July 7, 2007
STRAIGHTS NEED NOT APPLY? (via Kevin Whited):
Speech Police, Riding High In Oakland (George Will, 6/29/07, Real Clear Politics)
Marriage is the foundation of the natural family and sustains family values. That sentence is inflammatory, perhaps even a hate crime. [...]Some African American Christian women working for Oakland's government organized the Good News Employee Association (GNEA), which they announced with a flier describing their group as "a forum for people of Faith to express their views on the contemporary issues of the day. With respect for the Natural Family, Marriage and Family Values."
The flier was distributed after other employees' groups, including those advocating gay rights, had advertised their political views and activities on the city's e-mail system and bulletin board. When the GNEA asked for equal opportunity to communicate by that system and that board, it was denied. Furthermore, the flier they posted was taken down and destroyed by city officials, who declared it "homophobic" and disruptive.
The city government said the flier was "determined" to promote harassment based on sexual orientation. The city warned that the flier and communications like it could result in disciplinary action "up to and including termination."
Effectively, the city has proscribed any speech that even one person might say questioned the gay rights agenda and therefore created what that person felt was a "hostile" environment. This, even though gay rights advocates used the city's communication system to advertise "Happy Coming Out Day." Yet the terms "natural family," "marriage" and "family values" are considered intolerably inflammatory.
The treatment of the GNEA illustrates one technique by which America's growing ranks of self-appointed speech police expand their reach: They wait until groups they disagree with, such as the GNEA, are provoked to respond to them in public debates, then they persecute them for annoying those to whom they are responding. In Oakland, this dialectic of censorship proceeded on a reasonable premise joined to a preposterous theory.
How could truth fail to inflame deviants? Posted by Orrin Judd at July 7, 2007 8:49 PM
The manuals and directives of the Philadlphia School District regularly threaten termination for anyone who does not adhere to specific guidelines for dealing with the queer agenda.
There is a specific blurb to be recited if a child shoud make a forbidden utterance. More recently, teachers have been were commanded, under the same threats, to correct the speech of anyone who uses the term "gay" in a perjorative sense.
Now there is no question that the mainstream culture of parents in the community is decidely heterosexual, which has to do with how it is that they came to be parents in the4 first place.. Nor can it be disputed that many urban schoolchildren are of backgrouds characterized by blunt, direct speech, which omits sensitive nuances betreen orientation and behavior.
The problem is that the queer lobby has hijacked public education in our city, to the extend of authoring the curriculum materials supplied to classrooom teachers. Some outfit calling itself something like the "GLBT Task Force" (Gay-Lesbian-Bisexual-Transgendered) has produced our training video and authored brochures given out to teachers for classroom use.
All of this is why education can only be saved by crushing the infamous thing which public schools have become.
Posted by: Lou Gots at July 8, 2007 8:46 AMYes, public schools cannot be salvaged.
Posted by: erp at July 8, 2007 10:21 AMI share most of all of your views, but not your optimism. One wonders whether civilization can be salvaged.
Posted by: Bruno at July 8, 2007 7:01 PMSalvaged? Thi is the best shape it's ever been in.
Posted by: oj at July 8, 2007 10:05 PM