I sometimes wonder how so many modern Christian families can still tolerate the schooling system. I know for some of them it is a necessity, they have bills or work commitments that they need to fulfil and therefore both parents have to work. But there are others who seek to engage with a very woke and corrupted system by choice.
I know some schools are better than others, and some schools are doing a great job at training young people to stand up against the culture. But overall the schooling system in countries like the USA or ours are dogmatic propaganda centres that are designed to turn young people into little representatives of the secularized modern culture, some with a thin Christian veneer on top.
But sometimes this goes way further than others, and sometimes there are wins for those who still believe in sanity. For instance, this situation in California which was reported by CBN:
A California school district has settled a lawsuit for $100,000 with a mother who alleged her daughter was socially transitioned to a new “gender identity” by school staff without informing or getting her permission.
It’s a case that has been called a landmark victory for parental rights.
The Spreckels Union School District in Monterey County resolved the lawsuit filed by Jessica Konen who claimed the school fostered her 11-year-old daughter Alicia’s identification as a boy. Konen is represented by the Center for American Liberty, a nonprofit law firm that announced the settlement on Tuesday.
According to the law firm, Alicia was recruited to join an “Equality Club” where she was taught about bisexuality, transgender identities, and other LGBT concepts in the sixth grade.
In addition to giving the girl articles on how to conceal a new gender identity from her family, she was placed on a “Gender Support Plan” that instructed school staff to refer to her by a male name and male pronouns and to let her use the unisex teachers’ restroom, the Center for American Liberty said.
According to the 25-page lawsuit, “Under the Parental Secrecy Policy, Buena Vista teachers and staff would keep secret from parents that their children had articulated confusion about their gender identity, evinced a desire to change their gender identity, or assumed or expressed a new gender identity unless the student expressly authorized the parents to be informed.”
With the help of the Center for American Liberty, a nonprofit law firm, Konen sued the district in state court in June of 2022.
Praise God for this victory for this mother. And praise God, that according to the article, this young girl has decided to start correctly referring to herself as a girl again. These are two very good wins.
But make no mistake about what happened here. This girl was recruited and groomed into a radical sexual identity group that had the potential to lead her down a very dark and dangerous path, that often ends up in radical and harmful surgery and other medical procedures. And this all happened in her school. A system which is supposed to exist to educate children, but has become one of the main vehicles in our society dedicated to confusing young people about basic and fundamental realities like sex, gender and many other things.
This is far more common in the modern school system than many people realize. I have even been informed by people that in relatively conservative Christian schools there are children who the teachers and students are required to refer to by “preferred pronouns”. So, you need to be very plugged into what is happening in your child’s school, because a lot of young children are being taught stuff by their teachers and encouraged in stuff by their peers, which would terrify many parents. And it is not on. It is wrong.
But there is pushback. This mother is an example of this kind of pushback. As she said, “Parents please be bold,” she continued. “Stand up for your children and fight for them. Fight for your rights.”
This case was not a complete win, the school did not have to admit fault as part of the settlement. A payout for this kind of behaviour is far below what should be the basic minimum response. This child was harmed by a system that is geared towards teaching children dangerous stuff about their identity.
Obviously, parents who homeschool do not have to worry about any of this kind of nonsense. But for parents who choose to be a part of the schooling system you have to make sure that you are constantly engaging with the spiritual and ethical status of the school in which your children are involved.
Get to know the principal, get to know their teachers, and make sure you are aware of the views of your children’s friends, and other influences in their lives. And don’t let schools get away with this kind of behaviour. Parents have rights.
The laws and rules are different in Australia than they are in a place like California, but you still have rights as your child’s parents, and if you get even a whiff that your kid is in a school where children have the right to keep their “identity” secret from their parents, pull them out of there faster than you can get to the school.
Don’t think that this cannot happen to you. I know this sort of thing has happened to some solid Christian families, who just took their eye off the ball.* Be aware, and let’s turn this thing around. There are homeschoolers who believe in just disconnecting from the system, and I understand why they feel this way, I can empathize with it quite well. The system feels broken and in many cases it genuinely is. But we do need schools to be better.
Schools will probably always educate the vast majority of children, so we need them to be better. If you are involved in the schooling system, be like this mother, and “Stand up for your children and fight for them. Fight for your rights.”
* Some of the best advice I have heard about solving this situation if your child comes home from school hinting at any kind of attaching to radical gender ideology, is that you should get them out of the school and away from their friends as soon as possible. Change their school environment and their social network, and surround them with love, and this will almost certainly bring them back around. But if you leave them in that environment the bad ideology will be reinforced. So be aware of this, it can be opposed and your child’s future is worth the effort that it takes to remove them from such a situation.