Here is a photo of the conference bike. This photo is used to illustrate this question: “What were you thinking?” Even ideas that begin with good intentions can still be bad ideas. Most ideas are bad ideas. Sometimes we need to protect our children from bad ideas. (from here))

It started in California in 2011 and is spreading. Not measles or whooping cough! We’re talking about the inclusion of LGBT ‘facts’ in student school textbooks from K to 12. Topics of study include history and LGBT heroes and heroines, and equality that cites, for example, marriage between persons of the same gender and kids with two mommies or two daddies. California educators believe the LGBT community should have equal press!

It all started with enactment of the FAIR Education Act by the California legislature that mandates inclusion of LGBT contributions in the studies of history and social studies. The Act was proposed by then state Senator Mark Leno, himself openly gay. (www.edsource.org/2017/teaching-lgbt-history-complicated-by-historical-figures-who-didnt-out-themselves/590542 ).

Second graders in California will now have a section entitled “Different Kinds of Families” with a photo of a girl with her two moms. Fourth graders will learn about the two lesbian women who took their fight to be married to the Supreme Court. And, an eighth graders’ textbook discusses how same-sex behavior in colonial America warranted death, though the sentence was never carried out. The text also notes that “some historians” think that Baron von Steuben, the Prussian who helped the Continental army, MAY HAVE been gay. (www.politico.com/tipsheets/morning-education/2017/10/11/californias-search-for-lgbt-friendly-textbooks-222741). Are inferences really factual history?

This year, the trend has spread to Illinois, Colorado, New Jersey, and Maryland. In these states, textbooks will not be adopted for use in the classroom that do not include LGBT topics.

What is more interesting is that in California and Illinois it was not the Department of Education that mandated the switch in textbooks and curriculum. Instead, it was their state legislatures! (www.newsweek.com/mandatory-lgbt-history-lessons-school-children-illinois-senate-909329 ). So, it sounds like incorporation of the LGBT agenda in textbooks and classroom material is not an educational issue driven by educators, but rather is a political wedge enacted by politicians who are influenced by a lobby.

The bill in Illinois that goes into effect in 2020 says that history lessons on Illinois and the United States “shall include a study of the roles and contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people in the history of this country” (www.usnews.com/news/best-states/articles/2019-08-14/states-that-require-schools-to-teach-lgbt-history ). Superintendents in the educational system are further charged with enforcing the bill’s mandate, but private and religious schools are exempt from the law.

The whole move is frightening, but it does give Virginians a clue about what to do to ward off the adoption of the agenda in our state: We need to elect candidates eying Richmond who are conservatives that will protect our children and not impose the LGBT agenda on them. As well, local school board candidates need to pledge the same protection to earn our votes.

We need to build a hedge around our kids’ minds! Strategic planning to do that is essential NOW! Plan to attend the Family Alliance dinner meeting on September 28 (See Keep Radical Sex Education Out Of Prince William County Schools) in Manassas to hear two heroines from the Fairfax sex education battle present their case about the county to our north. They will help us plan how we can prevent it happening in Prince William County! Join us on Saturday! Get your ticket now.

— Posted by Tom Salmon for Doris, a fellow member of the Prince William and Manassas Family Alliance