Jul 21, 2009 by Candi
Skewed Priorities in California
We’ve been hearing a lot lately about California’s budget crisis, even to the extent that the state is issuing IOUs to taxpayers and contractors.
This is having an especially tragic effect on California education—with more teachers losing jobs, summer classes being canceled, textbooks not being ordered and instruction time expected to be reduced by five to seven days.
That is why it’s both sad and shocking to see what liberal California legislators put among their top priorities this week—yet another measure allocating precious education resources to political extremism.
It’s expected that California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will soon be asked to sign a bill (SB 572) that asks public schools to dedicate already limited classroom time to conducting “commemorative exercises” in recognition of Harvey Milk Day on May 22.
Harvey Milk was the “first openly gay man to be elected to public office in a major city of the United States,” explains the legislation. Parents should be aware that students asked to study and celebrate this political activist’s life, are also likely to become acquainted with his well-known promiscuity and long litany of partners, not to mention other destructive behaviors.
Furthermore, this legislation will likely pave the way for the Milk movie to be shown in many classrooms. One scene features Harvey Milk meeting a man on a subway platform and asking him to spend the night before even asking the man’s name. The film explicitly depicts homosexual behavior and also vilifies Christian conservatives and derides traditional viewpoints about sexuality. For more information, read the Plugged In review.
Do these messages really have a place in publicly funded classrooms, especially when schools are struggling to find time to cover the basics, like arithmetic and reading? While we believe all people—including those who identify as homosexual—are created equal by God, have inalienable rights and should be fairly and equally protected from violence or harm, we don’t think it’s right to sexualize and politicize the school environment at taxpayers’ expense.
Bottom line: This bill is bad news for parents and students, and represents an irresponsible use of taxpayer money in the middle of an economic crisis. Gov. Schwarzenegger vetoed this bill in 2008. Ask him to do so again in 2009. To find contact information, visit the CitizenLink Action Center
