Many politicians and educators want to steal our children. According to these activists, parents can feed and house children, but can’t guide their education or tell them how to choose right from wrong. Parents merely act as custodians of the State’s property. Here are recent samples of this line of thinking.

Media says that parents have no right to interfere with a public school education. The Washington Post printed a guest editorial that claims:

[E]ducation should prepare young people to think for themselves, even if that runs counter to the wishes of parents.

…

When do the interests of parents and children diverge? Generally, it occurs when a parent’s desire to inculcate a particular worldview denies the child exposure to other ideas and values that an independent young person might wish to embrace or at least entertain.[1]

That is, parents have no right to shield their children from any sort of predator or groomer having evil intent. As we’ll see later, this “no rights” idea comes from the claim that the interests of the child are automatically at odds with those of the parents.

Politicians also say parents have no such rights. In his campaign for reelection, Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe promoted this statist argument against parents’ rights in education. He said it this way:

“I’m not going to let parents come into schools and actually take books out and make their own decisions … I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”[2]

This statement was a key reason for his electoral defeat. But he didn’t get this opinion out of the blue. His friends and donors, teacher unions and school administrators, encouraged this thought.[3] They even call these nurturing parents “terrorists.”[4]

Parents are tyrants. Noah Berlatsky, a prominent liberal author, claims:

parents are tyrants. “parent” is an oppressive class, like rich people or white people.

…

socialists should be wary of the nuclear family; Marx is pretty definitive about that.[5]

Berlatsky has the traditional Marxist fear about the family, that its primary loyalty is to itself and not the (socialist) community.

We must abolish parenthood itself. According to columnist Joe Mathews[6] we must forbid parents from raising their own children. This amounts to abolishing parenting altogether. His article says:

Fathers and mothers with greater wealth and education are more likely to transfer these advantages to their children, compounding privilege over generations. As a result, children of less advantaged parents face an uphill struggle, social mobility has stalled, and democracy has been corrupted.

…

My solution — making raising your own children illegal — is simple, and while we wait for the legislation to pass, we can act now: the rich and poor should trade kids, and homeowners might swap children with their homeless neighbors.

…

In his “Republic,” Plato adopted Socrates’ sage advice — that children “be possessed in common, so that no parent will know his own offspring or any child his parents” — in order to defeat nepotism, and create citizens loyal not to their sons but to society.

…

But don’t pay those critics any mind. Because they just can’t see how our relentless pursuit of equity might birth a brave new world.[7]

(Note: Mathews’ is apparently embarrassed by what he said. Other web sites have a version of this column that reads “My solution is simple”, along with other minor changes. Just what is Mathews’ afraid of you reading?)

If a mother is banned from raising her own newborn – how can one even contemplate this confiscation? (Jeremiah 31:15) – then it’s likely that women won’t bother to have children at all. Whether Mathews offered satire or no, his “universal orphanhood” proposal aligns with socialist thought.

Why should we care what they say? These screeds against parents’ rights give us glimpses of why these activists, including teachers and school administrators, have become our opponents. Their words disclose their desires and plans. Believe them when they say they want to make changes. And if unopposed, they’ll create a cultural revolution by government fiat. Read on to understand what drives their animosity. You’ll also find some thoughts on how to confront this war on parenting.

The war against families and parental authority

Whose child is this? Does the child “belong” to his or her parents, or to the State? The answer to this question shapes our society. For example, without families raising children you wouldn’t have multi-bedroom homes, minivans, or even suburbs. We’d merely have loose communities of selfish, self-centered people, for the responsibility of nurturing children teaches commitment, devotion, and compassion.

By tradition and law, the parents have the primary responsibility for a child’s custody, care, and nurture. This responsibility also covers teaching morals and values, and deciding the content of education. That these decisions are for the parents to make, and not the State, has been repeatedly confirmed by the courts. One such Supreme Court case is Wisconsin v Yoder:

The history and culture of Western civilization reflect a strong tradition of parental concern for the nurture and upbringing of their children. This primary role of the parents in the upbringing of their children is now established beyond debate as an enduring American tradition. – Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972) [8]

But recent academic agitators have decided to debate the issue anyway. They say that parents are unfit to teach because they’re tyrants.[9] One of these agitators is Elizabeth Bartholet,[10] who wrote this about parents directing their children’s education:

The legal claim made in defense of the current homeschooling regime is based on a dangerous idea about parent rights—that those with enormous physical and other power over infants and children should be subject to virtually no check on that power. That parents should have monopoly control over children’s lives, development, and experience. That parents who are committed to beliefs and values counter to those of the larger society are entitled to bring their children up in isolation, so as to help ensure that they will replicate the parents’ views and lifestyle choices.

This legal claim is inconsistent with the child’s right to what has been called an “open future”—the right to exposure to alternative views and experiences essential for children to grow up to exercise meaningful choices about their own future views, religion, lifestyles, and work.

It is inconsistent with state laws and constitutional provisions guaranteeing child rights to education. It is inconsistent with state and federal laws guaranteeing children protection against abuse and neglect.[11]

By “open future,” she means State-approved morals and perspectives. Her view, and distortion of family law, is meant to break our society. She claims that children must be presumptively protected from their very own parents! James Dwyer,[12] a close associate of Bartholet, claims that “parental rights” amounts to kidnapping. He wrote:

But it is only because state statutes make biological parents the legal parents of a newborn child and give legal parents presumptive custody rights that birth parents have legal permission to do what would otherwise be kidnapping—that is, to take a person to their home and confine the person there without that person’s consent.[13]

And elsewhere Dwyer wrote:

The reason that parent-child relationship exists is because the state confers legal parenthood on people through its paternity and maternity laws.[14]

According to Dwyer, the concepts of “parenting” and “family” are mere legal constructs, that they didn’t exist until some government made them happen. Instead of government existing to serve the community, he thinks that people exist solely to serve the government. In the end, these activists want to make all children wards of the state.

Through this analysis, it becomes apparent that the claim that parents should have child-rearing rights – rather than simply being permitted to perform parental duties and to make certain decisions on a child’s behalf in accordance with the child’s rights – is inconsistent with principles deeply embedded in our law and morality.[15]

In Dwyer’s world, once you bring your children home you may only do for them what the government permits.

I propose further that the law confer on parents simply a child-rearing privilege, limited in its scope to actions and decisions not inconsistent with the child’s temporal interests. Such a privilege, coupled with a broader set of children’s rights, is sufficient to satisfy parents’ legitimate interests in child-rearing.[16]

In short, the mother and father may only play at being parents, being sure to not to instill virtues not preordained by the statist bureaucrats. This mirrors what the Soviets tried, and failed at, in Russia:

What responsibilities are left to the parents, when they no longer have to take charge of upbringing and education?… The state does not need the family, because the domestic economy is no longer profitable: the family distracts the worker from more useful and productive labour.[17]

Even today, Communists want to abolish the family:

Today, the main backwards role the family plays is the oppression of children, who are subjected to a tyranny of the parents and denied the basic rights which should belong to every human, most importantly the right of free development of the personality.[18]

To summarize, we don’t find American parents begging the government to take away their rights. Rather, academics have invented a rift between parent and child. They want the government to institutionalize their divisive, never-tried, and ungodly ways of dealing with children.

Defend all of our rights of parenting

Elected officials promise to represent all of us. However, they keep aligning themselves with tiny activist groups. Maybe it’s for the campaign money, or maybe the officials feel threatened by the activists’ political threats. Senator Everett Dirksen said about politicians, “when they feel the heat, they see the light.”[19]

To preserve our religious and parental rights, Christians need to do more than just vote. We must bring our own “heat.” Here are my suggestions for bringing political heat, some of which may surprise you.

Be persistent in pleading your cause. Politicians expect any that outrage against them will fade over time. Usually, political persistence is found only in those people wanting favors, and who have the money with which to buy them. If politicians don’t hear opposing voices, then they’ll forget their true constituencies.

Christians must frequently remind their officials just whom they represent, and that they’re supposed to be both just and impartial (Exodus 23:1-3; Leviticus 19:15). For example, isn’t trading donations for favors showing partiality? We must be like the widow who petitioned her unrighteous judge both day and night (Luke 18:1-5).

Be persistent in prayer. After telling us of the widow and the wicked judge, Jesus told us to be persistent before God. He will surely bring forth justice (Luke 18:6-8).

Be loud and be heard. Don’t be crude, but also don’t be timid. After all, the prophets weren’t gentle with the people concerning with God’s word (Jeremiah 36). And even Jesus riled up people when he scourged the Temple (John 2:13-16). Make sure that your officials have heard you, even if it means following them around. Make them uncomfortable, and even give them midnight serenades. After all, it’s protected political speech.[20] 

Be the all-important precinct captain. The best way to get politicians you like is to help weed out the bad ones before they even get to the ballot. That means becoming your own precinct’s captain, the most important political role in the country. Both the Democrats[21] and Republicans[22] recognize that political power starts with the precinct. The precinct captain walks through the precinct, at each home promoting the candidates he or she approves of. This means the captain has great power to influence elections.

Becoming a captain is easier than you think. See the site precinctstrategy.com to find out how.[23]

Be bold in the courts. The right to worship (First Amendment) doesn’t mean only the ability to think religious thoughts. It means being able to physically practice your religion in your private and public life. This also includes how your religion affects your parenting, such as in the Wisconsin v Yoder case (see above).[24] And ever since the Fourteenth Amendment, state law can’t be used to limit religious rights or activity.[25] But government officials, or the courts, won’t proactively fight for your rights. You yourself must act, challenging bad actions, laws, and decrees (“executive orders”) in court.

Be obedient to God, not to evil commands. In Romans 13, the apostle Paul speaks of obedience to authorities. The ruler is a “minister of God to you for good” (Romans 13:4). That is, a ruler is God’s delegated authority to encourage and enforce godly behavior. But if a ruler issues evil commands, he or she does so outside of that delegated authority to be a “minister for good.” You have no obligation before God to obey any evil commands.[26]

This principle was understood, and used, many times. Here’s a few cases:[27]

• In the 16^th century, Lutherans resisted the Emperor. He told them to abandon “salvation by grace” or be killed.

• In the 17^th century, Scots resisted King Charles. He gave them a new, “official” way to worship which denied their Presbyterian beliefs.

• In the 1770s, the American Colonists resisted King George. He tried numerous means to deny their God-given rights and freedoms.

All three of these cases have the same idea: while a ruler may have physical power, he or she has no moral or legal authority when acting beyond the ruler’s scope of office. In all three cases the communities resorted to military force to resist the unrighteous commands.

This “minister for good” concept is worth understanding well. It’s guidance for when you must decide to either obey God or obey an ungodly command. I recommend you read the referenced article, to be sure of yourself.

Be a shield against cultural insurrection. As we see, teachers, advocates, and politicians are seeking control of children that aren’t theirs. This is a power grab, a literal insurrection by elites. If Christians, and if parents, don’t block this then we might lose both our children and our American society.

Protect our children from subversive public schools

We’ve been blind and lazy about our public schools. We trusted our teachers and school officials, but they betrayed this trust by actively, and unapologetically, working against community values. They deny parental input, and also refuse oversight of their dealings.[28] We can’t even believe them when they do tell us things.[29] Perhaps as a joke, President Ronald Reagan said about the Russians “Trust, but verify.”[30] We could been verifying public schooling a long time ago, saving ourselves much grief.

If the public school people won’t teach community values, and reject community oversight, then why pay them with community property taxes? They promote society-altering socialism: Critical Race Theory,[31] the anti-American 1619 Project,[32] and liberating children from their parents (see above). These aren’t American community values!

Therefore, protecting our children revolves around getting them into schooling that their parents can trust. This generally means private schools or homeschooling. But what about families for this is a pipe dream? For them, leaving the public schools is hard for reasons like these:

• Private schools aren’t cheap. One survey has the tuition of Illinois private high schools at about $12,000 per year.[33] You might find a lower-priced school hosted in a subsidized building, or supported by charitable donations. You also might find a school with a fancy campus, because it’s intended to attract wealthy parents. But on the average, attending a private school is a substantial burden on the family budget.

But even at those rates, a family still might be able to swing a private school education. That is, if that family wasn’t forced to also pay for the expensive public schools. For example, in 2020 Chicago public schools spent about $30,000 per student![34] Even Paul Vallas, who used to run the Chicago public schools, now wants a practical school voucher program.[35]

• Parents are at work, and not available for homeschooling. Many families are single-parent households, or have both parents working outside of the home. They can’t take advantage of homeschooling because no adult would be at home to supervise their children.

• Educating special needs children is costly. When schooling children with severe mental or physical handicaps, extra aides, specialists, and facilities are needed. Parents of these children can currently turn only to the public school systems.

I don’t have big, comprehensive, plans that fix community schools to everyone’s satisfaction. And I don’t want such plans, for they lead to big, comprehensive bureaucracies. Rather, when people act in their own self interest they uncover small solutions to limited problems. Those that work get adopted by others. Here are my ideas for small solutions to education problems.

Take over your local school board. If you don’t trust the public schools, then why not clean house? Once you, and your friends, have control you can get rid of the bad people, fix the curricula, create transparency, etc. Sure, the teacher unions would be determined and formidable opponents. After all, you’re cutting in on their game. But a community coalition can win.

I’m serious about this. Here is a campaign cookbook that teaches how to network, and how to campaign to win.[36] Yes, it’s hard work, but it pays off. At the very least, you’ll have created the sort of “heat” your local politicians pay attention to.

Invent, and promote, easy-to-use homeschool systems. Homeschooling has a reputation for being hard to do. Yet:

• There are already homeschooling systems that claim to be easy to use. The parents get guidance on setting up their school. The student lessons might even be supplied as computer lectures. And the vendors do the hard work of getting the students’ efforts academically recognized.

• There might already be an online catalog or directory of easy homeschooling systems.

But if these easy systems are out there, then why are they so hard to find? And if there is a catalog of them, then where is it? My point is that self-promotion goes a long way to multiplying the number of families willing to try homeschooling.

I’m willing to use my blog to promote easy-to-use curricula providers, and catalogs of curricula. I also think that other blogs would do likewise. And if these online catalogs don’t yet exist, then who can start the first one?

Create models for bare-bones, but affordable, private schools. Modeling a private school on the public school model results in a pricey education. After all, public schools aren’t designed to be economical.

But what if a school pattern was created that has no frills: no sports teams, no fancy campus, no snob appeal for parents. Its attraction would be providing a competent, but inexpensive, education. The parents could shop among such schools, choosing which one best suited their desires. Such schools could be held wherever empty office space, or empty meeting halls, could be found. And they’d be priced so low that parents could use them even while paying for the public schools they aren’t using.

How inexpensive can we get? A school is just curricula, a teacher, some students, and a place for holding classes. Suppose that:

• Online curricula were used to do the actual teaching. The students would be largely interacting with the computer lessons. Such online teaching is already available from various private schools, and from some homeschool curricula publishers. It ought to be inexpensive to license these for a private school.

• Teachers and assistants monitor the students in their online learning. Their main teaching role would be to help the students over particular lesson difficulties, so you wouldn’t need many people. Perhaps you could get by with three or four adults per hundred children. That, and reminders from the parents that their children behave “or else.”

• The school could be held in a church basement, a rented hall, or some underused business property. There are enough of these places that a school could be placed most anywhere in a community. A quick online search of school codes reveals few conditions on building suitability, the biggest concerns being those of the fire departments.

A school of a hundred students, with full-time staff, held in a business property (that is, paying rent), might get by with an annual tuition of less than $6000. The actual numbers depend on the details.[37]

For me, an added benefit of inexpensive private schools is that it forces the public schools to scale back, for their funding is partially based on actual student attendance. A shrinking student base means they must sell underused properties, and perhaps become more responsive to their communities.

Promote a “community chest” to help special needs children get their education. Public schools are primarily funded by community property taxes. This means that parents of public school students don’t pay the entire costs of that year’s education. They’re subsidized by other homeowners.

This subsidy is even greater for special needs children. For example, a student with severe disabilities might need a one-on-one aide. The community, through the school, subsidizes this student more than it does other students.

If the switch to private schools works out, and the public school system shrinks, then we must remember these special needs students, along with their families. But we should help them through private donations, and not through taxes. A community, and not its government, should take care of its own. For example, look at what President Grover Cleveland said.

In February 1887, President Grover Cleveland, upon vetoing a bill appropriating money to aid drought-stricken farmers in Texas, said,

“I find no warrant for such an appropriation in the Constitution, and I do not believe that the power and the duty of the General Government ought to be extended to the relief of individual suffering which is in no manner properly related to the public service or benefit.”

President Cleveland added,

“The friendliness and charity of our countrymen can always be relied upon to relieve their fellow citizens in misfortune. This has been repeatedly and quite lately demonstrated. Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character, while it prevents the indulgence among our people of that kindly sentiment and conduct which strengthens the bonds of a common brotherhood.”[38]

You already see Facebook and Go Fund Me appeals for certain individuals and causes. That is the same sort of giving spirit that these parents will need for their disabled children’s education. What did you think those Monopoly “Community Chest” cards meant? Give, to help those in your community.

May I help?

I’d like parents to regain control of their children’s education. I currently know precious little of the details concerning private schools, but I think I can help anyway. For example, I could help catalog and promote useful homeschooling systems. And I could help work out details of “model inexpensive schools.” I also know a thing or two about computers.

If you’d like to write and see if I really can help, leave an email at this (slightly-obfuscated) address:  trusted.schools –at- fixthisculture.com

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Footnotes 

[1]      Schneider, Jack and Berkshire, Jennifer, Parents claim they have the right to shape their kids’ school curriculum. They don’t., Washington Post, October 21, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/parents-rights-protests-kids/2021/10/21/5cf4920a-31d4-11ec-9241-aad8e48f01ff_story.html

[2]      Terry McAuliffe’s War on Parents, National Review, October 1, 2021, https://www.nationalreview.com/2021/10/terry-mcauliffes-war-on-parents/

[3]      Duggan, Laurel, Teachers Union President Backing McAuliffe Promotes Article Claiming Parents Don’t Have A ‘Right’ In What Kids Are Taught, Daily Caller News Foundation, October 26, 2021, https://dailycallernewsfoundation.org/2021/10/26/randi-weingartin-terry-mcauliffe-teachers-union-curriculum/

[4]      Sims, Gwendolyn, Concerned Parents Are ‘Immediate Threat’ Says National School Boards Association President—Some Are Even Domestic Terrorists!, PJ Media, October 1, 2021, https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/gwendolynsims/2021/10/01/concerned-parents-are-immediate-threat-says-national-school-boards-association-president-some-are-even-domestic-terrorists-n1521073

[5]      Berlatsky, Noah, Parents are tyrants, Twitter, December 14, 2020, https://twitter.com/nberlat/status/1338586940157927427

[6]      Joe Mathews, LA Progressive, https://www.laprogressive.com/author/joe-mathews/

[7]      Mathews, Joe, Column: California should abolish parenthood, in the name of equity, Yahoo News, January 13, 2022, https://www.yahoo.com/news/column-california-abolish-parenthood-name-181725030.html

[8]      The Supreme Court’s Parental Rights Doctrine, Parental Rights, https://parentalrights.org/understand_the_issue/supreme-court/
The left column has several legal quotes, accessed by clicking on the line of “dot” links. The Yoder quote is merely one of these quotes.

[9]      Poole, Christian, The Case for Homeschooling (Part 1): The Strangeness of the Anti-Homeschool Movement, ThinkingWest, May 19, 2020, https://thinkingwest.com/2020/05/19/part-1-the-anti-homeschool-movement/

[10]    Elizabeth Bartholet, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Bartholet

[11]    Bartholet, Elizabeth, Homeschooling: Parent Rights Absolutism vs. Child Rights to Education & Protection, Arizona Law Review, Volume 62, Issue 1 [2020], https://arizonalawreview.org/pdf/62-1/62arizlrev1.pdf

[12]    James Dwyer, William & Mary Law School, https://law2.wm.edu/faculty/bios/fulltime/jgdwye.php

[13]    Dwyer, James, A Constitutional Birthright: The State, Parentage, and the Rights of Newborn Persons, UCLA Law Review, page 762, 56 UCLA LAW REVIEW 755 (2009), http://www.uclalawreview.org/pdf/56-4-1.pdf

[14]    Prominent Law Prof: ‘State Should Take Over the Legal Parental Role of Children’, Truth and Action, http://www.truthandaction.org/prominent-law-prof-state-should-take-over-the-legal-parental-role-of-children/2/
Alas! The original quote was in an interview on the CRTV network, but any transcription isn’t found on the internet. In some cases, the internet is NOT forever.

[15]    Dwyer, James, Parents’ Religion and Children’s Welfare: Debunking the Doctrine of Parents’ Rights, page 1373, William & Mary Law School Scholarship Repository, Faculty Publications, January 1994, https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1167&context=facpubs

[16]    Dwyer, James, Parents’ Religion, page 1374.

[17]    Kollontai, Alexandra, Communism and the Family, published in The Worker, 1920, collected in Selected Writings of Alexandra Kollontai, Allison & Busby, 1977, found at https://www.marxists.org/archive/kollonta/1920/communism-family.htm

[18]    Meghany, The communist abolition of the family, Destroy Capitalism Now!, March 26, 2017, https://destroycapitalismnow.wordpress.com/2017/03/26/abolish-the-family/

[19]    “Politicians see the light when they feel the heat”, The Big Apple blog, December 2, 2010, https://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/politicians_see_the_light_when_they_feel_the_heat

[20]    Schow, Ashe, Washington Post Defends Protesters At Senator Josh Hawley’s Home: ‘Peaceful Vigil’, The Daily Wire, January 5, 2021, https://www.dailywire.com/news/washington-post-defends-protesters-at-senator-josh-hawleys-home-peaceful-vigil

[21]    Rural Organizing & Engagement Toolkit for Precinct Captains, Democratic Party Official Website, https://democrats.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Rural-Precinct-Chair-Toolkit.pdf

[22]    5 Duties of the Precinct Chair, Collin County Republican Party, September 3, 2015, https://www.collincountygop.org/news/5-duties-of-the-precinct-chair/

[23]    Shultz, Dan, Precinct Strategy, https://precinctstrategy.com/

[24]    The Supreme Court’s Parental Rights Doctrine, Parental Rights

[25]    McCarthy, Mary, Application of the First Amendment to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, Notre Dame Law Review, Volume 22, Issue 4, Article 2, May 1, 1947, https://scholarship.law.nd.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3880&context=ndlr

[26]    Perry, Oliver, American Christians, Tyranny, and Resistance, Illinois Family Institute, May 20, 2021, https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/faith/american-christians-tyranny-and-resistance/

[27]    Ibid.

[28]    Kingkade, Tyler, They fought critical race theory. Now they’re focusing on ‘curriculum transparency.’, NBC News, January 20, 2022, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/critical-race-theory-curriculum-transparency-rcna12809?cid=sm_npd_nn_tw_ma

[29]    LaChance, Mike, Report: California Public School Teachers Being Told to Hide Critical Race Materials From Parents, Legal Insurrection, April 14, 2021, https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/04/report-california-public-school-teachers-being-told-to-hide-critical-race-materials-from-parents/

[30]    Watson, William, Trust, but Verify: Reagan, Gorbachev, and the INF Treaty, The Hilltop Review, Volume 5, Issue 1 (Fall), Article 5, Western Michigan University, December 2011, https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1045&context=hilltopreview

[31]    Perry, Oliver, Critical Race Theory is anti-Christian, Illinois Family Institute, October 8, 2021, https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/marriage/crt-racismblm/critical-race-theory-is-anti-christian/

[32]    The 1619 Project, Critical Race Training in Education, https://criticalrace.org/the-1619-project/

[33]    Illinois Private High Schools By Tuition Cost, Private School Review, https://www.privateschoolreview.com/tuition-stats/illinois/high

[34]    Conklin, Audrey, Chicago Teachers Union demands to know how Lightfoot is spending $2B in federal COVID relief for schools, Fox Business, January 5, 2021, https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/chicago-2-billion-covid-relief-schools
The article has an embedded link (see below) that effectively hides per-pupil spending by dividing it between fixed costs (the buildings, etc.) and instructional costs (the teaching). See http://www.illinoisreportcard.com/District.aspx?source=environment&source2=perstudentspending&Districtid=15016299025

[35]    Vallas, Paul, Guest Column–Paul Vallas: There is No Choice But School Choice, John Kass News, https://johnkassnews.com/there-is-no-choice-but-school-choice/

[36]    Toolkit: Combatting Critical Race Theory in your Community, Citizens for Renewing America, June 8, 2021, https://citizensrenewingamerica.com/issues/combatting-critical-race-theory-in-your-community/

[37]    Let’s try to estimate annual tuition for a school of 100 students.

1. A private school needs adult staff, which are full-time jobs for them. Factoring in benefits, let’s estimate one school master at $100,000, plus two assistants at $50,000, plus one administrator at $70,000. This gives annual labor costs of $270,000. We can use so few people because the teaching is done largely through computers, and we’ll have substantial moral support from the parents, pressuring their children to cooperate.
2. There are various homeschooling curricula that can be used. We could also turn to existing online schools whose online lessons we can lease. These sources will provide lessons, as well as proof (like “accreditation”). I see advertised costs of somewhere near $1,000 per pupil. I’d think that for a hundred students at once you could get a substantial discount on leases, so estimate licensing at $500 per pupil, or $50,000 per hundred students.
3. The school needs a suitable site. It might be the “between friends” use of a church hall, or currently vacant business space. Lacking specificity, I pick a number out of the air and say that facilities and utilities cost $300,000 for a year.
4. The annual costs for teachers, curriculum, and facilities comes to about (270,000 + 50,000 + 300,000 =) $620,000, or $6,200 per student.
5. A particular school could end up with much lower operating costs, but because of donated labor or facilities. Additionally, does the school intend to make even a small amount of money, or is it offered as a community service?

[38]    Williams, Walter, Charity Not a Proper Function of the American Government, The Liberal Institute, http://www.liberalinstitute.com/CharityNotProperGovernmentFunction.html

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Written by Ryan Scott Bomberger

I’m half white and half black. My melanin doesn’t change my worth or my propensity to sin. Yet we live in a culture where we are told that our skin color confers upon us a status that is fixed, assigned by an elite class of humans who call themselves “scholars.” They want us to see everything through the broken lens of “race”—a human construct that has only served to dehumanize us throughout history. As a person with brown skin, I reject my assigned “status” and refuse to see everything through that distorted prism.

It leads to blindness.

Instead, I choose to see through the breakthrough filter of Scripture that opens our eyes to the truth of our identity, the perfect bond of love, our oneness through Christ, and the freedom of forgiveness. Our human condition, and the frailty that marks us, can never be illuminated by the darkness of tattered theories.

And that’s exactly what Critical Race Theory (CRT) is.

How can a theory derived from anti-Semites who were virulent racists hell-bent on abolishing the family and religion bring healing to the sin of racism? Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels saw Christianity as an impediment to their socialist ideology. How can a godless theory be used as an “analytical tool” to address issues needing a Godly solution?

I’m particularly irked by Christians who don’t want the struggle of wrestling with solutions but simply hop aboard the latest bandwagon sponsored by an insanely profitable victimhood industry. Racism is evil as is every other sin known to humankind. Sin diminishes and destroys us. It is a brokenness that cannot be remedied by more brokenness. But for many, the goal is not to offer a solution but a continual subscription.

Famed educator and leader Booker T. Washington, a former slave, explained this industry well on page 144 of his book “My Larger Education”:

“There is another class of coloured people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs, and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs — partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.”

Today, that class of people is of varying hues and NY Times bestsellers capitalize on a form of activism that seeks to divide us, erase equality, and offer forced redistribution in the form of “equity”. Dr. Carol Swain, the brilliant former (black) professor of political science and law at Vanderbilt University, offers a helpful definition of Critical Race Theory:

“Critical race theory is an analytical framework to analyze institutions and culture. Its purpose is to divide the world into white oppressors and non-white victims. Instead of traditional forms of knowledge, it holds up personal narratives of marginalized minority “victim” groups (blacks, Hispanics, Asians) as evidence (considered irrefutably by its nature) of the dishonesty of their mostly white heterosexual oppressors.”

As someone who is “biracial,” I’m both the “oppressed” and the “oppressor.” Through no fault of my own, since no one controls the circumstances of his or her conception, I’m foisted into perpetual perplexity simply based on the sins or the sufferings of my lineage. Just to further illustrate the absurdity of this deeply prejudiced CRT approach to classification, I can simply highlight my own origin story. I was conceived in rape. So, am I responsible for my (black) biological father’s heinous act? Of course not. Interestingly, my white father—who chose to adopt and love ten children (of varying beautiful hues) that other men abandoned—is branded as part of the “white supremacist patriarchy” that is guilty of every negative outcome of black Americans. My dad, Henry Bomberger, recently passed away. The only legacy he left behind was one of unconditional love and self-sacrifice. His devotion to us proved that it’s not color that binds us; it’s love.

Despite Scripture’s insistence on the unity of believers and how Christ makes us one (Galatians 3:28), CRT diabolically separates us using the deeply flawed human construct of race. Ironically, in a culture that rejects the science of binary gender the progressive priests of CRT demand we can only be the “oppressed” or the “oppressors”. How nihilistic. It also preaches perpetual “guilt” and undeserved “privilege” based solely on one’s skin color.

Fake guilt will never erase real problems.

As Christians, we are all privileged to know and worship a God who could’ve merely condemned us but chose to redeem and rescue us (John 3:16-17). We are privileged to no longer be slaves to sin (Romans 6:6). We are privileged, through Christ’s strength, to be more than conquerors (Romans 8:37).

The Bible tells us to no longer conform to the pattern of this world in Romans 12:2, yet this is exactly what we do when we embrace the warped worldliness of CRT. Blame, Deceive, Repeat. This destructive pattern is recognizable throughout Scripture. Satan is the accuser, and he constantly coaxes us to embrace the lie instead of the Light.

CRT is a debilitating disease. Its malignancy in the body of Christ is spread by pastors who don’t believe the Word is enough. Some of these leaders apparently think the World has the answers to the temporal and eternal devastation of sin.

Mainstream media gave voice to a handful of black pastors who support using CRT and several who left a major denomination over it. Pastor Charlie Dates, of the Progressive Baptist Church in Chicago, exited the Southern Baptist Convention over SBC Seminary presidents’ rejection of Critical Race Theory, despite their clear denouncements of the sin of racism. I thoroughly agree with their statement. I’m not a Southern Baptist, so I have no interest in defending a denomination but merely want to uphold the Truth. Pastor Dates, who embraces unbiblical Black Liberation Theology and the Black Lives Matter movement, issued a defiant (and historically challenged) OpEd sharply condemning those who oppose CRT. He claims the rejection of CRT is due to “fear of liberalism.” I don’t fear liberalism. I wholeheartedly disagree with it because of its dependence on deception and division. Dates strangely then attributed certain social movements to “liberalism” (aka the Democrat Party) such as abolition, women’s suffrage, and civil rights. On all three, Republicans led the fight. But CRT and its advocates value feelings far more than facts.

I don’t think there’s any more eloquent a pastor speaking about cultural issues and Biblical authority than Pastor Voddie Baucham. As a black adoptive father, he embodies what many Christians should aspire toward—Godly character and critical thinking. He exposes and denounces CRT—not with emotionalism (like Pastor Charlie Dates) but with factualism.

Dr. Kimberlé Crenshaw, credited as a co-founder of “Critical Race Theory” (of course, derived from Marxist Critical Theory) is a leading proponent of this poison. Never mind this accomplished black woman was the recipient of Ivy League education at Cornell and Harvard Law School. But, you know, systemic racism. She sees it in everything…well except the abortion industry which massively and disproportionately kills black lives. Crenshaw, who is radically pro-abortion, pro-LGBT, anti-nuclear family and denies the clearly evident consequences of fatherlessness, blames racism for everything that victimizes black people and other “marginalized” groups. Her organization, the African American Policy Council, is holding an event on April 29th featuring Crenshaw, Brad Sears (Executive Director of UCLA’s dubious and radically pro-LGBT The Williams Institute) and Planned Parenthood’s President, Alexis McGill Johnson, as keynote speakers.

But sure, let’s use Critical Race Theory—an ideology that is hostile to Christianity in countless ways—as a means by which Christians should see the world. CRT activists claim to fight for justice but regularly reject truth and morality. Psalm 89:14 says: “Righteousness and justice are the foundation of Your throne. Mercy and truth go before Your face.” You cannot have justice without mercy (the compassion or forgiveness toward an offender) and truth. To ignore this is to welcome a cancer instead of the cure.

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This article was originally published at TheRadianceFoundation.org.

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Join us in Collinsville on Saturday, May 22nd for an IFI Worldview Conference about CRT!

An important new book by historian Paul Kengor sheds considerable light on Karl Marx and by implication the madness and mob violence that has descended on the country.

The throngs setting fire to police stations, looting stores and tearing down America’s cultural history are acting in the name of Black Lives Matter, a Marxist group that our ruling elites have airbrushed and turned into a totem of worship.

The current conflict is not merely a political disagreement over rectifying racial disparities; it’s a clash of religions: atheistic Marxism versus Christianity and Judaism.

At issue is whether the mobs, allied with the Democratic Party and leftist groups, can overthrow America’s Christian-inspired self-governing republic, where our rights come from our Creator, not fickle men in power.

In “The Devil and Karl Marx,” Prof. Kengor explores not only the communist icon’s religious views but how they corrupted so many others over nearly two centuries.

Marx hated God and Christianity with a white-hot passion. His prose is packed with attacks on faith, and his youthful poetry bristles with malice:

Look now, my blood-dark sword shall stab

Unerringly within thy soul.

God neither knows nor honors art.

The hellish vapors rise and fill the brain

Till I go mad and my heart is utterly changed.

See the sword—the Prince of Darkness sold it to me.

For he beats the time and gives the signs.

Ever more boldly I play the dance of death.

Citing numerous biographies and Marx’s own writings, Prof. Kengor reveals a man whose own family and friends were frightened by his demonic fits of rage and dark babblings about violence.  His own father said he was “governed by a demon.”  A key biographer, Robert Payne, described Marx as having “the devil’s view of the world and the devil‘s malignity.”

In 1849, Marx wrote,

When our turn comes, we shall make no excuses for the terror. There is only one way in which the murderous death agonies of the old society and the bloody birth throes of the new society can be shortened, simplified and concentrated, and that way is revolutionary terror.

A direct line can be drawn from Marx to Adolph Hitler, Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin and Mao Tse-Tung, all of whom despised Christianity and embraced murderous forms of socialism.

Before Marx, violent socialism was unleashed in 1789, with the guillotining of 40,000 aristocrats and others.  The French Revolution was ultimately an atheist revolt against the church and the rule of law.  The Jacobins in revolutionary France sought to wipe out history in order to create a Godless utopia. A hint of their fanatical atheism can be seen today in the beheadings in America of statues of Jesus and Mary and the torching of churches.

Communist revolutions, beginning in Russia in 1917, have taken at least 140 million lives, enslaved literally billions of people and spread unspeakable horror everywhere Marxism has taken root, Dr. Kengor notes.

When Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullours boasted in 2015 that “myself” and BLM co-founder Alicia Garza “are trained Marxists,” was she aware of the poisonous pedigree of her stated worldview?  Perhaps it didn’t matter.

BLM’s website is packed with Marxist rhetoric and flat-out lies like this: “In 2014, Mike Brown was murdered by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson.”  Mr. Wilson, who was acting in self-defense, was cleared during the Obama Administration.  Never get in the way of a useful narrative.

Among other things, BLM is using the LGBTQ movement as a blunt instrument:

We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure… foster a queer-affirming network. When we gather, we do so with the intention of freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking.

Families produce independent-minded people, which is why socialists promote sexual anarchy.  Marx and his co-author Friedrich Engels denounced families, saying the state should seize and raise children.

The rapidity with which virtually every sizable institution in America has bent its knee to BLM is stunning.  To be fair, most probably think it’s just about racial remonstrance and reforming police procedure, and even love of neighbor and equality before God.

But the call for getting on one’s knees to this movement and parroting their Marxist slogans is anything but sacred. How do Christians, in particular, justify kneeling to anything other than God Almighty and His Son Jesus Christ? A few courageous athletes have refused to go along.

For many, fear of man has triumphed over devotion to God.  Aided by a relentless media, Democrats have embraced Marxist mob rule while few Republicans other than President Trump have found the courage to call it what it is: un-American and evil.

A final word on Marx. If he had had a glimpse into the murderous misery his philosophy would unleash, would he have shelved his books and spared the world?

Hardly likely. Prof. Kengor shares a line from the heroine in one of Marx’s poems:

Thus Heaven I’ve forfeited, I know it full well. My soul, once true to God, is chosen for Hell.

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This article was originally published at Townhall.com.

Written by Walter E. Williams

Most people who call themselves Marxists know very little of Karl Marx‘s life and have never read his three-volume “Das Kapital.” Volume I was published in 1867, the only volume published before Marx’s death in 1883. Volumes II and III were later edited and published in his name by his friend and collaborator Friedrich Engels. Most people who call themselves Marxists have only read his 1848 pamphlet “The Communist Manifesto,” which was written with Engels.

Marx is a hero to many labor union leaders and civil rights organizations, including leftist groups like Black Lives Matter, Antifa, and some Democratic Party leaders. It is easy to be a Marxist if you know little of his life. Marx’s predictions about capitalism and the “withering away of the state” turned out to be grossly wrong. What most people do not know is that Marx was a racist and an anti-Semite.

When the U.S. annexed California after the Mexican-American War, Marx wrote: “Without violence nothing is ever accomplished in history.” Then he asked, “Is it a misfortune that magnificent California was seized from the lazy Mexicans who did not know what to do with it?” Friedrich Engels added: “In America we have witnessed the conquest of Mexico and have rejoiced at it. It is to the interest of its own development that Mexico will be placed under the tutelage of the United States.” Many of Marx’s racist ideas were reported in “Karl Marx, Racist,” a book written by Nathaniel Weyl, a former member of the U.S. Communist Party.

In a July 1862 letter to Engels, in reference to his socialist political competitor Ferdinand Lassalle, Marx wrote:

It is now completely clear to me that he, as is proved by his cranial formation and his hair, descends from the Negroes from Egypt, assuming that his mother or grandmother had not interbred with a nigger. Now this union of Judaism and Germanism with a basic Negro substance must produce a peculiar product. The obtrusiveness of the fellow is also nigger-like.

In 1887, Paul Lafargue, who was Marx’s son-in-law, was a candidate for a council seat in a Paris district that contained a zoo. Engels claimed that Paul had “one eighth or one twelfth nigger blood.” In an April 1887 letter to Paul’s wife, Engels wrote, “Being in his quality as a nigger, a degree nearer to the rest of the animal kingdom than the rest of us, he is undoubtedly the most appropriate representative of that district.”

Marx’s anti-Semitic views were no secret. In 1844, he published an essay titled “On the Jewish Question.” He wrote that the worldly religion of Jews was “huckstering” and that the Jews’ god was “money.” Marx’s view of Jews was that they could only become an emancipated ethnicity or culture when they no longer exist. Just one step short of calling for genocide, Marx said, “The classes and the races, too weak to master the new conditions of life, must give way.”

Marx’s philosophical successors shared ugly thoughts on blacks and other minorities. Che Guevara, a hero of the left, was a horrific racist. In his 1952 memoir, “The Motorcycle Diaries,” Guevara wrote,

The Negro is indolent and lazy and spends his money on frivolities, whereas the European is forward-looking, organized and intelligent.

British socialist Beatrice Webb griped in The New Statesmen about declining birthrates among so-called higher races, which would lead to “a new social order” that would be created “by one or other of the colored races, the Negro, the Kaffir or the Chinese.” The Soviets espoused the same “Jewish world conspiracy” as the Nazis. Joseph Stalin embarked upon a campaign that led to the deaths of Jewish intellectuals for their apparent lack of patriotism. By the way, the Soviet public was not told that Karl Marx was Jewish. Academics who preach Marxism to their classes fail to tell their students that his ideology has led to the slaughter of tens of millions of people. What’s worse, they fail to even feign concern over this fact.

White liberals are useful idiots. BLM, Antifa, and other progressive groups use the plight of poor blacks to organize left-leaning, middle-class, college-educated, guilt-ridden suburbanite whites. These people who topple statues and destroy public and private property care about minorities as much as their racist predecessors. Their goal is the acquisition and concentration of power and Americans have fallen hook, line, and sinker for their phony virtue signaling.

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Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University. To find out more about Walter E. Williams and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.

Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx are the mid-19^th century philosophical fathers of Communism.  Both men epitomized the rally cry of Atheism which is “God doesn’t exist, and I hate him.”   They saw religion as a competitor to their agenda of a government-based socialistic society.

In disparaging religious faith, Engels wrote:

“All religion… is nothing but the fantastic reflection in men’s minds of those external forces which control their daily life, a reflection in which the terrestrial forces assume the form of supernatural forces.”

Regarding this rivalry, Engels observed:

“Both Christianity and the workers’ socialism preach forth coming salvation from bondage and misery; Christianity places this salvation in a life beyond, after death, in heaven; socialism places it in this world, in a transformation of society.”

Do government powers compete with faith?  More specifically, can big government displace religious faith?   When people can get things they want from the government as a provider, are they less likely to turn to God for help?  These are not strange questions.  In fact, researchers have a name for it.  They call it an exchange model of religion.

A new paper compiled by researchers from three universities published April 12th in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin say that the answer to these questions is “yes.”   Big government replaces God for many people around the world.  They conclude that if some of the appeals of faith can be acquired from government, then religiosity declines in that society.

The researchers found a delayed effect between an increase in government services and a measurable decline in faith occurring one to two years later.  “If a secular entity provides what people need, they will be less likely to seek help from God or other supernatural entities. Government is the most likely secular provider,” the researchers concluded.

“The power and order emanating from God can be outsourced to the government,” the researchers claim.  I wonder how many politicians who are drawn to government doing more and more in every aspect of our lives realize that they are making a god out of government.  I suspect that many do know this.

The researchers compared state and country services as a percentage of gross domestic product with data about religion collected by Gallup from 455,104 people across 155 countries.

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This article was originally published by AFA of Indiana.

Virtually anyone over the age of 25 today has heard of Karl Marx and Marxism, though many remain ignorant of Marx’s history and the subsequent cultural ideology that emerged from aspects of his economic theories.

Karl Marx was the grandson of a Jewish rabbi, but his father converted to Lutheranism to escape the antisemitism endemic in Germany, and Karl and siblings were baptized in a Lutheran church in 1824.

Karl Marx’s father died in 1838, leaving the family in dire financial straits.

Like so many young people today, Marx became enamored with radicals at the University of Berlin, and in 1844 at the age of 26, Marx met the German socialist, Friedrich Engels, which sparked a friendship and collaboration.

Marx is perhaps most famous for describing religion as “the opiate of the masses.”

Marxism is a godless theory that promotes the view that what we can see and touch is all that exists: There is nothing beyond this mortal life, there is no hope of eternity in heaven, no dread of hell, no thing called sin. Therefore, everything in life is detached from any intrinsic value. Every act is valuable only if it contributes to the well-being of the proletariat (i.e., the lower or working class). Marx viewed society through an economic lens that divided people into groups based on economic wealth. The wealthy were deemed oppressors of the poor.

From Marxism emerged a social and political movement called the Frankfort School and its more comprehensive (i.e., not merely economic) theory of social criticism called Critical Theory, which began in Germany and later moved to academic institutions in the United States. Critical Theory is a complex and diverse set of ideas that share in common the goal of critiquing those forces in cultures that purportedly enslave and oppress humans.

In the view of critical theorists, those forces include traditional and natural institutions like marriage, family, and religion, as well as norms pertaining to sexuality. The sustained attack on these institutions and norms manifests through movements like Second- and Third-wave feminism, the homosexuality-affirming movement, and the “trans”-affirming movement. Many refer to these post-modern, politically correct, “progressive” movements as part of or emerging from “Cultural Marxism.”

The embrace by conservatives of political figures like Milo Yiannopoulos  who delights in flaunting his homosexuality suggests that Critical Theory has corrupted even conservatism. Milo claims to be a conservative, yet, like so many libertarians, divorces God’s transcendent truth from social and political theory.

Unfortunately, Yiannopoulos is not alone. Increasing numbers of Christians and conservatives capitulate to the cultural demands to tear down essential norms and institutions. Worse still, they exhort others to refrain from “judging” or “condemning” life choices inimical to human flourishing.

Too many libertarians and a growing number of conservatives advocate for near-absolute autonomy with a concomitant disregard for either moral truth or the public good.

Dr. Paul Kengor writes this in his book 11 Principles of a Reagan Conservative:

Consistent with Reagan, conservatives today constantly talk of freedom. Freedom. Freedom. Freedom. Go to any gathering of conservatives, and you will hear a freedom mantra.

. . .

Yet, in truth, as Reagan understood, to invoke freedom alone is a mistake. Freedom by itself, isolated, is libertarianism, not conservatism. For the conservative, freedom requires faith; it should never be decoupled from faith. Freedom not rooted in faith can lead to moral anarchy, which, in turn, creates social and cultural chaos. Freedom without faith is the Las Vegas Strip, not the City of God. Freedom without faith begets license and invites vice rather than virtue.

Faith infuses the soul with a sanctifying grace that allows humans in a free society to love and serve their neighbors, to think about more than themselves. We aspire to our better angels when our faith nurtures and elevates our free will.

America’s survival depends upon citizens with inner moral constraints striving to do what is right, not just what feels good at the time.

Remember that liberty divorced from truth ultimately results in chaos and destruction. Pray and act to advance God’s truth unapologetically and without ceasing.

Righteousness exalts a nation:
but sin is a reproach to any people.
~Proverbs 14:34~

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Written by Paul Kengor

Last week I looked at the history of the original socialists and at what Pope Francis aptly termed their “ideological colonization” of the family and marriage, work that started in the 19th century with the likes of Robert Owen, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

Whether they know it or not, today’s nature-redefiners — who target the family or marriage or sexuality or gender — are standing on the shoulders of those 19th century ideologues, utopians who sought to replace the natural-traditional-Biblical family with their own conceptions. Socialism’s new strategies are certainly different from the old, but the rebellion against God and His absolutes remains the same.

In recent decades, eager socialists in the West have been ripping down the traditional family from Scandinavia to Ireland. The spectacle in Ireland was especially disturbing. It was one of the few places where marriage was redefined not by unhinged judges or a left-wing Parliament but by national referendum in a one-time Catholic country where the majority no longer cares about the 2,000-year Christian teaching on the sanctity of marriage. Ireland’s citizenry once led the way in sending priests and nuns to the English-speaking world. Today the Irish take the lead as angry scoffers at their ancestors’ faith.

Socialism’s Bait and Switch

The contemporary left’s effort to fundamentally transform the family has been relentless, opportunistic and multi-faceted. Even in countries like Italy and France, where the populace was not demanding same-sex marriage, socialist politicians are hell-bent on giving it to them anyway.

Under the leadership of socialist Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, Italy just approved same-sex civil unions, which everyone in the country understands as the Italian left’s mere first step to securing same-sex marriage and adoption of children as well. Still, even there we can mainly blame the electorate. Italian citizens, after all, voted for the socialists. They did so not because they wanted the left’s wider cultural-social agenda. They voted for cradle-to-grave freebies and never-ending pensions from the nanny state, not for the redefinition of family and marriage.

But sadly, what they do not realize (or tolerate as a trade-off for socialism’s wondrous freebies) is that when you vote for the left for economic reasons you inevitably also get its cultural-social agenda — which undermines the natural-traditional-biblical family. If you are addicted to the welfare the socialist doctor provides, then you also accept his cultural brew. Such is the plight of the welfare junkie addicted to the state’s largesse.

Thus, Italians en masse remain sympathetic to Pope Francis and his appeals against same-sex marriage and the “demon” of gender ideology. Nonetheless, when you hold out your hands for “free” government goodies, among the candy in the socialist bag is family redefinition. You want the fat pension? Okay, fine, but you also must give a thumbs-up to gay unions.

Time to pay the socialist piper, kiddies.

Obama and the Democratic Socialists of America

As for America, our situation is not wildly different. We are getting an aggressive “LGBTQ” political-cultural agenda under Barack Obama’s expansive left-wing umbrella of “fundamental transformation.” That was not what the rank-and-file Obama voter was expecting in November 2008. Certainly, the record number of millions of African-Americans (historically the most religious voting demographic in the country) who enthusiastically voted for Obama did so for reasons that had nothing whatever to do with transgender bathroom edicts. But alas, the fundamental transformation they are getting is a White House literally illuminated in the rainbow colors of the gay-rights movement.

We should not delude ourselves that Barack Obama, the most far-left president we have ever had, is not a socialist of some sort. As Stanley Kurtz showed several years ago, we know that Obama was actually for a time in the 1990s a member of the socialist New Party. (For extended analysis, see my book on Obama’s long-time mentor, The Communist.) If Obama remains a socialist, he remains one from a cultural perspective as much as an economic one.

But moving away from Obama, look at the platforms of the dominant socialists in America today when it comes to family-sexuality issues.

The website of the influential Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is quite open about its social goals. Its “About DSA” section lists among its three planks the broad objective of seeking to “restructure gender and cultural relationships.” The DSA has been carrying the rainbow flag for quite some time. It passed a resolution at the annual convention in November 2011:

DSA calls for the legalization of same-sex marriages in all the States and Territories of the United States of America; the enactment of anti-discrimination laws in housing, jobs, education, and health care; and the repeal of state sodomy laws and anti-lesbian and gay restrictions.

That was merely point one in a very comprehensive seven-point statement on “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer (LGBTQ) Rights” that also included (among other things) “making public schools safe and bias-free for LGBTQ students, defending their free speech in school and allowing students to start gay-straight alliance clubs” and advancing “the rights of LGBTQ people to parent.” Very tellingly, point four in the DSA statement insisted: “DSA advocates for local and federal non-discrimination laws and insists that religious beliefs cannot be used to justify bias.”

For the record, the objectives of the DSA statement are almost identical to those of Socialist Party USA, whose official platform includes a statement pledging, “We are committed to confronting the heterosexism that provides the fertile ground for homophobic violence, and support all efforts toward fostering understanding and cooperation among persons and groups of differing sexual orientations.”

And if you want to go further left still, John Bachtell, Communist Party USA chair, recently writing in People’s World (successor to the Daily Worker), called for a socialist-communist-progressive-liberal-Democrat coalition, coalescing around Bernie Sanders, to “fight uncompromisingly against racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia.”

Marx and Engels: Proud Papas

What would Marx and Engels have thought about their name and ideology being invoked in the modern left’s crusade against “transphobia?” Well, they would have been shocked speechless. But they surely would have appreciated how their left-wing descendants found such handy tools to undermine the traditional family. Today’s leftists may not succeed in a total “abolition of the family” (to borrow from the phrase in The Communist Manifesto), but they are certainly succeeding in fundamentally transforming the institution.

Once upon a time, when we worried about socialists undermining the family, our concern was the economic destitution wrought by the ideology and its counterfactual theories about property and wealth confiscation and redistribution. In the old days, socialists harmed the family by leaving a dad jobless or the household scratching for income in a decimated economy. Today, we need to widen our horizon of socialism’s destructive possibilities. Modern socialists are not thinking merely about managing the state’s economic means of production; they are seeking to completely manage and revamp society’s very understanding of the human family itself.

They are, in short, fundamental transformers not just economically but culturally. And they operate a giant wrecking ball that is wreaking havoc in millions of lives.

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This article was originally posted at the Stream.org