Moms for Liberty: This isn’t a political stunt; it’s about our children’s futures | Opinion

The definition of ad hominem is “attacking a person’s character or motivations rather than a position or argument.” That’s exactly what Gary Shiffrin did in his recent guest column titled “State Rep. Randy Fine and Moms for Liberty are misguided fearmongers.”

Shiffrin’s column covered the June 25 press conference delivered by Fine and Moms For Liberty – Brevard (M4L), the Brevard chapter of the national organization, Moms for Liberty, which provided documents that Brevard Public Schools (BPS) had introduced critical race theory (CRT) into the school district.

Beyond accusing Fine and M4L of being “misguided fearmongers,” Shiffrin also accused them of being “shameful,” “wrong,” and “slanderous” peddlers of “outrageous assertions” and “conspiracy theories.” Shiffrin characterized the press conference as a “political stunt,” with the “sole purpose” being to “discredit” BPS.

It’s clear Shiffrin either did not watch the press conference, or he’s being willfully deceitful. Moms for Liberty – Brevard attended the press conference alongside Fine to provide screenshots, emails, documents, social media posts, and audio showing that BPS had introduced CRT into the school district. Much of the evidence was obtained via public records requests and/or from BPS educators and administrators willing to share materials with our group. You can see it yourself at https://whatiscriticalracetheory.org/brevard-county-florida/.

CRT is a political ideology. To CRT proponents, racism is pervasive and all-defining. America is “systemically racist,” designed so by white people, to keep white people in power. Prominent CRT proponents advocate racial discrimination to fight racism. They turn MLK Jr., on his head, judging every individual by skin color, rather than character.

Some CRT proponents say antiracism should be taught to students even when parents push back (https://www.city-journal.org/critical-race-theory-in-wake-county-nc-schools). We can have the debate as to whether CRT should or should not be taught in our K-12 classrooms, but what is not up for dispute is whether BPS is training administrators, counselors and principals in the subject. 

Curiously, Shiffrin didn’t once mention CRT, even though CRT was the reason for the press conference in the first place. Rather, Shiffrin offered a tortured, circuitous defense that there is no racism or racist agenda in BPS. But if Shiffrin watched the press conference, he’d have heard BPS’s own administrators admitting racism in BPS. For example, BPS director of secondary leading and learning, Dr. Stephanie Soliven, called Satellite High “far more racist” than Palm Bay High. Also, BPS’ director of equity and diversity, Dr. Danielle McKinnon, claimed that her position was created in part to address “systemic racism.” If there’s no racism in BPS, as Shiffrin claims, then why do Soliven and McKinnon believe otherwise? What need would there be to train staff in “anti-racism”?

Shiffrin also failed to mention that BPS paid thousands of taxpayer-funded dollars to what we see as a blatantly racist organization, “Overcoming Racism,” for administrator trainings which directly cited CRT (in the middle of a multi-million budget shortfall, no less). The CEO of the organization, Matthew Kincaid, is responsible for a multitude of social media posts like the following: “White America has a deep and thick appetite for Black Death and violence upon black people …” Kincaid also calls for the destruction of “this wretchedly backwards country.” How did Shiffrin miss this?

Furthermore, given his ties to teachers unions, how did Shiffrin miss the National Education Association’s plan to push CRT in all 50 states, and 14,000 local school districts? Part of the plan includes funding to attack groups opposing CRT, like M4L. There’s also plans to work with Black Lives Matter (BLM) to rally on George Floyd’s birthday “as a national day of action to teach lessons about structural racism and oppression.” This, even though a YouGov survey shows a great majority of Americans oppose CRT in schools, including 72% of independents. As for BLM, one of its public mission statements was to “disrupt the Western-proscribed nuclear family,” meaning, families like the thousands of families with children in BPS.

It’s no secret that the destruction of the family is a root cause of student disparities in educational outcomes, which is one issue BPS used to justify the introduction of CRT into the district. Also, children from broken homes are more than twice as likely to drop out of school or end up in jail, and four times as likely to have emotional and behavioral problems. Disturbingly, rather than try and fix root causes like the destruction of the family, organizations like the NEA and BPS blame “racism” while advocating racism in the form of CRT-fueled programs and organizations like BLM, which seek to destroy the family.

If Shiffrin’s looking for a “shameful,” “wrong,” and “slanderous” peddler of “outrageous assertions,” “conspiracy theories” and “political stunts” for the “sole purpose” of “discrediting” people who truly care about children in BPS — like the people in M4L — Shiffrin should just look in the mirror. 

Ashley Hall is a Cocoa resident and Brevard chair of Moms for Liberty.

— Editor’s note: Brevard Public Schools denies teaching Critical Race Theory or training teachers i