This is the goal of the fundamentalist right wing maga Christians racists bigots. It is not about protecting kids. It is about returning to a 1950s social public morality and enforced gender roles. It is about rolling back all social advances gained since the civil rights era. It is entirely about wiping minority rights away and pushing the LGBTQ+ back into the closet while making them afraid to come out openly into society. It is about returning to a time of white straight Christian superiority and automatic assumed authority, with subservient women to do their bidding. So now that this very vocal aggressive arrogant violent minority that feels laws and polite society norms don’t apply to them feels as they have the right to make the entire population follow their religiously driven views from a book written 2,500 years ago. Hugs
“Matt [Walsh] made this point, he articulated it directly, but this has been the point that has been building for months now, which is we need to make that symbol toxic, the pride flag symbol, we need to make that toxic.
“We need to have companies think twice about it. Everyone was talking about the Dylan Mulvaney incident as being harmful to the Bud Light brand. That’s true.
“But more importantly, it was harmful to the Dylan Mulvaney brand. Now, other companies are going to think twice before sponsoring Dylan Mulvaney because they don’t want to lose $6 billion in market cap in two days. That’s what we got to do.
“And then once we make these things culturally toxic or as we’re making these symbols culturally toxic, we’ve got to bring in the cavalry, we’ve got to come back in with more political force to ban some of this stuff and to say no.” – Daily Wire host Michael Knowles.
Knowles appeared here last week when he declared that millennials should not have the right to vote.
Last month Knowles appeared here when he declared that the bible instructs us to burn books. Knowles, who has called for televising executions, previously declared that banning drag shows and burning books is “very American.”
Earlier this year Knowles declared from the CPAC stage that “transgenderism must be eradicated.”
Knowles performed in a gay sex scene for a college film.
I just found an old short film that Michael Knowles acted in.
The current headliner of conservative homophobia and transphobia played a gay twink. So much for restoring "traditional masculinity" 💀 pic.twitter.com/sC8fcoQ3HC
That’s exactly where this is going. Does anyone think that a company that caves to homophobic and transphobic terrorists won’t do the same when it’s antisemites calling in bomb threats?
Can’t stop thinking about the highway construction blinky sign in Florida with KILL ALL GAYS flashing away. I’m looking forward to my death because I’m so fucking tired of having to live with people like that on this earth.
It’s amazing how people fail to realize how quickly a tolerant society can become an oppressive one when you have a disciplined and determined far-right movement that will stop at nothing to win.
Pride parades need to change. They need to be more political and less celebratory. We are in the middle of a right wing assault on our very existence. We need to make pride more like the silence=death activity in the ’80s and ’90s.
It’s not enough that they’re trying to ban drag and trans healthcare – now they’re going after corporations that support LGBT people to try and bully them into turning their backs on us. Today, it’s Bud Light hiring a trans spokesperson and Target selling Pride gear. Tomorrow, it’s any company that says or does anything to support us or offers benefits for same-sex spouses of employees.
Something tells me that sooner rather than later, all those people who complain about Pride becoming too corporate are going to miss the days before corporations stopped having floats at Pride for fear of terrorism and boycotts.
…and how many of those who complain about corporations, etc .. actually work for corporations?
A lot of the corporate donations / flags / pride months came *because* the corportate suite realized how many lgbtq’s etc they employed when those employees became vocal — started lgbt work groups, awareness campaigns, etc … it comes from within, and from without, too ..
The Texas family finds Oregon welcoming — but urges vigilance
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PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — When Karen’s daughter was 3, she knew how she felt. She didn’t know the word “trans” but she knew how she felt. She felt like a girl.
“I just shot that down real quick,” Karen told KOIN 6 News. “‘You’re not a girl, you’re a boy. You don’t have to worry. You don’t have to be a girl to like girl things.’”
But the feeling didn’t ever go away.
“I just saw her disappearing into herself and she came to me in the kitchen again. She was 6 years old and she said, ‘Mom, I’m a girl.’ And I repeated the same thing, ‘You don’t have to be a girl to like girl things.’ She went, ‘I know. But I’m a girl who likes girl things.’ And she just held my gaze,” Karen said. “I knew. And I knew she meant it and I didn’t understand but it was my job to find out because I’m her mom.”
Karen’s love for her child turned into advocacy — in Texas, where she, her husband and children lived.
Karen is the mother of an 11-year-old trans girl who moved her family from Texas to Oregon, May 2023 (KOIN)
In 2021, Karen joined other people rallying at the state capital in Austin against a slate of bills targeting health care for transgender children, like puberty blockers, or even seeking therapy from a behavioral health provider.
The bills and the attacks were relentless. The attacks focused on their health care, tried to go after providers of care that has been deemed best-practice medical care by literally every major medical association. After advocates and some push back from the business community, many of the bills did not pass that session.
Then in 2022, Gov. Greg Abbott — facing primary challenges to his reelection — ordered the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services to investigate providing gender-affirming care as child abuse. He also ordered the parents who provided it to their children to be investigated.
“I would always say, ‘Well, I’m going to stay here and fight until they try and take my kids away.’ And I would say it as, like a, well, you know, that’s never going to happen. But then it did,” Karen said.
“We were advised to leave before we couldn’t leave.”
Karen is the mother of an 11-year-old trans girl who moved her family from Texas to Oregon, May 2023 (KOIN)
Her lawyers said her public advocacy made her a target. She remembers the children of family friends were approached at school by Protective Services agents. She had to train both her children about what to do if that happened to them.
“We had to talk about, ‘Here is the little card that you will carry around with you in your pocket and in your backpack. And if CPS shows up at your school you show them the card that says, ‘I don’t consent to talk to you. This is my lawyer’s information.”
The tipping point to move
A year ago Karen feared not only for her daughter’s safety but the affect the politics in Texas was having on her.
Her daughter was having panic attacks. One day in the car, the stress became clear when Karen asked her daughter if she wanted to record a statement for a rally in front of the Texas governor’s mansion.
“She was very quiet and she was sitting behind me,” Karen said. “Then, I just heard her little 10-year-old voice ask, ‘Am I going to die?’”
“It seems to come from out of nowhere except, no, that kind of question must be on her mind constantly hearing about all of this hate, all of these lies about her. So I pulled over and I asked, ‘Why would you say that? Of course you’re not going to die.’
“She looked at me and said, ‘Because everybody hates me here.’ And I just knew I can’t ask her to grow up in a place like this.”
Karen is the mother of an 11-year-old trans girl who moved her family from Texas to Oregon, May 2023 (KOIN)
The order by Gov. Abbot to investigate families of trans kids was struck down by a court last summer around the same time Karen and her family fled their native Texas.
Her husband’s employer saw the stress the political battle was having on their family and helped accommodate their move to Portland.
It was immediately a reset for Karen’s daughter.
“When we got into Oregon we went downtown. Then there’s this massive Pride festival and I thought it was really cool,” she said. “I felt like I’m in the right place. This is where I live now and I don’t plan on moving ever again.”
Karen sees a freedom in her daughter she didn’t see when they lived in Texas, a freedom from worry, freedom of thought — and freedom to be a kid again.
“I remember before she first started school (in Oregon, I asked) ‘Are you going to tell them that you’re trans?’ And she went, ‘Probably. It’s safe, right?’ I went, ‘Yeah, I think so.’ She just feels so supported.”
Her daughter said she was really nervous at her new school. “But I knew there was another trans kid in my class because when I visited, everyone told me this other person was trans just so I could know. And I was, like, cool. Then I felt more safe. Then I adjusted to my school more because everyone was so nice and so friendly. And it was so beautiful and I spent most of the time playing.”
Playing at school, like an 11-year-old should.
Karen feels relief in Oregon. She’s finally able to testify on legislation she supports. But during testimony in Salem earlier this spring she heard similar false arguments made here that she heard in Texas.
Just this year there have been more bills targeting the existence of transgender children introduced than the last 8 years combined, according to TransLegislation.com.
She hopes Oregonians remain vigilant in protecting equal rights for transgender people.
And so the Christian Taliban maga brownshirts win. I have seen one of the videos of these extremists telling other shoppers that a rainbow shirt was from the devil and it was supporting child sex, question workers and other shoppers if they were Satanist or believed in god, talking of grooming kids, all this hyper anti-gay religious stuff. That video is below in the comments. These people have learned to be violent, like the maga that went into stores and threw beer out of the shelves and coolers. Instead of standing up to these domestic terrorist, these chain stores are giving in to them. Shades of 1930s Germany. Hugs
Target is removing certain items from its stores and making other changes to its LGBTQ merchandise nationwide ahead of Pride month, after an intense backlash from some customers including violent confrontations with its workers. “Since introducing this year’s collection, we’ve experienced threats impacting our team members’ sense of safety and well-being while at work,” Target said in a statement Tuesday.
”Given these volatile circumstances, we are making adjustments to our plans, including removing items that have been at the center of the most significant confrontational behavior.” Target confirmed that it has moved its Pride merchandise from the front of the stores to the back in some Southern stores after confrontations and backlash from shoppers in those areas.
Target’s Pride month collection has also been the subject of several misleading videos in recent weeks, with social media users falsely claiming the retailer is selling “tuck-friendly” bathing suits designed for kids or in kids’ sizes.
Target is removing certain items from its stores ahead of Pride month after an intense backlash from some of its customers, including violent confrontations with workers. https://t.co/cJsNN6m73F
Target has had a Pride collection for 10 years. It’s not new. What is new is that bigots have learned that threatening violence works, so Target capitulated. And given the nature of violence in this country, part of me can’t blame them. In 2023, violent intimidation works https://t.co/VGm3OpKcI9
— Eric Ansley Diaz 🏳️🌈 (@GeekBoyEric) May 24, 2023
I get so sick and tired of this shit! I understand Target wanting to protect its employees but caving in to terrorist demands only emboldens these cretans. “Don’t have a Pride parade or we’ll kill ya!” Result: Pride parade canceled. “Don’t have Drag Queen story hour or we’ll kill ya!” Result: Drag Queen story hour canceled. “Don’t sell gay merchandise or we’ll kill ya!” Result: Gay merch banned. Seriously, when does this end? What’s next? “Don’t be gay in public or we’ll kill ya!” So all gay people have to act straight? This is nonsense! I am tired of Bible thumping bigots trying to rule our lives.
This video is a year old. Not complaining, mind you because it shows the mindset of the Christian nut jobs who go around preaching hate. But it is not a recent event from this year.
That said there has been some hateful woman going around filming herself in Target screaming about LGBT merchandise. I saw one of her videos yesterday, can’t remember if it was here or on Reddit.
What a little weenie with his little agenda. What an wrongly righteous creep. I hope I don’t run into these kind of people anywhere. What idiocy for Christian grooming and Christian nationalist terrorism.
If the store staff was being threatened, call the police and have the terrorist arrested! If the local yocals, county clowns, or staties won’t prosecute, call the FBI. After all, they are the ones who are supposed to deal with domestic terrorism. Turn over the store security videos to the FBI and make examples of a few NAZIs.
Most Target stores I’ve been to have security already. They are usually up by the front doors (not far from where Pride items are/were). Now that Target is hiding the Pride merchandise it will be more vulnerable to vandalism.
Target might as well get rid of all the Pride stuff. They’re shown they really don’t have our backs like they’ve pretended to.
It is definitely different this year in a few of the Tucson stores. Not only is there NOT as much stuff, it is hidden in the very back of the store. The display is inconspicuous. There is only but a few items of clothing, translucent cups, plates, and … yep, that’s about it. A couple of years ago, in that same store, there were three (maybe FOUR!) displays, including one dedicated to music by itself. What in the hell is wrong with Target? As you mentioned, they are capitulating to the whims of the bigots. Something has to change…for the better.
Correction: What the hell is wrong with SOCIETY that Target has to actually protect its employees and its customers from this shit? I wholeheartedly agree with posters (in different threads) here that Target still deserves our support. Unlike other corporate chains, Target has been — and hopefully, will continue to be — supportive of the LGBTQ+ community. I sure as hell would not expect to even find any pride merchandise in, say, Hobby Lobby to start with. So, the mere fact that Target employees have to HIDE merchandise in the first place speaks volumes about the supportive environment of the store and the corporation.
A transgender high school student in Mississippi missed her graduation ceremony after a federal judge denied her request to wear a dress and heels. The student, who has not been identified, had been planning to wear a dress and heels under her graduation gown in accordance with the school’s dress code for female students. However, the school’s principal told her that she would not be allowed to wear the dress and heels, citing the school’s dress code policy.
The student’s family filed a lawsuit against the school, arguing that the dress code policy was discriminatory. However, a federal judge denied the family’s request for an injunction, allowing the school to enforce its dress code policy. As a result, the student missed her graduation ceremony.
The student’s case has drawn attention to the issue of transgender rights in schools. Transgender students are often subjected to discrimination in schools, including being denied the right to use the bathroom that corresponds with their gender identity. The student’s case is a reminder that transgender students still face significant challenges in schools, and that more needs to be done to protect their rights.
Republicans claimed that drag shows should be off limits to kids because of sexual content and it’s sexualizing the children. Protect the children, they cried. Even though there was no sexual content at family friendly drag shows. None! Now they are outlawing drag queen story hours, which is mostly men dressed up in flamboyant costumes including dresses or “female” clothing. Have you seen the pictures? I have, I have posted some, there is nothing sexual about them. They are in public places with the parents / other adults present. But the goal as I have long said is to outlaw men dressing in female clothing so they can outlaw trans women. Recently a cis woman was not allowed to walk on stage during her graduation because she was wearing pants, the people in charge demanded she put on a dress to be part of the graduation. It was OK for boys to wear pants, so why not the girls? Because it doesn’t fit with their strict 1950s gender roles that these fundamentalist Christian conservatives are trying hard to force the nation back to. Look at the other bills mentioned, like legally making sex mean male or female in state law. Kansas and Tennessee have similar laws set to take effect on July 1 that LGBTQ+ allies argue will deny legal recognition to nonbinary and transgender people and prevent them from changing the sex on their birth certificates and driver’s licenses. Montana’s law would take effect on Oct. 1. That is what they are demanding, to be the US moral police Christian Taliban. To roll back all the social progress and acceptance of civil rights since the 1950s.
Unlike some of his older peers in the Montana House, Mitchell comes from a hard-right youth movement. In 2018, he organized pro-gun marches in opposition to some of his classmates’ “March for Our Lives” demonstrations. He joined Turning Point USA, a well-funded student club, and went on to become an ambassador for the group.
After Donald Trump disputed his 2020 election loss, Mitchell used Twitter to amplify a call for members of Congress to reject electors “from disputed states.”
He also tweeted a picture and video of the far-right paramilitary group the Proud Boys at the pro-Trump “Million MAGA March,” a Nov. 14 demonstration. During Mitchell’s campaign, screenshots circulated of him allegedly tweeting an anti-gay slur.
ByAmy Beth Hansonyesterday
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Scenes from a drag show at the state capitol held in protest to a slate of bills aimed at how trans Montanans live on Thursday, April 13, 2023, in Helena, Mont. Montana has become the first state to specifically ban people dressed in drag from reading books to children at public schools and libraries. The law took effect immediately after Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte signed the bill on Monday, May 22, 2023. (Thom Bridge/Independent Record via AP)
HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Montana has become the first state to specifically ban people dressed in drag from reading books to children at public schools and libraries, part of a host of legislation aimed at the rights the LGBTQ+ community in Montana and other states.
Bills in Florida and Tennessee also appear to try to ban drag reading events, but both require the performances to be sexual in nature, which could be up for interpretation. Both bills also face legal challenges.
Montana’s law is unique because — while it defines such an event as one hosted by a drag king or drag queen who reads children’s books to minor children — it does not require a sexual element to be banned.
That makes Montana’s law the first to specifically ban drag reading events, said Sasha Buchert, an attorney with Lambda Legal, a national organization that seeks to protect the civil rights of the LGBTQ+ community and those diagnosed with HIV and AIDS.
“It’s just constitutionally suspect on all levels,” Buchert said Tuesday, arguing the bill limits free speech and seeks to chill an effort that helps transgender youth know they are not alone.
The bill, which was co-sponsored by more than half of the Republican-controlled legislature, took immediate effect after Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte signed it on Monday.
Gianforte signed the bill because he “believes it’s wildly inappropriate for little kids, especially preschoolers and kids in elementary school, to be exposed to sexualized content,” spokesperson Kaitlin Price said in a statement.
The bill initially sought to ban minors from attending drag performances, which were defined as shows that tended to “excite lustful thoughts.” The legislation was later amended to ban minors from attending sexually oriented or obscene performances on public property.
The bill’s sponsor, Republican Rep. Braxton Mitchell, said he sponsored the bill “because drag shows in recent years have been specifically aimed at children,” and spoke of online videos that show children at drag shows.
“In my humble opinion, there’s no such thing as a family-friendly drag show,” Mitchell said in April.
Drag performers who opposed the legislation said they have separate drag performances for children compared to those intended for adults.
It’s not clear how often such drag reading events have been held at public schools or libraries in Montana. Drag reading events were held in 2022 at ZooMontana in Billings and at a bookstore in downtown Helena. Both events drew protests, but neither would be banned under the new law. Another event held at a Bozeman bookstore last weekend also drew protesters.
A Montana drag performer with The Mister Sisters in Great Falls, whose stage name is Julie Yard, helps organize drag reading events and says she has never been asked to coordinate one in any school — public or otherwise. Between 6 to 10 events are scheduled throughout the state in the coming months.
“Usually the requests for drag story hours happen a lot through the summer,” Yard said. “They typically tend to coincide with Pride celebrations.”
Planning such events in the current political climate also involves developing a safety plan and working with local law enforcement in case protesters show up.
The drag reading events will continue despite the protests, which Yard says helps prove that they are needed.
“For us, it’s again just doubling down and making sure that we are sending a message out there to anyone, but especially kids who are vulnerable, that there is a place for them, there is a community for them, and that there are folks out there who are interested in making sure that they are accepted and feel safe.”
Tennessee’s bill to restrict drag performances in public spaces or in the presence of children was temporarily blocked in March by a federal judge who sided with a group that filed a lawsuit claiming the statute violates their First Amendment rights. U.S. District Judge Thomas Parker said the state failed to make a compelling argument as to why Tennessee needed the law, and agreed that it was likely vague and overly broad.
A drag show restaurant has filed a challenge against Florida’s ban, saying the law deprives the restaurant of its First Amendment rights to free expression. The restaurant had held “family friendly” drag shows on Sundays, but the law required them to ban children from the shows. Gov. Ron DeSantis also signed bills this week to ban gender-affirming medical care for minors and restrict the discussion of personal pronouns in school.
Gianforte signed a bill this year to ban gender-affirming care for transgender minors in Montana during a legislative session in which transgender lawmaker Democratic Rep. Zooey Zephyr was expelled from the House floor following a protest against Republican lawmakers who had silenced her over her opposition to the care bill.
Last week, he signed a bill to define the word “sex” in state law to mean only male or female. Kansas and Tennessee have similar laws set to take effect on July 1 that LGBTQ+ allies argue will deny legal recognition to nonbinary and transgender people and prevent them from changing the sex on their birth certificates and driver’s licenses. Montana’s law would take effect on Oct. 1.
Do No Harm, a nonprofit that launched last year to oppose diversity initiatives in medicine, has evolved into a significant leader in statehouses seeking to ban gender-affirming care for transgender youths, producing model legislation that an Associated Press analysis found has been used in at least three states, including Florida.
The nonprofit, not widely known outside conservative medical and political circles, describes itself on its website as a collection of doctors and others uniting to “protect healthcare from a radical, divisive, and discriminatory ideology.”
Founder Dr. Stanley Goldfarb is a kidney specialist and a professor emeritus and former associate dean at the University of Pennsylvania’s medical school. Goldfarb retired in 2021 and incorporated Do No Harm in January 2022.
Do No Harm initially focused on race in medical education and hiring. “The same radical movement behind ‘Critical Race Theory’ in the classroom and ‘Defund the Police’ is coming after healthcare, but hardly anyone knows it,” it warns on its website.
Goldfarb declined to be interviewed by The Associated Press but said in an email that “Do No Harm works to protect children from extreme gender ideology through original research, coalition-building, testimonials from parents and patients who’ve lived through deeply troubling experiences, and advocacy for the rigorous, apolitical study of gender dysphoria.”
The organization’s executive director, Kristina Rasmussen, previously was chief of staff to former Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner, a Republican, and served as president of the Illinois Policy Institute, a conservative think tank, according to her LinkedIn profile. Perhaps coincidentally, Rauner donated $250,000 to DeSantis’ former political committee.
An AP analysis of statehouse bills to restrict gender-affirming care for youths found passages identical or nearly identical to Do No Harm’s model legislation in Montana, Arkansas and Iowa.
The organization had lobbyists registered in 2022 in at least three states — Kansas, Missouri and Tennessee — and in Florida in 2023. People associated with the group have appeared as witnesses in statehouses, including Chloe Cole, 18, listed on its website as a “patient advocate” who has spoken to lawmakers about her gender-transition reversal.
In states including Florida, Idaho, New Hampshire, Tennessee and Ohio, Cole described her transition beginning at age 13, surgery to remove her breasts at 15, and stopping her transition a year later saying it was a mistake. Republican supporters of bills restricting or banning gender-affirming care often cite Cole’s story.
Cole told the Kansas news outlet The Reflector this year that Do No Harm was reimbursing her travel expenses as she testified before state lawmakers. She and her lawyer did not respond to requests for comment from the AP.
Do No Harm originally organized as a charitable organization whose tax-exempt status would be endangered by substantial lobbying.
On March 9 this year, after the group had already made significant inroads in legislatures with its model bill, lobbyists and hearing witnesses, it incorporated Do No Harm Action as a separate nonprofit with a tax status that allows for more lobbying, according to records obtained from the Virginia Office of Charitable and Regulatory Programs.
Goldfarb did not respond directly to questions about Do No Harm’s lobbying, nor did another representative for the organization.
In the application for nonprofit status obtained from the Virginia agency, Do No Harm projected revenues of $910,000 in 2022, more than $1.1 million in 2023 and over $1.5 million in 2024.
The organization is so new that federal tax forms that typically reveal nonprofits’ spending details have been either not received or not processed.
It won a $250,000 award last year called the Gregor Peterson Prize. Its previous recipients include the Center for American Liberty, led by Harmeet Dhillon, a lawyer who advised former President Donald Trump’s 2020 reelection campaign and who is representing Cole in her lawsuit against Kaiser Permanente over gender-transition treatments she now says she regrets. The prize was announced in December at a summit held by the American Legislative Exchange Council, a prominent provider of conservative model legislation.
Duke Health’s antiracist “pledge” is nothing more than a political assertion forcefully made on behalf of its employees, who were in no position to push back.
When did health institutions start acting politically under the guise of medical science?https://t.co/3aalgjq47S
We hope the inquiry into DEI spending at Virginia’s public colleges and universities will begin to dislodge this divisive ideology from medical education.
The people pushing this madness are right about one thing: systemic racism is real. They’re proving it by bringing racial segregation back into the higher education system. pic.twitter.com/MWQd2lqsKs
.@FLSurgeonGen’s guidance against socially and medically transitioning children is a well-thought-out and evidence-based approach.https://t.co/8xn8vg3qgk
The Florida state legislature and @GovRonDeSantis passed two commonsense bills that will help restore fairness and sound teaching in higher education, including in medical schools. pic.twitter.com/IPDsATjvXV
When it became obvious that the targetted religious war on just the LGBTQ+ community was starting to lose public support, they simply changed to hating the non-defined “WOKE” giving them a faceless generic enemy to rake in tax free money and run political campaigns, and giving them an even larger base of fellow Americans to focus their hate upon, and rally their “Christian Warriors” around.
Freedom Caucus — they hate freedom Moms For Liberty — they hate liberty Alliance Defending Freedom — they’re anti-freedom Do No Harm — they’re doing great harm
ALL of Iowa’s recent book banning, gay shaming, bathroom bills are simply out of state copy/paste laws. Oh and libs of tik tok and Q anon bitches got to write a couple bills too. Non are home grown
It ALWAYS starts out with the Trojan Horse of protecting the young children, before quickly expanding to including all teens/minors, and then the banishing of LGBTQ adults from sight…”for the sake of the children,” and not for the bigoted adults hiding behind them.
bans the “instruction, guidance, activities, or programming regarding sexual orientation or gender identity to students enrolled in prekindergarten through 12th grade
Question 1. Are you married? Question 2. How do you explain that to an 18 year old without alluding to the fact that you’re a man and the person to which you are married is not?
Question 3. Why is that an exception to your rule?
This is about absolute power and control. Abortion bans/contraception bans Book bans Attacks on LGBTQ+
Can you tell the difference between Republicans/Conservatives and Muslims/ISIS and Sharia Law? pic.twitter.com/9MgNgF0AR2
— Fight4Justice Fight4Equality! AbortionIsARIGHT! (@fight4women) May 17, 2023
All 3 members of the Republican freshman class of 2020 who lectured us the loudest about family values and marriage didn’t have their marriages survive a second term. pic.twitter.com/Zel6uyB6Ut
I’ve been dubious of the word “fascism” being thrown around. But it’s the right word. After reading How Fascism Works by Jason Stanley, I am convinced that DeSantis is in fact a fascist.
“What normalization does is transform the morally extraordinary into the ordinary. It makes us able to tolerate what was once intolerable by making it seem as if this is the way things have always been.”
CNN’s Elle Reeve spoke with Darcy Schoening, the Moms for Liberty chapter chair in El Paso, Colorado. Reeve asked Schoening if she thinks there is a high-level, coordinated effort to make more children become gay or transition, and she said yes. Reeve asked who she thinks is behind that effort. Schoening said, “Teachers’ unions and our president, and a lot of funding sources.” Reeve followed up, “Why would they want more kids to be gay and trans?”
Great dogs that love gravy. This is purely pushing their Christian religion and they admit it by refusing to prohibit proselytizing to vulnerable kids. Think if you were a parent of a different faith or no faith? Ask why it is only Christian chaplains allowed in the bill? Why do the religious leaders need no qualifications, but everyone else does? This is simply the end run of the Christian nationalist to make every school a Christian school, forcing their faith on every child possible with the backing of the force of law. You know that Christians wouldn’t tolerate it if a different faith was allowed to do this. You know this is because they can not stand secular proven fact driven studies in schools, which they have been trying to overthrow since evolution began to be taught. This is outright religious indoctrination and attempting to force themselves on to every family that has a child in PUBLIC schools. Again this is not about religious schools, but public schools where kids of families of different faiths and no faith go. As I am preparing this post I am listening to a video of a trans girl who went to school all her Jr / Sr high school years as a girl accepted by all the students. She was prevented from going to her graduation unless she dressed like a boy. She refused, and a trump appointed judge backed up the school. So this girl missed her graduation and another cis girl was told to change out of pants and wear a dress or she couldn’t walk on stage during graduation to get her diploma. Think on that people, the second girl couldn’t wear pants. 1950s stereotypes here we come. Hugs.
Speaking to state lawmakers last month, Rocky Malloy argued that putting unlicensed religious chaplains in schools could prevent youth violence, teen suicide and teacher burnout. And he rejected concerns that school chaplains might use their access to recruit kids to Christ.
Chaplains “are not working to convert people to religion,” Malloy, the head of the National School Chaplain Association, told the Senate Committee on Education. “Chaplains have no other agenda other than to be present in relationships, care for individuals and to make sure everybody on campus is seen and heard.”
What Malloy didn’t mention was that, for decades, he has led another group that promotes school chaplains as a tool for evangelism. Malloy is the founder of Mission Generation, which had been open about its desire to proselytize in schools.
The Texas Legislature has passed a bill that would allow schools to employ chaplains in addition to school counselors, with Republicans overriding objections by Democrats to send the proposal to the governor’s desk.
The bill will permit school districts to hire chaplains who, unlike school counselors, are not required to be certified by the State Board for Educator Certification. A version of the bill already sailed through the state Senate last month.
“I worry that this bill will lead to Christian nationalists infiltrating our public schools and indoctrinating our students,” Democratic Rep. James Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian, told Religion News Service. The chief sponsor of the bill in the House, Rep. Cole Hefner, refused to amend the bill to bar proselytizing,
A key supporter of a push to allow unlicensed chaplains to be placed in schools has rejected concerns that they might use their access to recruit kids to Christ.
But for decades he’s led a group that promotes school chaplains as a tool for evangelism.https://t.co/9Yd6WF3qn9
Recruiting children to their brand of snake oil — grooming, if you will — is the whole bleeding point of this law. Republicans would not be pushing it if they could not use it to indoctrinate kids.
“…chaplains who, unlike school counselors, are not required to be certified by the State Board for Educator Certification”
I’m guessing these “chaplains” also get to sneak into the schools without a criminal records check? And given this is happening in a neo-confederate red state, I’m guessing that, if not now then certainly later on, they will be empowered to take disciplinary action against LGBT+ kids without regard for the school’s regular processes?
They don’t give AF about keeping kids safe. The ONLY reason they want chaplains in schools is so they can be groomed and indoctrinated into their KKKristian cult.
Last week, Ron DeSantis signed legislation into law requiring transgender people to use public restrooms that align with their assigned sex at birth.
The six trans men shown below were all assigned female at birth. I’m wondering if DeSantis REALLY thinks it makes sense for them… pic.twitter.com/jzG2cuU5dM
Gorgeous. Anyways. Unisex restroom could do it! We’re all first and foremost humans. The World needs to stop behaving like Russia. #NoToHateAndDivision 🫶😊
I don't care who is using the restroom when I am in it as long as they are respectful and leave me alone when I'm doing my business. Most trans women are going to look like women, maybe mannish, but a lot of women look like men! I once went into a work restroom to find someone… pic.twitter.com/sEldHxB7Bt
— Wolf River Ghost Society (@WolfRiverGhosts) May 21, 2023
