The threats began the same day that Walters retweeted a post from a day earlier on the conservative provocateur account Libs of TikTok, which featured a video of a librarian at Union Public Schools. The video shows the librarian walking next to a book shelf with the text “POV: teachers in your state are dropping like flies but you are still just not quite finished pushing your woke agenda at the public school.” That’s different from the caption that the librarian originally posted on her TikTok account, which Libs of TikTok removed: “My radical liberal agenda is teaching kids to love books and be kind — hbu??”
When Walters retweeted the Libs of TikTok post to his nearly 10,000 followers, he added: “Woke ideology is real and I am here to stop it.”
See what happened there? The original sentiment of the librarian in question was "My radical liberal agenda is teaching kids to love books and be kind." Are conservatives deciding that loving reading and being kind really are some kind of scary agenda, and that the comment wasn't a frightening manifesto about left-wing indoctrination, but an ironic comment about how a librarian's job is to do something totally normal and not-scary: show kids that books are great. Encourage them to be nice to each other!
Boogedy!
See, this is how easy it is to create a boogeyman. Just drop some charged language like "woke" into the mix and frame things as if they were a problem when they are not, and watch simple-minded drones fly in to stir shit because they want to signify for something. Look at me! I am a culture warrior against....
Literacy and decency. Good job, so-called Christian conservatives. Feeble sarcastic golf clap for the bomb threat people. You are literally barbarians tearing down Western Civilization. You've struck a blow against public safety and demonstrated the superiority of your side at mindless terroristic posturing.
Was Walters mad because someone pointed out that teachers don't want to teach in this environment? Is it because he has no answer to how to make things better but, unhelpfully, add more Jesus? Nothing against Jesus--but that isn't getting the reading, writing, and 'rithmetic taught. Nor the necessary history or science. The job of the school system isn't souls--that's the church's job. His job is supposed to be brains.
Gay and trans kids aren't hurting the education of other kids in Oklahoma. It's shitty ideologues who are trying to work a political agenda instead of doing their basic job.
It would be great if irresponsible fuckwits like Ryan Walters hadn't been raised to think they are doing the Lord's work when they rip into things that benefit everyone, like kids being educated and capable of getting good jobs and being productive citizens. It would be great if now being a grown man, he understood that being entrusted with a public good like the education system, he realized it is there to educate, not to proselytize and that such a trust should be for all the people--not just people of a certain political or religious bent.
Maybe he would do a better job if he loved books and was trying to be kind. Just saying.
4 comments:
Start with the "T" move next to the "LGB" continue on to anyone who opposes the MAGA.
Conservatives yearn to liquidate millions of Americans.
If the good superintendent is rational about his goals what better target rich environment of impressionable young minds than schools. The hate isn't naturally baked in, mostly, it must be taught and learned and a great place for teaching it is a (duh) school.
I think, to both your points, a guy like this goes into a role like superintendent of schools for the purpose of destroying or radically altering the institution so as to make it a better tool for his ideology. That the role can be used to hurt people along the way seems to be a bonus for people of this bent.
I listen to religious radio (CSN, BBN, Bott Radio) all the time in my car. I need to be aware of what these people are saying and doing. And sometimes they're laugh-out-loud funny.
One chuckly radio host said, "You know, little kids--you can get them to believe anything. Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny. You tell them, and they believe it."
He went on to say how important it is to start on Jesus indoctrination early, before the kids "develop some, you know, critical thoughts."
What he meant to say was, "before they develop critical thinking."
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