A very upset mother read quotes from a book that her 4th grader picked up from the shelves of his suburban Austin school. In short, the book discusses young boys engaged in, shall we say, sexual acts.
I couldn't understand what she was saying, but the subtitles on the YouTube version of the video work:
Now, there are two different books called "Lawn Boy," one for 4th graders by Gary Paulsen, the other by Johnathan Evison meant for teens (the smutty one). The book the 4th grader got was the Evison book.
Now it seems possible (and dollars to donuts this is what the Leander School District officials will say) that the school meant to order the Paulsen book but got the Evison one anyway.
Possible. I'm not convinced.
Not wishing to be unfair to the educators involved, I did a bit of research. It seems the school district had already gotten into hot water with "inappropriate" books on a student book club reading list last February.
Leftists who pretend that there is no such thing as being "age appropriate" and otherwise appropriately choosy for the reading of school kids—sure, even for high school students—are merely trying to indoctrinate your kids.
Let's get one thing straight. Evison's "Lawn Boy," with its open discussion of sex acts between a pair of underage boys, is not appropriate for (1) elementary school kids, because it's inappropriately sexual, and (2) older kids, because it's inappropriate pedophilic for them.
And for adults? Well, let's just say that such books might be covered by the First Amendment, but I wouldn't want any adult who would read or recommend such a book to kids anywhere near any children.
Yes, radicals, yes: some topics are off-limits. Taboo. And should remain so.
Even if it turns out that the book was ordered by mistake, it was a pretty damn bad mistake, and the fact that the book is touted by many respected book reviewers for older kids speaks volumes about the entire industry.
Does anyone know where I can read up about methods of downloading Internet Archive books and other data in big tarballs? If I wanted to make a backup of everything, and I could afford it, excluding the copyrighted stuff, could I do so? | via startthis.org/?p=1732
An objective fact—a reminder—for my reasonable friends: never in the history of the world has there been a global push to administer an experimental medicine to absolutely everyone in the world, billions of us, at the same time. | via startthis.org/?p=1370
It utterly boggles the mind that so many otherwise reasonable people have been influenced to think this is a good idea.
You have to be willing to trust the welfare of *humanity* not just to the honesty of our brave leaders, not just their decency, not just their competence, but their actual *success* in making a safe vaccine.
Sorry, but...
Deuteronomy 22:5 NASB
"A woman shall not wear man's clothing, nor shall a man put on a woman's clothing; for whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD your God. | via startthis.org/?p=1315
Of course, Christians are not under the law, and they certainly cannot pick and choose which moral rules they wish to respect based on political convenience. | via startthis.org/?p=1321
The Atlantic bemoans an " 'infodemic'—involving the viral spread of misinformation, as well as the mingling of facts with half-truths and falsehoods in a fractured media environment—has compounded the COVID-19 pandemic."