On the morning of April 6, we contacted lawmakers in Suffolk County, Long Island about a proposed resolution that would abridge the right of a member of the clergy to determine the contents of his prayer invocation. After we published an email contact for the legislator who heads the Ways and Means Committee, and our subscribers let loose, the resolution was tabled before noon. It is not likely ever to be introduced again.

This story began on December 21, 2021 when Msgr. Robert Batule, who is the pastor at St. Margaret Parish in Selden, Long Island, gave a prayer invocation before Suffolk County lawmakers. He included a prayer for the unborn. That led one of them, Bridget Fleming, to propose a resolution that would only allow “neutral prayers.”

The lawmaker did not know that Msgr. Batule is on the board of directors of the Catholic League and a long-time friend of Bill Donohue.

In his letter to the members of the Ways and Means Committee, Donohue said Batule “had every constitutional and moral right” to offer such a prayer. He also said that the reasoning of the resolution, which was introduced January 3, 2022, was “constitutionally flawed.”

Donohue noted that the establishment clause of the First Amendment was not written to guarantee “pluralism among religions in governmental speech and practice,” as contended by Fleming. After explaining why Madison wrote it, he said that Fleming’s interpretation of a 1983 Supreme Court decision actually undercut her position.

A more pointed decision by the Supreme Court, Donohue said, was not mentioned by Fleming. In the 2014 Town of Greece, NY v. Galloway, the high court took up objections by two persons who were offended by the Christian themes of prayer invocations. The words “Lord,” “Jesus,” and “God” were frequently used by Christian ministers before town meetings.

The Supreme Court said such prayers did not violate the First Amendment. At the very outset, the high court rejected the contention that a prayer’s content determined its constitutionality. If it were otherwise, it ruled, courts would be converted into “supervisors and censors” of religious speech, something which itself would violate the First Amendment.

“The idea of a ‘neutral’ prayer,” Donohue said, “is an oxymoron.” He explained that “Prayers are never neutral—they are always normative, and they frequently reflect the personal beliefs of the prayer giver. Most significant, if government personnel were to sit in judgment determining whether a prayer were neutral, they would become the ‘supervisors and censors’ that the Supreme Court clearly rejected.”

Once again, our email subscribers played a key role in securing justice.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has decided to institute “inclusion standards” governing eligibility for an Oscar, but not for all demographic categories: people of faith are not included. They will go into effect in 2024.

Those standards are based on race, ethnicity, sex, those with disabilities, sexual orientation and gender identity. Noticeably absent is any mention of religion.

This prompted Bill Donohue to write to the president of the Academy, David Rubin.

He pointed out that the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex and national origin. Civil rights laws were later extended to cover sexual orientation, gender identity, those with disabilities and veterans.

“The Academy’s criteria cover all of these categories save for religion and veteran status,” Donohue said. “I am particularly interested in why religion—one of the original categories cited in the 1964 Civil Rights Act—was not mentioned by the Academy.”

Donohue added that “It is no secret that Hollywood is a gay-friendly community. Nor is it a secret that it is not religion-friendly. Why, then, would the Academy demand that movie production companies do a better job hiring more ‘LBGTQ+ people’ but not practicing Catholics and Protestants? Clearly the former are already overrepresented; the latter are not.”

We don’t expect an answer. We just wanted to let the Academy know we are on to their game.

Pluralism is a good thing, just so long as it is not pushed to extremes, because when it is, it becomes a separatist threat to cultural cohesion. Unfortunately, we live in a time when our society is more polarized and segmented than ever before. For example, we should be encouraging new immigrants to learn English; it makes it easier for them to assimilate.

In the 1980s, when I was a professor, a colleague of mine, a nun, introduced me to an Irish priest from Fordham who had written a book on Puerto Ricans. I was aware of the book—I assigned it to my students in a Minorities class—so I was pleased to meet him. In the course of our discussion, he and the nun said they were opposed to mandating that Puerto Ricans speak English in the schools, preferring a bilingual approach.

I disagreed with them, pointing out that when I taught in Spanish Harlem in the 1970s, the Puerto Rican parents were opposed to bilingual education, insisting their kids speak English. The priest was honest enough to admit that I was right.

We are hurting Spanish-speaking people, not helping them, when we don’t hold them to the same standards as other non-English speaking people. Most of the immigrants who came here from Europe had to learn English as well, and in time they did.

So why did this learned priest, a sociologist whose expertise was studying Puerto Ricans not support the aspirations of the people he studied? No doubt it was because he believed that the Puerto Ricans were not enlightened. He, on the other hand, was, and therefore he need not respect their wishes. This is the way liberals think.

By enlightened, liberals mean that it’s time to stop with the chauvinistic adoration of America, or what most Americans would simply call patriotism. Thus do they incline to a more critical perspective. Mandating Puerto Ricans to master English carries with it, they say, the odious implication that there is something inferior about their heritage. They are clearly wrong about this, but don’t try to reason with them.

My anecdote is illustrative of what was going on in higher education in the 1980s. That is when multiculturalism was all the rage. Multiculturalism does not celebrate diversity in a healthy way, such as promoting respect for different racial and ethnic groups, and the heritages they represent. No, it celebrates division.

We now have a well-paid Diversity industry, fully credentialized experts—most of whom are badly educated activists—who are busy telling employers that they need to embrace what makes us different, not what unites us. This, in turn, has led to a new wave of segregation, only this time it is heralded as a victory for social justice.

We have separate racial and ethnic dorms on campus, separate graduation ceremonies, and the like. Yet some wonder why there is so much racial tension on campus. It would be astonishing if we didn’t witness polarization—we’ve done our best to nourish it.

What makes this so disconcerting is that we started out as a nation which boasted of its ability to unite people. As far back as the 18th century, a French student of the American colonies, J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur, wrote about this in his classic, Letter from an American Farmer. He had never seen such assimilation; the ability to “melt” disparate peoples into a new man was unparalleled. The idea of the “melting pot” had been born.

People like Horace Mann picked up on this idea in the early 19th century, and in his case he decided that the best way to achieve a “melting pot” was the public schools. This was the best way to unite the multiplicity of racial and ethnic groups that came here. The goal was assimilation.

From the perspective of multiculturalism, and the Diversity industry, the “melting pot” idea is anathema. That’s because our ruling class is bent on dividing us, not uniting us. Most Americans find this hard to believe, thinking these people are simply misguided.

Americans, for the most part, are a good and honest people. They want the best for their country. They also want to be able to get along with everyone, regardless of their race, ethnicity or religion. Subcultures, such as Chinatowns, are okay, but it is still important that we all seek to fit into society, and not live apart from it (the Amish are an exception), much less undermine it.

Unfortunately, even though most Americans want this, it is not being promoted in the schools or in the workplace. It is not unity the elites want; it is division. Some of those who are intentionally dividing us are motivated by ideological reasons: they hate America. Others are doing it because it is a lucrative business.

“E Pluribus Unum,” out of the many, one. Our nation’s motto is being attacked—the elites find it atavistic. It’s about time Americans realized that what we are witnessing is not a matter of misguided policies; rather, it is the result of what the “enlightened ones” are intentionally doing.

For decades, parents, teachers, the clergy, health professionals and public officials have warned against drug use. In more recent times, some states and cities have legalized marijuana, and in a few cases they have dropped penalties for smaller amounts of other drugs. We now have evidence that those places which have relaxed restrictions have paid a big price: the results are devastating.

On April 1, 2022, the House of Representatives voted 220-204 to decriminalize marijuana. The bill now goes to the Senate. New York Senator Chuck Schumer is not satisfied to decriminalize marijuana—he wants to legalize it altogether. He said that federal legislation to do so was a “priority” for the Senate.

Polling data indicate that a majority of Americans are in favor of legalizing marijuana, though the only organized effort to do so is coming from those who expect to profit from it. Yet Schumer justified his enthusiasm by saying the legislation is needed to restore “justice for communities impacted by the War on Drugs—especially communities of color.”

The fact is there has been no groundswell of support by Asians, Hispanics or African Americans to legalize marijuana. Indeed, there is no campaign among “communities of color” to legalize any drugs.

If Schumer were right, we should be able to see a marked difference of opinion between whites and blacks on this issue. But there isn’t. Between 2015 and 2021, Pew Research Center conducted several surveys on support for marijuana legalization, and in five of them they listed support for it based on race and ethnicity. There was almost no difference between whites and blacks on this issue in the surveys taken in 2015, 2016, 2019 and 2021 (there were two in 2021).

Polls measure preferences; they do not measure demand. There is a big difference between the two. Quite frankly, there is no demand coming from blacks, or from any other sector of society, for drug legalization. Blacks, in particular, may want to rethink their position.

A Pew Research Center study released in 2022 found that blacks have been hit the hardest by drugs. “As recently as 2015, Black men were considerably less likely than both White men and American Indian or Alaska Native men to die from drug overdose. Since then, the death rate among Black men has more than tripled—rising 213%—while rates among men in every other major racial or ethnic group have increased at a slower pace.”

It also found that “death rates among Black women rose 144% between 2015 and 2020, far outpacing the percentage increases among women in every other racial or ethnic group during the same period.”

In the 1980s, Harlem congressman Charles Rangel supported the War on Drugs that Senator Schumer decries. He said that “a lot of the drug-related bleeding was staunched.” He also made an insightful comment about why white leaders want to legalize drugs. “It seems to me that more white America is saying, let’s legalize drugs because we can’t deal with the problem.” He was not naive in understanding who pays the biggest price for this policy.

Let’s face it. There is big money involved. There is an entire industry waiting to cash in on drug legalization, and it has no plans on stopping after marijuana is legalized.

Parents were asked in a Yahoo News/Marist poll in 2017 what behaviors they worried about the most in their children. Marijuana use topped the list, beating out concerns over drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes, having sex or cheating on a test.

Parents keep an eye on these issues. It was reported in 2022 that drug overdoses now kill more than 100,000 Americans, which is more than those who die in vehicle accidents and from guns combined. It is also almost twice the number of Americans who died in the Vietnam War between 1954 and 1975.

Doctors have been telling us for decades about the harm that smoking cigarettes does to our body, especially our lungs. They have also been telling us about the seriousness of respiratory problems caused by COVID-19. Why, then, is the campaign to legalize a substance that causes more respiratory problems being undertaken at this time? Moreover, according to one prominent physician, “One joint today is like 17 joints in the 1970s.”

If the health issues attendant to marijuana use were more widely known, support for legalization would wane.

Kenneth L. Davis is the president and chief executive of the Mount Sinai Health System and Mary Jeanne Kreek was the head of the Laboratory of the Biology of Addictive Diseases at Rockefeller University. Their review of the medical literature led them to conclude that marijuana is not the harmless substance that many believe.

Marijuana has a “deleterious impact on cognitive development in adolescents, impairing executive function, processing speed, memory, attention span and concentration. The damage is measurable with an I.Q. test. Researchers who tracked subjects from childhood through age 38 found a consequential I.Q. decline over the 25-year period among adolescents who consistently used marijuana every week. In addition, studies have shown that substantial adolescent exposure to marijuana may be a predictor of opiod use disorders.” They add that the brain is still developing in young people to age 25.

Today’s potent marijuana can make users psychotic. A 2019 study in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that adolescent marijuana use was associated with significant increases in developing depression and suicidal behavior during adulthood.

Roughly a third of marijuana users become dependent on it and it has proven to be deadly for some of those who have damaged their lungs and heart. In fact, one study found that “a person’s risk of heart attack during the first hour after smoking marijuana is nearly five times his or her usual risk.” A peer-reviewed article published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal found that young people who use marijuana were twice more likely to experience a heart attack.

Pregnant women who use marijuana are causing severe behavioral problems for their children. According to Melinda Wenner Moyer, a contributing editor at Scientific American, “deficits in language comprehension, visual perception, attention and memory” are well-documented problems associated with such children. Also, some studies show that marijuana use during pregnancy is linked to “low birth weight, reduced IQ, autism, delusional thoughts and attention problems,” owing in large part to the fact that “cannabis today is nothing like the cannabis of years past.”

Those who make the case for marijuana legalization like to cite the growing acceptance of medical marijuana as a reason to change our views about this matter. But a recent study by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that medical marijuana “is associated with higher opoid mortality” and that legalizing the substance is “associated with greater death rates” when compared to keeping it illegal.

In March, 2022, Massachusetts General Hospital released a report that showed that medical marijuana can cause serious psychological and physical health issues and that it usually fails to improve symptoms of “pain, anxiety, and depression.” It also increases the risk of addiction to the drug, even when prescribed.

If legalizing marijuana were inconsequential, we would know it from studying what has happened in Colorado.

Between 2012, when marijuana was legalized, and 2019, marijuana-related traffic deaths increased by 151 percent, while overall state deaths increased by only 35 percent. Nationwide, between 2000 and 2018 vehicle fatalities from marijuana more than doubled from nine percent to 22 percent, meaning that the situation in Colorado is much worse. Emergency room visits for users increased 52 percent in Colorado, while marijuana-related hospitalizations increased by 148 percent.

Marijuana did not become available for recreational sales until two years after it was legalized. The New York Times did a review of what happened over the next five years. “Nearly twice as many Coloradans smoke pot as the rest of America.” The consequences were horrific.

The Times reporter spoke with Andrew Monte, an emergency and medical technology physician and researcher at the University of Colorado. Some of the heavy users he treated suffered from “severe vomiting.” Patients in the emergency room with marijuana-related cases were “five times as likely to have a mental-health issue as those with other cases.”

Children who consumed edibles came to Dr. Monte “disoriented, dehydrated or hallucinating after consuming too much marijuana.” A father of three shot his wife dead after eating edibles. Such stories are commonplace among attending physicians.

That’s not all. Violent crime since legalization increased in Colorado by 19 percent; it increased by 3.7 percent nationwide. Property crime increased by eight percent as compared to a national decrease of 13.6 percent. No wonder that one study concluded that “for every dollar gained in tax revenue, Coloradans spent approximately $4.50 to mitigate the effects of legalization.”

Coloradans like their drugs so much that they embarked on a campaign to legalize other drugs. In 2019, lawmakers made the possession of small amounts of heroin and cocaine a misdemeanor, not a felony. The Democrat-controlled legislature included fentanyl, the most dangerous of them all. Colorado prosecutors pleaded with lawmakers to exempt fentanyl—four grams is the equivalent of 13,000 deadly doses—but they refused. What happened? Opiod overdose deaths increased by 54 percent in 2020.

In 2018, King County, which encompasses Seattle, and neighboring Snohomish County, stopped charging people for small amounts of hard drugs. Meth overdoses skyrocketed, going from 18 deaths in 2008 to 197 in 2019. Heroin overdose deaths jumped from 45 to 147 and fentanyl-related deaths climbed from 9 to 106, during the same time period. Seattle radio talk-show host Jason Rantz says decriminalization made “the problems worse.” In fact, he brands it “an unmitigated disaster.” There are now calls to reverse this law.

One of the great myths about drug legalization is that it will dry up the black market. In fact, just the opposite happens. The Mexican cartels are not stupid. To make up for the loss in revenue from trafficking in marijuana, they have expanded their operations in heroin and meth.

States which have legalized pot have attracted an entire new thriving market in marijuana fields. According to Steven Malanga at the Manhattan Institute, California’s experiment in legalizing marijuana shops has led to illegal growers undercutting the price of legal weed. The black market drug lords, he says, don’t have to pay for “the cost of a license, taxes on sales, and the financial burdens of complying with state health regulations.” The final tally is incontestable. “As a result,” he says, “production of illegal pot is increasing.”

In December 2021, San Francisco supervisors got the message and unanimously voted to suspend the city’s tax on pot through 2022, in an attempt to curb illegal marijuana sales.

No policy can stop the demand for drugs, but making it easier to access is the worst alternative. Indeed, it has proven to be a death sentence for too many Americans.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis earned the admiration of fathers and mothers when he signed the Parental Rights in Education bill. Their rights have been slipping away, not only in Florida but throughout the nation, as sex-crazed activists, school administrators and teachers have sought to supplant them, making unauthorized and damaging decisions affecting their children.

Most people have never read the bill. If they listened to those branding it the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, they would think it is a hate speech bill. This is a total lie.

To begin with, the following terms never appear in the legislation: heterosexual, homosexual, straight, gay, bisexual, intersex, non-binary and transgender (the last three categories are a fiction—they don’t exist in real life). The bill is about parental rights. It is also about protecting children from sexual engineers, namely those who treat kids as though they were a toy that they can play with to further their own agenda.

Here are some of the highlights of the bill:

• School district school boards must “reinforce the fundamental right of parents to make decisions regarding the upbringing and control of their children in a specified manner.”
• School district personnel are prohibited from “discouraging or prohibiting parental notification and involvement in critical decisions affecting a student’s mental, emotional, or physical well-being.”
• School district personnel are prohibited from “classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in certain grade levels or in specified manner.”
• “Classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”

Who could possibly object to these standards of common sense and common decency? (Most of the following comments were made prior to the bill’s passage.)

President Biden called the bill “hateful.” Disney said it “should never have passed and should never have been signed into law.” Oscar hosts slammed it, jumping and screaming, “gay, gay, gay.”

Ana Navarro whined that “the message it sends is a very chilling one for LGBTQ families.” Whoopi Goldberg said the bill is “shaming” queers and “punishing” teachers. Andy Cohen labeled it “one big dog whistle” that is “scaring people into spewing hate and discrimination at the LGBTQ community.”

Gay rights groups are just as irresponsible.

The Human Rights Campaign complained that “LGBTQ+ students may wonder if they’re allowed to even acknowledge their own sexuality or gender identity.” Nadine Smith from Equality Florida charged that DeSantis “attacked parents and children in our state by invoking hateful anti-LGBTQ stereotypes.”

Lambda Legal blasted the bill for giving “the ‘green light’ to teach intolerance, allow harassment, and fail to confront violence against LGBTQ+ youth and their families.”

An editorial in the Washington Post said proponents of the bill “invoke the bogeyman of school systems infringing on ‘parental rights,’ arguing that such conversations should be led by parents and families.”

Kara Swisher, a New York Times opinion writer, said, “Let’s call it what it is, trans- and homophobia.”

Robin Maril at Slate blamed insecure politicians who “rely on religiously based divisive messaging because it works. The theology of autocracy, meanwhile, uses the mantel of the church to promote nationalistic conformity while also channeling fear and anger toward communities that can’t or won’t conform.”

This is the kind of hysteria we have come to expect from left-wing sources.

There is nothing “hateful” about the bill. It does not “shame” queers or “punish” teachers. Nor are LGBT parents and children in any way “attacked” by the legislation. The curriculum does not teach intolerance, never mind “fail to confront violence” against anyone. Nor is there anything “phobic” about the bill. And it certainly has nothing to do with promoting the “theology of autocracy,” whatever that is.

Best of all is the Washington Post’s mention of “parental rights.” News Flash: There is nothing so-called about the rights of parents—they exist—and there is nothing debatable about contemporary assaults on them.

Kudos to Gov. DeSantis. He speaks for Americans way beyond Florida, including most practicing Catholics.

The law recently signed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, the Parental Rights in Education bill, prohibits teachers from instructing kids as young as 5-years-old about sexual orientation and gender identity; it also ensures parental rights. Though it never mentions the word “gay,” it is nonetheless being dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.

There are several issues here.

Why would a teacher want to ask little kids whether they are sexually attracted to those of the opposite sex or the same sex? What’s wrong with these people? Why would a teacher want to lie to little kids about their ability to switch their sex, something which is immutable, God-given and nature-ordained? What’s wrong with these people?

“It’s not like there’s no kernel of truth in that maybe kids that young shouldn’t be thinking about sex at all.” Those are not the words of a prude—those are the words of Bill Maher. Speaking about supporters of the DeSantis bill, he noted that “it’s not like you’re not allowed to literally not say gay, but they just don’t want teachers talking about it. They think it’s the province of parents.”

It’s one thing for the political opponents of the law, including celebrities, to call it the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, quite another when the media do the same. To be sure, the media have every right to quote critics of the bill who characterize the bill this way, but they have no right to officially brand it this way.

We did a Nexis search of the number of media outlets that, in its headline, identified the bill as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill. From March 1 to April 8, we found over 450 such instances.

What’s really wrong with all of these people is not simply that they lie about the bill, but that they really want little kids to be sexually engineered by teachers, preferably behind the back of their parents. They need to be confronted and defeated at every level.

LGBT activists have quite a tag-team going between pollsters and the media. First, the pollsters present a dishonest survey of public support for LGBT curricula in the schools, and then their allies in the media give Americans the impression that most favor such instruction.

Two such polls recently teed it up for the media to distort the truth even further. Both are being used to discredit the Parental Rights in Education bill signed by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis: it disallows classroom instruction of sexual orientation and gender identity for grades kindergarten through the third, and it insists on parental rights.

“A Majority of Parents Are Okay with Teaching on Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation in Schools, a New Poll Finds.” That was the headline of a Yahoo news story about a National Parents Union poll. The headline is deceptive. So is the news story. The headline reads, “Majorities of Parents Support Classroom Instruction about Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation.”

When asked whether classroom instruction about these matters should be allowed in middle school and high school, 31% said it should be allowed but not encouraged, 25% said it should not be allowed, 7% were unsure. When asked if such instruction should be encouraged, just 37% agreed, meaning that the majority were opposed to encouraging such classroom instruction. But one would never know this from reading the story. Keep in mind that the DeSantis bill addresses kindergarten-3rd grade.

When respondents were asked about such classroom instruction in elementary school (the question never mentioned the early grades), only 30% said it should be encouraged. Similar numbers were posted about having students read books about LGBT people.

The results of a Morning Consult poll, taken for an LGBT organization, The Trevor Project, merited a positive story in The Hill, an influential Washington media source. It said the survey showed that a majority of Americans “do not support banning books on LGBTQ+ topics from school libraries or discussions about LGBTQ+ issues from classrooms.”

It should be noted that the DeSantis bill says nothing about classroom discussions—it only addresses classroom instruction. No young student in Florida will be punished for discussing anything.

Also, the DeSantis bill deals exclusively with kindergarten-3rd grade. This poll asks respondents how they feel about LGBT instruction and library books “at school” and “in school libraries.” It is not specific to the early grades.

One of the “Key Findings” cited in the survey is the following: “Most adults, including parents, feel that ages 5 through 11 are the most appropriate ages for students to be learning about LGBTQ topics at school (our italic).”

That is a gross distortion of the truth. In fact, 57% of adults, and 58% of parents, said that the most appropriate age would be 12-18. The authors of the poll came to its conclusion because 38% said the most appropriate age was 5-11. Just because that was the highest number given the age levels that respondents were asked to choose from (0-4, 5-11, 12-14, 15-17, 18), that doesn’t mean that most adults and parents agreed that 5-11 was the most appropriate age. A plurality is not a majority.

A majority, 55%, said parents should have “the ultimate say” about whether their transgender child receives gender-affirming medical care.

The average American has no idea what kinds of things are being taught in LGBT curricula and what kinds of books are being made available to students.

On March 1st, Bill Donohue sent a letter to Donna Orem, president of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), asking her to substantiate a story about the organization that was published by Breitbart, an internet media outlet; copies were sent to members of the board of trustees. She has not replied, thus Donohue went public with his concerns.

NAIS is the national accreditation association for private schools across the country. In his letter he refers to its “queer-inclusive curriculum,” one which constitutes manipulative and highly objectionable fare. Moreover, it does so in secrecy, intentionally shielding parents from its contents. Many Catholic parents who send their children to a private non-sectarian school would be horrified to learn what the curriculum entails, as would non-Catholic parents.

At a NAIS conference in 2020, a staff member explained to teachers in a training session what children will be taught.

“Starting in Pre-K we talk about their bodies, the parts that they were born with, about penises and vaginas and whether they make somebody a boy or a girl. But also their feelings, what do they feel like inside, do they feel like a boy or a girl? What does their head say? Do their heart and their body match up?” Vocabulary lessons include words such as “the vulva and the labia.”

After leading these children to question their status as a boy or a girl, the schools will then proceed to encourage those who are in rebellion against their nature. “Students ready to socially transition may initiate a process to change their name, pronoun, attire, and access to preferred activities and facilities,” the latter meaning locker rooms and bathrooms.

Books that students can access in their library may include Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe. It includes illustrations of boys performing oral sex.

All of this is to be done behind the back of parents. Worse, their children may be expelled from school if parents voice “strong disagreement” with the curriculum. To top things off, teachers are being instructed how to deal with “puritan” parents who object. The condescending attitude is typical of educational elites.

“Puritan Speak” includes phrases such as “That’s my job.” “They’re just not ready.” “They’re too young to know that.” “Won’t they lose their innocence?” “But, what if my child is not ready?” “You’re just trying to put ideas in their heads.” There is nothing “puritan” about these concerns—they are merely expressions of responsible parents.

What these educators are doing to children is child abuse and what they’re doing to parents is parental abuse. This is not sex education: it is sexual engineering, and it is violative of the rights of mothers and fathers.

If there is one good thing that the pandemic yielded, it is the extent to which unsuspecting parents have learned just how morally debased some teachers and administrators have become. The pushback must continue.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams inherited a mess created by his predecessor, Bill de Blasio. Most New Yorkers had high hopes that he would turn things around. Instead, he is off to a bad start.

New York City has the highest unemployment rate of any city in the nation. It is also witnessing a mass exodus of people to other parts of the country—Manhattan leads the nation. This is driven in large part because of the spike in violent crime, made possible because of morally bankrupt D.A.’s and an insane bail reform law. The high cost of living is also making it impossible for many to live here anymore. To top things off, the public schools are a disaster.

And what is Mayor Adams doing? He is spending the taxpayers’ hard-earned money on billboards in Florida to convince non-heterosexuals who live there to come to New York where they can “say and be whoever you want.” As if that is a problem in Florida.

Adams is abusing his office and the trust of the people. He was elected to solve the fiscal crisis in New York City and make our city safe again. Instead, he is inventing problems in other states that he purports to solve. His misuse of public funds is a disgrace.

If he actually thought this through, he would know that one of the reasons why New Yorkers are fleeing in record numbers—in all the five boroughs—is precisely because of the kind of irresponsible leadership that de Blasio offered. He was supposed to fix things, not play games.

Ironically, they are leaving en masse to Florida, a state with low taxes, low crime rates and good schools. And believe it or not, those who live there can actually “say and be whoever they want.”

It was reported on April 1 that President Biden took the opportunity on “Transgender Day of Visibility” to commend the parents of transgender children for “affirming your child’s identity,” saying it is “one of the most powerful things you can do to keep them safe and healthy.”

This was not an April Fool’s joke. No, this is the mindset of the president and an administration that purports to being compassionate, but in reality is promoting child abuse on a massive scale. No need to impute malicious motive—cluelessness will do.

It’s too bad they don’t actually listen to the stories of young people who have undergone this abnormal process.

A recent story in The Telegraph about an English girl who transitioned to a boy, and back again, is heartbreaking. The April 6 article is titled, “I Was Allowed to Transition at 18 Without Question—But I Regretted It.” Here is a synopsis of her travails.

Allie was raised in Lancashire “in a very masculine environment.” Because her mother worked nights, she was cared for by her father. She shared a home with two stepbrothers, who were eight years older than her. Her parents divorced when she was 11. In that same year, she became convinced that she was “meant to be a boy.”

Allie learned through the internet about transgender people and thought this might be the answer to her condition. She decided she was “meant to be born male.” Initially, she found herself sexually attracted to girls, but then realized she was bisexual. At age 12, she suffered from anxiety and depression. She spent the next year fluctuating between feeling “girly” one day, and wanting to “dress like a man,” the next day.

At age 14, Allie was sexually abused by a stranger after “being groomed online.” Four years later she decided she wanted to transition to a boy. “The big narrative being pushed is that transition will be the answer to all your problems,” she said.

This is exactly the position of the Biden administration. It turned out to be tragically wrong.

Allie’s private doctor prescribed testosterone so she could transition. He never once attempted to explore “the possible causes of my gender dysphoria, such as my mental health problems or my difficulties fitting into society (our emphasis).” Thus did she prove to be more astute than her doctor.

Not only that, she was given a “30-minute phone consultation.” In fact, she never had “a face-to-face consultation.” When she was given her prescription, there was “no exploration of my sexual trauma, and no mention of my upbringing and how that could have affected things.” No one told her about possible side effects, “such as heart problems and loss of bone density, or the extent to which it could impact fertility.”

The first year after she transitioned she was “over the moon.” Her body became more muscular and her periods stopped. She felt “a lot more emotionally stable” and was treated well by her friends. This was all good, except that she came to the conclusion that she “was never completely comfortable.” She knew something was wrong, and events proved she was right.

During her first year at the University of Lancaster she experienced “a bad mental health episode.” She attempted suicide and was diagnosed with autism.

When Allie turned 20, she realized that “I really wanted a family—and I had chosen to self-sterilise for no good reason.” She then decided to transition back to being a female [she never really became a male—nature made that impossible], partly because “ever since transitioning, my menstrual cycle has been an absolute mess.” She is now being treated for polycystic ovary syndrome.

Allie was 11 when she learned of her mental health problems, and began to transition when she was 18. This needs to be said if only because she is a lot older than the young people Biden wants to empower. He is encouraging children to “go with the flow,” telling parents they need to be supportive.

At one of the presidential debates in 2020, Biden threw his support behind children as young as 8 and 10 who think they want to transition to the other sex. “The idea that an 8-year-old child or a 10-year-old child decided, you know I want to be transgender. That’s what I’d like to be. It would make my life a lot easier. There should be zero discrimination.”

Note that Biden sees this issue in terms of discrimination, not mental or physical health. This is the kind of robotic response he has been trained to develop.

Of course, chemical castration and body mutilation are the real issues here, not discrimination. Nobody thinks that eight and ten-year olds are being discriminated against because they cannot drink alcohol, drive a car or vote. Responsible adults are committed to the psychological and physiological wellbeing of children—they don’t allow them to be exploited by irresponsible adults.

At some point in the future, historians will look back at this period in history and wonder why so many prominent Americans aided and abetted child abuse. That day can’t come too soon.