Last week, the Daily Herald published a deceptive and disingenuous letter from Kim Cavill, the worst school board member of the District 211 School Board, five of whose members—including Cavill—are being sued by an unjustly fired teacher.

In her letter, the controversial sexpert Cavill complains about being unprepared for the enraged and hateful messages she has received since becoming a District 211 board member in 2019:

In April of 2019, I ran for a seat on District 211’s board of education and I won. I ran as who I am: a person who cares deeply about my community and the young people who live in it. I didn’t hide that I’m an experienced sex education teacher who specialized in teaching teen pregnancy prevention and an expert in health education, because I couldn’t feel prouder of my nationally recognized work.

Though I certainly anticipated heated disagreement on issues coming before me as a board member, I did not anticipate getting Facebook messages telling me to kill myself. I did not anticipate emails littered with curse words and hateful slurs. I did not anticipate people posting satellite images of my home on social media alongside dangerous, evidence-free accusations too disgusting to summarize. I did not anticipate people who find my work so reprehensible that they twist it into something monstrous and publicly slander my character.

Unfortunately, this is not the first time I’ve experienced this kind of treatment. The abuse I am open about surviving did not break me, and neither will enraged emails from people who’ve forgotten how to disagree with any kind of decency. But using dehumanizing language in person or on social media gives implicit permission for others to use that same kind of language against all of us and that is unacceptable.

We can and must be able to disagree with one another without forgetting that we are neighbors. We are all humans with families to look after, friends to hug, jobs to work, and people to love. If we let our passions twist into shapeless hatred, it corrodes the connections that bind us together. Our connections to our neighbors and our communities are too important to lose.

I agree with Cavill on little, but she argues rightly that slurs and threatening messages are “unacceptable” and give “implicit permission for others to use that same kind of language.”

In preparation for serving on the D211 School Board, perhaps Cavill should have talked to former District U46 board member Jeanette Ward, whom Cavill publicly called the “High Priestess of the Order of Moron” in 2018. Ward too has been the recipient of enraged, vulgar, and hateful messages.

In 2017, Cavill described three fine candidates for the District 211 Board as the “hate slate” because they opposed the sexual integration of locker rooms for minors. Like Ms. Ward, these three received hateful messages and were publicly slandered.

In her letter describing “enraged” emails, Cavill didn’t mention any of the reasons community members might feel anger toward her. For example, she didn’t mention that 11 days before that 2017 election, she and her sister set up a sham PAC to launder over $26,000 collected by a “transgender” PAC from “LGBTQ” activists from outside the community to defeat the slate of excellent candidates, two of whom were women of color. One wonders, are Cavill and her sister racists?

In her letter, Cavill describes herself as “an experienced sex education teacher who specialized in teaching teen pregnancy prevention and an expert in health education.” That vague, whitewashed description omits that Cavill’s expert “health education” includes presenting polyamorous “family structures,” anal sex, and porn positively in her podcasts for young adolescents.

On August 28, 2020, while a sitting D211 board member, Cavill tweeted that those who vote for Trump would be choosing to make the United States a “white nationalist fascist state.” Is that what Cavill calls decent disagreement?

Community members might want to ask Cavill why she has shut down her Twitter accounts since I started reporting on her tweets.

I too receive obscene, threatening, hateful messages “from people who find my work so reprehensible that they twist it into something monstrous and publicly slander my character.” So too does every theologically orthodox Christian and political conservative who publicly expresses his or her views on sexuality, marriage, and the sexual integration of private spaces and women’s sports. While Cavill no more deserves hateful or threatening messages than do political conservatives and theologically orthodox Christians for expressing their views on sexuality, her words and actions do merit righteous anger.

Cavill closed with these words: “We … must be able to disagree with one another without forgetting that we are neighbors.” Well, neighbors don’t call neighbors morons for holding different beliefs on sexuality. And neighbors don’t call neighbors fascists for their electoral choices.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Letter-in-Daily-Herald-from-D211s-Worst-Board-Member-Kim-Cavill.mp3

Illinoisans have no dearth of reasons to remove their children from our government faux-education camps that are called “schools” in Newspeak. Leftists control teachers’ unions, the Illinois State Board of Education, and the fetid Springfield Swamp from which have emerged laws mandating that 5-year-old children must be introduced to positive ideas about and images of sexual perversity. And leftists control many local school boards.

What’s more, leftists sitting on school boards want nothing less than total fascistic control of everything pertaining to curricula and professional development. They resent the presence of even one conservative board member. They have no interest in ideological diversity, inclusivity, or unity with those who do not share their moral, political, or pedagogical views.

It would behoove Illinoisans to take a gander at the school board of the largest high school district in the state, District 211, to understand better just how depraved school boards have become. And it would certainly behoove anyone with children who is considering moving to District 211 to read on.

District 211 just elected 33-year-old anti-Christian bigot/BLM activist Tim McGowan, who claims to be a “business owner,” to serve on the board. Other than controversy, a pending lawsuit against him, and melanin—er, I mean “diversity”—it’s a little bit fuzzy what he brings to the board. Maybe some intrepid community members can ferret out the specific reasons his supporters voted for him.

What is known about McGowan is that made a since-deleted YouTube video in which he referred to “validating ignorant little white boys,” and then issued a press release in which he ironically called the Illinois Family Institute “racist,”–oh and “anti-Semitic” and “homophobic.” As near as we can tell, he called IFI “homophobic” because of our biblical views on marriage and homosexuality. Is this really the kind of person, the D211 community thinks can serve all children?

Unfortunately, he’s not the worst leftist D211 board member. That ignominy goes to the puerile and presumptuous sexpert Kim Cavill who takes special pride in exposing children to all manner of inappropriate sexuality topics while mocking and condemning conservatism and the GOP on her Twitter account. It doesn’t appear she is even a smidge invested in diversity, inclusivity, or unity.

This is the person who several years ago in an online public post referred to former School District U-46 Board Member and recent conservative Illinois State Senate candidate Jeanette Ward as the “High Priestess of the Order of Moron.” Cavill is such a fine role model for children.

Cavill has a sordid history in District 211 about which I wrote this:

The curious story of the April 2019 election of Kim Cavill actually goes back to the even curiouser story of the 2017 school board election. Three well-qualified people who opposed co-ed private spaces for minors were running against three people who supported co-ed private spaces for minors.

On March 22, 2017, just 13 days before the 2017 election, LaSaia Wade, a 29-year-old “black trans woman” (i.e., a biological man), and Daye Pope, another biological male who passes as a woman, set up a Super PAC called Trans United Fund Illinois. Pope is the organizing director for a 501(c)(3) called Trans United Fund.

Two days later, on March 24, 2017—11 days before the 2017 election—Kim Cavill and her sister Lindsay Christensen set up a Super PAC called Parents and Neighbors for Quality Education (PNQE).

Just days after the founding of Trans United Fund Illinois, donations from some surprising people came pouring in:

• Matrix Director “Lana” Wachowski, a biological man who pretends to be a woman and lives with his dominatrix wife in Chicago, donated a whopping $10,000.

• Far left Illinois State Senator Heather Steans(D-Chicago), who has an adult son who pretends to be a woman, also donated $10,000.

• Homosexual Clark Pellet, a retired attorney and development chair for the “LGBTQ” Center on Halsted who lives in Chicago, donated $5,000.

• Executive director of Gender Rights Maryland, Dana Beyer, a man who pretends to be a woman and lives in Chevy Chase, MD donated $1,000.

• Eliza Byard, executive director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) who lives in Brooklyn, NY donated $500.

• Homosexual Douglas Hattaway, president and CEO of a Washington D.C. strategic communications firm who lives in D.C., donated $500.

• Architect Kira Kinsman, a biological man formerly known as Kyle Kinsman who lives in Wilkes Barre, PA, donated $250.

The more than $26, 000 in donations for a school board election from donors who don’t live in District 211 then went to—you guessed it—Cavill’s Parents and Neighbors for Quality Education.

Enquiring minds may wonder why Cavill and her sister set up PNQE, since Trans United Fund Illinois was already established. Why the extra step to fund the defeat of conservatives? The answer to that question might be found in mailers and yard signs. State law requires that campaign mailers and yard signs identify the groups that pay for them. Signs must say “Approved by….”

Which sounds better—and by “better” I mean less likely to arouse suspicion: “Approved by Trans United Fund Illinois” or “Approved by Parents and Neighbors for Quality Education”?

Flush with filthy lucre, the Cavill sisters got busy smearing good people with nary a backward glance.

Almost immediately after the school board election and defeat of all three good candidates, Cavill and her sister deactivated their Super PAC. Malignant Mission Accomplished.

Then in 2019, Cavill ran for the school board and won.

In her “sex positive” podcasts for tweens she opines on anal sex:

Before trying anal sex, people need to talk about their own and their partner’s boundaries like any other type of sex. It should be preceded by a conversation about what the people participating in sex are consenting to, what they aren’t consenting to, how they’re expecting sex to go, and how they’re going to communicate during sex to make sure everyone’s still on the same page. Anal sex also requires a lot of lube.

And on porn:

Porn can certainly cause relationship problems but so can a lot of other things. Porn causing relationship problems isn’t inevitable, it depends on the relationship and it depends on how the people in that relationship feel about porn…. [T]he evidence says that if you think porn’s bad, it is, and if you think porn’s fine, then it is.

In two other “sex positive” podcasts, she discusses “Creating Queer inclusive spaces” with a self-identifying “non-binary, pansexual” woman from California and a woman from a Naperville, Illinois organization who “educates” teachers . Recommendations for this queering endeavor include adorning classrooms with pro-“LGBTQ” paraphernalia and books galore, and scrubbing from the classroom all gendered language like the words “boy” and “girl.”

Health teachers should absolutely not refer to “girls” having their periods or “boys” having penises. Why not? Because some humans with natal menstruating uteruses are “boys,” and some humans with natal functioning penises are girls—that is, in Cavill’s make-believe, science-denying, metaphysical world where disembodied spirit humans inhabit wrong bodies, they are.

One wonders how Cavill’s dream queer-inclusive classrooms, awash in pro-“LGBTQ” symbology and propaganda, would make Orthodox Jews, Muslims, and theologically orthodox Christian students feel. Would those whose authentic identities include beliefs about biological sex and sexual acts that are implicitly and explicitly condemned by queered spaces feel included?

Let’s take a look at a few of “inclusive” school board member Kim Cavill’s tweets over the past year—tweets that any student with a Twitter account can read. Read them bearing in mind the board of education policy that says, a “Board of Education member should honor the responsibility which membership demands by representing at all times the entire school community.”

April 13, she tweeted this quote from an Atlantic article: 

“For the past 30 years, the GOP has pursued a consistent strategy: Find a misunderstood or marginalized group, convince voters that the members of that group pose an existential threat to society, and then ride to victory on the promise of using state power to crush them.” 

April 12 retweet: 

“Nothing like a police shooting to demonstrate conservatives’ most strongly held belief: With great power comes no responsibility.” 

January 28:

My 17 year old son: “I’m using spermicide and condoms to protect against STDs. I also know about PrEP for HIV prevention. My girlfriend’s on the pill, too.

Me [Kim Cavill]: “I’m so proud of you. Pick a restaurant, I’ll buy you both dinner, tell me what day works and we’ll get you take-out.” 

Feb. 24:

The only reason for seeing an increase in sexual fluidity as a negative is bigotry, so if you’re upset about how many young people are bi, the problem is…you 

March 16:

Praying for all the health teachers who will be asked, “Can you pop your vagina into someone else’s vagina? 

March 20, shortly before Easter:

My ten year old: “Why did they put Aragorn on that billboard?”

Me [Kim Cavill]: “Honey, that’s not Aragorn, that’s Jesus Christ.”

Ten year old: “Lame.”

(I wonder if Cavill would have posted such a Tweet if the billboard had featured a picture of Muhammad.) 

March 5:

Just had a three minute conversation with someone who was too scared to get the vaccine and now they are going to take the next available appointment.  If I can achieve this with adults, just imagine how effective I am with classrooms full of teenagers. Sex ed saves lives. 

November 12, 2020 tweet directed at Associate Justice Samuel Alito:

Roses are red

Violets are blue

Plan B prevents ovulation,

so screw you. 

August 28, 2020 retweet:

“It sounds absurd to say it, but America is in the process of choosing whether to be a white nationalist fascist state or an inclusive democracy. That’s not hyperbole, that’s just where we are”

August 23, 2020 Retweet: 

“Here is what I would like for you to know: In America, it is traditional to destroy the black body – it is heritage.” — Ta-Nehisi Coates

July 26, 2020

17 being the average means that some people have sex earlier and some people wait a lot longer. There is no “right age” to have sex. Only you can decide what’s best for you according to your values, goals, and circumstances. The decision should come from inside, not outside.

Cavill exposes how she views her sex “educator” job in this tweet:

Anytime a Very Serious Free Speech Defender tweets about “censorship” I think about how many times I had to answer students’ questions with, “I wish I could give you an answer, but the state/your school board/your administration/ doesn’t allow me to talk about that. I’m sorry.”

Cavill believes that having any restrictions on what she says to other people’s minor children about sexuality in a taxpayer-subsidized school constitutes “censorship,” thereby demonstrating what I have been saying for years: Leftist activists posing as teachers think they should have absolute autonomy in the classroom.

Equally troubling, the restive Cavill makes sure her students know that she opposes these restrictions, thereby encouraging student resentment against rules imposed by their state, their school board, or their administration. Cavill has the maturity of adolescents who rebel against rules that thwart their desires.

Cavill is a cunning, vulgar, anti-conservative, far left activist who is unfit for any school board. And school boards all around the country have members who think just like Cavill, which is one of the many reasons conservative parents must get their children out of government indoctrination centers. If Americans cannot see that someone like Cavill is unfit to sit on a school board or teach children, then they are the proverbial boiled frogs.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

Last Thursday night, District 211—the largest high school district in the state with 12,000 students and five high schools—held a board meeting to discuss Superintendent Daniel Cates’ boneheaded proposal to allow students who “identify” as the opposite sex to have unrestricted access to the locker rooms of opposite-sex peers. Expecting a large crowd, the district moved the meeting to Palatine High School. The Daily Herald reported that 25 speakers were randomly selected, 16 of whom opposed the proposal, which is well over 50 percent.

Several years ago, when the district was first sued by a biological boy who was self-“identifying” as a girl, Cates allowed him to use the girls’ locker room as long as he changed clothes behind a privacy curtain. Cates steadfastly opposed this boy’s request for unrestricted access to the girls’ locker room. That was then, this is now. Now Cates proposes allowing boys and girls who pretend to be the sex they aren’t to have unrestricted access to the locker rooms of their opposite-sex peers. Perhaps Cates is spineless and follows the path of least resistance, which now leads into darkness. Perhaps he has morally devolved as so many school administrators have. Or perhaps his retirement at the end of this school year has freed his authentic inner corrupt self to emerge.

Cates couldn’t do this dirty work alone. It takes a village and at least four board members to indoctrinate children with an incoherent, irrational, and harmful ideology. One of those sorry villagers is the newly elected, morally corrupt, and unpleasant District 211 board member Kim Cavill, who is a sex “educator” when she’s not promoting feckless locker room policies.

If her name rings a bell, it’s because I mentioned her in an article about former District U46 school board member Jeanette Ward, a fearless, wise, and gracious woman who endured egregiously disrespectful treatment from fellow board members Traci O’Neal Ellis, Veronica Noland, and Melissa Owens. In an online post, Cavill referred to Jeanette Ward as the “High Priestess of the Order of Moron.” Oddly, that comment has been scrubbed from the Internet. Maybe she thought such a comment wouldn’t help her get elected to the District 211 board. Sounds a wee bit intolerant and hateful.

The curious story of the April 2019 election of Kim Cavill actually goes back to the even curiouser story of the 2017 school board election. Three well-qualified people who opposed co-ed private spaces for minors were running against three people who supported co-ed private spaces for minors. The three well-qualified challengers were,

Jean Forrest, a Chinese-American woman with an MA in economics who works as an actuary

Katherine Jee Young David, a Korean-American woman with a BS in Business Administration from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

Ralph Bonatz who has a degree in electrical engineering and is a global quality control manager for an international corporation

On March 22, 2017, just 13 days before the 2017 election, LaSaia Wade, a 29-year-old “black trans woman” (i.e., a biological man), and Daye Pope, another biological male who passes as a woman, set up a Super PAC called Trans United Fund Illinois. Pope is the organizing director for a 501(c)(3) called Trans United Fund.

Two days later, on March 24, 2017—11 days before the 2017 election—Kim Cavill and her sister Lindsay Christensen set up a Super PAC called Parents and Neighbors for Quality Education (PNQE).

Just days after the founding of Trans United Fund Illinois, donations from some surprising people came pouring in:

• Matrix Director “Lana” Wachowski, a biological man who pretends to be a woman and lives with his dominatrix wife in Chicago, donated a whopping $10,000.

• Far left Illinois State Senator Heather Steans (D-Chicago) also donated $10,000.

• Homosexual Clark Pellet, a retired attorney and development chair for the “LGBTQ” Center on Halsted who lives in Chicago, donated $5,000.

• Executive director of Gender Rights Maryland, Dana Beyer, a man who pretends to be a woman and lives in Chevy Chase, MD donated $1,000.

• Eliza Byard, executive director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) who lives in Brooklyn, NY donated $500.

• Homosexual Douglas Hattaway, president and CEO of a Washington D.C. strategic communications firm who lives in D.C., donated $500.

• Architect Kira Kinsman, a biological man formerly known as Kyle Kinsman who lives in Wilkes Barre, PA, donated $250.

The more than $26, 000 in donations for a school board election from donors who don’t live in District 211 then went to—you guessed it—Cavill’s Parents and Neighbors for Quality Education.

Enquiring minds may wonder why Cavill and her sister set up PNQE, since Trans United Fund Illinois was already established. Why the extra step to fund the defeat of conservatives? The answer to that question might be found in mailers and yard signs. State law requires that campaign mailers and yard signs identify the groups that pay for them. Signs must say “Approved by….”

Which sounds better—and by “better” I mean less likely to arouse suspicion: “Approved by Trans United Fund Illinois” or “Approved by Parents and Neighbors for Quality Education”?

Flush with filthy lucre, the Cavill sisters got busy smearing good people with nary a backward glance.

As reported by the “LGBTQ” newspaper Windy City Times, a local mom (Who could that have been?) reached out to Trans United Fund, “a national trans-led advocacy group,” who agreed to help them defeat the three candidates who supported single-sex locker rooms:

Trans United Fund (TUF) and a group of local parents, youth, and allies, worked together to launch the first trans-led, trans-focused independent expenditure in history. TUF assembled a powerful team of thoughtful allies to quickly build and execute a research-informed and strategic plan to help the parents and youth get their message out. TUF supported the parents’ efforts through digital, mail, phone banking and helping to train volunteers to reach their neighbors at the door.

The Windy City Times made clear this campaign was a smear campaign in which good people who believe locker rooms and restrooms should correspond to biological sex were vilified. District 211 community member Tracey Salvatore, spewing venomous lies said this about the good people who were defeated:

We are fed up with this small group of vocal, transphobic people guided by a national hate group [Alliance Defending Freedom] wreaking havoc in our community…. Our District 211 community will not tolerate adults bullying kids or intimidating us for one more day. The ADF-inspired slate of candidates ran with the agenda of inserting a hate-based, national agenda into our schools. They didn’t care that their policy changes would increase bullying and violence against kids…. So we reached out to Trans United Fund and they helped us to get our message out to our neighbors and community members. (emphasis added)

Neither Salvatore nor anyone affiliated with PNQE felt the ethical obligation to provide evidence that the three candidates feared or hated “trans”-identifying students, or that they bullied kids, or that they intimidated community members, or that ADF has a “hate-based agenda,” or that single-sex private spaces for minors increase “bullying and violence.” Why try to provide impossible-to-find evidence when hate-mongering rhetoric does the job.

The belief that biological sex is the source of feelings of modesty and the right to privacy when undressing does not constitute hatred of persons no matter how many times people like Salvatore and Cavill spread their repugnant lies.

I wonder if Salvatore spreads these same ugly and false lies about feminists—including lesbians—who oppose biological males in women’s private spaces. Perhaps Salvatore is unaware of the growing schism in the “LGBT” alliance. Just a week ago, a group of influential supporters of the “LGB rights” movement in the United Kingdom, including Stonewall UK founder Simon Fanshawe, published an open letter in the Sunday Times in which they criticize Stonewall and suggest it’s time for the formation of a new organization that is “committed both to freedom of speech and to fact instead of fantasy.” Here’s an excerpt from that letter that Salvatore, Cavill, and Cates should ponder:

Last October a group of LGB rights supporters asked Stonewall to “commit to fostering an atmosphere of respectful debate rather than demonising as transphobic those who wish to discuss, or dissent from, Stonewall’s transgender policies.” Since then, Stonewall has refused repeated requests to enter into any such dialogue…. We believe it has made mistakes in its approach that undermine women’s sex-based rights and protections. The most worrying aspect of this is that all primary-school children are now challenged to review their ‘gender identity’ and decide that they may be the opposite sex if they do not embrace outdated gender stereotypes.

Does Salvatore demonize teens as hateful transphobes if they don’t want to undress in the presence of male peers? What about female teachers who don’t want to undress in front of male colleagues? Does she accuse them of hate-based bullying?

Almost immediately after the school board election and defeat for all three good candidates, Cavill and her sister deactivated their Super PAC. Malignant Mission Accomplished.

And now we return our story to the school board election of April 2019. Kim Cavill, the person who orchestrated the ugly and deceitful campaign smear of three good people by creating a Super PAC front for a Super PAC financed by “LGBTQ” donors from out of the district, ran for the District 211 board and won. Is she really an emblem of good government and transparency?

If you are not yet convinced of her unfitness for serving on a school board or her unfitness to serve as a role model for children, here are just a smattering of quotes from her sex ed podcasts for children and teens.

From her podcast for tweens and teens on anal sex titled “All About Anal”:

Before trying anal sex, people need to talk about their own and their partner’s boundaries like any other type of sex. It should be preceded by a conversation about what the people participating in sex are consenting to, what they aren’t consenting to, how they’re expecting sex to go, and how they’re going to communicate during sex to make sure everyone’s still on the same page. Anal sex also requires a lot of lube.

From her podcast for “tweens and teens” titled “Let’s Talk About Porn”:

Porn can certainly cause relationship problems but so can a lot of other things. Porn causing relationship problems isn’t inevitable, it depends on the relationship and it depends on how the people in that relationship feel about porn…. [T]he evidence says that if you think porn’s bad, it is, and if you think porn’s fine, then it is.

One thing notable from sexpert Cavill’s podcasts is how studiously she avoids the words boy, girl, man, and woman. Even in her podcast explaining how babies come into existence, she never mentions men and women. Instead, she describes a “grown-up with a penis” and a “grown-up with a vagina.” Huh. I wonder what those are.

There are two lessons to be learned from this incredible story:

1. Local communities no longer control their own school boards and, therefore, their schools.

2. Cultural regressives are targeting the hearts, minds, and bodies of other people’s children—your children—and they’re using your money to do it.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Incredible-Story-of-District-211-School-Board-Elections_AUDIO.mp3

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School District U46 (Elgin, Illinois) School Board Member Jeanette Ward offers a profile in courage, grace, and wisdom, while fellow board members Veronica Noland and Melissa Owens offer profiles in hypocrisy and ignorance. Their hypocrisy and ignorance were revealed during a recent school board meeting discussion about proposed changes to the “Student Code of Conduct.”

In 2013, the board voted to add the terms “sexual orientation,” “gender identity” and “gender-related identity or expression” to the section of school board policy on bullying and harassment. Those are the only conditions constituted by subjective, internal feelings and volitional behavior to be specifically identified. Since board policy then concludes with the inclusion of “any other distinguishing characteristic,” there exists no necessity for naming any characteristic, let alone ones constituted by subjective feelings and volitional behavior.

But bad became worse this past Monday night when the board voted to add this language from board policy to the “Student Code of Conduct,” which all parents must sign in order to enroll their children in District U46. Prior to the 5-2 vote, with Phil Costello joining Ward in opposing the change, Ward asked if, under the policy change, students would be guilty of bullying if they refused to use the “pronoun preference for a gender dysphoric student.”

She offered this commonsense and compassionate explanation for her opposition to punishing students for refusal to lie in the service of a science-denying ideology:

I don’t think it helps the student who is struggling with this issue to help them in their denial of reality. And I don’t view that as a form of bullying. I think to join them in what is not real, in the real world, only hurts them.

Hoo boy, the leftist ideologues on the school board did not tolerate well her dissent from their dogma.

The self-righteous Noland huffed:

I have to say something. Using the terms “gender dysphoric” and making the statements that you make hurt the students of this district. They go against what the accepted practices from major major organizations in this country… the American Academy of Pediatrics… I could bring out my list of references from a year and a half ago… but I will strongly strongly condemn your terms that you use and the language that you use in hurting the students of this district. I think it’s an ideology of yours, and it’s a minority in this district and a minority in this country. It goes against our policies that we have voted on. It goes against against so many things. You can continue to use this as a political platform of your own because you have that right, but I will vociferously object to the comments and the terms that you use for our students.

When Noland suggests students are “hurt” by the term “gender dysphoric”—a term which is not a pejorative and is used commonly in the mental health community—what does she mean? Does she mean students who seek to pass as the sex they are not don’t like the term? If so, how does her strong, strong condemnation of and vociferous objection to Ward’s beliefs make students in the district who share those beliefs feel? Might they be hurt by Noland’s words?

Noland cites—again—the American Academy of Pediatrics’ endorsement of “trans”-affirmative experimental protocols without mentioning that all anyone really knows is that a small committee of leftist members of the AAP created this policy, which an even smaller group then voted on. The rest of the thousands of members of the AAP had no input or vote on the policy. In fact, most didn’t know about it until the public learned about it.

Noland believes that Ward’s “ideology” is shared by only a minority in the district and country. To which of Ward’s positions specifically is Noland referring? Does Noland believe most people in the country oppose the use of the term “gender dysphoric”? Does she believe most people in the country want students punished for refusing to use incorrect pronouns? If so, perhaps at the next board meeting, she can provide conclusive, research-based evidence for her claims.

Further, is Noland—who is apparently a true-blue “progressive”—arguing that minority groups should be denied a voice? The hypocrisies just keep piling up. Commitments to tolerance, diversity, and minority voices gone in slavish servitude to the disordered, doctrinaire sexuality ideology of the left.

Perhaps the most laughable of Noland’s statements was her characterization of Ward’s views as an “ideology” that informs a “political platform.” Why are Ward’s views on the science-denying “trans” ideology part of an ideology but Noland’s views are not? Why when Ward expresses her views on the “trans” ideology is she guilty of using school board discussions for a political platform, but when Noland expresses her views on the same subject, she’s not guilty of using board discussions for a political platform? Noland should be asked to answer these questions publicly.

Then board member Melissa Owens made clear the Orwellian, anti-First Amendment—even fascist—nature of this policy (fascism: “A political philosophy characterized by authoritarian views and a strong central government—and no tolerance for opposing opinions; tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control”):

If sitting at a table in a position of power and saying that our students don’t live in reality, if that’s not bullying, I don’t know what bullying is to be quite honest with you.

Well, I would argue that if sitting at a table in a position of power and saying that students must speak lies or risk being disciplined for bullying is not bullying, I don’t know what bullying is—to be quite honest.

Objectively male students who claim to be girls are denying the reality of their sex. Stating that objective truth no more constitutes bullying than does saying that Rachel Dolezal denied reality when she claimed to be African American.

Throughout multiple board meetings in which Jeanette Ward has repeatedly contended for the truth, enduring uncivil and open hostility from arrogant colleagues and community members, Ward has demonstrated courage, grace, wisdom, restraint, and humility. In addition, with grace, she weathers despicable attacks on her school board Facebook page from people like “Sex Positive Parent/Sex Education Teacher” Kim Cavill, who earlier this week called Ward the “High Priestess of the Order of Moron” (nice role model for kids).

Here’s some apolitical truth.

At birth, doctors do not assign or designate “genders” (as redefined by “progressives”). Rather, doctors identify the sex of babies, which is virtually always correct except in the very rare cases of babies born with Disorders of Sexual Development (i.e., intersex disorders, which are wholly irrelevant to discussions of the “trans” ideology). “Gender” (as redefined by “progressives”) denotes the arbitrary socially constructed behaviors, conventions, and expectations associated with maleness or femaleness. It’s beyond silly to claim that at babies’ births, obstetricians assign to them arbitrary socially constructed behaviors, conventions, and expectations. Obstetricians identify the sex of babies, and the sex of humans can never change. Pronouns denote and correspond to biological sex.

No administrator, faculty member, staff member, or student should be compelled by Big Brother to lie by being forced to use incorrect pronouns when referring to someone who masquerades as the sex they are not. Punishing students—or staff—for resisting mandatory speech codes is institutional bullying at its worst. The government has no right to compel speech—let alone deceitful speech. For an arm of the government—which is what schools are—to require employees or students to lie is a frightening exercise of tyrannical power.

Thank you to Jeanette Ward for standing bravely and almost alone for truth in the District U46.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Jeanette-Wards-Profile-in-Courage-Grace-and-Wisdom.mp3

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As most know, the youth arm of the far-Left Women’s March has organized an anti-gun school protest that will take place in countless public schools across the country this week. They’re urging students to leave school buildings at 10:00 a.m. on Wednesday, March 14 for 17 minutes, which, counting the time it takes for students to exit and return to class, will disrupt classes for about 35 minutes. One school board member who understands the motives, implications, and problems of this political protest, Jeanette Ward in School District U-46, sent several questions to district CEO Tony Sanders, who posted his responses. This is the same Tony Sanders who “guided” his administration to “support” demonstrating students through myriad activities throughout the day.

What Sanders’ responses reveal is how “progressive” administrators rationalize violations of even board policy and student conduct policy in the service of “progressive” causes. Such rhetorical and ideological gymnastics must require some serious mental limbering up.

Here is the first of Ward’s questions:

[H]ow does the walkout not violate Board policy 7.196, where it says, “Student disruptions to the continuity of the instructional program on school district premises, or at school-related activities, will be viewed by the Board of Education, in consultation with Administration, as a serious matter and may be grounds for suspension and/or expulsion”? Isn’t a 10 am walkout a “disruption to the continuity of the instructional program”?

And now for Sanders’ first risible rationalization:

The full text of Board Policy 7.196 regarding student demonstrations which states “Peaceful and free expression of student ideas and opinions will be allowed as long as such expression does not disrupt the continuity of the instructional program. School personnel may reasonably regulate peaceful assembly and the time and place of petition circulation in order to avoid interference with the normal school operation. Student disruptions to the continuity of the instructional program on school district premises, or at school-related activities, will be viewed by the Board of Education, in consultation with administration, as a serious matter and may be grounds for suspension and/or expulsion.” In other words, policy supports administrators working along with students to “reasonably regulate.”

Let’s try to read this the way normal people and good attorneys might read it. Yes, board policy does, indeed, say that administrators may “reasonably regulate,” but Sanders apparently forgot to include the object of this reasonable regulation, so I’ll provide it: “In order to avoid interference with the normal school operation,“ “School personnel may reasonably regulate peaceful assembly” that “does not disrupt the continuity of the instructional program.” (emphasis added)

Non-disruption of the instructional program and non-interference with normal school operation are necessary pre-requisites for any type of student demonstration. It should go without saying that when students leave their classes, the “continuity of the instructional program” is disrupted.

Evidently not noting his contradiction, Sanders goes on to demonstrate that the walkout not only “disrupts the continuity of the instructional program” but also interferes with “normal school operation”:

Teachers not assigned to a classroom will be expected to supervise students. We are also sending support from central office to any school that requests assistance with supervision…. If every student in a classroom departs to participate in the walkout, then the teacher will move with their students to supervise only.  

After his odd and ungraceful leap over the type of event that school personnel may regulate (i.e., demonstrations that neither interfere with normal school operation nor disrupt the continuity of the instructional program), Sanders scurries on to dangle a glittering red herring that flutters like a rhythmic gymnastics ribbon in front of his audience by reciting irrelevant board policy about basic civil rights; education for a democracy; freedom of individual conscience, association, and expression; and, ironically, social responsibility:

Further we have other policies. 7.131 states, “the basic civil rights afforded individuals of a democratic society will be supported by U-46 personnel in their interactions with students.” Policy 7.130 says “The Board of Education seeks to educate young people in the democratic tradition, to foster recognition of individual freedom and social responsibility, and to inspire meaningful awareness of and respect for the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights. Freedom of individual conscience, association, and expression will be encouraged. Procedures will be observed both to safeguard the legitimate interests of the schools and to exhibit, by appropriate examples, the basic objectives of the democratic society as set forth in the Constitutions of the United States and the State of Illinois.”

Of course, all those goals and values are important, but prohibiting a walkout that inarguably disrupts the “continuity” of instruction and interferes with “normal school operation” does not conflict with the district’s civic mission or abrogate students’ rights to express themselves or associate.

In Ward’s second question, she asked whether the demonstration violates the student code of conduct that prohibits “a demonstration and mass protest,” which is defined as “willful disturbance of school activities through a march or rally that prevents the orderly conduct of school classes or activities.”

Sanders’ rationalization goes like this:

[W]e are working with the students to prevent the walkout from becoming a disturbance. We are allowing students who want to peacefully assemble to do so and working to ensure that students who do not want to participate are not kept from their classroom instruction. Should students engage in behavior that is disruptive, then consequences would be appropriate pursuant to the Student Code of Conduct.

So, according to sophist Sanders, exiting the school building during class neither “disrupts the continuity of” instruction, nor interferes with “normal school operation,”—even though supervision must be radically altered and increased—nor “disturbs school activities,” nor “prevents the orderly conduct of school classes or activities.” Did you hear that, kiddos? Leaving class does not disturb the orderly conduct of class.

Oh waaait, maybe Sanders doesn’t know what a “disturbance” is! A disturbance is any activity that interrupts the “peace” of, for example, a class. It’s an event that “interferes” with an activity. It’s defined as a “disruption.” How is exiting the school building during class not a “disturbance”?

In contrast, District 300 has made this far wiser decision:

[I]f a “walkout” type event does occur (e.g. moment of silence), it must happen within the building and with the prior consent of the school administration. Due to safety and supervision concerns we are discouraging any walkouts and will not support an activity that takes our students outside of the building. Doing so on a known date and time violates our safety polices and common sense. 

Take ACTION: Parents, contact your schools to find out what your board policy and student conduct code says about political demonstrations, and find out if students will be permitted to participate in this political demonstration without consequence or penalty. And consider keeping your children home if your school is permitting normal school activities to be disrupted, disturbed, or interfered with for Wednesday’s political demonstration.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/School-CEO-Rationalizes-Violation-of-School-Policy-to-Defend-Disruptive-Anti-Gun-Protest.mp3

RESCHEDULED: IFI Worldview Conference May 5th

We have rescheduled our annual Worldview Conference featuring well-know apologist John Stonestreet for Saturday, May 5th at Medinah Baptist Church. Mr. Stonestreet is s a dynamic speaker and the award-winning author of “Making Sense of Your World” and his newest offer: “A Practical Guide to Culture.”

Join us for a wonderful opportunity to take enhance your biblical worldview and equip you to more effectively engage the culture.

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A new controversy has erupted in School District U-46, and this time it doesn’t involve compulsory co-ed locker rooms or offensive statements from board member Traci O’Neal Ellis. This time 18 local religious leaders have objected to school board member Jeanette Ward’s Facebook post about a controversial article on religion assigned in a sixth-grade class.

A teacher had her sixth-graders read an article by Australian history of religion professor and agnostic Philip Almond and then answer questions based on that reading. Here are some of the controversial statements from that article:

“Judaism, Christianity and Islam are three of the world’s major religions. While they have many differences, they all believe in the same God.

“Some of the prophets that Jews follow were Noah, Abraham and Moses. Christians follow these prophets too. They also think that Jesus was another prophet of the same God.”

“Jesus, Muhammad and the Hebrew prophets all described the same God.”

“The God of the Old Testament can be both good and evil.”

“Like the prophets of the Old Testament, Jesus predicted a day when God will punish humankind and will be merciless in doing so.”

 “Muslims, Christians and Jews all worship the same complex God. But each religion believes that its books and teachings reveal the true nature of that God. This disagreement has shaped the course of history. The followers of each religion believe that only they will be saved by God. They see all others as damned. This way of seeing people, as damned by God and beyond saving, has led to violence and hatred.”

After reading the assignment, Ward posted the entire article by Almond along with these innocuous comments:

Do you know what your children are being taught: Muslims believe in the same God as Christians and Jews?

My 6th-grader came home with this assignment today. She was supposed to read the article and answer the questions. (She will not be completing this assignment). The full text of the article is below. Quiz questions are depicted in the pictures. This article is utterly incorrect and false on many levels. This is one of the many reasons I voted no on this curriculum resource.

In response to Ward’s Facebook comments, a statement signed by 18 religious leaders—mostly from apostate denominations—was read at Monday’s school board meeting (see names and affiliations below*). They began by mildly critiquing Almond’s article for its lack of “nuance” and “generosity”:

None of us saw our faith traditions represented in their fullness in the article as represented from the school’s curriculum.

The central problem with the article was not lack of “nuance,” “generosity,” or  “fullness.” The central problem was theological errors taught to children as facts. For many Christians such theological errors are offensive, and having government employees present such errors to their children as facts compounds the offense.

Then, with insufficient nuance and generosity, these religious leaders criticized Ward’s Facebook comment:

[W]e feel that more important than the content of the article is the question of how we are to engage with inevitable differences of opinion, theology, and world view. Here, we strongly take exception to Ms. Ward’s approach… We believe that these instances represent a valuable opportunity to practice civil discourse and to express our differences with both respect and humility.

Seriously? Ward’s “approach” is more important to purported Christian pastors than a public school presenting resources that teach children that the God of the Old Testament is evil and that Allah and Jesus are the same?

Moreover, what specifically did Ward write that is uncivil, disrespectful, or prideful? Maybe these faith leaders could tell everyone exactly what the permissible ways to “engage with inevitable differences of opinion, theology, and world view” are.

One wonders why these religious leaders didn’t publicly chastise school board member Veronica Noland when she referred to opponents of co-ed locker rooms as “narrow-minded fear mongers.” And why didn’t they condemn school board member Traci O’Neal Ellis’ “approach” when she three times referred to Republicans as the equivalent of KKK’ers. Curiouser and curiouser.

This theologically imbalanced coterie of critics next claimed it’s the job of some unnamed persons to correct the misinformation provided to young middle schoolers by government employees:

[W]hen such articles and statements are presented to our children, we believe it is helpful to use these instances as opportunities to teach our children why we disagree with the information being presented and how to do so with respect and humility. Indeed, we believe teaching our children to identify, understand, and even challenge ideas with which they do not agree is helpful training for them as students, citizens, and people of faith.

The subject of their recommendation remains unclear. Who should teach children that the material presented at school is incorrect? Religious leaders? Parents? How can religious leaders or parents engage in the work of correcting misinformation if they don’t know that such misinformation was disseminated to their children?

This raises critical questions: Who selected this article? Did a department chair and curricula review committee read it? And why are teachers using resources that present arguable assumptions and errors as facts?

Continuing their criticism of Ward under the guise of offering their definition of proper leadership, the faith leaders inadvertently revealed their fealty to government employees as opposed to parents and other taxpayers:

[F]aithful, respectful leadership means engaging teachers and administrators directly.

This may be the most troubling part of their troubling statement. They failed to mention that the primary responsibility of school board members is to directly engage parents and other stakeholders—you know, the people who elected them and for whom they work.

How can Muslim, Jewish, or Christian parents have the kind of conversations with their children that this group of mostly “progressives” recommend unless a school board member or members engage directly with those parents to inform them of what was taught? Clearly the teacher didn’t do that.

From working for a decade in a public school, I learned that there is an unwritten principle that teachers, administrators, and board members cling to as if it were sacred. The rule is that if parents have a concern with resources, they should first express their concerns to teachers, and then if unsatisfied with the response, move up the food chain. In my humble opinion, that’s an arbitrary, socially constructed rule that parents need not honor.

Ironically, teachers, administrators, and board members who believe there’s no need to honor the practice of segregating boys from girls in restrooms and locker rooms think parents must honor the practice of keeping controversial resources on the down-low in order to avoid controversy. How “progressives” arrive at their ethical and moral imperatives is baffling.

Unfortunately, given the desire of “progressives” in government schools for absolute autonomy and their self-identification as “change agents,” controversy is both inevitable and necessary. To borrow from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in “Letter from Birmingham Jail”:

[W]e who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

There’s a lesson to be learned from this mess. It’s that “progressives” control schools in part because they act. Perhaps at the next board meeting, 20, 25, or 30 theologically orthodox Christians could make a statement about the problem of using taxpayer money to teach young children that Jesus and Allah are the same God or that the God of the Old Testament is evil. Surely there are a few pastors in the Elgin area who find such teaching objectionable. And surely  there are some who feel empathy for Jeanette Ward who stands in the gap for children when no other school board member does.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Faithless-Faith-Leaders-Protest-Jeanette-Wards-FB-Post_01.mp3

*Lois Bucher, associate pastor, First Congregational Church (United Church of Christ), Elgin; Richard T. Carlson, pastor, First United Methodist Church, Elgin; David Daubert, pastor, Zion Lutheran Church, Elgin; Marlene Daubert, deacon, Zion Lutheran Church, Elgin; Dr. Paris Donehoo, senior pastor, First Congregational Church (United Church of Christ), Elgin; The Reverend Dr. Nathaniel Edmond, Second Baptist Church, Elgin; Rev. Donald J. Frye (“married” to a man), rector, St. James Episcopal Church, West Dundee; Sulayman Hassan, Baitul Ilm Academy, Streamwood; Ed Hunter, chaplain, Presence Saint Joseph Hospital, Elgin; Margaret Frisch Klein, rabbi, Congregation Kneseth Israel, Elgin; Steven J. Peskind, rabbi and chaplain, Streamwood; Fred Rajan, reverend (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America) and vice president, Office of Spiritual Care, Advocate Hospital; Karen Schlack, reverend, First Presbyterian Church (PCUSA), Elgin; Jill Terpstra, reverend, St. Paul’s United Church of Christ, Kane County; Katie Shaw Thompson, pastor, Highland Avenue Church of the Brethren; Rev. Denise Tracy, president, Coalition of Elgin Religious Leaders President, Elgin; George Wadleigh, Christian Scientist; and Mark Weinert, pastor, First Christian Church, Elgin.

End-of-Year Challenge

As you may know, IFI has a year-end matching challenge to raise $160,000. That’s right, a great group of IFI supporters are colluding with us to provide an $80,000 matching challenge to help support IFI’s ongoing work to educate, motivate and activate Illinois’ Christian community.

Please consider helping us reach this goal!  Your donation will help us stand strong in 2018!  To make a credit card donation over the phone, please call the IFI office at (708) 781-9328.  You can also send a gift to:

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A new controversy has erupted in School District U-46, and this time it doesn’t involve compulsory co-ed locker rooms or offensive statements from board member Traci O’Neal Ellis.  This time 18 religious leaders have objected to school board member Jeanette Ward’s Facebook post about a controversial article on religion assigned in a sixth-grade class.

A teacher had her sixth-graders read an article by…

Read more here…

If Illinoisans want to know what’s wrong with public education, look no further than School District U-46, more specifically to the arrogant, self-righteous school board member Traci O’Neal Ellis who never misses an opportunity to insult conservative values through bigoted, divisive, uncivil language.  She is the school board member who has twice gleefully referred to the Republican National Convention as the “Klanvention.”

Evidently wanting to outdo herself in offending a segment of the diverse community whose interests she laughingly claims to represent, she just posted this on her Facebook page:

I’m proud to stand with the sons of bitches on the field today. And I promise you I would #TakeAKnee at school board meetings if my doing so would not be disruptive to KIDS and a distraction to the work we need to do for THEM. But [Trump’s] remarks are nothing more than continued white nationalism at its finest. That flag means nothing more than toilet paper to me. [emphasis added]

By asserting that the American flag means nothing more than “toilet paper” to her, Ellis reveals her crudity and unprofessionalism.

Ellis’ unprofessional comment came to light when a concerned community member sent it to the only  conservative on the U-46 school board, Jeanette Ward, who then re-posted it, with this brief statement:

This was sent to me by a very concerned constituent. A U-46 BOE colleague of mine has stated that our country’s flag means “nothing more than toilet paper”. I disagree in the strongest possible terms. Many patriotic Americans have shed their blood to defend the ideas and ideals America represents. To call it “nothing more than toilet paper” is absolutely despicable and disgusting.

Ellis, incensed that Ward and community members are (justifiably) upset by her juvenile comment, took to Facebook again to rationalize her comment and attack—not Ward’s brief comment—but Ward herself.

Ellis, who is black, began though with a summary of the tragic history of her family going back to the Middle Passage and continuing up to today when, Ellis reports, her family continues to experience racism. Because of this, she says that “The flag and the anthem are symbols in this country of freedom and ‘justice and liberty’ for all. Yet that is a blatant lie for black folks.”

But is it a “blatant lie for black folks”? Is there no justice or liberty for blacks?

I couldn’t possibly list all the blacks who have achieved success in virtually every area of life including the arts,  military, government, journalism, athletics, academia, and medicine. Ellis herself is a sitting school board member and an attorney, and yet she claims there is no justice or liberty for blacks.

Ellis shares that she has “many family members and friends who now serve or have served in the United States military, and they have my deepest respect. But let’s be clear, I can love and respect them without loving a false symbol of hope.”

How is the flag that represents the ideals and principles that have helped rid our nation of the scourges of slavery, slave codes, Black Codes, Jim Crow Laws, and segregation a false symbol of hope? Is Ellis so blind that she cannot see how far this country has come in healing racial division? When I look around, I see daily marvelous evidence of racial unity. I see bi-racial couples, families that include adopted children of diverse races, churches with racially mixed congregations, colleges with racially mixed student bodies and faculties, and racially mixed groups of teens laughing together.

It is not the ideals and principles represented by the flag that have failed. It is fallen people who fail to live up to those ideals that have failed. It is fallen people who don’t recognize truth who perpetuate foolishness, injustice, and evil.

If the injustices that persist because of the fallenness of humans taint the flag for Ellis, then why don’t the great strides we’ve made in America in eradicating racial injustice generate in Ellis a love for the flag?

Ellis then behaved like a schoolyard bully, attacking Jeanette Ward personally:

Jeanette Ward is the most absurd hypocrite I have ever had the personal misfortune to know and have to yield any of my personal time to. She dares to claim free speech to castigate U-46 kids and deny the humanity of our LGBTQIA students. She constantly WHINES about lack of tolerance to diversity of thought and CRIES like a 2 year old that her freedom of speech is being impinged on when anyone dares to disagree with her. Yet she has the unmitigated gall to try to take me to task when I express MY OPINION on the flag on my personal Facebook page. Hey Jeanette (and anybody else offended by what I said), that’s not how free speech and liberty and the flag you love so much works. THAT’S. NOT. HOW. ANY. OF. THIS. WORKS.

Jeanette Ward has never denied “the humanity” of “LGBTQIA students.” When has she castigated U-46 kids and for what? Recognizing the profound meaning of objective, immutable biological sex, Jeanette Ward has worked courageously for the privacy rights of all students, which entailed opposing co-ed restrooms and locker rooms. Perhaps in Ellis’ twisted world, denying students access to the private spaces of opposite-sex persons constitutes “denying” their “humanity.”

All school board members, teachers, and administrators should care deeply about diversity of thought—something woefully absent in many public schools when it comes to matters related to race, sex, homosexuality, and the “trans” ideology. And school board members, teachers, and administrators—who are role models for children—should care deeply about how diverse views are expressed.

Ellis calls Ward’s 63-word comment on Ellis’ offensive Facebook post a galling attack on her speech rights. So what is Ellis’ 842-word screed in which she describes meeting Ward as a “personal misfortune,” and calls Ward an “absurd hypocrite” who “cries like a 2 year old”?

But Ward is not the only target of Ellis’ unrighteous indignation:

Finally, the fact that so many of you are coming UNHINGED over my post actually proves my point. The freedoms you enjoy and the flag you profess to love so much do not extend to me as a black woman. They are not my birthright. Yet I demand them anyway, and that demand includes the right to not feel any patriotism towards a piece of cloth and a pledge of allegiance to a country that does not love me back. Forced allegiance is not patriotism. It is fascism. And I will not bow to that.

Does Ellis actually think criticism of her Facebook post constitutes the denial of her freedoms? Does she think exercising her speech rights requires everyone else to remain silent? When she criticizes Republicans, conservatives, or colleagues is she denying them their birthright freedoms?

Ellis’ pouts that her country “does not love” her back. How did she arrive at that odd conclusion? Because her comment was criticized? Is she kidding? If she’s serious, what does her nasty personal attack on Ward mean? What do the hateful comments about Ward from Ellis’ fans in U-46 over the past six months mean?

Clearly Ellis doesn’t understand why so many people are upset by her adolescent “toilet paper” comment. People feel resentful about Ellis’ comment—not because they desire to force allegiance—but because the comment represents a myopic and distorted view of America, which is shaped by Critical Race Theory and promulgated as truth in public schools.

This ideology promotes an imbalanced, cynical view of American history. It encourages students to view the world through the divisive lens of identity politics, which separates people into groups according to who are the purported oppressors and who the oppressed. It cultivates a sense of undeserved guilt on the part of the alleged oppressors and robs minority students of a sense of agency in and responsibility for their own lives. Critical Race Theory (or teaching for “social justice”) is distinctly anti-American, hyper-focusing on America’s failings while diminishing or ignoring the remarkable success America has achieved in integrating virtually every ethnic and racial group in the world, and enabling people to improve their lots in life through economic opportunity and American principles of liberty and equality.

Ellis holds in contempt the American flag about which President Barack Obama said, “”I revere the American flag, and I would not be running for president if I did not revere this country.”

The American flag that drapes the coffins of soldiers who have given their lives for this country—the country into which millions of people have sought and continue to seek refuge—is to Ellis something that people should use to clean themselves after defecating.

Ellis has a First Amendment right to say anything she wants, and her community has the right to decide whether she truly seeks to represent all members of her community in a professional manner.  Ellis doesn’t seem to realize that school board members are role models for children or that she is a lousy one. If I were a member of her community, I would use my birthright freedom to give her the heave-ho.

Listen to Laurie read this article in this podcast:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/School-Board-Members-Adolescent-Statement-About-the-American-Flag.mp3

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If Illinoisans want to know what’s wrong with public education, look no further than School District U-46, more specifically to the arrogant, self-righteous school board member Traci O’Neal Ellis who never misses an opportunity to insult conservative values through bigoted, divisive, uncivil language.  She is the school board member who has twice gleefully referred to the Republican National Convention as the “Klanvention.”

Evidently wanting to outdo herself in offending a segment of the diverse community whose interests she laughingly claims to represent, she just posted this on her Facebook page:

I’m proud to stand with the sons of bitches on the field today. And I promise you I would #TakeAKnee at school board meetings if my doing so would not be disruptive to KIDS and a distraction to the work we need to do for THEM. But [Trump’s] remarks are nothing more than continued white nationalism at its finest. That flag means nothing more than toilet paper to me. [emphasis added]

By asserting that the American flag means nothing more than “toilet paper” to her, Ellis reveals her crudity and unprofessionalism.

Read more…

Hard to believe but another offense was just exposed in Illinois School District U-46, and ironically, CEO Tony Sanders inadvertently exposed it.

Last Thursday, September 29, CEO Tony Sanders released a statement regarding the controversy over his secret decision to allow a gender-dysphoric student to use a locker room and restroom designated for persons of the opposite sex. Here is an excerpt from that statement:

Earlier this school year, I agreed to provide access to one transgender student to the locker room and restroom based on that student’s gender identity….As I shared in a prior weekly message, we could have done a better job communicating the change….For the sake of transparency, I am sharing with you the guidelines  we have established to support transgender students.

The guidelines assure community members that “The District is committed to proactively address the needs and concerns of…gender expansive students.” (trigger warning: sarcasm coming) It’s hard to imagine that for almost 200 years public schools failed to address the concerns of “gender-expansive” students. What was wrong with those people?

On a cursory read, Sander’s statement may seem innocuous, maybe even positive in that Sanders admits his prior poor communication and lack of transparency. But spend a few moments cogitating on the implications of what he has implicitly acknowledged and admitted. They ain’t pretty.

In his statement Sanders shared that there is a gender-dysphoric student in the district who has been given permission to use an opposite-sex locker room and restroom, which is exactly what school board member Jeanette Ward communicated and was vilified for communicating.

Tony Sanders implicitly admitted that Jeanette Ward is the only school board member who did a good “job communicating the change.” She is the only board member who was transparent.

Because Sanders chose to conceal information to which parents have a right, Mrs. Ward posted this on Facebook on September 5:

Starting tomorrow, U-46 Administration is changing its practice concerning students’ access to locker rooms of the opposite sex. Students who identify as the opposite gender (regardless of biological sex) will be able to use the locker room that corresponds with the gender with which they identify, at the same time as other students. U-46 has opted not to inform parents or the community at large of this change. I am informing you. I encourage you to contact U-46 administration about this matter if you have concerns.

Mrs. Ward did not release the name of the student, the sex of the student, or the name of the school the student attends. She provided no identifying information. The only additional information she provided in a press interview was that the student attended a middle school. U-46 has eight middle schools that serve 5,827 students. Communicating that the student is one of almost 6,000 middle school students hardly constitutes identifiable information.

The day after Mrs. Ward’s post, Sanders, evidently feeling some heat, posted this defensive and dissembling post: “Did we notify families? No, we did not. Why? Because it would be a violation of state and federal laws that protect students from the release of personal information.”

Was Sanders intentionally trying to mislead the public by playing fast and loose with language? His statement seems to suggest without stating that the district was prohibited from sharing with the public the information contained in Mrs. Ward’s post. His statement seems to suggest that Mrs. Ward violated federal and state laws with her September 5 statement—a statement which mirrors his very own statement published 3 ½ weeks later on September 29.

Surely in the past 3 ½ weeks, Sanders knew the public thought he had said that Mrs. Ward had violated state and federal laws. He must have known that because “progressives” have been accusing her on social media and at school board meetings of doing so. And in the midst of this unseemly spate of false accusations, Sanders never once stepped in—as a person of integrity would have—to correct the public. Never once did Sanders clarify that Mrs. Ward had not released any information that violated federal or state law.

Please absorb this: Sanders has now implicitly admitted there is no federal or state law prohibiting Mrs. Ward from making the statement she did on September 5. He implicitly admitted it when he said the very same thing. And every board member who claimed that it was illegal for Mrs. Ward to share the general information she—and finally Sanders—shared has been lying. Either that or they have utterly inept legal counsel (i.e., Miguel Rodriguez, you know the school attorney who “liked” board member Traci O’Neal Ellis’ reference to the Republican National Convention as the “Klanvention.”) Either way, Mrs. Ward is owed an apology—many apologies.

Sanders said “we could have done a better job communicating the change.” Surely he jests. Does he think all of his community members just fell off the turnip truck?

Most of the board did no job “communicating the change.” And the only board member who in fact did do a “better job of communicating the change” has been treated like a pariah by four board members, Tony Sanders, and many community members.

Speaking of which, every community member who insulted and attacked Mrs. Ward on the Facebook pages “Connecting the Dots in U-46” and “School District U-46 Uncensored,” wrongly accusing her of violating laws and releasing private information owes her a public apology for saying what Sanders has just said.

Now that Sanders has inadvertently admitted that the board should have communicated the information Mrs. Ward communicated three weeks ago, perhaps Rebecca Vogt-Miller, Dana Michelle, and Sandy Achler Reeves who wrongly accused Mrs. Ward of violating state and federal laws will apologize to her.

Perhaps Reeves, who was not content merely to accuse Mrs. Ward of violating laws but also wanted to kick her in the gut, will apologize for this:

I want Mrs. Ward to think about this. What if this student decides to take their own life because of what YOU did? What about their family losing their child because YOU violated federal and state law?? Can YOU live with yourself? Mrs. Ward please resign because YOU don’t care about these kids.

Perhaps Phil Novello who called Mrs. Ward’s act of good communication and transparency “a blatant hateful act” will apologize.

And surely failed school board candidate Larry Bury will apologize for not only wrongly accusing Mrs. Ward of violating laws but also for penning this malignant accusation:

Monday evening will be the true test of character for the members of our U46 Board of Education.

…

Do they stand in support of state and federal law?
…

Or do they stand in support the ugliness being perpetrated on U46 by a certain Board member who is willing to destroy the life of a U46 student in the name of political self-promotion

A feckless CEO and four feckless board members stumble from one offense to another—all of their own making—leaving the community with more than ample justification and motivation to give the sorry four (also known as the gang who can’t shoot straight) the heave ho. Two of them, Donna Smith and Veronica Noland are up for re-election this coming April.

And maybe, just maybe some of the people who have bullied Mrs. Ward for doing exactly what Sanders has finally done will have the humility and integrity to apologize to her (mark your calendars for the 12^th of never).

There is another school board meeting this Monday night, October 3 at 7:00 p.m.  at 355 East Chicago Street in Elgin. Please try to attend and perhaps ask CEO Tony Sanders and board members Donna Smith, Susan Kerr, Traci O’Neal Ellis, and Veronica Noland how it is that Tony Sanders didn’t violate any laws for saying virtually the same thing Jeanette Ward said.

And then there remains that pesky problem of co-ed locker rooms and restrooms in U-46. Sanders likes to emphasize that only one student is currently using an opposite-sex locker room and restroom, but someone should ask the board what they will do when more gender-dysphoric and “gender-expansive” students ask to use opposite-sex restrooms and locker rooms. And what will the board do when these students and their parents assert that privacy stalls and adult supervision are unjustly discriminatory, because that’s what’s a’comin’.

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A second article was needed to address adequately the problems exposed in Monday’s school board meeting in Illinois School District U-46 in which the decision to allow a middle school gender-dysphoric student to use an opposite-sex locker room and the decision of school CEO Tony Sanders’ to conceal that information from parents were debated.

It is important for taxpayers in every community to pay close attention to what is being done and said by leaders in U-46, because the serious issues regarding modesty, privacy, the meaning of biological sex, parental rights, and gender dysphoria will confront every community. And the arrogance, ignorance, and hypocrisy of “progressives” who are driving this destructive assault on truth and reality will need to be identified and boldly confronted.

Anti-discrimination policy bait and switch

Board member Traci O’Neal Ellis inadvertently let the cat out of the bag “progressives” furtively carry about and use to humiliate conservatives into silence and submission. But first some background is in order.

Any conservative who opposes the inclusion of “sexual orientation” (code word for homosexuality) or “gender identity” in anti-discrimination policies is routinely called hateful and falsely accused of either not caring about the bullying of homosexual and gender-dysphoric students or of actively supporting such bullying. School board member Jeanette Ward has been on the receiving end of such malignant and false accusations.

It is not a desire to harm students that leads conservatives to oppose the inclusion of conditions constituted by subjective feelings and volitional acts (as opposed to objective, non-behavioral conditions like race, sex, and national origin) in anti-discrimination policies. All decent people—and yes, the vast majority of conservative people are decent—oppose bullying of any person for any reason.

Rather, the reasons conservatives oppose the inclusion of these conditions in anti-discrimination policies are these:

1.)  It opens the door for other conditions similarly constituted to be added to anti-discrimination policies.

2.)  It inevitably leads to the erosion of religious liberty, as we are currently witnessing.

3.)  Such policies are later exploited for purposes perhaps intended but never mentioned. In other words, “progressives” use the old bait and switch stratagem, knowing that gullible or gutless conservatives will fall for it.

So, back to Ellis’ revelatory comments.

She referred to the district’s “existing anti-discrimination policy,” that she said “has not changed.” Well, she means it hasn’t changed since 2013 when it changed.

Ellis implied without stating that the non-changing, existing policy mandates that gender-dysphoric boys be allowed in girls’ locker rooms and vice versa. Is that how the addition of the term “gender identity” to school anti-discrimination policies is ever explained, promoted, or justified to community members?

In 2013 U-46’s School Board—which had exactly zero conservative representation—added “gender identity” to its anti-discrimination policy at the recommendation of school attorney Miguel Rodriguez. I can’t find in board minutes an account of the discussion that took place prior to the vote, so I wonder what arguments were put forth to defend the addition. Did school board members inform parents that this policy change was needed in order to ensure that gender-dysphoric boys would be allowed in the girls’ restrooms and locker rooms? Or was it promoted as an effective tool for curbing bullying? Did community members assume the policy change was made in order to prevent harassment and abuse only to see it now used to justify co-ed locker rooms?

Ironically, the footnotes in the board documents recommending the change—a change that Ellis now suggests  requires sex-integrated locker rooms—cites the Illinois Human Rights Act which states the exact opposite: “The Act permits schools to maintain single-sex facilities that are distinctly private in nature, e.g., restrooms and locker rooms.”

It’s important to note that the policy that was changed applies only to “educational and extracurricular opportunities”—not to bathroom and locker room usage. In addition, Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 specifically states that schools may maintain sex-separated locker rooms and restrooms.

Ellis, the school board member who suggested that those who oppose co-ed locker rooms are exercising “authority without wisdom” and are “bruising” children, is the same board member who referred to the Republican National Convention as the “Klanvention” on her Facebook page.  Enquiring minds want to know if such a slur might erode the trust conservative community members have in her ability to honor her oath to “represent all school district constituents honestly and equally”?

Ellis concluded her school board statement Monday night with these hollow words:

And to our students, I offer this to you. If you are straight, bisexual, gay, lesbian, transgender, gender non-conforming, queer, questioning, white, black, Latino, Asian, Native American, bi-racial, or any other racial, ethnic or national origin…if you score a perfect score on the SAT and are headed to Harvard, or you graduate dead last in your class, if you are able-bodied, or disabled, if you are low income or the child of the most affluent family in this district; if you have one, two, or no parents, if you are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Scientologist, atheist, agnostic or of any other belief…however you show up in U-46, when you cross the threshold of a U-46 school, I welcome you. You are not “less than”. And because you are welcome here, that means that as a district, we have to work to meet your unique needs and well-being, while balancing others’ needs and well-being. In other words, we must exercise our authority with wisdom, in order to polish, not bruise you.

I wonder if Republican students who may have Republican parents believe those words.

And who “liked” Ellis’ “Klanvention” Facebook comment? None other than U-46 attorney Miguel Rodriguez, the person who recommended adding “gender identity” to school board policy.

Macro-aggressive government employees 

Although Bartlett High School English teacher Gary Lorber’s macro-aggressive conduct at the board meeting may have been unusual conduct for a teacher, his views are widely held by “progressive” teachers in government schools who self-righteously view themselves as “agents of change” and have assigned themselves the duty of shaping the moral and political views of other people’s children. In my experience, this kind of arrogant teacher is over-represented in English departments. They, like many on the U-46 school board, want government schools to have no conservative representation in leadership or teaching positions. One conservative member on a board of seven is one too many for the disciples of diversity.

Lorber’s intemperate treatment of Mrs. Ward, especially his maudlin concluding insult was both unprofessional and cruel. I hope you can find three minutes to watch this video of Lorber’s performance, but in case you can’t, here’s a bit of what he said to his board member, Mrs. Ward:

I do not know how you…have become…so hateful….I wonder what a little girl thinks of you when she looks into your eyes. I wonder what hatred you indoctrinated into her eyes when she looks into yours.

I have never seen a teacher so brazenly and perniciously attack his own school board member. If a conservative had said anything approaching this, he or she would be vilified as a hateful bully. No child of mine would ever sit in a classroom under the tutelage of a teacher so devoid of tolerance, respect, decorum, civility, and humility.

U-46 board policies state the following: “All District employees are expected to maintain high standards in their school relationships, to demonstrate integrity and honesty, to be considerate and cooperative and to maintain professional relationships.” When the board and administration review Mr. Lorber’s statement, do they hear the voice of a considerate, cooperative, and professional staff member?

“Fringe” political “hate” group 

Two speakers at Monday’s meeting alluded to Mrs. Ward’s support coming from a hate group. Rich Jacobs, “husband” of homosexual activist and Kane County judge John Dalton, referred to “fringe political groups known for hate and divisiveness,” and board member Veronica Noland referred to a group labeled a “hate group” by the (ethically dubious) Southern Poverty Law Center. Because of my keen powers of deduction, I suspect the allusions were to the Illinois Family Institute, and, therefore, some context is warranted. And I know from assertions made by multiple board members that the board takes pride in listening and learning from diverse voices (after which some members hurl epithets).

Since the Left loves them some yum yum southern impoverished law center putrescent potage, below are five articles about the SPLC. The first three detail my experiences with the infamous Mark Potok and his laughably named “Intelligence Report.” They reveal how deceitful and hapless Potok is and how bogus is his “hate groups” list:

“IFI Labeled Hate Group”

“When Will the Southern Poverty Law Center Stop Bullying?”

“The Morality Police at the Southern Poverty Law Center”

“The Church of Morris Dees” (originally published at Harper’s)

“The SPLC exposed – Southern Poverty Law Center – Morris Dees and hate crimes”

It is clear that some of the U-46 board and faculty members, like the SPLC, have redefined “hate” to include the expression of moral and ontological propositions with which they disagree. Perhaps these particular board and faculty members hate those with whom they disagree, but they ought not project their habits of mind onto others.

Most people are fully capable of deeply loving those who hold different beliefs and act in accordance with those beliefs. Most of us in this wildly diverse world do it every day. I wonder if these board and faculty members hurl the same ugly epithets at Muslim and Orthodox Jewish students and their parents who likely hold conservative views regarding co-ed restrooms and locker rooms?

Who really foments hatred?

Finally, I would argue that it is “progressives” who act and speak in destructive ways that foment hatred by relentlessly telling children and teens that those who believe that biological sex is profoundly meaningful hate those who reject their biological sex. That is a pernicious lie that undermines the possibility of dialogue with and relationships between people who hold different beliefs. Such a lie works against the purported goal of school boards everywhere to create and sustain diverse communities. By its nature, a diverse community will include those who hold diverse views, including on matters sexual. What “progressives” seek is a “diverse” community (and a “diverse” school board) in which everyone thinks just like them.

Here’s what “progressives” in their arrogance and self-righteousness refuse to acknowledge: Conservatives believe as strongly that “progressive” views on modesty, privacy, biological sex, and gender dysphoria are ignorant and destructive as “progressives” believe conservative views are.

Treating unreality as reality harms the entire U-46 community and undermines the very essence of education.

Last Call for IFI’s Faith, Family & Freedom Banquet

We are excited to have as our keynote speaker this year, former Congresswoman and Tea Party Caucus Leader, Michele Bachman!

Don’t delay, act today!

So much to say about Monday night’s barn-burner of a school board meeting in School District U-46, so little time.

The meeting started at 7:00 p.m. By 6:00 p.m. the meeting room was filled to capacity, and attendees were sent to two upstairs overflow rooms to watch a livestream of the meeting. Approximately 58 visitors spoke, with 37 speaking in opposition to the school board’s decision to allow a student to use the locker room designated for persons of the opposite sex and to do so without telling U-46 parents of this decision. The remaining 21 spoke in favor of these decisions. In the overflow room where I was seated, pro-transparency/pro-single-sex facilities supporters vastly outnumbered anti-transparency/pro-co-ed supporters.

Read more…

Tony Sanders, the chief executive officer of School District U-46 which serves 40,000 students in Cook, DuPage, and Kane Counties in Illinois, has declared that a middle school locker room is henceforth co-ed. He has declared from on high that a student who wishes to be the opposite sex may use whichever locker room his or her heart desires. Even more troubling, Sanders has further declared that no parents in the district may be apprised of the fact that their children may be sharing a locker room with an opposite-sex student. If it weren’t for one courageous school board member, Jeanette Ward, who alerted the community to this presumptuous decision on the part of the administration, parents would still be unaware of the practice that took effect on September, 6, 2016.

Opposition to co-ed restrooms and locker rooms does not constitute hatred of those students who suffer from gender dysphoria. And opposition to co-ed restrooms and locker rooms is not solely or centrally about the physical safety of students posed by close encounters of the undressed kind, although by high school such risks are not nil.

Rather, opposition to co-ed restrooms and locker rooms is driven by a recognition of the arguable assumptions embedded in and promoted by such practices. In other words, allowing co-ed restrooms and locker rooms depends on first accepting a number of controversial ideas about biological sex. Further, allowing co-ed restrooms and locker rooms necessarily means teaching those underlying ideas to all students. Practices and policies teach.

For example, such practices teach all students that feelings of modesty and the desire for privacy when engaged in intimate bodily activities have no necessary connection to biological sex. Co-ed restrooms and locker rooms teach all students that subjective feelings about one’s sex take precedence over biological sex in even the most private spaces. Such practices teach all students that in order to be compassionate and inclusive, they must share restrooms and locker rooms with persons of the opposite sex. Attorney General Loretta Lynch has, in effect, told girls the truly wicked lie that their desire not to share restrooms and locker rooms with boys is tantamount to the refusal of white racists to share restrooms with blacks. While many parents teach their sons and daughters that they should leave a restroom or locker room if an opposite-sex student enters, schools now teach them that leaving would be hateful and bigoted.

In a Facebook statement district CEO Tony Sanders explained his feckless decision:

While the vast majority of transgender students in our schools prefer to change in private, the needs of each student is addressed on a case by case basis.

State and federal statutes prohibit districts from releasing information about any student without parent permission. If we provide information regarding a student that would lead to the identification of the student without parental permission, we would be in violation of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act and the Illinois Student Records Act. As such, administration will not share with a school community if a transgender student is utilizing the locker room of his or her choice.

Any student who does not feel safe in a locker room or a restroom should immediately contact the school principal. Schools can then work to address any concerns and, if appropriate, find an alternative location to address privacy or safety concerns.

Sanders must be kidding. He’s exploiting the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and the Illinois Student Records Act to rationalize not telling parents that their children’s privacy will be invaded by an opposite-sex student? If these laws, which were passed in part to give “parents the right to have some control over the disclosure of personally identifiable information from their education records,” are now used or abused to allow school administrators to prevent telling parents that their children will be sharing restrooms or locker rooms with opposite-sex students, then the laws need to change. School administrators can make parents aware of the decision to allow co-ed restrooms and locker rooms without giving student names. Withholding a general notification about the end of sex-segregated restrooms and locker rooms violates the rights of other students and their parents.

Here are a list of questions that should be posed to your favorite teachers, school board members, and administrators:

• Do you believe children who wish they were the opposite sex have the right to use opposite-sex restrooms and locker rooms?

• Do you believe students have a right to use restrooms and locker rooms with only persons of their same-sex?

• Do you believe that parents have a right to know if their children may be sharing a restroom or locker room with opposite-sex students?

• Why should girls who are uncomfortable sharing girls’ restrooms or locker rooms with a biological boy (formerly known as a boy) be forced to use other facilities (as Tony Sanders suggested above)?

• Should “gender fluid” or “gender non-binary” students be permitted to choose on a daily basis which restrooms or locker rooms they want to use?

• If policies that prohibit “discrimination” based on both sex and “gender identity” are applied to bathrooms and locker rooms, on what basis could schools prohibit a non-gender-dysphoric boy (i.e., a normal boy) from using girls’ restrooms or locker rooms? If schools argue that he can’t use girls’ facilities, he could point out the inconsistency of allowing another boy—the gender-dysphoric boy—to use the girls’ facilities while prohibiting him. He could also claim that since allowing a boy who “identifies” as a “transgirl” to use the girls’ facilities, while prohibiting him—a “cisboy,” they’re discriminating against him based on his “gender identity.”

• Does physical embodiment as male or female per se have any meaning relative to modesty and privacy?

• Why is it acceptable to allow a boy who wishes he were a girl in the girls’ locker room but not the girls’ shower?

• Should objectively female students who “identify” as male be permitted to use urinals in boys’ bathrooms using “stand-to-pee” devices? If not, why not?

• Should an objectively female coach of a boys’ swim team who “identifies” as a man be allowed in the boys’ locker room while the boys are showering and changing? If not, why not?

• Should an objectively female swimmer who “identifies” as male but has chosen not to have “top surgery” be permitted to wear a boy’s Speedo for swim practices and meets? If not, why not?

• Should an objectively female swimmer who “identifies” as male and has had a double mastectomy be permitted to change and shower with the boys? If not, why not? If all the boys and their parents are okay with her changing and showering with the boys, would she be permitted to do so?

• Staff and faculty routinely use student restrooms. Should male teachers who pretend to be women be allowed to use girls’ restrooms? Should biologically male teachers who “identify” as women but choose not to take cross-sex hormones, cross-dress, or have any surgery be allowed to use girls’ restrooms?

If you can get your school leaders to respond, their answers will likely reveal several things. (And don’t let them get away with responding to any of the hypothetical scenarios posed above with the all too common responses of “That will never happen,” or “That’s different.”)

First, their answers will likely reveal that our public school leaders have not thought about the ramifications of the ideas embedded in the practices and policies they are already implementing.

Second, their answers will likely reveal the inherently contradictory nature of the leftist ideas they are implementing.

Third, these leaders will likely reveal that they do, in fact, believe that objective, immutable biological sex per se has meaning: Biological sex is the source of feelings of modesty and the desire for privacy.

Opposition to co-ed restrooms, locker rooms, and showers in public schools has little to do with the risk of sexual assault by boys who “identify” as girls (or claim to), though that risk increases in middle school and high school. Opposition to such subversive practices stems from the abandonment of any recognition of and respect for the deep meaning of objective biological sex. Leftists are persuading or coercing public schools to treat subjective, disordered feelings about biological sex as if they are of greater importance than objective, immutable sex.

One of the many troubling lessons I learned from working in a well-respected public high school (Deerfield High School) for a decade and sending four children through public school is that few public school teachers, administrators, and school board members are deep thinkers. That is not to say they’re not intelligent. Rather, they rarely think critically about their own assumptions or about the logical outworking of ideas. In fact, many become become downright angry if pressed to think deeply about ideas—particularly ideas that challenge their usually unchallenged dogma.

Another critical issue that I hope becomes evident by thinking through these questions is where the chuckleheaded ideas, practices, and policies—which are embraced by foolish administrators, teachers, school board members, and parents or tolerated by cowardly administrators, teachers, school board members, and parents—will lead. They will lead to unrestricted co-ed restrooms, locker rooms, and showers everywhere. Eventually, there will be no more privacy curtains in locker rooms, no more separate showers, no more accommodations of just a few gender-dysphoric students.

Those who prefer not to rock boats—including even the pirate ships that are carrying away their children—will assuage their prickly consciences by repeating the empty mantras “Oh well, it’s just a few confused children,” or “Oh well, they’re  taking cross-sex hormones and are going to have surgery, so they’ll look like the sex they’re pretending to be.” What these cowardly boat-steadiers don’t realize is that “transactivists” and their political enablers like Barack Obama don’t think “transgender” persons need to cross-dress, take cross-sex hormones, or have surgery (By the way, having “top” or “bottom” surgery does not transform women into men or vice versa). In the doctrinaire leftist cosmos, a “trans” person doesn’t have to feel distress about their biological sex. All that’s needed for a person to be “trans” is his or her claim that he or she feels like the opposite sex (or both sexes or neither sex)—today.

The logic of leftist arguments necessarily leads to the end of sex-segregation everywhere. Don’t dismiss these changes in practices or policies as trivial or as affecting only a few students. These changes affect all students, and they are profound. In fact, these changes are the portents of the most radical cultural revolution in modern history.

“Laurie’s Chinwags”

Have you had a chance to checkout the latest special feature we are calling “Laurie’s Chinwags?” For the past few weeks, we’ve been adding audio recordings (aka podcasts) to articles written by Laurie. We hope this new feature will serve the needs and desires of IFI subscribers. We would appreciate any constructive feedback.