Why Asking Kids to Announce Their Pronouns is a Big Deal

John Stonestreet, Radio Host and Director of the Colson Center

According to a friend, the first day of her son’s 8th grade class began with teachers asking students to stand up and declare their pronouns. This was in Ohio, but I’d be willing to bet it happened in most state schools this year. 

Set aside for a moment the questionable wisdom of asking hormone-riddled middle-schoolers during the most awkward times of their lives to talk about their bodies in front of their peers…  

This would have never happened five, even three years ago. Compared to other ways gender confusion is aggressively advanced in our culture, this one may seem like an innocuous first-day-of-school icebreaker. It’s not.  Culture is most powerful not where it’s loudest, but where it makes things seem normal, or “common.”  Encouraging students to view their identity as chosen, and their physical bodies as wrong isn’t normal. It isn’t true; and it’s harming our kids.  

Christians shouldn’t participate. And parents should not let this classroom activity slide by unopposed. 

Copyright 2021 by the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. Reprinted from BreakPoint.org with permission.

Jonesboro Library Fails to Respect Parental Rights, Child Welfare with Pro-LGBT Display

A page from one of the many pro-LGBT books the Jonesboro Public Library reportedly placed on display in its children’s library in June.

In June the Jonesboro Public Library made headlines after placing a large selection of pro-LGBT material in its children’s library area.

The books included titles like The GayBCs and My Two Moms. The library also displayed a pro-LGBT flyer about the gay pride flag.

One mother noted that the picture books showed very young children identifying with different sexual-orientations. The publishers’ age range for these books reportedly was as young as four years old.

In August the Craighead County Jonesboro Public Library Board met to discuss the display.

Proposals reportedly were offered to move pro-LGBT material to a different part of the library — away from the children’s area — and to give the library board oversight when it comes to special displays. However, those good proposals failed to pass.

One of the flyers reportedly displayed in the Jonesboro Public Library.

Unfortunately, this is not the first time children have been targeted with pro-LGBT material.

For example, in June popular children’s cartoon “Blue’s Clues” released a video of an animated gay pride parade on YouTube.

And around the country different libraries have hosted “Drag Queen Story Times” geared toward children. These events are not about getting children to read or play together. They’re about promoting homosexual and transgender ideology to little kids.

There are several problems with pro-LGBT displays like the one in Jonesboro’s children’s library, but here are two key issues:

First, the display fails to respect parental rights.

Parents have a right to talk to their children about sex and gender. By placing this sort of material front-and-center where children can’t help seeing it as they walk into the library, the library is interfering with a conversation that parents ought to be able to have with their children.

Second, the material fails to respect child welfare.

As one Jonesboro mother noted, it’s simply inappropriate to encourage young children to question their gender-identity or to consider same-sex attraction. These books should not be sitting out where a child could easily grab them off a shelf without a parent realizing it.

Families should be able to walk into a public library without worrying about the books that might be on display in the children’s area. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be the case in Jonesboro and in many of our other libraries.