19 Comments
Oct 6, 2023Liked by K. Parker

Kate, not only do you offer a great sum-up of the news each week, but your interspersed comments are 💯💯💯 top of the line. This time around, I loved, just as one of many excellent observations, “The only way preschoolers will believe unicorn kitties are real is if the adults around them all present these tales as fact, not fiction…but that’s a person problem, not a book problem.” And, BTW, on the subject of books, here’s a terrific one for kids, complete with lesson plans: https://www.transgendertrend.com/product/my-body-is-me/

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Problem is, that kitty book is clearly written to be presented as an allegory for fact. It's designed to teach Queer Theory doctrine, just like VeggieTales is designed to teach Christian doctrine. I don't think public school teachers should be teaching ANY doctrine.

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I’m not familiar with that particular book, but you do make a very good point: some books are irredeemable, no matter how good the teaching is that surrounds them. I think one thing that may sometimes get forgotten (not by Kate, as she is a librarian and well-versed in this) is that school libraries do have to select among available books, so thoughtful guidelines for use in selecting among books could be helpful here.

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I don't think it's irredeemable. It could be a great starting point for analyzing and criticizing Queer Theory doctrine. I can see it as a start to some fantastic conversations. But frankly I'm not really comfortable with public school teachers doing that either. I would prefer that public school teachers stay out of doctrine debates, at least at the elementary school level. Leave doctrine discussions with young children to the parents.

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I see what you mean, and this makes good sense, as do your points in another comment on how to evaluate books for inclusion in school libraries, and at what grade level. There is a lot to think about here, for sure.

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Oct 6, 2023Liked by K. Parker

I laughed at your comment on Dr. Erica Anderson…I think we can loan her to the Canadians occasionally! She knows how to switch her keyboard to Canadian spelling when she’s writing the expert witness testimonies.

Oh canada!

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As a retired pediatrician, I have to disagree with what I think is Lisa's position on banning books for prepubertal children. There are some books clearly written to influence the worldview of young children, whose values and lives really should be protected by their parents. In adolescence, one needs real wisdom. There are so many books about which I have limited insights which appear to desire to convert these easily confused kids. This is a tough area for a platform like Substack and its subscribers who clearly embrace free flowing discussion.

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If public schools are going to teach doctrine, I would prefer it be in high school in a comparitive religions class. I do not support VeggieTales in a public elementary school classroom. There's nothing inherently wrong with VeggieTales, but it is intended to teach doctrine to young children. As such,bit has no place in a public school classroom.

Most of these "book bans" are also about removing books that teach doctrine. That cute book about crayons is teaching doctrine. So is the cute book with the uni-kitty. If you're not familiar with the doctrine, it's easy to miss. If you ARE familiar with the doctrine, it's glaringly obvious in both text and images.

Core doctrinal ideas of Queer Theory are as follows:

1. Whatever you believe yourself to be is TRUTH.

2. Failure to affirm a self-assessment is the greatest sin, and such behavior is the source of all suffering in the world. Objective reality is oppression and anyone who expresses objective reality is evil.

3. All good people have a moral obligation to affirm any and all self-assessments. Moreover, all good people have a duty to stop the sin of oppression.

4. Those who transcend the gender binary are superior and will bring humanity to the next level of evolution. (Read Martine Rothblatt for details.)

5. Escaping sin is the greatest and truest manifestation of love.

Now look at that cute kitty book again. Cross reference it against Queer Theory doctrine. It's a religious book, just like VeggieTales or a children's picture Bible. As such, it shouldn't be in a public school classroom.

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Just one suggestion; it's easier to think clearly about these matters if one uses the term "trans identified male" instead of transwoman. They aren't any kind of woman, and, at least for me, calling them transwomen always gives me a split second of confusion before my brain processes the term properly.

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Great summary of the week...thanks Katie Parker!

Idk what’s up with book bans.

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I think the bans are part of a growing backlash--parents are feeling threatened and a little paranoid and are overreacting.

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I’m just thinking of reading VC Andrew’s Flowers in the Attic when I was a kid and that book was everywhere. I also got my hands on Jackie Collins when I was …10. Anyway I’m usually glad when my kids are reading. I don’t want them reading Genderqueer but I think if they do (they probably have)! they will survive. That book grossed me out and I only saw a few pages. Book banning is the best way to get teens reading.

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I've resorted to writing messages in children's books from Little Free Libraries and returning them where children and parents can feel inspired to play pretend all you want, but we are born in our correct and healthy body. Then came the brainstorm of writing in the free advertising magazines, such as the Park Slope Courier, and returning them to the kiosk or a bench out in public. These quote articles, such as recent Danish report (based on statistically significant subject numbers and a span of 20 years) telling us that men who take estrogen are 95% times more likely to have heart disease or strokes and women who take testosterone have a 63% higher likelihood of developing same. This was compared to same sex control groups; the researchers also did opposite sex control groups. It just is not healthy to take exogenous hormones. Here's my Magazine Graffiti at Rockefeller Center Plaza: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/CtOcQ-Jk-8E

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Kate, Dragonmama, Coastal and all others commenting: particularly after reading the interesting comments here—and also going back to watch the YouTube Kate posted on the kitty-corn book, I am even more interested than I already was in reading the article Kate is working on about this. My initial reaction to the kitty-corn book is to agree with Dragonmama that it is a vehicle for indoctrinating children in gender identity precepts, though I can also see Kate’s point that how problematic the book is in fact might depend on how it is taught.

All of this reminded me of the movie “Inherit the Wind,” which dramatized the trial of high school teacher John Scopes for teaching evolution. While library books per se weren’t involved in that, textbooks certainly were. In searching this out, I found an article on JStor, “Effects of the Scopes Trial,” that examines science textbooks down through the years. Here’s what the authors concluded, and I think it has bearing on today’s conflicts over library books:

“Readers may choose their own villain in the story we have told. Like us, some will find the greatest culpability in the scientific community itself, for the large-scale failure to pay attention to the teaching of science in the high schools. Others will blame the textbook authors and publishers for pursuing sales rather than quality. Some will attach blame to the politicians who exploited antievolution sentiment to get into, or remain, in office. Others will blame the conservative Protestant clergy. Some may blame the whole educational system for failing to teach Americans how to evaluate evidence. And many will blame the evolutionists for bringing the matter up in the first place. But whatever the lesson one wishes to draw from the history of biology textbooks since the Scopes trial we think the story itself is worth knowing. That the textbooks could have downgraded their treatment of evolution with almost nobody noticing is the greatest tragedy of all.”

Author(s): Judith V. Grabiner and Peter D. Miller

Source: Science , Sep. 6, 1974, New Series, Vol. 185, No. 4154 (Sep. 6, 1974), pp. 832-837

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/1738991.pdf?refreqid=fastly-default%3A8a08245ee5e20c7f8bedd7a75aded85a&ab_segments=&origin=&initiator=&acceptTC=1

Any thoughts?

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BAN BANNING BOOKS!

Without freedom of speech and expression, there is nothing but a 'boot stamping on your face forever', total tyranny and slavery! Free speech must be protected and preserved at all costs!

www.citizensforfreespeech.org

www.thefire.org

And furthermore, the whole 'trans' and 'Diversity/Equity/Inclusion' as perpetrated today, is indeed really very nefarious, a scheme by upper crust technocrats with an anti-life/anti-human agenda to transform the impressionable next generation into sexless, genderless, weak, sickly compliant robotized slaves of their technocratic overlords.

THEY can't get rid of the 'useless eaters' fast enough! Mistakes were not made, it was always malice aforethought!

Creative performing arts and writing/fine arts are the best part of being human and the thing the globalist predator technocrat megalomaniac total slavery control freaks most want to destroy.

Too many 'sheeple' are brainwashed to blindly obey authority figures on the media or in daily life in corrupt system ruled by control freak psychopaths who use propaganda lies to enslave their subjects and they are dumbed down to be obedient by 'education' institutions. Fortunately I was raised to question everything. This transcends party lines. We need a system that punishes psychopaths and rewards compassion and sharing, we need a system that actually follows The Constitution in reality.

I DO NOT COMPLY! NEVER HAVE, NEVER WILL!

There is no noxious crime that the evildoers desiring to lord it over us won't commit to maintain their stranglehold on power. A groundswell critical mass resistance to their murderous enslavement plans is needed urgently!

There is a fate worse than death - I would rather die than be a robotized slave of technocratic overlords! This is my hill to die on!

I have a landline and a wired laptop and a wired monitor screen, all the tech anyone should ever want or need. I never had and refuse to ever have one of those infernal mobile devices that are designed to enslave you.

My loathing of AI and all things NANO and digital knows no bounds!

Kudos to BROADview's heroic efforts and success in the struggle. We the People must always be aware of the existential threats lurking behind this fight!

How I stick my thumb in the eyes of the grotesque billionaire bastards pushing their enslavement agenda and how I embrace being fully human.

Fighting the globalist predator technocrat psychopath megalomaniac TOTAL SLAVERY AGENDA one performance at a time!

Amazing Amy: Eccentric Yoga Entertainer!

As an entertainer, I have been devastated and practically destroyed by the closure of all performance venues and then when they reopened, because MY BODY, MY CHOICE - being made a total untermenschen pariah outcast in NAZI NIGHTMARE LAWLESS 'SHOW ME YOUR PAPERS' JAB CROW APARTHEID/DISCRIMINATION/SEGREGATION HELL NYC WHERE THE MAD/DRUNK WITH POWER TYRANT POLS DOUBLE DOWN ON THEIR ILLEGAL MANDATES. I am trapped here with zero financial resources to leave or do anything else about this 'wish I were dead' endless misery life has become. The tragic irony is that my SPREAD THE YOGA LOVE performances are all about health, miraculously overcoming age (68) and injury to achieve feats of flexibility few can attain at any age. So BIG PHARMA who wants to addict every person on the planet to their toxic products hate people like me who prove that we do not need them if we eat healthy organic food and exercise daily!

https://www.reverbnation.com/artist/amazingamycontortionistuniqueyogadancer

I try and live and embody the creative performing artistic world and life I so fervently want existence to be about.

They can stick their f*cking damned NANO, Digital IDs, AI, jabs and chips up their asses where the sun don't shine!

All manner of lies and propaganda spew forth from the upper echelons in governments worldwide who are completely intertwined with the global criminal ruling class that wants to commit the worst atrocities imaginable and suffer no consequences. And their corruption slithers down the chain of command creating petty tyrants everywhere.

Supporting this excellent post with a statement and useful links. https://virustruth.net

We the People are facing HORRIFYING TECHNOCRATIC PSYCHOPATHY TO DESTROY HUMANITY AND ALL NATURAL LIFE!

It was NEVER about health! The Powers That Should Not Be were ALWAYS about they want you DEAD or a SLAVE! This is a painful truth to accept but we the people must wake up and fight back!

We must never lose sight of the larger picture of the vile malignance we are fighting against.

CLIMATE CHANGE IS AN EVEN WORSE FRAUD THAN THE PLANSCAMDEMIC! SO-CALLED GREEN TECH IS A GIGANTIC SCAM! MINING AND MANUFACTURING 'GREEN' PRODUCTS NEEDS COAL, GAS AND OIL AND MINING RARE MINERALS IS MORE ENVIRONMENTALLY TOXIC AND DESTRUCTIVE THAN LEGACY PRODUCTS. SCREW YOUR DAMNED AGENDA!

There is an insidious global ruling class plot to enslave all life on earth behind all the madness and suffering inflicted on We the People.

How to fight back against this TOTAL SLAVERY!

RESIST! DO NOT COMPLY! DITCH THE DAMNED 'SMART' PHONES AND THE DAMNED QR CODES AND GO BACK TO LANDLINES OR FLIP PHONES AND USE CASH AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE! INSIST ON CASH! CBDC IS TOTAL SLAVERY!

Other than getting rid of nuclear weapons which I support 100% the rest of the anti-nuclear peace movement and CLIMATE CRISIS propaganda is parroting UN utter GARBAGE, a complete surrender to the ENSLAVEMENT AGENDA by the diabolical despots of Davos - ruling class criminals who lust for total power and control and all of whom should be tried and jailed for life and their malign organizations dismantled: the UN, the WEF, the IMF, the WHO, the BIS, NATO, Blackrock, Vanguard, The Rockefellers, the Rothschilds, The Bilderbergers, the CFR et al.

There is an evil predator globalist technocratic elite agenda of eugenics/depopulation/genocide using bioweapon poison jabs, war, geoengineering, EMF radiation, starvation and economic collapse - THE GREAT RESET/AGENDA 2030/4TH INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION to get rid of billions of 'useless eaters' and to use nano tech to turn the survivors into ROBOTIZED COMPLIANT SLAVES! WAKE UP AND RESIST! DO NOT COMPLY! These are psychopath megalomaniacs who want to play god by turning all life into digitized metaverse mechanistic synthetic biology to be manipulated by their AI algorithms. A more demonic sickening idea is nearly impossible to imagine!

APPALLED AND HORRIFIED AT INSANE TYRANNICAL PROTOCOLS THAT HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH HEALTH AND EVERYTHING TO DO WITH TOTALITARIAN CONTROL! REVERSE THIS NOW!

MAKE THE WORLD AND AMERICA 2019 (comparatively speaking), AND FREE AGAIN!

NO, I AM NOT AFRAID OF THE MORONIC SCARIANT SHMARIANT MONKEYSHINES! WAKE UP ALREADY!

TOTALLY CONDEMN BIDEN AND ALL OTHER POLS WHO HAVE NO POWER TO LAWLESSLY ACT LIKE AN EMPEROR OR DICTATOR AND DECREE JAB CROW 'SHOW ME YOUR PAPERS' FASCIST SEGREGATION/DISCRIMINATION/APARTHEID VIOLATIONS OF THE CONSTITUTION, THE NUREMBERG CODES AND EVERY CIVIL RIGHT IMAGINABLE.

NO GREEN NEW DEALS OR BUILD BACK BETTER FROM THE CRIMINAL TECHNOCRAT TYRANTS KLAUS SCHWAB AND HIS CRONIES FROM THE WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM.

STOP THE TERRIBLE TYRANNY OF THE TECHNOCRATS GLOBAL AGENDA OF TOTAL SURVEILLANCE AND CONTROL USING THE VIRUS AS EXCUSE AND PROPAGANDA TOOL!

NO MUZZLING STIFLING MASK MANDATES! NO FORCED VACCINES! END TORTUROUS DEVASTATING LOCK DOWNS NOW! I WANT MY LIFE BACK.

https://wrenchinthegears.com

https://www.stopworldcontrol.com/

https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com

https://pandemicfacts.info

https://wearehumanwearefree.org/7-days-campaign/

https://sonsoflibertymedia.com/covid-19-roadmap-12-step-plan-to-create-a-totalitarian-new-world-order-were-on-number-8-headed-towards-number-9/

https://questioningcovid.com

https://www.corbettreport.com/interview-1581-james-corbett-breaks-down-the-great-reset/

http://www.stopcp.com/GlobalResetPSYOP/GlobalResetPSYOPMindMap.html

https://everydayconcerned.net/2020/09/04/breaking-major-investigative-report-by-association-of-french-reserve-army-officers-finds-covid-19-pandemic-to-have-a-hidden-agenda-for-global-totalitarianism-nanotech-chipping-of-all-5g-irradia/

Pam Popper: https://makeamericansfreeagain.com

Del Bigtree: https://www.brighteon.com/channels/highwire

https://www.technocracy.news

Naomi Wolf: https://dailyclout.io

www.nojabforme.info

https://www.globalresearch.ca/we-must-awaken-from-corona-coma-reject-great-reset-robotic-technocracy-assert-common-humanity/5745213

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As an entertainer for decades, believe me, 'Hellywood' is the last place on earth that would WANT someone my age, eccentricity and anti-gov't/corporate attitudes.

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Are you located anywhere near NYC?

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I do local live performances in the Tri-State NY Metropolitan area in front of cheering, clapping crowds when I can get shows to WANT me which is excruciatingly hard because of ageism. I DESPISE ANYTHING ONLINE! IT IS NOT REAL AND GARBAGE! I will do video/film shoots if they respect my skills and pay OK, because the crew is an audience so to speak but live shows are the thing and the BEST way to SPREAD THE YOGA LOVE.

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