'Parents' Rights': GOP Wages Education Culture War Ahead of 2024 - 'Peddling Hysteria & Fear'
- ‘Parents’ rights’: Republicans wage education culture war as 2024 looms,' The Guardian, March 24, 2023. - Ed.
- Republicans hail policies they say will give parents a say in their children’s schooling – but critics say it’s a guise to advance a rightwing education agenda. -
Speaking recently at a theater in Davenport, IA, Donald Trump marveled at the crowd’s reaction when he vowed to “bring back parental rights into our schools”. The line elicited thunderous applause – one of the loudest ovations of his nearly 2-hour address. “Can you imagine what I’m doing? I’m saying, ‘Parents, you have rights’ … & the place goes crazy,” remarked the former president, who is again seeking the GOP nomination. With the 2024 election cycle looming, Republicans are leaning into the education culture wars, championing policies that they say will give parents more of a say in their children’s education, from the subjects they are taught to the books they read, with hopes of appealing to suburban voters who recoiled from the party during the Trump years.
In their telling, Republicans are the defenders of America’s schoolchildren whose education is threatened by a leftwing ideology that promotes activism, racial history & gender fluidity over academic outcomes. But critics & many educators say conservatives are using the term “parents’ rights” as a guise to advance a rightwing education agenda that undermines public schools, whitewashes American history & marginalizes LGBTQ+ students. The debate took center stage in the House this week, where Republicans broke into cheers after narrowly advancing their “Parents Bill of Rights”. Friday’s vote followed a contentious 16-hour committee hearing & a bitter floor debate over the legislation, whose sponsor argued would “bring more transparency & accountability to education” & whose opponents derisively rebranded the “politics over parents act”.
Democrats argued that the bill would only serve to embolden a far-right movement that has pushed book bans, restrictions on the instruction of American history & turned classrooms into “ground zero” for conservative culture wars. “This legislation has nothing to do with parental involvement,” said Hakeem Jeffries, the Dem. House minority leader. “It has everything to do with jamming the extreme Maga Republican ideology down the throats of the children & the parents of the United States of America.” Though the legislation has little chance of advancing in the Democratic-controlled Senate, it will serve as a rallying cry for the GOP on the campaign trail. - ‘A line in the sand:’ The origins of the “parents’ rights” movement, experts say, can be traced back to the 1925 “trial of the century” in which a Tenn. biology teacher was fined for teaching evolution in violation of state law. The term has been invoked repeatedly in the decades since, notably in clashes related to desegregation, the red scare, sex education & homeschooling.
“The idea of parents’ rights is really nothing new in American politics,” said Melissa Deckman who has written extensively about culture war battles in education. The present movement emerged in response to the upheaval sparked by the pandemic, when extended school lockdowns led to a burst of political activism by parents who felt overwhelmed & abandoned, & by the racial justice protests that erupted in the summer of 2020, with the murder of George Floyd. Conservative politicians were quick to seize on any backlash, channeling voter frustration into a sophisticated national campaign aimed at restricting instruction on race & gender.. Democrats believe they can offer a strong contrast. They are promoting an education agenda focused on boosting federal funding for public schools & raising teachers’ pay while expanding pre-K programs & increasing college affordability, plans that face strong Republican resistance. - Read More...https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/24/republicans-parents-rights-education-culture-war
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The think tanks should be a clearinghouse for campaign strategy, etc.
What McAuliffe said about education was correct, he just said it inartfully. Ignorant-ass MAGA parents have no more place making education policy than I do telling my doctor how to practice medicine. Real smooth think tank propaganda from our side--the type the right always has--is what's needed here, and needed fast, because some of the worst of the old right-wing think tanks (Heritage, Claremont) have turned into MAGA think tanks. 
