Black Agenda TV
This video is re-posted from Black Agenda Report.
In this edition of Black Agenda TV:
- Black America and the Genocide in Congo; African Americans have not used their political clout to stop the killing.
- Obama’s Race to the Top Hurts Black Students, Teachers, Communities; Drives school closings and helps charter profiteers.
- Black Misleadership Class to Launch “February 30th Movement” to hold President Obama (and themselves) accountable.
To My Male Relatives on Facebook Who ‘Like’ Sexism
This article by Jessica Valenti is re-posted from ZNet.
Dear cousin/nephew/second-cousin,
It’s generally a real pleasure to have you as a friend on Facebook. I appreciate that I can keep up on what the kids are listening to these days on Spotify and I thoroughly enjoy eyeing pictures of high school ragers. But I’ve noticed that lately your taste in “likes” has changed. It’s out with Bieber, in with Tosh.0.
You’ve indicated that you will be attending “Booty Slap Day” and have started to share videos of young men running up to women they don’t know in order to grope their behinds, run away and laugh—videotaping it all for hilarious posterity.
Now, I hate to get all Aunt Feminist Killjoy on you—but I love you and it’s my job. And I imagine you care about me too, at least enough to read on.
Here’s the thing: those guys running up to women just to grab their ass? Stuff like that happens to women all the time. It’s happened to me. When I was your age, guys—from boys in school to men on the subway—used to grope and touch me against my will too. I don’t know if any of them videotaped it or if they did it as a “joke”—all I know was that it was really scary.
Once it happened on my way to school on the train. I was wearing a dress because it was my seventeenth birthday. The subway was crowded and a man—I never saw his face—put his hand up my skirt and grabbed my ass right over my underwear. The memory of it still makes me feel like vomiting. This was just one incident—it’s happened to me at least a dozen times. The girls you know at school—girls you’re friends with?—I’m betting it’s happened to them, too.
Being touched against your will has become a twisted rite of passage for American females. It’s a reminder that you’re never safe anywhere. That your body is not really yours—but instead public property, there to be rubbed against by an old man or pinched and videotaped by a young one.
I know that a quick click on the “like” button may not seem like a big deal to you—but it scares me to think about the larger implications. I think about the high school kid in Steubenville, Ohio, joking and laughing about the unconscious teen girl in the next room who had just been raped by two of his classmates. That may seem a million miles away from “liking” a video—but it’s all part of the same world, the same culture that devalues women. Even laughing at a joke about rape supports the idea that women are less than and makes rapists think that you are like them. And the more you laugh at this stuff, the easier it becomes to take the ideas you’re laughing at more and more seriously.
Listen, I don’t think you’re an asshole who thinks it’s funny to do something that women find scary. You’ve been raised to think that this sort of stuff is all in good fun. Not by your parents necessarily, but by culture. You’ve grown up in a country where a Super Bowl commercial for Audi suggests that girls your age actually like it when a guy they don’t really know grabs and forces a kiss on them. (Seriously—they won’t like this.) You’ve been raised in a culture that positions women as existing just for sex, for humiliation, for objectification.
So please understand that I don’t blame you for partaking in the only kind of culture you’ve ever known. At least, I don’t blame you yet. Because here’s the thing—if you didn’t realize before that this kind of stuff is harmful and hurtful to women, now you do. So think of this as a chance to make a decision about what kind of man you’re going to be.
As you continue to grow up, you’re going to have plenty of opportunities (too many) to laugh at women’s pain, embarrassment or the sexual harassment and assault we face. These moments will define you. Will you laugh along? Share a video, like a status, laugh at a joke? Or will you say “no,” tell a friend that’s a fucked-up thing to say, and walk away?
Yes, if you choose the latter—the undoubtedly more difficult path—your friends may give you a hard time. They could laugh, call you a “pussy” or accuse you of not being able to take a joke. I’m sure that will be a pain. But it’s still the right thing to do. And you can be secure in your decision to stand with women—to stand with me—because you’ll know that you’re better than all that. Media, sexism, misogyny—all of these structures are depending on the idea that you won’t think deeply about the messages that are sent to you, that you’ll just accept them without consideration or critical thinking. But you’re better than the culture says you are. You’re smarter than that and you’re kinder than that. I know you are.
So please, the next time you’re considering sharing a video or laughing at a joke or saying something unsavory about a female peer—take the action seriously, think about what it really means. And consider your Auntie Feminist who loves you very much.
Michigan’s 21 Million Gallon Frack Job: A National Record?
This article is re-posted from Ban Fracking Michigan.
The destruction of the world’s fresh water due to fracking is at the uppermost of our minds, as we live and drink the water in the Great Lakes state. How much water is being used for Michigan’s frack industry is now proven to be obscenely underestimated. Michigan may have set a national record for allowing Encana Oil & Gas USA to frack a natural gas well with more than 21 million gallons of water.
A second nearby well is set to be fracked with more than 16 million gallons, according to a permit granted Encana late last year by Michigan regulators.
These big numbers are a big surprise. Most industry and government claims of water usage go by Marcellus shale figures, but here in Michigan, the frackers are using more water than perhaps anywhere else in the nation.
- According to Michigan regulators (Department of Environmental Quality) “up to 5,000,000 gallons or more.”
- According to industry’s public relations front group, Energy In Depth “as much as 5 million gallons.”
- According to the industry group website, FracFocus, by Ground Water Protection Council and Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission states it takes (referring to the Marcellus shale in the eastern U.S.) “5 million gallons of water per well.”
The truth is now coming out
FracFocus says the first well, State Excelsior 3-25 HD1, was fracked on Oct. 30, and Encana used 21,112,194 gallons of water. Combined with two other horizontal wells on the same pad, FracFocus says more than 42 million gallons went permanently downhole. The Excelsior pad (named after the township) is on Sunset Trail between Kalkaska and Grayling in the Mackinaw State Forest in Kalkaska County.
Fracking Sites in Michigan
A permit that was issued Nov. 30, for Encana’s well State Roscommon 1-7 HD1, states the company intends to frack with 400,000 barrels. That equals 16,800,000 gallons. The company’s application adds that the wellpad is sized to accommodate “up to six or 8 HD’s” (horizontal drills). If there are eight horizontal drills on the pad, the total water usage will be more than 100 million gallons. The pad is in the Roscommon State Forest, south of Houghton Lake.
The per well figures are three and four times what the industry and regulators have been saying. And it cannot be compared to the water used by farmers. Irrigation water returns to the aquifer and the hydrologic cycle. Water used for fracking is lost forever deep in the frack wells and disposal injection wells.
Why is the gas industry allowed to suck up so much water? Industry’s latest answer is that fracking is ok because burning natural gas synthesizes new water in the atmosphere, chemically, where it didn’t exist before. Eventually the new water rains to earth. If enough gas is burned from a well, the water created can actually surpass the amount of water destroyed in the fracking process.
This is a diversionary tactic to try to ignore the fact that millions of gallons of water are being destroyed forever, leaving our landscape full of frack wells and injection wells filled with toxic and carcinogenic frack wastes–water permanently diverted from the Great Lakes and now buried in the ground … in literally bottomless pits.
The industry’s newest gimmick is only telling half the story about the chemistry and, there’s a catch: Little of the rain will fall in Michigan. Atmospheric winds whirl it around the world. It can fall anywhere, usually on places with wet climates or in the oceans. In addition to creating H2O, burning methane creates CO2, a greenhouse gas that accelerates climate change.
Michigan is in a drought. Great Lakes levels are at near-record lows. Water is limited. Gas extracted here—or anywhere—will bring scant amounts of it to rain in our state.
There’s a second catch: Inevitably some wells are duds. Duds don’t produce enough gas to generate enough water to equal the amount lost during fracking.
Exponentially more water threatened by future wells
Encana’s threat to Michigan is profound. Encana has identified 1,700 potential Collingwood well locations in Michigan. Each location may host more than one frack well. Encana holds oil and gas leases on 430,000 net acres in the state. Recent pipeline applications say it anticipates drilling a significant number of wells in Kalkaska and Crawford Counties over the next several years.
It’s painful to do the math on how much water this will destroy. If all 1,700 Encana well locations used 21.1 million gallons of water, 35.8 billion gallons of water would be used for Encana’s wells alone, producing even greater amounts of frack wastes, when adding in the amounts of chemicals, additives and silica sand in the injectate. And if the Roscommon and Excelsior wells are the model for the industry, it is likely there will be more than one frack well on each of the 1,700 frack well locations, more than doubling or tripling the water and wastewater estimates.
Since learning of the high water use figures at the Excelsior and Roscommon wells, Ban Michigan Fracking has asked industry and environmental sources around the country to see if anyone has heard of any larger well anywhere. So far, no larger well has been identified. We will keep readers posted.
Michigan will become a toxic wasteland of frack wastes that will be unrecoverable and unfixable
The burgeoning problem resulting from all this fracking and unconventional shale gas drilling is where to put all the toxic wastes directly made by the process? Already Ohio is the recipient of the Pennsylvania frack industry’s toxic wastewater, in addition to its own, overwhelming the injection wells there. Michigan, with more than 1,000 injection wells, will quickly become a toxic wasteland, taking in frack wastes from Michigan and other locations.
Is this the kind of Michigan where healthy crops can be raised, where industries like wineries and breweries can produce uncontaminated products? Where pure Michigan groundwater can continue to sustain us?
When Dick DeVos says he wants to do something about public education it should scare the shit out of us
Yesterday, WOOD TV8 ran a story that began with the display of drawings of what the new entertainment facility at the BOB in downtown Grand Rapids will look like.
The story quickly turned into cheerleading for the group that worked on getting public funding for the BOB’s expansion, Grand Action. Grand Action was formed in 1991 and has made it their stated goal to develop the downtown of Grand Rapids.
This development has included the arena, the convention center, the civic theater, medical mile and more recently the downtown “market.” What the channel 8 story does not mention, and what local news people generally fail to report on, are the tactics in which Grand Action has used over the years and who are the primary beneficiaries of their projects.
One tactic that Grand Action has used over the years is to use public funding on these projects, without public input. We reported on the millions of public dollars that has been obtained by Grand Action in the course of the acquisition of the property and the construction of the new downtown market.
When it comes to beneficiaries of these downtown projects, all one has to do is look at who owns the hotels, bars, parking areas and other venues that have made a great deal of money due to the Grand Action projects. The DeVos family has certainly expanded their empire, especially with their near monopoly of the hotel business, but others businesses have also benefited tremendously. Not surprising, some of these other business owners are also involved with Grand Action, which is just another reflection of the interlocking systems of power in Grand Rapids.
DeVos and Public Education
The other aspect of the WOOD TV8 story, which was very instructive, was the commentary by Dick DeVos about public education in Grand Rapids. DeVos is quoted as saying, “They have been failing miserably, frankly, and it has got to change. I’m encouraged by new leadership, but we need action.”
Anyone hearing or reading such a statement who hasn’t bought the propaganda of the DeVos family, would either be rolling on the ground in laughter or fuming with rage. The fact that the channel 8 reporter doesn’t ask a follow up question to such a statement is also telling.
It is no secret that Dick and Betsy DeVos have not only given millions of dollars to fund private schools, but they have provided an equal amount of dollars to undermine public education by funding school voucher schemes and charter schools.
In 2002, Dick DeVos gave a speech to the conservative think tank, the Heritage Foundation. In that speech DeVos lays out a strategy for attacking and undermining public education. Here is the text of that speech:
“Where’s the battle going to be fought, for the future? In my view it will be, and at this point it needs to be, fought at the state level–utilizing vehicles such as GLEP and others nationally but ideally these organizations must be constructed locally. They need to be constructed with individuals such as the staff we had in Michigan, who were intelligent and connected with the local grassroots politics of what was going on, that had the relationships, the insights, and the political sensitivity to know what was happening.
And so while those of us on the national level can give support, we need to encourage the development of these organizations on a state-by-state basis, in order to be able to offer a political consequence, for opposition, and political reward, for support of, education reform issues.
That has got to be the battle. It will not be as visible. And, in fact, to the extent that we on the right, those of us on the conservative side of the aisle, appropriate education choice as our idea, we need to be a little bit cautious about doing that, because we have here an issue that cuts in a very interesting way across our community and can cut, properly communicated, properly constructed, can cut across a lot of historic boundaries, be they partisan, ethnic, or otherwise.
And so we’ve got a wonderful issue that can work for Americans. But to the extent that it is appropriated or viewed as only a conservative idea it will risk not getting a clear and a fair hearing in the court of public opinion. So we do need to be cautious about that.
We need to be cautious about talking too much about these activities. Many of the activities and the political work that needs to go on will go on at the grass roots. It will go on quietly and it will go on in the form that often politics is done – one person at a time, speaking to another person in privacy. And so these issues will not be, maybe, as visible or as noteworthy, but they will set a framework within states for the possibility of action on education reform issues.”
Lastly, it is important to note that in the channel 8 story DeVos says he is “encouraged” by the new leadership at the GRPS. Indeed, there have been several superintendents that have been willing to push a neoliberal agenda for the Grand Rapids Public Schools for over a decade.
This neoliberal agenda has resulted in several rounds of school consolidation, the elimination of some important programs, privatizing the busing system, attacking the teachers union and drastically downsizing staff. It is no wonder that DeVos would be “encouraged” by such actions, since it fits in well with his own plans.
Immigration “Reform” might exclude millions
The following info-graphic is re-posted from Color Lines. Editor’s Note: As the US government debates the current immigration policy, we think it is important that whatever policy is adopted it will not be adequate, since it does not take into account US foreign policy, which is the cause of much displacement and migration of people, particularly from Latin America.
This article by Andrea Germanos is re-posted from Common Dreams.
A “profoundly disturbing” Justice Department document obtained by NBC News outlines when the U.S. can put its own citizens on a “kill list” to be targeted in drone strikes.
“This is a profoundly disturbing document, and it’s hard to believe that it was produced in a democracy built on a system of checks and balances. It summarizes in cold legal terms a stunning overreach of executive authority – the claimed power to declare Americans a threat and kill them far from a recognized battlefield and without any judicial involvement before or after the fact,” Hina Shamsi, director of the ACLU’s National Security Project, said in a statement.
From the white paper:
Describing problematic rationale of the document, Jameel Jaffer, ACLU’s Deputy Legal Director, writes:
The paper’s basic contention is that the government has the authority to carry out the extrajudicial killing of an American citizen if “an informed, high-level official” deems him to present a “continuing” threat to the country. This sweeping authority is said to exist even if the threat presented isn’t imminent in any ordinary sense of that word, even if the target has never been charged with a crime or informed of the allegations against him, and even if the target is not located anywhere near an actual battlefield. […]
Even more problematic, the paper contends that the limits on the government’s claimed authority are not enforceable in any court. […] Without saying so explicitly, the government claims the authority to kill American terrorism suspects in secret.
Speaking on Democracy Now! on Tuesday morning, Jaffer added that this is not real transparency from the administration; this is a briefing paper, not a legal memo.
“This briefing paper is not a substitute for the 50-page legal memo on which it’s based. When the executive branch seeks to give itself the unilateral authority to kill its own citizens, a summary of its argument is no substitute for the argument itself. Among other things, we need to know if the limits the executive purports to impose on its killing authority are as loosely defined as in this summary, because if they are, they ultimately mean little. President Obama rightly released the Bush-era OLC torture memos and he should now hold his own administration to the same standard by releasing its killing memo,” Shamsi added in the statement.
Read the 16-page document here (pdf).
Editor’s Note: There has been a great deal of media attention given to gun violence and the debate about gun control, but as this article makes clear, the debate is narrow and limited.
In the wake of the massacre at Sandy Hook elementary the political dialog has been dominated by the issue of gun control for nearly two months. Extreme solutions have been proposed on “both sides of isle”, and the public is expected to endorse one side or the other on this admittedly complex and contentious issue.
Since the uproar began I’ve spoken with educators, gun enthusiasts, right wing ideologs, anarchists, moderates, and youth. These conversations have taken place during record breaking consumer purchases of guns and ammo (apparently even the warehouses are sold out). Our conversations focused primarily on two questions: How does the mass murder at Sandy Hook relate to gun control, and what is an effective response given our current circumstances? The answers I received have not been articulated in any of the media outlets, with the exception of the right wing ideologs, who seemed to be parroting the right wing media almost verbatim. I will present the noteworthy and exceptional examples I encountered.
To begin, most folks I spoke with did not make the connection between Sandy Hook and gun control nearly as quickly or clearly as the capitalist media or politicians had been telling them to. Indeed, a majority felt that if the issues were related at all, the connection was loose. No one felt that gun control laws would alone solve the issue of spontaneous shootings and massacres, but that reforms surrounding arms would have to come alongside social and cultural changes as well. This reaction gave credence to the Republican assertion that Democrats have been exploiting the tragedy to forward their own agenda. However, implying such begs the question: what agenda, exactly? The right wing has been quick to accuse Obama of attempting to disarm them for his own nefarious (and inevitably, socialist) ends. Second Amendment quotes and “Don’t Tread on Me” flags have been simultaneously brandished with the moral fortitude of a population one would think has been long oppressed by a regime quick to annihilate any dissent.
The “Second Amendment Defense” falls short, however, with the fact that activists (right or left) do not arm themselves against the authorities in the United States. The argument is nullified by its lack of manifestation in the real world. So while Tea Partiers thought it was bold to protest with rifles in tow for a while, the fact the protestors rarely got up from their plastic lawn chairs left those in power feeling decisively calm and unthreatened. While examples of armed struggles against the state certainly exist around the world, this level of resistance rarely occurs in the U.S., and those fighting for “gun rights” don’t seem very eager to begin that dialog, either. After all, activists don’t even need to be armed to be charged with terrorism any longer, “economic disruption” is violent enough for the establishment nowadays.
One gun and hunting enthusiastic provided a perspective on the nature of the reforms being proposed that highlights our representatives’ general ineptitude in handling this issue.
They’ve got the thing all wrong, especially this assault rifle ban they’re talking about. It’s not going to do anything… I have a 7mm BAR downstairs (a hunting rifle). Now, it’s the same as any of those assault rifles on the inside, the guts of the gun are the same. Same amount of power, rate of fire, all that, it just doesn’t look like an assault rifle on the outside. But this type of gun is not going to be affected by the (proposed) ban. Tell me how that makes sense.
I couldn’t. I thought maybe the difference was in the intention of the weapon when it was produced, that hunting rifles aren’t intended to kill people, so that somehow makes them less dangerous. Then I remembered that nearly all the most popular hunting calibers used today were created for snipers in World War II.
The hunter I spoke with (who keeps multiple guns in his vehicle year round) did reject the NRA’s suggestion to arm all teachers for the protection of students, citing it as “unnecessary”. In fact no one I spoke to thought this was a viable or constructive solution.
The most poignant of all my conversations was with the youth, teens ranging from 13-17 in small groups discussing violence in their communities. While none of them or their relatives have been the subject of national headlines recently, nearly all of them have experienced gun violence in their lives, at least peripherally.
The kids felt like conflict resolution and coping skills were the problem, that people lack the skills or resources to resolve their issues in a healthy way or without violence. Some of the youth told stories of friends who had either perpetrated or been the victim of an impulsive act of violence over some seemingly insignificant “beef”. They’re suggestions ranged from tighter security in schools to more parent and community involvement.
When asked whether or not more guns in their communities would make them more or less safe, their answers were unanimous: less. While some believed that they personally needed a gun for protection, it was never argued that this was a solution to violence. Additionally, they all felt like arming teachers would affect their education in a negative way, not positive. None of the youth were compelled by arguments putting economic growth in front of “common sense” gun control reforms, such as closing existing loopholes in the background check system.
My conversations exposed what most Americans already know, that the elite policy makers and their mouth piece (the capitalist press) are vastly out of touch with not only the needs of the people, but also the relationship between the society and social policy. This absurdity is even more exposed when one takes the time to compare the “mainstream” response to the death of 20 children at Sandy Hook to the response to the approximately 176 children killed by US drone strikes in Pakistan alone, (nearly 9 times more). Ironically, Washington politicians have complete control over the latter example, which is funded entirely by US tax dollars, while spontaneous shootings are not only far less deadly, but also random in nature.
The tragedy at Sandy Hook has been used by the power elite as another distraction from issues which truly effect US residents, while the corporate media and lobbying groups have handled the issue equally poorly, creating a false dichotomy between “banning all guns” and “arming every citizen”, as if either of these are appropriate responses to what occurred on December 14th. Americans are well advised to see these pseudo debates for the charades they really are and keep focused on issues that actually contribute to their own freedom.
Corpocrisy: The Systematic Betrayal of American Workers
This article by Paul Buchheit is re-posted from Common Dreams.
Free market idealists argue that capitalism works for anyone with a little initiative and a willingness to work hard. That might be true if job opportunities were available to everyone. But the facts reveal a lack of opportunity, largely because the very system of capitalism that’s supposed to work for everyone is betraying its most productive members.
It’s a step-by-step process of hypocrisy disguised as free enterprise:
1. Let the public pay for the research.
Since World War 2 our federal government has played the dominant role in the research of new technologies, with an emphasis on the long-term basic research that painstakingly perfects design while not yet producing revenue. Corporate R&D, on the other hand, is heavy on the profit-making late stages of development.
Government has contributed significantly to the development of today’s most modern technologies. Business has taken full advantage. Even during the frenetic growth of the 1990s, industry funding for computer research declined dramatically while government research funding continued to climb. As of 2009 universities were still receiving ten times more science & engineering funding from government than from industry.
2. Use the publicly-funded technologies to double profits in 8 years.
From 2003 to 2011 total corporate profits more than doubled from $900 billion to almost $2 trillion.
A big part of that is the financial industry, which has adapted the (nationally built) Internet to fashion trillion-dollar trading schemes. Up until 1985 financial firms never earned more than 16 percent of domestic corporate profits. Their share recently reached 41 percent.
3. Use the recession as an excuse to cut taxes in half.
For the twenty years prior to the 2008 recession, corporations paid an average annual rate of 22.5% in federal taxes. Since then the average has been 10%.
4. Quietly hoard all the excess money.
Anywhere from $2.2 trillion to $3.4 trillion in cash is being held by non-financial corporations, who have chosen to fatten stockholders rather than invest in new production facilities and the employees needed to make them profitable.
Once again, the financial industry leads the way. Just 12 large banks hold 69 percent of industry assets, close to $8 trillion. But they’re not making their money available to consumers or small businesses. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, community banks, which hold less than one-fifth of industry assets, provide over half of all small business loans.
5. Pay existing workers what they earned in 1970.
Less, actually. Average real wages were $17.42 in 2007, down from $19.34 in 1972 (based on 2007 dollars). Wages as a percentage of the economy, at 44% of GDP, are at an all-time low.
Jobs that remain are increasingly low-wage positions. Apple is a good example of the race to the bottom for wages, with an estimated $420,000 profit per employee and a $12 per hour pay rate for its store workers.
6. Eliminate all the other people who helped increase productivity.
Not only are “job creators” failing to create jobs with their cash hoards, but they’re also cutting jobs in order to ‘streamline’ their operations. Evidence comes from The Nation, Market Watch, and Business Insider. – Verizon, which made $38 billion in 2008-11 and paid no tax, cut 41,100 jobs. – AT&T, which made $9 billion in 20011 and paid no tax, cut 54,000 jobs. – Merck, which made $34 billion in 2008-11 and paid a 7% tax, cut 13,000 jobs.
Other leading job-cutters: – Citigroup, which made a $28 billion profit in 2010-11 and paid no tax. – Boeing, which made $15 billion in profits in 2008-11 and paid no tax. – IBM, which made $75 billion in profits in 2008-11 and paid less than 2% in taxes. – HP, which $40 billion in profits in 2008-11 and paid an 11% tax. – Pepsico, which made a $10 billion profit in 2011 and paid a 6.3% tax. – Proctor & Gamble, which made almost $60 billion in profits in 2008-11 and paid 11% in taxes. – Google, which avoided about $2 billion in 2011 taxes by shifting revenue to a Bermuda tax haven.
7. Ignore the facts.
And do nothing to address the mistreatment of American workers. CEOs, Congress, and the media are all skilled at this final step of betrayal.
GRIID Interview with Tim Wise
Last week, anti-racist educator and activist Tim Wise spoke at GVSU and participated in several programs on campus.
GRIID was able to sit down with Wise and talk about a variety of issues, particularly as it relates to West Michigan.
The following interview includes questions about the difference between White Supremacy and racism, the failure or limitations of diversity training, gentrification, the creative class, the BDS campaign against Israeli Apartheid, the importance of doing intersectional analysis and movement building and the topic of his next book.
The interview with Tim Wise is 36:49.
Don’t Say Gay in Tennessee Schools
This article by Jack McCarthy is re-posted from Political Research Associates.
This week, Tennessee State Senator Stacey Campfield (R) reintroduced the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill, which bans any discussion of homosexuality by elementary and middle school teachers in the state.
The bill’s actual name is the “Classroom Protection Act”–protection against “safety issues involving human sexuality,” insinuating that classrooms need protection against LGBTQ people. If a teacher or other school official–including counselors and nurses–knows or suspect that a child might not be heterosexual, the bill makes parental notification mandatory. This means that a student coming out to a trusted adult at school for advice about their sexuality would lose any expectation of privacy.
Within the vague and open-ended piece of legislation, the senator attempts to touch on the density of human sexuality. “Because of its complex societal, scientific, psychological, and historical implications, human sexuality,” according to Campfield (and others on the Right who share his stance), should be considered an acceptable topic of conversation only at home. The bill states: “course materials or other informational resources that are inconsistent with natural human reproduction shall be classified as inappropriate for the intended student audience and, therefore, shall be prohibited.”
Most would agree that human sexuality is complex and requires some level of maturity to fully grasp. However, blocking informational resources (i.e. teachers) from educating students on their own sexual orientation can only harm youth–especially in treating homosexuality as negative and dangerous, a religious influence on public education.
Meanwhile, Campfield’s own deeply inaccurate beliefs demonstrate he could use a dose of comprehensive sex education. “My understanding is that it is virtually—not completely, but virtually—impossible to contract AIDS through heterosexual sex,” he stated in an interview. “Most people realize that AIDS came from the homosexual community—it was one guy screwing a monkey, if I recall correctly, and then having sex with men. It was an airline pilot, I believe.”
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy 