The Media Research Center’s Dawn Slusher spent a March 1 post being angry that a TV show wouldn’t hate non-heterosexuals the way she does:
It’s no secret ABC’s Roseanne spinoff The Conners loves to push liberal propaganda. We’ve called them out numerous times over the years on many different issues. Unfortunately, their newest season has begun, and this week’s episode, “Shrinks Don’t Talk and Kids Don’t Sing,” took on a familiar tone crying “censorship” over parents wanting to protect their kids from sexual politics in the classroom.
In the episode, Becky (Alicia Goranson) complains that her daughter’s elementary school doesn’t have a budget for a music class. Her stepmother Louise (Katey Sagal), who is a singer and musician in a band, offers her services for just the cost of gas money and her lunch.
Becky is thrilled the kids will now be able to learn about music, until the teacher becomes concerned when she introduces the song “Dancing Queen”:
Um, isn’t Slusher the one engaging in sexual politics here? Yes, she is. As the storyline noted that a teacher insisting that “Dancing Queen” was about “gender identity,” she continued to do so by touting a real-life case in which a Dolly Parton song was banned from a classroom for not being sufficiently hateful of LGBT people:
While we all know Abba’s “Dancing Queen” isn’t about drag queens, and thus this storyline is quite a stretch, vilifying parents who are concerned about their child(ren) being exposed to sexual and identity politics is not okay.
In real life, the song that was banned was Rainbowland by Dolly Parton and Miley Cyrus . One news story pointed out the same school district removed gay pride flags and flyers from schools, as well.
A teacher from that district complained, “If you don’t let me have a rainbow in my classroom, and my student has two moms, or if I had a rainbow sign in my class, and then it was removed, what is that telling that student? And how is that student expected to be able to learn under those conditions?”
Umm, it’s telling that student they’re there to learn how to read, write, and do arithmetic. It’s protecting all students and keeping them safe from sexual politics that have no place in a child’s classroom. Absolutely, gay students – or students with gay parents – deserve to be treated like everyone else. Call out and discipline anyone who mistreats them. But, you don’t need a rainbow in your classroom to do that.
Despite her faux compassion — we doubt she really believes that gay kids should be treated like everyone else, given her employer’s longstanding hostility to anyone who’s not heterosexual — Slusher wouldn’t explain why she thinks an image of a rainbow in a classroom is so threatening. Indeed, she continued to rant about the rainbow:
Sadly, liberals have commandeered the rainbow symbol and ruined it for everyone by using it as a symbol for vulgar kinks, fetishes and other explicit sexual “causes.” They can’t expect to wear, wave and display rainbows all over parades like this…
…and not have parents concerned about their children being exposed to such obscenities. (The 6:34 mark is particularly disturbing and should serve as a warning to all parents how serious this issue is.)
At the end of the episode, Louise changes her mind about apologizing to the school board. She delivers the news to Becky, who is blasting the song “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows,” on a stereo in the school parking lot:
By the end of her post, Slusher was in full frothing “they’re coming for your children” rage:
Parents, pay close attention. They aren’t hiding that they’re coming for your children. And they’re even revealing how they plan to do it. Don’t let them outnumber you on school boards and in school administrations. Because, as they said, “Somebody has to be on that board to push back when things don’t make sense.”
If you think they just want smiley, happy rainbows and innocent songs without the associated vulgar sexuality, think again. And when schools/governments start acting like they know better how to raise your children, it becomes a slippery slope that leads to incredibly scary and dangerous outcomes.
As the headline of her post makes clear, Slusher believes that anyone who doesn’t hate LGBT people as viciously as she does is a “groomer” — though demanding that her hate be taught in schools is form of grooming too, given her desire to indoctrinate a new generation of hateful homophobes. Oh, and her link on the words “slippery slope” goes to a New York Post article claiming that a Montana couple “lost custody of their 14-year-old child after opposing her interest in changing genders.” But as we’ve documented, the parents made it clear they hate their child by refusing to acknowledge the child’s identity, refused to permit treatment of the child for suicidal thoughts, and their insistence on running to right-wing media to play victim and spew anti-transgender narratives violated confidentiality orders — meaning that they also were playing sexual politics.
But sexual politics that demonizes anyone who’s not a right-wing heterosexual is totally OK with Slusher — remember, narratives matter more than the truth at the MRC.