DriveThru – Get What You Need

Warning: Graphic content discussed below.

Come what may, GLSEN—the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network—seems determined to promote sexually explicit content to our school children.

There’s been a public outcry in recent weeks over books GLSEN recommends for kids as young as middle-school age—which graphically describe things like teen-adult sexual interactions in parks and public restrooms.

Despite all this, the organization is stubbornly continuing efforts to push this material into public schools.

Consider GLSEN’s current plea to help it win $1 million from Chase Bank’s Community Giving charity competition. (The bank is allowing social networkers to vote for their favorite charity to win the money.)

GLSEN has announced that if it wins the money, it will use it to send a “Safe Space Kit” to “to every middle and high school in the country.” 

So, just what is in this “Safe Space Kit”? Among other things, instructions to educators to “use GLSEN’s BookLink …  to find appropriate books for your curriculum. … to find grade-appropriate literature for your school library.”

Yup, you got it. The same exact book list that has such “grade-appropriate” offerings as Queer 13. This book, which GLSEN thinks is appropriate for 7^th graders, includes a detailed and extremely disturbing description of a boy being raped by an older man. Afterward the boy exults about how “The whole world of rest-room sex had opened itself up to me.” And that’s just one of the many graphically lewd anecdotes in this book and others on the list.

GLSEN may deem this “grade-appropriate” for 7^th graders. But the majority of U.S. citizens and responsibly thinking parents don’t. And they are outraged. But sadly, GLSEN and its founder—the Obama administration’s “Safe Schools Czar” Kevin Jennings—remain deaf to the outcry.

Five out of 12 major anti-family policies in the omnibus spending bill are related to funding abortions and liberalizing sex education. You can thank bill-supporting Members of Congress (House, Senate) and our President for the following “gifts” just before Christmas 2009:

• Elimination of abstinence education funds ($zero$)
• Funding for Planned Parenthood (Title X funding boost to $315M)
• Publicly funded abortions for D.C. residents in our nation’s Capitol
• U.S. funding for U.N. population control, including China’s one-child policy and subsequent abortions (U.S. Taxpayers will pay $5M more)
• International family planning – fund overseas abortions – Mexico City Policy – ($103M more)

The Heritage Foundation posted a Web article titled, “Twelve Anti-Family Gifts From Congress,” [Dec. 22, 2009],   that lists another seven egregious funds and policies passed in by Congress in the omnibus spending bill. Policies such as more funding to keep people on welfare, needle exchange, limiting free speech, ending D.C. scholarship program, domestic partner benefits for D.C. employees and legalized “medical” marijuana … “high” in a pear treeeeee …

Supporting Members of Congress voted in favor of this bill, and President Obama signed it into law. We certainly hope they enjoy all the Piggy Pudding they passed in the $1.1 Trillion Pork-nibus spending bill with more than 5,000 earmarks.

Though this battle was lost in 2009, the war is far from over in 2010.

MORE INFORMATION

• See a PDF of The Heritage Foundation’s Twelve Anti-Family Gifts From Congress … 
• See Appendix for 2010 Budget of the U.S. Government … 
• See Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2010 – H.R. 3288 (omnibus spending bill) …  [PDF]

More troubling information keeps coming to light on the Obama Administration’s “safe schools czar”—Kevin Jennings.  The new revelations are very disturbing to people of faith who value their religious freedoms.

Now, a column that Jennings wrote for the The Huffington Post has come to light, in which he made a skewering attack on a well-known, mainstream Christian student group, Young Life. He accuses the club of  “ ‘baiting and switching’ to suck young people in.”

In the same column, he also attacks the Texas “Religious Viewpoint Antidiscrimination” law, which was passed to protect students of faith from having their free speech censored in public schools.

This is frightening to parents and students of faith who expect taxpayer funded government education to be neutral and respectful toward all viewpoints, including theirs!

These are just two incidents in a long list of frightening statements that Kevin Jennings and the group he founded—GLSEN, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network—have made about socially conservative and religious viewpoints. For more examples, click here.

Yesterday’s post raised objections. A few felt my attack on “all Americans” was too extreme and a bit un-American. Was I over the top?

Oppenheimer spoke with the knowledge that his actions unleashed an irreversible change to the world. The best available research suggest that 70 percent of the world’s pornography is still produced in the United States. Our nation collectively has unleashed untold damage on individuals, families and cultures throughout the world. I think the analogy fits.

Yet, is it fair to indict average Americans who have no taste for pornography? Consider this: we live in a democratic Republic in which elected representatives conduct the daily affairs of governance, but WE THE PEOPLE run the show. We the people have passed laws prohibiting the distribution of obscene pornography and zoning laws to restrict the negative impact of sexually-oriented businesses. We the people have the obligation to make sure our laws are enforced. But, we the people have not taken the actions we could to reduce the harm of pornography.

Inaction alone may not count you among the “destroyers of world,” but if we oppose the exporting of sexual violence, we must ask if there is something we can personally do to help stop it. Have you spoken with your police chief or district attorney’s office? Have you written your Congressman or U.S. Attorney to ask why the law isn’t being enforced? Have you taken steps to curtail the insatiable demand for this material – stopped consuming porn yourself or helped another out of their own addiction? For some, the answer will be “yes. “ For most, I fear it is “no.”

If average citizens can derail Obama’s agenda on spending and healthcare, we can at least try to put an end to illegal pornography. Do we care enough to act?

There’s been a growing movement afoot for states to “voluntarily” adopt national curriculum standards. So far 47 states have signed up (the holdouts are Alaska, Texas and South Carolina).

“Voluntary” is a subjective word, since it’s becoming obvious how the Obama Administration intends to use federal funding as a stick to force contrarians into line.

While this is a concerning trend, it’s not really time for flashing sirens yet—because, so far, academics are still fighting amongst themselves over who exactly should have input into the final standards and what they should look like. It remains to be seen whether the states can agree.

So I guess you could say the threat level is yellow.  In the meantime, we can look to England for some insight into where this might lead.

In 1989, England implemented a national curriculum with a call for uniformity on core subjects. But what started as core standards, now includes compulsory sex education classes that teach kids about homosexuality and same-sex unions.   Apparently, faith-based schools are not exempt—they’ll have to engage in controversial teaching, while explaining that it “runs contrary to their religious beliefs.”

Others experts have expressed concerns that politically correct agendas are edging out core subjects and that student performance on national tests has stalled in recent years.

So before we embark on another failed experiment, perhaps we should learn a lesson from our friends across the ocean.