for their own lives. Even more troubling, SEED promotes subversive views of the nature and morality of homosexuality.   (For more information on SEED, click Here)
• Dan Cohen brought the partisan political action club AWARE to the district. AWARE is an acronym for Anti-War Anti-Racism Effort. Of course, no rational person wants war and no moral person supports racism, but AWARE espouses a particular political and philosophical ideology that is similar to that of SEED.
• Dan Cohen helped co-teach District 113’s Equity and Excellence workshops which grew out of the racialist theories of Glenn Singleton.
• Dan Cohen led a workshop during an Institute Day in District 113, which he described as follows:

“Whiteness: Making the Invisible Visible and How It Impacts Our School Culture”:

Description: In what ways is race relevant for a predominately white school district? In this session we will learn to see whiteness as we read Peggy Macintosh’s “Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” Then we will study how whiteness and white culture operate in District 113. This will be done through film, reading and discussing Judith Katz’s “Defining Aspects of White Culture” and personal reflection. This session is designed for people who have some prior experience exploring the concept of whiteness.

• Dan Cohen was able to get taxpayers to fund at least one of his trips to California to attend Stir Fry Seminars, where according to their website, he is currently a “facilitator.” His Stir Fry Seminars bio shares this:

[Dan Cohen] has taught high school in and aroundChicagofor 14 years. It has been through re-examining American history as an adult and hearing the stories of his students and colleagues that Daniel has come to realize that he carries his whiteness, his maleness and his heterosexuality with him everywhere. He has felt the cost of racism and sexism while recognizing the vital need for dialogue and change inAmerica.

• While teaching an English class at Deerfield High School, Mr. Cohen led a discussion of his favorite topic–no, not literature–race. He asked his students to share stereotypes of African Americans. Two students in that class shared with me that students felt uncomfortable with this request. Students feared that if they identified a stereotype, someone might assume they held it. But finally a student said that one stereotype is that African Americans are rappers; another student said that some believe that African Americans are all good athletes. Then Mr. Cohen said that another stereotype of African American men is that they’re all “well hung,” which he then wrote on the board. I know this to be true because one of the students who shared this anecdote is my daughter.
• On two separate occasions, I heard Mr. Cohen make the startlingly racist, sexist, and heterophobic comment that if someone is white, male, and heterosexual, they are oppressors.

As a public educator, his words and actions are public words and actions subsidized by taxpayers and intended to shape the beliefs and values of his captive audience–other people’s children. District 200 parents and other taxpayers are entitled to detailed information about Mr. Cohen’s pedagogical beliefs, his goals, and the degree to which he thinks teachers should bring their political and moral beliefs into the classroom through their comments and curricula. Taxpayers are entitled to know what ideologies teachers advance in the classroom through their rhetoric, resources, and activities. And taxpayers are entitled to know the cost and content of the professional development opportunities that activists like Mr. Cohen use school funds to subsidize.

With regularity and persistence, taxpayers in District 200 and every other community should be asking their administrations and school boards for detailed information on the costs and content of the professional development opportunities offered to their faculties on late arrival days, Institute Days, and summer workshops. They need to ask for the costs and detailed information about the often troubling and highly politicized workshops, conferences, and seminars that their taxes are subsidizing, conferences like this one that Stevenson High School teachers attended , and this one that Dan Cohen attended.

After receiving this information, parents should do further Internet research to find out more about the speakers and organizations involved.
If administrations are not forthcoming, parents should file Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to access the desired information. FOIA requests are very easy to file, and IFI is happy to help taxpayers understand how to use them.

Activist ideologues in public schools expect and thrive on their nearly limitless autonomy, lack of public awareness and oversight, and access to public money. The only way to effect positive change is to limit their autonomy; demand transparency; insist on ideological parity; and explicitly prohibit the use of public resources to advance unproven and controversial social, political, moral, and pedagogical theories.

Last year, Nettelhorst Elementary School, a public school in Chicago, tried to deny they were marching in the Chicago “Gay Pride” parade, but not this year. With unadulterated pride, they announce their participation on the school website, extending an invitation to the entire school community to attend this shameful event. What despicable exploitation of children.

The cost for non-profit organizations to participate in the parade is $175.00. Let’s hope Illinois taxpayers aren’t footing the bill for this one.

Express your opposition to a publicly funded elementary school using the school website to encourage participation in a parade that celebrates behavior that much of the taxpaying public views as profoundly immoral:

Principal Cindy Wulbert:

cawulbert@cps.k12.il.us