The knee-jerk groupthink response to your reporting is so predictable.
If you disagree on a sensitive topic, you must of course be one of the Bad Guys, an enemy to poor struggling children everywhere. There can be “no debate” when it comes to the gender questioning kids (or even those who were just roped into the club).
But the point is, these teachers are trying to get kids to attend a club and hide the conversations from their parents. And the justification for this is an assumption that it needs to stay secret from the parents, because any parent who would object to teachers’ secret conversations with their kids about sexuality are Bad Guys too.
Either you agree with the current ideology 100% no questions asked, or you’re a bad person who’s up to no good.
You’d think the San Francisco Chronicle would be above such childish thinking but no. That why so many people are reading Substack.
Sexualizing 7 year olds is sick and damaging. I’m only 39, but ANY teacher talking about sex with my 7-year old will be going to jail and sued into poverty. I’m soooo glad my kids are not in public school. This is heartbreaking. A kid crush is just that - not something for some manipulative and abusive “teacher” to delve deeper into with a little kid!!!!! This is so destructive. I don’t know any parents who would care if their kid is gay. I also don’t know any parents that see anything positive in sexualizing little kids. These people are sick.
I saw that article, it was a complete disgrace and a blatant attempt to whitewash what you uncovered, presumably to please the twitter chorus that dictates the direction of legacy media newsrooms. I have been lazy about canceling my subscription (the cancel option on their website doesn't even work) but I will be sure and get to it now.
Even the aggressively moderated comments section there seems mostly to fall on the side of reason.
"...with regard to matters of deeply-held values—sex, religion, gender and the like—how ought they to proceed with other people’s children? Humbly and with complete transparency."
EDIT: ...with regard to matters of deeply-held values—sex, religion, gender and the like—how ought they to proceed with other people’s children? NOT AT ALL -- this is 100% the parents' business, and unless they send their children to sex ed classes and/or religious schools these topics should always be outside the purview of schools.
The only way to fix this is to cut off all taxation to schools, and make it a pay as you go and your choice situation. Property taxes ensure no one truly owns their homes. It's a complex topic, but the taxation enables this outrageousness that has nothing to do with a meritocracy of educators, but enables a unionized gang of extortionists.
I wish you'd actually talk to teachers. You have a critical misperception about the structure of k-12 education that undercuts your entire thesis.
I'm a high school English teacher. You seem to imagine the school system is comprised of kookie teachers and 'the union' who have terrorized poor hapless bureaucrats, state reps, admin, and board into doing the opposite of what these poor souls really want, which is to educate the children. Under your set up, once we remove the nefarious rogue teachers and the evil 'union,' the kind admin, board, and state will naturally be able to educated students as they always have.
Here's the truth: This is all coming from the TOP DOWN. The 'union' is simply operating as the 'bad cop' to the state's 'good cop.' In fact, this entire movement comes from the state and university bureaucrats and connected corporations. They want to turn the money spigot and power spigot to go directly into their mouths. Teachers are nothing--sure there are some rogue teachers. But the majority of us are not like this. The key thing is that if you fired every single teacher in the country tomorrow, NONE of this would change. Actualy it would get worse, because teachers like me (20+ years of experience) would be gone and in our place would be compliant deranged 21 year olds who buy into the propaganda.
If districts were really being bullied by the union, then all you'd need to do is remove the union. This is why your focus is so dangerous. Removing the union will not only cure nothing; it would simply strength the powers of the state, central admin, and board so they can do their propaganda even more easily.
Right now, i can teach Romeo and Juliet just as I've been teaching it for two decades. If I'm told at a professional development meeting to 'be mindful' of CRT, I can ignore and simply teach R & J. Without the union, if the board and admin really wanted CRT in the schools, and knew I wasn't playing the game, I'd be fired.
Please understand the structure. Right now you are playing into their hands. A couple of teachers is nothing. Literally nothing. It's like if you were against the Iraq war and concentrated on four soldiers' misdeeds and trusted the generals and contractors. Foolish. I'm sorry to be so blunt, but it's super frustrating to see such critical misinterpretation from an otherwise important voice.
The target needs to be the leadership and structure of the system itself. Not a couple of young insane teachers out of millions.
Leftist perverts normalizing pedophilia and mutilation. This is not normal, folks and Abigail has the courage to tell the truth. Don't let the lunatics run the asylum. They seem crazy because they are.
Wow I had neglected the fact that this was a presentation at the state level. There shouldn't be so much scandal about Abigail revealing these things then. Incredible.
We have no right to criticize another person’s sexual preferences, but we have every right to object strongly and by whatever means necessary to their attempts to warp our kids’ minds with their dangerous proselytizing.
In theory, I understand that some gay-questioning kids might need outside support if they come from families that, for whatever reason, pressure or even punish them for even having such thoughts. After all, we know there are many gay adults who recall the anxiety and fear they felt growing up in a house where to be "different" in that way was to make yourself a target of anger, possibly even abuse.
But what I really don't understand is the current obsession among the wokerati not just to be accepting of a gay or questioning kid, but to *celebrate* gay, lesbian, etc. students as having triumphed over the allegedly tainted state of heterosexuality.
In other words, among a certain kind of people, there is a *clear* idea that *anything* is superior to being (the horror, the horror) "straight."
That bizarre notion of celebration seems to underpin these crusading teachers' glee and zeal for finding and recruiting (remember when that was the most nefarious charge one could level at gay people?) kids for their club.
Brilliant once again. The people labeling this a "conservative" issue apparently didn't get the message yet, but another few election cycles and I think they may.
As an aside, a first grade teacher should never assume her students to be sexual beings. If she does her job right, most of them will want to marry her by the year is over, and it has nothing to do with what's under her skirt. (My first grader is taken, though. He's marrying me.)
According to Wikipedia, "Stalking is unwanted and/or repeated surveillance by an individual or group toward another person." And those two rogue teachers freely admitted they "totally stalked what (their students) were doing on Google...."
"Totally stalked." Those were the teachers' very own words. These two rogue teachers "totally stalked" their students so they could recruit them into the teachers' secret clubhouse. And what took place during those ultra secret club meetings? The students were groomed and indoctrinated into embracing their "gender identity." You know. The preposterous nonsense that boys and girls can change their biological sex. And all this was kept from the parents. Top secret. Loose lips sink ships.
And now that the teachers' dirty little secret has been exposed, they want to point the finger at everyone else. But they have only themselves to blame for the mess they now find themselves in. And what a mess. They knew they were playing with fire. But they went ahead and did it anyway. And then, best of all, they were stupid enough to brag about it.
Yes. They bragged. They bragged about how smart they were to come up with all those clever, new ways to recruit children and deceive parents. They said the parents were too dumb, too stupid to ever figure out what was going on. And they bragged about it. Joyfully. Openly. They wanted to spread the word about their dirty little secret. And so they shouted it from the rooftops of Palm Springs. And then when all the stuff hit the fan, they stomped their little feet, cried like babies, and called the San Francisco Chronicle. The San Francisco Chronicle? I'm shocked it still exists.
But their wounds are purely self inflicted. These two feckless teachers shot themselves in the foot. They hung themselves with their own rope. And they were hoist by their own petard.
Talk about perversion. Both of our most cherished things in this world 'Our Children' and of your reporting of it by them trying to make themselves into the victim. They need to go to prison for a long time! How dare they! How sick has the world become?
The left loves to quote the United Nations; so let's do it. Before it was run by a cabal of first world global world woke elites and second and third world dictators and torturers, the United Nations was rational and the home of Western values. Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, approved at the General Assembly of the U.N. in December 1948, states that "parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children." The parents of every race with whom I've spoken (I'm a long time secondary school teacher), hate the new racism and reality of Critical Race Theory and Marxist revisionism. Their pride in America is palpible. Aren't we relieved that a sane Senate refused to consider Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court? I know that I am.
We need 10,000 more Abigail Shrier’s !
The knee-jerk groupthink response to your reporting is so predictable.
If you disagree on a sensitive topic, you must of course be one of the Bad Guys, an enemy to poor struggling children everywhere. There can be “no debate” when it comes to the gender questioning kids (or even those who were just roped into the club).
But the point is, these teachers are trying to get kids to attend a club and hide the conversations from their parents. And the justification for this is an assumption that it needs to stay secret from the parents, because any parent who would object to teachers’ secret conversations with their kids about sexuality are Bad Guys too.
Either you agree with the current ideology 100% no questions asked, or you’re a bad person who’s up to no good.
You’d think the San Francisco Chronicle would be above such childish thinking but no. That why so many people are reading Substack.
(edited for typos)
Sexualizing 7 year olds is sick and damaging. I’m only 39, but ANY teacher talking about sex with my 7-year old will be going to jail and sued into poverty. I’m soooo glad my kids are not in public school. This is heartbreaking. A kid crush is just that - not something for some manipulative and abusive “teacher” to delve deeper into with a little kid!!!!! This is so destructive. I don’t know any parents who would care if their kid is gay. I also don’t know any parents that see anything positive in sexualizing little kids. These people are sick.
I saw that article, it was a complete disgrace and a blatant attempt to whitewash what you uncovered, presumably to please the twitter chorus that dictates the direction of legacy media newsrooms. I have been lazy about canceling my subscription (the cancel option on their website doesn't even work) but I will be sure and get to it now.
Even the aggressively moderated comments section there seems mostly to fall on the side of reason.
"...with regard to matters of deeply-held values—sex, religion, gender and the like—how ought they to proceed with other people’s children? Humbly and with complete transparency."
EDIT: ...with regard to matters of deeply-held values—sex, religion, gender and the like—how ought they to proceed with other people’s children? NOT AT ALL -- this is 100% the parents' business, and unless they send their children to sex ed classes and/or religious schools these topics should always be outside the purview of schools.
The only way to fix this is to cut off all taxation to schools, and make it a pay as you go and your choice situation. Property taxes ensure no one truly owns their homes. It's a complex topic, but the taxation enables this outrageousness that has nothing to do with a meritocracy of educators, but enables a unionized gang of extortionists.
Thank you for everything you do. Your Princeton speech was phenomenal. Happy New Year! The tide will turn in 22.
I wish you'd actually talk to teachers. You have a critical misperception about the structure of k-12 education that undercuts your entire thesis.
I'm a high school English teacher. You seem to imagine the school system is comprised of kookie teachers and 'the union' who have terrorized poor hapless bureaucrats, state reps, admin, and board into doing the opposite of what these poor souls really want, which is to educate the children. Under your set up, once we remove the nefarious rogue teachers and the evil 'union,' the kind admin, board, and state will naturally be able to educated students as they always have.
Here's the truth: This is all coming from the TOP DOWN. The 'union' is simply operating as the 'bad cop' to the state's 'good cop.' In fact, this entire movement comes from the state and university bureaucrats and connected corporations. They want to turn the money spigot and power spigot to go directly into their mouths. Teachers are nothing--sure there are some rogue teachers. But the majority of us are not like this. The key thing is that if you fired every single teacher in the country tomorrow, NONE of this would change. Actualy it would get worse, because teachers like me (20+ years of experience) would be gone and in our place would be compliant deranged 21 year olds who buy into the propaganda.
If districts were really being bullied by the union, then all you'd need to do is remove the union. This is why your focus is so dangerous. Removing the union will not only cure nothing; it would simply strength the powers of the state, central admin, and board so they can do their propaganda even more easily.
Right now, i can teach Romeo and Juliet just as I've been teaching it for two decades. If I'm told at a professional development meeting to 'be mindful' of CRT, I can ignore and simply teach R & J. Without the union, if the board and admin really wanted CRT in the schools, and knew I wasn't playing the game, I'd be fired.
Please understand the structure. Right now you are playing into their hands. A couple of teachers is nothing. Literally nothing. It's like if you were against the Iraq war and concentrated on four soldiers' misdeeds and trusted the generals and contractors. Foolish. I'm sorry to be so blunt, but it's super frustrating to see such critical misinterpretation from an otherwise important voice.
The target needs to be the leadership and structure of the system itself. Not a couple of young insane teachers out of millions.
Leftist perverts normalizing pedophilia and mutilation. This is not normal, folks and Abigail has the courage to tell the truth. Don't let the lunatics run the asylum. They seem crazy because they are.
Wow I had neglected the fact that this was a presentation at the state level. There shouldn't be so much scandal about Abigail revealing these things then. Incredible.
Thanks for outstanding reporting. Happy New Year!!
We have no right to criticize another person’s sexual preferences, but we have every right to object strongly and by whatever means necessary to their attempts to warp our kids’ minds with their dangerous proselytizing.
In theory, I understand that some gay-questioning kids might need outside support if they come from families that, for whatever reason, pressure or even punish them for even having such thoughts. After all, we know there are many gay adults who recall the anxiety and fear they felt growing up in a house where to be "different" in that way was to make yourself a target of anger, possibly even abuse.
But what I really don't understand is the current obsession among the wokerati not just to be accepting of a gay or questioning kid, but to *celebrate* gay, lesbian, etc. students as having triumphed over the allegedly tainted state of heterosexuality.
In other words, among a certain kind of people, there is a *clear* idea that *anything* is superior to being (the horror, the horror) "straight."
That bizarre notion of celebration seems to underpin these crusading teachers' glee and zeal for finding and recruiting (remember when that was the most nefarious charge one could level at gay people?) kids for their club.
Brilliant once again. The people labeling this a "conservative" issue apparently didn't get the message yet, but another few election cycles and I think they may.
As an aside, a first grade teacher should never assume her students to be sexual beings. If she does her job right, most of them will want to marry her by the year is over, and it has nothing to do with what's under her skirt. (My first grader is taken, though. He's marrying me.)
What a great way to ring the new year, Abigail!
According to Wikipedia, "Stalking is unwanted and/or repeated surveillance by an individual or group toward another person." And those two rogue teachers freely admitted they "totally stalked what (their students) were doing on Google...."
"Totally stalked." Those were the teachers' very own words. These two rogue teachers "totally stalked" their students so they could recruit them into the teachers' secret clubhouse. And what took place during those ultra secret club meetings? The students were groomed and indoctrinated into embracing their "gender identity." You know. The preposterous nonsense that boys and girls can change their biological sex. And all this was kept from the parents. Top secret. Loose lips sink ships.
And now that the teachers' dirty little secret has been exposed, they want to point the finger at everyone else. But they have only themselves to blame for the mess they now find themselves in. And what a mess. They knew they were playing with fire. But they went ahead and did it anyway. And then, best of all, they were stupid enough to brag about it.
Yes. They bragged. They bragged about how smart they were to come up with all those clever, new ways to recruit children and deceive parents. They said the parents were too dumb, too stupid to ever figure out what was going on. And they bragged about it. Joyfully. Openly. They wanted to spread the word about their dirty little secret. And so they shouted it from the rooftops of Palm Springs. And then when all the stuff hit the fan, they stomped their little feet, cried like babies, and called the San Francisco Chronicle. The San Francisco Chronicle? I'm shocked it still exists.
But their wounds are purely self inflicted. These two feckless teachers shot themselves in the foot. They hung themselves with their own rope. And they were hoist by their own petard.
Talk about perversion. Both of our most cherished things in this world 'Our Children' and of your reporting of it by them trying to make themselves into the victim. They need to go to prison for a long time! How dare they! How sick has the world become?
The left loves to quote the United Nations; so let's do it. Before it was run by a cabal of first world global world woke elites and second and third world dictators and torturers, the United Nations was rational and the home of Western values. Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, approved at the General Assembly of the U.N. in December 1948, states that "parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children." The parents of every race with whom I've spoken (I'm a long time secondary school teacher), hate the new racism and reality of Critical Race Theory and Marxist revisionism. Their pride in America is palpible. Aren't we relieved that a sane Senate refused to consider Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court? I know that I am.