Americans for Truth

Homosexual superintendent defends disgusting play

Whatever happened to “heartland” values? Concerned parents and citizens across the nation are aghast at the news that a teacher in Deerfield High School (north of Chicago) would assign a homosexual activist-authored play, “Angels in America,” with graphic depictions of sodomy, etc., to students in AP English class. District 213 Superintendent George Fornero (gfornero@dist113.org) — who apparently is a homosexual, based on his participation on “gay” websites — defends the use of the play. (AFTAH received information from several sources about Fornero’s postings on a “gay sports” website and another related to the homosexual group Dignity, which purports to serve homosexual “Catholics” but which defies Vatican teachings on homosexuality.)

Laurie Higgins has written before for Americans For Truth, including this review of “Angels in America.” She is a writing instructor at Deerfield High, where she is also a bold and eloquent critic of politically correct nonsense at the school. Below is Higgins’ take on Deerfield’s and Fornero’s folly in defending the use of Tony Kushner’s homo-pornographic and anti-religious play in a senior AP English class — Peter LaBarbera:

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Click HERE to read excerpts of “Angels in America,” which cannot be read over the air but are supposedly OK for teenagers

Click HERE for contact information for Superintendent Fornero (gfornero@dist113.org) and other District 213 officials

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By Laurie Higgins

The administration of District 113 has sent out what they call a “Fact Sheet” regarding the obscene play Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes that is being taught at Deerfield High School. Below is the “fact sheet” with my responses in blue:

Dear ——-,

Here are the facts pertaining to the selection of this play:

Angels in America Facts

• Students studying the play are second semester seniors in Advanced Placement English. (Translation: “We save the most offensive tripe for the most intelligent.”)
• This play has been taught to similar classes in other high schools. (Translation: “Everyone else is doing it, and we’re lemmings and conformists who cannot think for ourselves.”)
• The College Board oversees all Advanced Placement testing; the class syllabus, including all readings was approved through the Board’s audit process. (Translation: “Of all the readings offered through the College Board, we’re including the most offensive.”)
• Parents received information about Angels in America that specifically addressed the mature content and potential for offense. (Translation: “We’re using the inaccurate euphemism ‘mature’ for the more accurate term “obscene.” Reality: The use of obscene language represents the very antithesis of maturity. It is intemperate, puerile language. In addition, the information given parents did not adequately convey exactly how obscene and perverted the material is. Moreover, there are different kinds of maturity that are being deliberately conflated. If by “mature,” one is referring to intellectual maturity, then it is irrelevant. No one objects to this play because the material is intellectually inaccessible. If educators are referring to emotional maturity, meaning that students are emotionally stable enough to discuss emotionally challenging material without being traumatized, then that too is irrelevant in that most people who object to Angels are not concerned about students being too immature to handle it, although some students will likely be deeply troubled by the language, images, and ideas.The concern many have is with moral maturity. Many people recognize that adolescents, including even bright, mature high school seniors, are not yet adults. They are still constructing a moral compass. They are impressionable, malleable, and much more vulnerable to external influences than are adults whose moral compasses are likely fixed and stable. For a teacher to contend that there are any eighteen-year-olds whose moral compass is fully developed and fixed represents an ignorant and hubristic assertion. Activist ideologues recognize this developmental fact and seek to influence the moral development of other people’s children using other people’s money to do it.)
• Parents were asked to make an informed decision about the text their child would read. Two viable choices were presented: Angels in America and Albert Camus’ The Plague. They were also given the option of having their students read both texts. Letter to parents requested that they provide permission for their student to read the selected text(s). (Reality: Many parents have neither the time nor interest in reading the entirety of Angels in America; This teacher is much beloved by students, and teens are rebellious, therefore, even parents who don’t want their children to read Angels may feel the force of social pressure, compelling them to allow their children to read the provocative, controversial text. The school has potentially set parents up for conflicts with their own children.”)
• The Pulitzer Prize-winning play is set in the 1980s at the beginning of the AIDS crisis in this country. It deals with social and political themes around that issue. In addition, the play won Tony and Emmy Awards (Translation: “Be impressed by prizes that are awarded by arrogant, elitist organizations that hold in disdain the traditional values of provincial, philistines regarding sexuality and language.” Reality: This is a common fallacy called “argument from authority” which relies on the word of an expert or authority rather than on evidence.)
• Excerpts taken out of context from the play by NSSA are being used to diminish the work’s social and political themes. (Reality: There is no context that can justify or render acceptable the teaching of the most extreme violations of decency and truth that occur in this play. Put another way, can the administration or school board imagine any text in which the sexual vulgarity, obscenity, profanity or sacrilege is so extreme or offensive that its very presence would render a text unsuitable for teaching, no matter what positive elements may also be present? Or will positive literary elements always trump issues of obscenity, profanity, and sacrilege? Are administrators saying they will never, under any circumstances take into account the nature and extent of obscenity, profanity, and sacrilege?)
• Although there is strong language and obscenity, the teacher raises questions for student discussion that include: How do we respond to the illness of a loved one? What does it mean to abandon that loved one? How do our personal beliefs clash or coincide with our politics? To what extent do we truly know ourselves? To what extent are we blind? What does it mean to be willfully blind? What is the role of forgiveness? (Translation: “We are able, in the midst of this odious miasma of a text, to extract something of value.” Reality: Another text could easily be found that explores these or other important questions, and does so without the features that assault religion, goodness, truth, and beauty, including the virtue of modesty.)
• This gifted teacher was recently named a Teacher of Distinction from Golden Apple. (Translation: “Once again, be impressed by prizes.” Reality: Once again, this represents the fallacy of appealing to authority. In essence the fallacy goes something like this: This teacher made the decision to teach this odious text, and he is a “Teacher of Distinction.” His intelligence or gifts as a teacher, however, do not serve as justifications for the decision to include this text. Really smart people can make really chuckleheaded decisions.)
• According to Lake County State’s Attorney Mike Waller, the reading and discussion of the material is not a violation of the obscenity laws, or any other laws, of the State of Illinois. (Reality: The fact that it may not technically violate obscenity laws does not mean it is not obscene. I guarantee that if I start using Kushner’s language in the writing center where I work, or if students start using it in their classrooms, faculty members and administrators will curtail it due to its obscene nature. And if I or students refuse to cease and desist, we will be disciplined.)
• It is the belief of this district that our teachers and parents, not an outside group such as NSSA [North Shore Student Advocacy], are best equipped to determine whether or not our students should read the text. (Reality: NSSA, some members of which are District 113 taxpayers, former parents or future parent, knows more about the inner workings of DHS than most parents in the community. Furthermore, the administration and faculty members, especially liberal activists, want little to no feedback from parents, unless it’s affirmation of and support for the curricular incarnations of their liberal dogmas. Liberal activists covet absolute autonomy and depend on parental ignorance and cowardice to maintain it.)

“After almost 15 years of school advocacy and reviewing many objectionable books and curricula, I have never seen anything this vulgar and harmful to students.”– Lora Sue Hauser

Click HERE to read some disgusting excerpts from Tony Kushner’s play; WARNING: they are worse than you could imagine

Kudos to my friend and extraordinary pro-family school advocate, Lora Sue Hauser, for exposing this extreme case of educational malpractice, at Deerfield High School north of Chicago. The teachers and administrators responsible for allowing this travesty — which could be “payback” for Lora Sue’s effective advocacy at DHS on behalf of students and parents over the years — should be terminated.

How did we get to the point in America where such disgusting pornographic writing could be justified as a part of a lesson plan for teenage boys and girls in school? Overly “tolerant” liberalism is corrupting our children at a rapid rate, while busy parents barely know what’s going on. Enough is enough: take action today! — Peter LaBarbera

TAKE ACTION: Read the “Angels in America” excerpts and call or write Deerfield High School Principal Sue Hebson to express — with civility — your dismay that their school, or any school, would even consider exposing impressionable youth to this vile, anti-religious, homosexual “literary” pornography: 224-632-3011; shebson@dist113.org; main office: 224-632-3000.

Write or call District 113 Superintendent George Fornero (gfornero@dist113.org) through the District 113 website, or call 224-765-1000. The District 113 Board of Education also can be reached through their website.

Our sources indicate the class where “Angels in America” will be used is AP Literature and Composition, by Deerfield HS English teacher Jeff Berger-White. You can reach him at jbergerwhite@dist113.org or by calling 224-632-3125.

No matter where you live, let Principal Hebson, Superintendent Fornero and DHS hear from you regarding this incredible breach of educational trust. Send us your letter and/or any replies that you receive: americansfortruth@comcast.net.

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News Release

North Shore Student Advocacy

Deerfield High School Offers Pornography To Students

March 7, 2008

Contact: Lora Sue Hauser, Executive Director, North Shore Student Advocacy
Telephone: (847) 651-8646; NSSAdvocacy@aol.com

DEERFIELD, Illinois — North Shore Student Advocacy has learned that Deerfield High School, in Deerfield, Illinois, is offering the books “Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes” (Part One & Two) —- laced with graphic sexual content, including gay sex, pervasive expletives, religious denigration and mockery —- in English classes this spring.

Click HERE to read some disgusting excerpts from Kushner’s play; WARNING: they are worse than any normal person could imagine

“After almost 15 years of school advocacy and reviewing many objectionable books and curricula, I have never seen anything this vulgar and harmful to students,” says Lora Sue Hauser, Executive Director of North Shore Student Advocacy. “Parents, taxpayers and concerned citizens must force themselves to read these excerpts, as horrific as they are, so you know what kids are being exposed to. The school justifies this egregious choice because of its themes of hope. Evidently, all great literature with themes of hope have already been exhausted so teachers need to start offering pornography. We say – enough.”

Read the rest of this article »

SURELY TO THE DELIGHT OF ‘GAY’ PORNOGRAPHERS EVERYWHERE, homosexual activist Tony Kushner’s pornographic, sodomy-celebrating and blaspheming play, “Angels in America,” has made it into a high school classroom (in Deerfield High School north of Chicago). You simply will not believe it after reading some crude excerpts below from the play. Take action by clicking HERE.

WARNING: Pornographic and Highly Offensive Excerpts Follow

Note to Readers: the following are sample excerpts from what surely is one of the most disturbing selections ever to be used or considered as a literary resource for use in a high school — or any — classroom. We understand that most readers will be shocked by this material and some offended that it has even found its way onto our website, but please consider that this will be made available to underage (teenage) children in a classroom setting.

Parents MUST be aware that the public schools are becoming pro-homosexual indoctrination and desensitization centers. How did America get to this point where outright perversion is introduced to students in the guise of studying literature? –Peter LaBarbera

Click HERE to take action by emailing or calling DHS and District 113 authorities and read the North Shore Student Alliance’s news release.

Read the rest of this article »

New law ‘mainstreams sexual deviance among children’

Feb 7, 2008 

Contact: E. Ray Moore, Jr., Chaplain (Lt. Col.) USAR Ret, Director of Exodus Mandate or Dr. Bruce Shortt, 803-714-1744. California Exodus contacts: www.Californiaexodus.org, press@californiaexodus.org

COLUMBIA, South Carolina, Feb. 7 /Christian Newswire/ — California Governor Schwarzenegger signed legislation mandating that public school children be indoctrinated to accept as normal the homosexual lifestyle and other forms of sexual deviancy. In the wake of the failed effort to obtain a referendum to repeal this legislation, a broad coalition of Christian grassroots organizations have endorsed the Campaign for Children and Families’ call for California families and churches to rescue their children from California’s public schools.

Read the rest of this article »

Appeals Judge issues outrageous ruling embracing homosexual ‘tolerance’ lessons, ignoring Constitutional religious guarantees; links ’same-sex marriage’ to homosexual instruction

 Judge Sandra Lynch

Folks, it is astonishing how far the “gay agenda” (which some homosexual activists say doesn’t exist!) has come in the last 30 years. From defending homosexual bars to opposing parents who merely want to be informed about pro-homosexuality lessons in their young child’s class, the agenda moves on.  Massachusetts and California are the states to watch to see where the homosexual youth- and school agenda is headed. 

We recommend carefully studying the MassResistance website, and other sites like Linda Harvey’s TruthatSchool.org to get engaged on this issue. 

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The following is MassResistance.org’s report on Judge Lynch’s decision, which the Parkers and Wirthlins are appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court:  

Federal Appeals Court Upholds Dismissal of David Parker Case

Judge issues outrageous ruling embracing homosexual “tolerance” lessons; uses notorious “1999 Curriculum Frameworks” in argument; Parker’s lawyers already preparing to appeal case to US Supreme Court

Federal Appeals Judge Sandra L. Lynch, a Clinton appointee, wrote the opinion 
 
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS (JAN. 31, 2008) www.massresistance.org — A three-judge federal appeals panel issued a bizarre and horrific ruling today denying the recent appeal  by David Parker, his wife Tonia, and Rob and Robin Wirthlin in their federal Civil Rights case against the Lexington school system. The ruling, written Judge Sandra L. Lynch, upholds the dismissal of the case by Federal Judge Mark Wolf, agrees with his reasoning (with some minor exceptions) and even goes a bit further.

BACKGROUND RESOURCES:

• Full text of ruling by First Circuit Court of Appeals (44 pages, Adobe Acrobat format)
• MassResistance’s comprehensive report on the Parker case;
• MassResistance article: “David Parker lawsuit having chilling effect on schools’ homosexual programs”;.
• Reaction by New England’s leading homosexual activist group GLAD (Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders) to Judge Lynch’s decision;
• Click HERE for MassResistance’s article about Judge Wolf’s ruling, which Lynch upheld

Strange legal reasoning
Judge Lynch shows little interest in the major point made by Parker attorney Rob Sinsheimer that the basic Constitutional protections of religious belief are being trampled on by the school. Instead, she attempts to show how Massachusetts law makes it necessary. She digs pretty deep to do that. In her ruling references 1993 Massachusetts Education Reform Act as mandating that standards “be designed to inculcate respect for the cultural, ethnic and racial diversity of the commonwealth.” 

Lynch then uses the extremely controversial Massachusetts 1999 Comprehensive Health Curriculum Framework to justify homosexual-oriented “tolerance” lessons in the lower grades. She quotes from its “measurable goals” in the lower grades, such as “define sexual orientation using the correct terminology.”  But Lynch completely ignores the fact that that document was clearly intended as a non-mandatory, informal set of guidelines.  That is why Planned Parenthood has filed bill H597 this year to make that document a legal guideline, not informal. (Even the resources listed in the document are from the radical fringe.)

Lynch also presents an interesting analysis of the state Parental Notification Law (Ch. 71, Sec. 32A) which succinctly explains that it is so watered down — and is particularly compromised by the Department of Education’s “advisory rulings” — that it is essentially useless in this situation.

Lynch then observes that the 2003 Goodridge decision held “that the state constitution mandates the recognition of same-sex marriage” and therefore, she implies, the schools must recognize it also.

Most of the rest of Lynch’s reasoning consists of a merry-go-round of excerpts from various “case law” decisions going back several years. That is always suspicious, as we’ve seen throughout this case, because one can cherry-pick language from past decisions (often out of context) almost forever.

Click HERE for the full article on Judge Lynch’s ruling by MassResistance

This is an oldie but a goodie from the brilliant, politically incorrect (lesbian) feminist Camille Paglia, from her 1998 online Salon Q&A column “Ask Camille.” Now, before you think we’ve sold our conservative souls and are ready to join the Wayne Besen Homosexual Hysteria Club so we can start smearing ex-gays, ridiculing common sense, and destroying traditional marriage – no, we are not sanctioning lesbianism by posting this piece. (Personally, my hope would be that Paglia would outgrow lesbianism, but that’s another essay.) She just makes some refreshing observations that, frankly, we wish more traditionalists would make. (And Paglia has always opposed the Gay Left’s totalitarian impulse by defending the free speech righs of opponents of homosexuality.) 

Of course, the problem Paglia addresses below has only grown exponentially worse in the decade since she wrote this.– Peter LaBarbera

Emphasis is added below:

Dear Camille:

I am a black, conservative female. I am proud to say that you are one of my heroes. I would like your opinion of the following press release, which I am forwarding to you. It’s regarding the Gay Youth Pride Day. Now, according to some, I may have no right to have an opinion about this, because of my heterosexuality. However, I think some in the so-called “gay community” take this pride thing a bit too far. As a 19-year-old, openly straight female, I really don’t understand the need for the self-anointed leaders of the gay rights movement to draw gay youngsters into their self-indulgent politics. Am I misguided or insensitive in my approach to the “young gay dilemma”?

Your conservative admirer in Va.
Dear Conservative:

The psychological turmoil of adolescents at sexual awakening cannot be underestimated. Everything is in flux — impulses, fears, dreams, with simultaneous longings for independence and for protection by adults. What I dislike about the push of organized gay activism into high schools is that it imposes a rigid political paradigm on a stage of life that is in rapid, painful transition for everyone, gay or straight.

As an equity feminist, as well as an open lesbian, I oppose special protections for any group, including my own. Teachers and administrators should obviously not permit physical harassment of any kind on school property, but verbal epithets, however offensive or hurtful, have First Amendment protection. The PC thought police, having been defeated on college campuses after the court-ordered banning of the fascist speech codes, are now oozing their way into high schools. “Hate” cannot be stopped by authoritarian manipulation but by slow social change, which may take generations.

The Internet has been a boon to lonely gay teens in geographically remote areas — but, of course, computers still remain largely a white middle-class luxury. I find very suspicious the statistics about teen suicides with which gay activists badger the media. If gay teens are indeed attempting suicide at a higher rate than straight teens, perhaps more questions need to be asked about the genesis of homosexuality. The intolerable sense of isolation may precede the homosexuality, rather than vice versa.

I have written repeatedly about my theory that homosexuality is an adaptation, rather than an innate trait, and that it is reinforced by habit. With its cant terms of “oppression” and “bigotry,” gay activism, encouraged by the scientific illiteracy of academic postmodernism, wants to deny that there is a heterosexual norm. This is madness. We need more art and history and less politics in primary education. Art gives the young the psychological and spiritual tools for authentic self-discovery. And art is where sexual dissenters have contributed the most to the human record.

In short, I agree with your concern about the Trojan Horse of gay activism, which is being dragged into high schools under the false flag of compassion. Young people who oppose homosexuality for any reason have a constitutional right to express their views, in or out of the classroom. Whatever they may privately believe as individuals, educators have a professional obligation to remain ideologically neutral in their treatment of students.

I was greatly encouraged by the many letters AFTAH received responding to 14-year-old ”Joe,” who wrote via our website explaining that he is a gay atheist who hates Americans For Truth. I will be passing on all the notes to Joe, and publishing a few, including this from suburban Chicago writer Laurie Higgins (emphasis added)–Peter L.:
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Dear Joe,
 
What you have said, what you feel, and what you think break my heart. All reveal the deception that our culture has taught our children. Mr. LaBarbera doesn’t hate you or homosexuals. And even though I firmly believe that homosexual conduct is not moral, I do not hate you either.
 
I no more hate you than I hate those who engage in other behaviors that I consider immoral, and those would include me, my husband, and my children. Every single human who has ever lived, save one, engages in immoral behavior. Our task is figuring out what constitutes moral and immoral behavior. You have appropriated one philosophical perspective on what determines right and wrong: you believe that if a behavior doesn’t directly harm another person physically, then it’s moral. But some of the greatest thinkers who have ever lived define morality differently. Defining morality as you have would permit adult consensual incest, lying, selfishness, polyamory, and apotemnophilia.
 
Neither Mr. LaBarbera nor I believe that homosexuals choose the feelings they have anymore than those who are attracted to adolescents or children or their siblings choose their powerful attractions, or those married men who are attracted to other women choose those attractions, or those who are powerfully drawn toward gambling or alcohol or drugs choose those attractions. We do believe, however, that those who experience same-sex attraction choose how they will respond to their desires, just as I choose how to respond to my selfish, or greedy, or angry, or lustful desires. Some in society tell you that acting on same-sex impulses is legitimate and good. They have lied to you, and it is a cruel lie.
 
You ask why someone would care about the sexual practices of others. I care that others are teaching children lies. I care that others are teaching kids that homosexual conduct is morally equivalent to heterosexual conduct when it’s not. I care because that lie carries devastating emotional, psychological, physical, and spiritual consequences. I care because I care about truth and its impact on the lives of individuals and on society.
 
Joe, homosexuals do have the full complement of civil rights.  They even have marital rights. Every homosexual can get married; they simply can’t redefine marriage. They can’t eliminate the criterion of complementarity, just as those who “love” children cannot eliminate the minimum age criterion, and those who love relatives cannot eliminate the consanguinity requirement, and those who love multiple partners cannot eliminate the binary requirement. The fact that homosexuals cannot redefine the institution does not mean the institution is unavailable to them.
 
As to your comment that homosexuals can think logically: You’re absolutely right, Joe; you were created in the image and likeness of God, and, therefore, you possess the gift of reason. It is not just religious traditions that inform us that homosexual conduct is wrong. Natural law tells us that. You are heterosexual, Joe. All humans are. Species cannot procreate homosexually. Our bodies are not designed for homosexual sex. They are exquisitely designed for heterosex. Desires do not define identity. And the male sex drive is so powerful, it can be misdirected to a whole host of inappropriate objects and activities. Don’t allow the unbidden presence of desires, impulses, or attractions define who you are. None of us should.
 
Please, do not dismiss arguments that emerge from religious tradition. Speaking as one who deeply values logic, evidence, and intellectual argument, I can attest that Christianity holds up intellectually. And remember, atheism too is based on faith. You are no more able to prove the non-existence of God than I am able to prove unequivocally God’s existence. But search out some “apologetics.” I would recommend the website of Ravi Zacharias. And read about the conversions of atheists like Mortimer Adler who was a famous University of Chicago philosopher, or British journalist Malcolm Muggeridge, or more recently the physicist Anthony Flew. And it’s not just the Christian Bible that teaches that homosexuality is wrong; the Old Testament does also, as does the Koran.
 
By the way, there are no scientific studies that prove that homosexuality is genetic. In fact, most scientists, even those who identify as gay and whose studies are most often cited, believe that at most, biology may play a part in desire, but that environmental influences are significant. In addition, the presence of biological influences tells us precisely nothing about morality.
 
Joe, there is freedom, truth, beauty, joy, and peace available to you. Seek them relentlessly, and know this, except for a very few fringe wackos, those who hold traditional beliefs do not hate you. On the contrary, they grieve for the lies you’ve been taught and desire nothing but that which is truly good for you.
 
If you would like to talk more, and your parents are agreeable to us talking, I would love nothing more. You can contact me through AFTAH. 
 
Laurie

Charlene Cothran/David Parker AFTAH BANQUET VIDEO Is Finally Available!

Excellent teaching tool for young people who are being brainwashed to accept homosexuality!
 
The AFTAH Banquet Videos are finally available and will be shipped ASAP!  To order a complete DVD (or CD) set of both ex-lesbian Charlene Cothran’s and parental rights hero David Parker’s outstanding talks, make an online donation of at least $25 postpaid to Americans For Truth (http://americansfortruth.com/donate/). Please use the online form at https://americansfortruth.nozonenet.com/donate/cc.php to specify your order.  You can substitute an audio CD but you must request this specifically. To order by regular mail, send your check or money order specifying “2007 Banquet DVD” (or CD) to: Americans For Truth, P.O. Box 5522, Naperville, IL 60567-5522.

Bulk Orders available: 2 for $40; 3 for $55; 4 for $70; add $10 for each additional DVD or contact us at americansfortruth@comcast.net (or 630-717-7631) for large bulk order pricing.