Open Letter to Texas School Boards and Superintendents Considering Library and Instructional Materials

Dear school board members and superintendents of Texas,

As you (school board members and superintendents) review policies for instructional and library materials, appropriateness of materials should be prioritized over diversity, inclusion, representation, or any other woke goals. Diversity is a feature of the community at large, the diversity of your district is out of your control. Diversity may be of some value to students as they experience their larger community, but it is of secondary value. We should be aiming for excellence, and challenging students of all backgrounds to achieve their academic potential. On the scale of desirable ends, excellence beats diversity every time. Diversity should also not be confused with perversity. Using diversity as an excuse to allow material that is harmful to students’ psyche is appalling.

Here is a video of a Texas Superintendent doing just that after parents addressed the school board regarding books with passages that were sexually inappropriate.

Parents have a reasonable expectation that their children will not be exposed to materials that do not align with the State Board of Education’s guidance for health and human sexuality. Books and other classroom materials that promote sexual promiscuity, homosexuality, and transgender identities, or contain sexually inappropriate content do not line up with that guidance in Texas.

School boards must stop patronizing parents by pretending to include them by “allowing” parents to see what THEIR kids check out from the library, or by providing the ability to block certain titles from being checked out by their child. No parent can possibly know what is in every book in the library, nor can anyone stop a student from reading one of the perverse passages out loud in front of other students. MMB has been contacted by parents who have children who have been scandalized in just this way. This scenario of one child reading a perverse passage out loud in front of other kids would be considered sexual harassment in any other setting. Why are school librarians and teachers allowed to create an environment conducive to sexual harassment?

One common excuse school boards and superintendents give for not taking appropriate action is that they will be sued and they have a “fiduciary duty” to prevent a lawsuit. I respectfully disagree, the board and the superintendents have a moral duty to protect the innocence of the children entrusted to their care. They have an obligation not to betray the trust that parents of students have placed in them. If a lawsuit should come about because the secular humanists’ organizations and the secular humanists that run the American Library Association and its Office of Intellectual Freedom decide to sue for the “right” to groom children in public schools then that is a battle worth having and it is your duty to fight for the children, not dirty books. Another common excuse for not removing inappropriate materials is that they are representative of a minority / protected class. This is just absurd. Nobody is denied the right to publish a book, to use the library, or to check out a book. What parents and concerned citizens are wanting are collections and materials that are appropriate.

Books rated for adults and young adults do not belong in public schools. Any policy for library materials that includes provisions for adult books or young adult books should be revised to exclude those categories. Students in public schools are almost entirely under the age of 18. No book is being “banned”. Appropriateness for children should be taken into account in acquiring and maintaining library collections and class materials.

Policies should be created locally. These are “independent school districts” after all. The policy should prioritize educational suitability with respect to the appropriateness of the books and materials for minors. No input should be considered from unelected bodies such as the American Library Association, Texas Association of School Boards, ACLU, the Office of Intellectual Freedom, or any other unelected, non-governmental organization, or special interest groups in making the local policy.

In regards to materials and resources that push tenets of cynical theories such as critical race theory, schools must promote the true story of America—a story that is honest about the injustices in American history, but that places them in the context of our nation’s high ideals and the how far we have come. The true history of the United States is rich with stories of achievements and sacrifices that inspire all Americans—and stands in stark contrast to the pessimistic narrative of critical theories. Cynical theories hurt the students and have a deleterious effect on society.

Texas passed SB 3 in 2021, although not perfectly constructed, the spirit of this bill gives parents the reasonable expectation that their students will not be indoctrinated with critical theories that portray one set of Americans as oppressors and the other as the oppressed in a system that doesn’t allow all citizens an opportunity to achieve the American dream. Children are being led to speculate about their peers, whether their peers see them as oppressive or oppressed. Telling innocent children that they or their family members are oppressed or are oppressors is mental and emotional abuse. STOP IT! Having children separated into groups to identify their privilege is bullying. STOP IT! STOP teaching that all white people play a role in systemic racism and have “work to do”. Stop indicting the whole community of being racist. Stop accusing teachers of being racist and relegating them to reeducation for white supremacists via “diversity trainings”. It is no wonder so many teachers are leaving. Despite the overwhelming number of bad actors being exposed in schools, most teachers didn’t sign up to be political agents of change in a Marxist revolution. Most only wanted to make a difference in the lives of children by helping them reach their goals rather than telling them their goals are out of reach or they are privileged for having such goals and thinking about their path ahead without first “doing anti-racist work”, which is apparently work that will never be complete as long as the race hustlers are profiting.

The arguments against “censorship” of ideas in education cannot always be defended when it comes to the education of children. Ideas have consequences, those ideas either erode culture and truth and have a deleterious effect on society at large or they benefit society at large. Surely, there are ideas that most people agree shouldn’t be deployed in the name of “education” (i.e. promoting racism as an acceptable practice, promoting sex work as valid work, promoting promiscuity, promoting violence). Queer theory and critical theories ( better named cynical theories) should be counted among those ideas that have no benefit in the education of children. There is so much propaganda in LGBTQ theory that it should be deemed as educationally relevant as a book about flat earth or Sasquatch.

Let the children learn. Return the schools to instruction in reading, writing, math, language, history, government, and science and leave the political agendas aside. There is plenty of time for children to learn all about the world. They deserve to learn of it organically by getting to know their peers and people in their community. Parents and taxpayers deserve an honest school system that doesn’t seek to indoctrinate children and that will protect children from unwholesome ideas and harmful ideology while entrusted to schools for an education.

What schools are engaging in today is harmful to children and to society. Willfully or not, public school administrators, teachers, superintendents, and school boards have become revolutionaries that are creating a generation of young Americans who will identify as rebels of a system that they are convinced is entirely unjust and unsalvagable. Children’s futures are being harmed and the future of the nation is at risk of being harmed by the consequences of the ideas being promoted in public schools today.

To the school boards and superintendents considering the library and instructional materials for public schools in Texas and pretending their highest calling is to ensure “diversity” which has somehow been confused with promoting sexual deviance and racism: KNOCK IT OFF! Safeguard children or you have no business even being around children at all.

Mad Momma Bear