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Apologies, looking at this in context, I think I probably came off as cranky at you, but I actually think you did a fine job presenting the plaintiff's arguments & broader issues. Your top-level was fine and good. However, I am disappointed with the several subthreads where an expansive reading of the malicious implications and innuendo in the plaintiff's arguments are uncritically credited when they seemed, to me, both so obviously in-credible and, as it happens, trivially-verified to be untrue.
Sure, this statement is true. But for people not super into the anti-LGBT stuff, it's a lot less incendiary! To extremify a bit more, if Little Bobby Tables is being fitted for his harness and pup mask in kindergarten, essentially every parent would throw unlimited support behind whoever promises to make that stop. But if he's told that there are guys like his dad, except instead of having a wife, they have a husband, and some of his classmates might have two dads... yeah, some of regulars here think that's a justification for unlimited violence against civilization, but a large majority of the country disagrees.
Parts of the thread are fine (or at least aren't doing the thing I'm complaining about). Agreed.
Were I somehow put in charge of designing Pride Puppy's word search, I certainly would have avoided including 'leather' to try and prevent this sort of "Re: Re: Re: Re: FWD: Re: Biden forces schools to let furry kids use kitty litter!" urban legend from circulating on X. But at the same time, if I had to name 300 distinct objects / attributes in that story, yeah, 'leather' and 'underwear' probably make the list—there's really not that many things to choose.
Given the context, which really is about as anodyne and wholesome as possible, this sort of free-association guilt-by-implication argument is the same school of media criticism that spent the last twenty years detailing how each and every piece of media was racist, misogynistic, and otherwise problematic, just with different in- and out-groups. "Woke right" is an annoying snarl term, but at the same time, I can't help but think this really is just conservative Anita Sarkeesian.
This seems like the classic equivocation on the word 'sexuality.' A man mentioning his wife is just talking like a perfectly ordinary person, a man mentioning his husband is "making things about sexuality/sex/politics." Obviously Pride is related to 'sexuality' and what people wear to Pride is an expression of 'sexuality' but this meaning of the word has not all that much do with sex, per se, (though some stuff at Pride definitely is and of course no minimally-qualified parent is taking his child to Folsom) and is no more child inappropriate than a teacher wearing her engagement ring. Nor a man wearing a suit, even though that's a huge fetish. Or a teacher appearing pregnant in front of her students, even though it's very literally the fruits of her sex life.
The taboo around keeping kids and 'sex' separate serves a vital social role of establishing easily-adjudicated bright-lines to protect them from pedophiles. This is right and good. But teaching kids that Pride is a fun social event (while certainly a sort of political propaganda) doesn't transgress it except in the minds of folks who throw sex acts and the existence of LGBT people in the same mental bucket. The average 90's Animaniacs or 2010's Adventure Time episode had far more sexual content and real, intended innuendo than the examples on display. It was just (mostly) straight.
The broader complaint that this is indoctrinating kids into LGBT acceptance is... basically true! But like, when people like the indoctrination, they just call it 'socialization' (or "Niceness and Civilization," as the case may be) and pretending gay people don't exist, aren't a normal part of society, or are inherently 'adult content' that's not a normal part of kid-friendly public life is, from my vantage, a far less neutral option than teaching kids what most of society broadly accepts. Again, if folks want to debate that, I do think it's fair game. But the groomer narrative is, broadly speaking, transparent malicious lies, and we should aspire for better discourse.
As many on this forum would agree: inculcating western values and defending western culture against folks from other cultures is essential for the continuation of western civilization. The disagreement is about what those values are.
Charitably, the groomer accusation is downstream of the idea that programs such are are choosing to make kids more gay, because that is their preference. Literal pedophile accusations are real, and some people below defend it, but is less common. (Most common is mean shitposting.)
I don't have a rigorous understanding of how people relate to sexuality and what the consequences of exposure are at age 4 versus 9. That might make me unqualified to argue about it here, but it doesn't make me, or the average parent, unqualified to say "Hey, wait a second, 'lace' and 'underwear' have sexual associations I'm aware of in this context. Why is that here?" Associations that a pregnant woman does not. Lace in a wedding book word search hits different.
And I think this is a major disagreement. Pride is many things. Pride is civil rites. Pride is trans, and pride is transgressive. Pride is family friendly. Pride is debauchery, nudity, and a chance to get laid. Pride is identity. Even with the continued whitewash, to the distaste of some gays, Pride can be reasonably understood to be lots of things that 4th of July celebrations and Macy's Thanksgiving parade are not understood as.
I wouldn't ask schools to pretend gay people don't exist, but the memeplex that advocates for celebration is fuel and also not very normal. Milder forms of indoctrination look a lot like the golden rule. A page in a book that mentions a man has a husband, that's normalizing something. Instead, Montgomery County said, 'damn the torpedoes!'
The children's book industry needs to churn out an fleet of content the in class curriculum to replace other curriculum. Identity, orientation, inclusivity is too important. Mandate a book a year? Nay, a dozen books. They each should be read 1 time-- 3 times, no, 5 times a year. A single child that leaves Pre-K without an understanding of pride parades, drag queens, and how lace and leather fit might be associated is an unacceptable outcome. The culture war of it all.
I have most of a post written that is one half an unlimited amount of questions on the present state of trans medicine/research with the other half a fantasy counter-factual for what a more mild culture war could have looked. I already push enough belongs on my non-existent blog. But, they can't normalize stuff like this. They need to man the wheel of the zeitgeist. They need to crush opposition and old-fashioned bigotry along with it. Hopefully it's part of a normalization process.
Anyway you should post more often.
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Pride is a motte and bailey of events that was originally specifically to transgress. It is completely disingenuous to act like throwing Pride and sex acts together is some absurdity; that's what pride was for its first 40+ years, and that's still what it is in many areas.
Surely, surely some fraction of the LGBT community can act like normal gosh-darn people and admit that a line can be drawn between And Tango Makes Three or whatever the equivalent with human characters is versus Pride Puppy or Grandpa's Pride (Noticing a theme here). AND YET! This absurd books that are practically beyond parody keep getting pulled up in schools.
Gay people are normal, yeah. While it's been toned down since Raytheon started sponsoring, a significant fraction of Pride is not.
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See, the thing is, I'd be more convinced about "it's just a few crazy kids on campus" - sorry, I meant "it's just a book about being nice and having fun!", "it's just teaching tolerance and civility!", "it's just treating people the way they want to be treated" were it not that every. single. time. it's been - what was that phrase again? oh yeah - "motte and bailey".
"We're only teaching kids that some kids have two moms or two dads, what is wrong with that?" is the fig leaf for "and trans. that they might be trans. and they can trust us. we'll help them out and keep it secret from their parents. because their parents are bigots and would be mean to them. but we'll keep it a big secret just between the two of us, yeah?"
Now we're getting "it's just a woman wearing a leather jacket, what is so strange about that?" in the context of a Pride parade. Yeah, what is so particular about leather at a gay parade that could ruffle some feathers?
I have always hated the notion of dog whistles because I think a lot of the time it's motivated reasoning and people getting het-up over nothing. But damn it, sometimes a "lesbian wearing leather" is a leather dyke. Unless we are to assume the author of Pride Puppy is an innocent pure soul who thinks Pride parades/Pride Day/Pride Month are only about rainbow flags and everyone parading, with no deeper knowledge of the LGBT culture and its history, I don't see how things like that can be anything but deliberate. And it turns out Ms. Stephenson is an activist of sorts herself, so yeah I think it's deliberate. No matter what the illustrator says (so the leather jacket had to be studded? and a motorbike type jacket? because that's what women wear to the grocery store as a matter of course? with nothing underneath except a rainbow bra? and a choker?)
Okay sure, maybe, I imagine some women wear that kind. But looking online the closest I can find to the jacket in the illustration is "bomber" or "moto" jackets, and none of these have spikes on the shoulders. But then again, I've never worn a leather jacket in my life, so what do I know about fashion?
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