I've been pretty vocal on social media against the two East Brunswick board of education candidates running explicitly on the anti-LGBTQ platform. One of the candidates, Yosef Schmidt, asked me, and I quote:
" If someone speaks up against teaching sexuality to young kids, how do people conclude they are anti-gay?
[…] There is a difference between explaining where babies come from and getting into more details discussion about sex. Leave that for older kids. As little ones they can see a set of same sex parents and just know that is the way it is sometimes. We do not have to get into more details about what they do in the bedroom, just like we don't have to get into more detail about what straight parents do in the bedroom."
In East Brunswick public schools young kids are not taught sex acts. The curriculum of other classes is not sexualized. It's already possible for parents to withdraw their kids from sex education classes completely. So everything this candidate is describing is already the case.
The question he poses is why people think he is "anti-gay".
If his platform is already the case in East Brunswick public schools, there must be a reason he is running. Shouldn't it be satisfactory that young kids are not taught sex acts and that parents can withdraw their kids from sex education, be sufficient as a choice for parents?
It is revealing that it's not.
Ultimately, these two challengers want to achieve the complete eradication of the LGBTQ community from the school curriculum. They want to pretend they don't exist.
Where is the line they are willing to draw? Let's play this out.
Suppose that in the name of "parents' choice", a family decides that their freedom to feed their child peanuts is restricted by the school building not allowing peanuts because a child is allergic.
Another family comes up with the idea that they no longer wish their kids to be exposed to kids with autism in public schools. A Christian family declares that they don't want their children sharing a classroom with Jewish kids, and another white family decides they don't wish non-white kids sharing a cafeteria with theirs.
It is, therefore, valid to ask, "What are the boundaries of parents' choice?" What choices are reasonable to accommodate, and what choices aren't?
It is Saturday before Tuesday, November 8th, election. Many of you have already voted. If you haven't, please preserve the quality of our public schools by voting for Mark Csizmar, Heather Guas, and Liwu Hong — board of education ballots lines 1, 4, and 5. Our public schools and our property values are on the line.
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What exactly are the boundaries of “parents’ choice” ?
Thank you for writing this. Parents in East Brunswick already have rights and the larger movement about Parents’ Rights is very obviously mostly about fear and intolerance.
What exactly are the boundaries of “parents’ choice” ?
Thank you for writing this. Parents in East Brunswick already have rights and the larger movement about Parents’ Rights is very obviously mostly about fear and intolerance.