The attack on public education is nothing new (it has happened under both Democratic and Republican administrations), but it’s reached a fever pitch in the past couple of years. That’s what the culture wars are about, and it’s all part of a playbook:
“In a recent lecture at ultra-conservative Hillsdale College, culture war orchestrator Christopher Rufo detailed the strategy for replacing public education with a universal voucher system. ‘To get to universal school choice, you really need to operate from a premise of universal public school distrust,’ Rufo explained. Earlier in that same lecture, describing how to lay siege to institutions, he noted the necessity to create your own narrative and frame and advised his audience they ‘have to be ruthless and brutal.’
Rufo and other dark money-funded extremists follow a consistent playbook for attacking public schools.
First, they concoct lies, smears and distortions that stoke fear and anger, such as that eight-year-old white students are being taught to hate themselves because they are responsible for slavery, and that kindergarten teachers are grooming five-year-olds.
Next, these falsehoods are spread on social media and by Fox News and the click-driven, controversy-obsessed mainstream media.
Finally, extremist state politicians champion cookie-cutter bills provided by those same national voucher backers to ‘solve’ the manufactured ‘outrage,’ often under the banner of ‘parents’ rights.’”
Please click through to the TIME Magazine article, below:
Extremists Are Using Lies to Undermine America’s Public Schools: We Need to Take a Stand