FIGHTING SEX-ED IN WA
NEWS: CAMPAIGN 2020, US NEWS
Catholics and conservatives rise up
OLYMPIA, Wash. (ChurchMilitant.com) - A grassroots coalition in Washington State is rising up against a state-wide sex-education program legislated by Democrats.
A coalition of the state's Republicans, Catholics and conservative Christians is hoping voters in November will repeal legislation passed in March that mandated "sex-ed" be taught in public schools. Within days of the bill clearing the state legislature, the coalition formed to repeal the measure. By June, the group had gathered 260,000 signatures, successfully calling for a referendum on the November ballot. The signatures represented twice the number required by the state.
Mindie Wirth, a one-time Republican state Senate candidate, headed up the coalition. She explained the group's success.
"It feels like we're just not being listened to, and I think this is a very large part of what this represents," said Wirth, whose 2016 campaign for a state Senate seat failed.
It is reported that Catholic parishes across the state assisted in the effort to repeal the law, providing petition-signing locations since traditional signature-gathering methods had to be abandoned owing to the Wuhan virus.
Writing for My Faith Votes, Caleb Backholm detailed some of the key problems with the state's sex-education mandate:
- Communities will not be allowed to choose curricula exclusively promoting abstinence before marriage
- "Protected classes," i.e., LGBT proponents, must be recognized in the instruction. It is not clear what "recognition" would entail
- Curricula must begin at kindergarten and continue for 13 years
- "Guest speakers" will be invited to address students on specific topics, opening the door for radical sexual views to be shared
- Curricula choices must be "science" and "evidence" based. There are no guidelines about who will decide what or whose "science" will qualify
- School districts or individual schools are not allowed to "opt out" of the program — children will be taught sex education
Mario Villanueva, executive director of the Washington State Catholic Conference, pointed out his concern.
According to Villanueva,
When you get into the issues of how do you say "yes" or how do you say "no," that can easily open the door to that "it's okay. It's okay to say yes and no," and that steps on our teaching that sexual activity is to be reserved for the sacrament of marriage.
Washington State lawmakers are defending the legislation, claiming its purpose is to protect children from abuse, diseases and infection.
The battle, however, is a David-and-Goliath situation. The referendum group seeking to repeal the law is funded by a Republican political action committee that has only $245,000 to run its activities. The sex-ed proponents, funded primarily by Planned Parenthood, however, have $1.1 million at their disposal.
The November referendum in Washington represents the first time that Americans will have the opportunity to vote on sex education. Up to now, decisions about sex education have taken place in state legislatures or in school board meetings.
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