Senate
Bill 48—the Fair, Accountable, Inclusive and Respectful Education
Act (FAIR Act)—is making its way through legislation, and the
Traditional Values Coalition is doing everything in its power to
strike down the bill.
The
FAIR Act, written by self-admitted homosexual state
Sen. Mark Leno of San Francisco, will force all California schools to
use textbooks and instructional materials that include homosexual,
bisexual and transgender teachings. Despite its name, the Traditional
Values Coalition says there is nothing fair, accountable, inclusive
or respectful about it.
“The
state of California is on the verge of financial collapse,”
Benjamin Lopez, legislative advocate for Traditional Values
Coalition, told Charisma
News.
“The last thing we need is to make an unnecessary expenditure to
promote the gay lifestyle in California’s schools.”
If
the bill passes, homosexuals, bisexuals and transgenders must be
included in textbooks and instructional materials in a manner that
does not “reflect adversely” upon them, according to the
Traditional Values Coalition. This means that textbooks
and materials—for students in kindergarten through 12th grade—must
present lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, groups and
lifestyles in a positive
manner. Nothing negative or perceived to be negative about them can
be presented.
According
to Lopez, the bill also classifies the gay lifestyle as a civil right
and gives it minority status, which the Supreme Court has ruled
against in the past. This means that if a family with a mother and
father is mentioned, the textbook will also have to discuss a family
with a set of homosexual parents. In addition, when referencing the
civil rights movement led by Martin Luther King Jr. in the 1960s or
the discrimination against Asian people in America after World War
II, the textbook will also need to mention the gay rights movement.
Lopez
explains that it is important the bill doesn’t pass because
California is the No. 1 supplier of textbooks in the nation. “If
the other 49 states do not want pro-gay textbooks in their classroom,
then they’ve got to help us stop SB 48 here in California,” he
urges.
Senate
Bill 48 passed the California State Senate on April 14, and is set to
go through committee hearings and a final vote in the State Assembly. There will be a hearing before the Assembly Education Committee on June 22 at 1:30 p.m. If the bill passes, it wil go on to the State Assembly at a later date. Visit the Traditional Values Coalition
website for information regarding the bill.
“The
victory and the nail in the coffin for the gay agenda” would be if
there was a “ a groundswell across the country demanding textbook
companies say no to gay teachings in textbooks,” Lopez explains.
Lopez
and the Traditional Values Coalition urge everyone to help stop the
law from passing before it gets voted on at the State Assembly. “If
they’re California residents, we want them to absolutely bombard
the state assembly with phone calls, letters, emails and faxes,
demanding that legislators reject SB 48,” Lopez pleads.
“For
people across the country—for everyone outside of California
looking in—they’ve got to think, ‘As California goes, so goes the
nation.’ We need people outside of California to write their local
legislators saying, ‘Don’t even consider doing what they’re doing
in California.’
“My
very stern plea is for people … to take action. [Lawmakers are]
messing with the minds and the innocence of children for their own
twisted benefit. If that doesn’t bug you, I don’t know what
will,” Lopez says.
“The
time to say no is now. Abraham Lincoln’s words are prophetic to say
that ‘the philosophy of the classroom in one generation will be the
philosophy of government in the next generation.’”
