A microcosm of Christian Dominionism

[NullTuples]

"...voiced concerns to district leadership about adjustment counselor Hector Santos and current eighth-grade guidance counselor Delinda Dykes, noting that the two routinely misgendered and deadnamed transgender students and staff, invoked anti-LGBTQ prayer at school, allowed religion to overflow into conversations with students and staff, and failed to provide support to students who were facing gender-based bullying or intimidation at school. Santos also posted religiously worded anti-LGBTQ material on a public Facebook page.

This year, when Santos’s daughter Tania Cabrera was brought on to serve as the seventh-grade guidance counselor, staff and students told The Graphic she also misgendered trans kids, told staff that a trans student had reverted to using their legal name when they had not, did not report on an anti-LGBTQ harassment incident that was reported to her, and told a trans male student who went to her for support that she sympathized with his parents, who had “lost their daughter.” The Graphic reached out to Dykes, Santos, and Cabrera with every allegation and allowed them the right to reply; in three almost identical statements sent by email, they refuted all claims made in this report.

[...]

But Guevara also confirmed by email that district policy requires staff to file complaints against other staff with Assistant Superintendent of Diversity, Equity, and Human Resources Doreen Cunningham. “All student matters come to Faye [Brady] and me, and complaints about adults go to Doreen [Cunningham],” she wrote. Cunningham has personal ties to the three counselors. In addition to Santos being slated to officiate at Cunningham’s wedding in July, Santos referred to Dykes and her husband as his “siblings in faith” in a previously public Facebook post, which included pictures of him, Dykes, and Cunningham at a party.

Fearing retaliation if they filed a complaint against the counselors with Cunningham, multiple staff members say they dropped their complaints and took to trying to create alternative forms of support to safeguard kids. Meanwhile, Dykes was named interim principal by the superintendent in November 2022, when Diego Sharon took a leave to attend to family matters. And she and Santos were granted professional educator status in under two years, a tenure-like designation that is normally awarded only after three years of positive professional evaluations."

(continues at link)
http://thegraphic.arps.org/2023/05/its-life-or-death-failure-to-protect-trans-kids-at-arms-a-systemic-problem/

This is yet another canary in the coal mine moment.

Twenty years ago, I availed myself of the opportunity to read Christian Dominionist newsletters that my employers distributed to their "ministry". There was also significant overlap, as half the workforce had been recruited via the local Southern Baptist congregation. They organized, packaged, labeled and shipped recruitment media including Dominionist newspapers from a store room adjacent to the marketing department's printing room. I wanted to see who and what they really were so I made a habit of randomly grabbing an issue and reading it at lunch.

The situation described in the news story above is exactly what their long term goals looked like: "embedding" their followers in positions of authority throughout every level of society in order to force everyone to live as conservative Christians. Nepotism of course, is used by them as a tool. Honesty is irrelevant in the face of their larger goals, as is harm to others. And anything can be and is justified by claiming it is done in service to their god. They've taken over schools, law enforcement, health care to a large degree, and all three branches of government in half the states, plus wide swaths of federal positions - including significant portions of the judiciary. They will cheat, lie and steal to accomplish their goal of forcing American to be a "Christian Nation". Each time they've been in power over the last few decades, they've ratcheted the balance to the authoritarian, fascist right in small steps that don't seem to be clawed back before they're in power again.

Frankly, I'm terrified. They have a significant number of states where it is simply no longer possible for Democrats to regain control regardless of "getting out the vote" - and this in turn affects Congress, too. They've placed zealots in lifetime appointments throughout our legal system. They own law enforcement. They've taken control of health care via ownership and lawmaking to deny life-saving care and to deny body autonomy to half the population. I'm sure the list goes on, but I'm done typing.

[live love laugh]

1. "... it is simply no longer possible for Democrats to regain control regardless of "getting out the

vote…”

This should go before the Supreme Court, it is unconstitutional. How can votes be cast and never have a chance of affecting the outcome?

[NullTuples]

7. The Roberts Court has already stated that elections are outside their purview.

At least, how states run their elections. When it comes to federal laws that protect elections, well...

"Selective originalism and selective textualism: How the Roberts court decimated the Voting Rights Act"
https://www.scotusblog.com/2021/07/selective-originalism-and-selective-textualism-how-the-roberts-court-decimated-the-voting-rights-act/

[jmbar2]

2. I ran into this in education in 2012

I was in Texas, working at a community college when a mysterious new staff member was added, with no apparent credentials to be there. He started holding prayers to open meetings, and focused on certain people to eliminate by monitoring their every move, as well as computer usage.

Turns out he was a minister without a church, and ran a Christian job placement company. He arranged terminations for several people - nonbelievers, LGBTQ, etc. and replaced them with his hand-picked people. I was one of those targeted after I complained about the prayers.

This was the time when Rick Perry was holding Dominionist rallies and supposedly the "Chosen" one to usher in the new Seven Mountains strategy.

I filed an EEOC complaint - went nowhere. Now, 10+ years late, the guy is head of the Department. With a fake Ph.D. I was one year from vesting in the Teacher's Retirement system, and lost that.

Have paid a high price for that.

[NullTuples]

8. The amount of power they've gathered over individual lives is frightening.

[MutantAndProud]

3. Hard to even describe

My targeting, some of which I recently uncovered was active. My entire life was and basically is still upended until I can leave

[LastDemocratInSC]

4. The Dominionist's Prayer

Be ye all the same,
Be ye one like another,
Be ye all like ME!

[MutantAndProud]

6. Borg prayer

Charming

[Initech]

9. They'll do anything to "protect kids".

Unless you're LGBT and especially trans. Or you have independent thoughts not manufactured by Rupert Murdoch. Then they don't give a shit about you.

[NullTuples]

10. Except protect them from bullets, bigots & fascism.