The Movement to Make Our Children Innocent Again

When you walk through the Library of Congress in Washington, one inscription reads, “The foundation of every state is the education of its youth,” quoting Diogenes. For the Greeks, Romans, and America’s Founding Fathers, education meant instilling virtue as well as information. Now, education is progressive indoctrination. Education of the youth is still the foundation of a state, so what happens when the moral foundation of education itself begins to shift decisively toward a political extreme?

On Thursday, the House decided in a narrow 214-212 vote to pass Trump’s rescission package to cut taxpayer funding to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds NPR and PBS. These media conglomerates have a decidedly left-wing bias, having supported cultural Marxist themes, drag shows, and blatant relativism. Perhaps PBS is more strongly associated in the minds of some Americans with cultural classics for young people such as “Cat in the Hat,” “Sesame Street,” or “Martha Speaks.” True, PBS did have strong educational content in the early years, but by the turn of this century it took a turn for the woke.

In 2022, PBS was forced to cancel the longest-running animated children’s show in the network’s history, “Arthur,” after backlash over their 2019 episode featuring a homosexual wedding and a 2020 episode discussing George Floyd’s death. Previously, when “Arthur” had tried to promote LGBTQ+ narratives, the episodes were removed under pressure from President George W. Bush’s Department of Education. But since Bush departed office, producers shamelessly have aired leftist propagandized shows. And they’re funded by American taxpayers.

In 2017, Bustle, the online women’s magazine with an audience of over 100 million monthly readers, said unashamedly that, “these progressive children’s shows prove that you don’t need to have an over 18 target audience to create work that challenges assumptions about gender, race, and politics…that’s the beauty of these shows…this is education via stealth.[emphasis added]” They said the quiet part out loud, which gives me the chills, and not in a good way.

In line with this approach, Sesame Street ran an episode called “Family Day” with gay couple Dave and Frank in 2021, and in 2022, Elmo encouraged children to get the COVID shot, as part of PBS’s “The ABCs of the COVID Vaccine” learning initiative. Sesame Street hosted outspoken homosexuals in recent years, such as Ellen DeGeneres and rapper Lil Nas X. Even PBS’s bipartisan literacy initiatives launched during the Reagan administration are now focused on “racial literacy.” PBS’ movie “Real Boy” features a transgender teenager who struggles with sobriety. The perfect viewing for a Friday family movie night! Lest we forget, these programs are aimed at children, who should not be over racialized or sexualized if the goal is to educate, not indoctrinate.

PBS isn’t the only aggravator. NPR’s programming over the past decade is rife with woke propaganda. A report issued by the White House lists their offenses. A 2015 segment featured the “population of anthropomorphic animal enthusiasts known as ‘furries.’” In 2022, NPR ran a story on what “Queer Ducks” can teach youth about sexuality. Later that same year, our great nation had the distinct privilege of learning about the ancient communities of genderqueer dinosaurs and trans-Ceratops.

The NPR Valentine’s Day special in 2024 was on queer animals, because, well, how fitting. We learned about gay anteaters in the Smithsonian Zoo, hermaphroditic banana slugs, and nonbinary deer. But the cherry on top of this Valentine’s Day special is NPR’s final takeaway to have more sex with the people around you:

As a social species, our survival relies on us being able to get along with one another. Same-sex sexual behaviors … is thought to be another way of strengthening these bonds and assuring that we can protect each other, take care of each other and help each other forage. So think about an animal like a bonobo. One of our closest relatives, a primate species—they have so much sex. It’s thought to be like, ‘Hey, instead of fighting over these resources, let’s just have sex with one another, feel good about it and share.’ And that’s really worked out for them.

Feeling edified? Well, hopefully, taxpayers across the political spectrum who value education won’t have to fund programs like this for much longer, as 214 House members concluded Thursday afternoon on the House floor: Federal funds do not belong in the pockets of woke media conglomerates. The education of youth is the foundation of a state, and elected officials are beginning to take that seriously.

Mike Gonzalez is the Angeles T. Arredondo E Pluribus Unum Senior Fellow in the Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy at The Heritage Foundation.

Rebecca Phillips is an intern with The Daily Signal.

Reprinted with Permission from The Daily Signal – By Mike Gonzalez & Rebecca Phillips

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.