Moms For Liberty Uncovers Source Of Offensive Books In HCS Libraries

Photo Credit: Moms for Liberty – Hamilton County Chapter and Public Domain

The Tennessee Conservative [By Jason Vaughn] –

District 1 Hamilton County School Board Member Rhonda Thurman recently questioned HCS school administrators about how books are chosen and who makes the final call on their placement on school library shelves.

Administration did not give a clear-cut answer stating that books could find placement from a variety of sources, including school-based teams, librarians, teachers, principals and even students.  Overall, the statement was made that it is difficult to answer considering there are 75 schools in the Hamilton County school district.

However, the Hamilton County Chapter of Moms for Liberty has recently discovered that a local citizen’s group in Chattanooga has been allowed to “go wild” stocking the shelves of elementary, middle and high schools over the past few years.

According to Moms for Liberty (M4L), beginning in 2018, the group Moms for Social Justice installed classroom libraries in 15 schools in Hamilton county. 

The project was funded by a local philanthropic organization called the Osborne Group that donated $20,000 to Moms for Social Justice. 

M4L states that the group had a specific criteria in mind for the books they chose and would not accept books from people in the community who offered to donate. 

In Moms for Justice’s own words they “worked with experts in our community to finely tune a diverse and inclusive reading list, according to student population and grade level.” 

They stocked the shelves of the public school classroom libraries using books “with protagonists of color, authors of colors, women led, Spanish titles, LGBQT titles, you name it.” 

M4L states that in reviewing several of the books, they have a growing concern that there is a deeper agenda at play.

Through M4L’s research they found that the Osborne Foundation has funded two organizations in the Hamilton County community that have connections to two elected school board members. 

Joe Smith (District 3 school board member) is the executive director of Prison Prevention Ministries and Marco Perez (District 3 school board member) is the Director of Finance and Operations at La Paz Chattanooga. 

According to The Osborne Foundation’s 2019 Form 990, the group donates $6,000+ a year to Smith’s organization and donated $15,000 to La Paz in 2019. Local organizations can be found toward the end of the form.

M4L asks “Could this be considered a financial conflict???”

M4L said, “This is just one year, there is a lot more where this came from…I’m sure they have some kind of influence in our county!

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Following is an overview of several books M4L reviewed with questionable content. 

M4L asks that when reading the excerpts to keep in mind that the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART) defines grooming as:

“… a method used by offenders that involves building trust with a child and the adults around a child in an effort to gain access to and time alone with her/him. In extreme cases, offenders may use threats and physical force to sexually assault or abuse a child. More common, though, are subtle approaches designed to build relationships with families.

One example of grooming behavior is discussing sexually explicit information under the guise of education. 

*Note from The Tennessee Conservative – if you are offended by graphic language, situations, etc., you may want to stop reading now as the excerpts from these books intended to be read by children are full of very adult language and situational content.

M4L School Library Books Review:

Book Title: The Lottery’s Plus One – Installed by Moms for Social Justice in a 4th grade classroom at Orchard Knob Elementary.

This book deals with the gender dysphoria of a 4-year-old child named Briar (name has been changed to Brian), who changed her gender identity from female to male at the age of 3 years old. The parents have shaved her head and let her dress as a boy. This book is on the shelf in a 4^th grade classroom at Orchard Knob Elementary School, installed by Moms for Social Justice.

1. Once upon a time a man from Delhi and a man from Yukon fell in love, and so did a woman from Jamaica and a Mohawk woman. The two couples became best friends and had a baby together. When they won the lottery, they gave up their jobs and found a big old house where their family could learn and grow … and grow some more. Now Sumac Lottery (age nine) is the fifth of seven kids, all named after trees. With their four parents and five pets, they fit perfectly in the Toronto home they call Camelottery. ‘But the one thing in life that never changes … is that sooner or later things change.
2. “Socks, Dad,” pleads PopCorn. “The boy,” says Grumps, staring. “Wood?” says Sumac, looking around. “The wee baldy one.” Grumps is pointing at naked Brian, who’s shuddering under the hose. “He’s a girl.” A silence, which Brian breaks. “I not a girl! Aspen titters. “Didn’t you know?” she asks Grumps. Sumac’s staggered. How can the man have spent nearly two weeks here thinking Brian’s a boy? At the moment Brian’s preferring not to be called that,” murmurs PopCorn.
3. Grumps must have heard she sometimes, but not known that it was this particular balding four-year-old being talked about. Why did you name her Brian, the. love of God?” he demands.  “It actually Briar,” says Sumac, “but she changed it when she was three.”
4.  It’s the woman from Toytally Awesome, all out of breath and hair stuck to her face as she catches up with the Lotterys, “I’m sorry, but — your boy stole something.” Pointing at…
5. Brian. “She’s a girl,” says Aspen before anyone can stop her, “Not a girl,” objects Brian.
6. PopCorn and CardaMom exchange a helpless glance, “Well, he — there’s an item in his, in her pocket,” says the woman confusedly. Brian grips the sides of her fire truck as if she’s about to speed off in it.”

Book Title: Far from the tree: Another book installed by the Moms for Social Justice group.

Overview of the book:

Grace:  An adopted child. She got pregnant in high school, had a baby at 16, she put her baby up for adoption. This experience made Grace want to find her bio mother. Grace has two biological siblings, Maya and Joaquin.

Maya was adopted by a different family. Her adopted mother is an alcoholic, her adoptive parents fight a lot and eventually tell her they are getting divorced. Maya has a girlfriend named Claire.  Maya has a pretty dark sense of humor, (i.e. she jokes about practicing devil worship and ritual sacrifices.)  Maya is a drug user.

Joaquin is their biological brother. He has had 18 sets of foster parents. His current foster parents are good people and want to adopt him.

The F-bomb is sprinkled throughout, I stopped counting after the 10th or 11th time. G-D is also featured along with other curse words. The book is poorly written, unrealistic, the characters are stereotypical. One paragraph had the word “had” in it almost 10 times.

Excerpts:

1. “What about your mom?” Claire said, and Maya looked away. “Exactly, My.” “That’s private,” Maya said. “That’s about her, not me.” “Bullshit. It’s about all of you. You just don’t realize it. And who cares if it’s private? I’m your girlfriend.
2. “Always be so freaking calm,” Maya said. They had been sitting on a wall by the fountain, and Maya hopped down, too agitated to sit still. “Why do you always have to be like my mom?” “Your mom?” Claire said, starting to laugh. “You think I’m ike your mom? That’s pretty fucked up, My…
3. Maya wondered if Grace was lying. Grace seemed like the kind of girl who would wait her whole life so she could lose her virginity on her wedding night, who would read Cosmo articles about how to give him the best blow job of his life! but never actually say the word blow job.
4. When their parents were fighting, Maya sometimes imagined torching their entire house. She always thought she’d spray the most gasoline on those family portraits on the stairs.
5. Claire was too measured, too reasonable, too Claire. Even her goddamn name sounded calm.

Book Title: More than we can tell – Recommended reading grades 8-12

Excerpts:

1. You suck. And that’s what I’m going to say to you when I find you and shove it in your mouth hole. Gross, at least this guy didn’t include a dic pic. 
2. I just don’t want to play with some chick on the rag. Well, I don’t want to play with a douchebag, I snap.
3. My father doesn’t need a bullet, this letter is enough. He didn’t need a bullet ten years ago either. Sometimes I wish he’d had a gun. A bullet would have been quick.
4. I can do this all day baby. Tell me, do you charge for sucking?

The following two books, found in Hixson High Schools library, are also filled with sex, drugs, rape, domestic violence (parents abusing children, boyfriends beating girlfriends) etc…

Aristotle and Dante discover the secrets of the universe

This book is about two teenage boys, one who is gay, one who is confused, forming a relationship and ultimately falling in love.

1. Do you masturbate? I’m thinking you think that’s a funny question. But it’s a very serious question. I mean, you ‘re pretty normal. At least, you’re more normal than me. So maybe you masturbate or maybe you don’t. Maybe I’m a little obsessed with this topic lately. Maybe it’s just a phase. But, Ari, if you do masturbate, what do you think about?
2. I placed my hand on the back of his neck. I pulled him toward me. And kissed him. I kissed him. And I kissed him. And I kissed him. And I kissed him. And he kept kissing me back. We laughed and we talked and looked up at the stars. “I wished it was raining,” he said. “I don’t need the rain,” I said. “I need you.” He traced his name on my back. I traced my name on his.
3. All this time. This was what was wrong with me. All this time I had been trying to figure out the secrets of the universe, the secrets of my own body, of my own heart. All of the answers had always been so close and yet I had always fought them without even knowing it. From the minute I’d met Dante, I had fallen in love with him. I just didn’t…

The perks of being a wallflower

Overview:

A coming-of-age epistolary novel by American writer Stephen Chbosky, which was first published on February 1, 1999, by Pocket Books. Set in the early 1990s, the novel follows Charlie, an introverted observing teenager, through his freshman year of high school in a Pittsburgh suburb. It contains gay teenage relationships, sister who has a boyfriend who is physically abusive, molestation themes, drugs, etc…

1. And this guy got really red-faced. And he looked at me. Then, he looked at her. And he wound up and hit her hard across the face. I mean hard. The weird part is that my sister didn’t do anything. It was so weird. My sister goes crazy if you eat the wrong kind of tuna, but here was this guy hitting her, she didn’t say anything. She just got soft and nice. And she asked me to leave, which I did.
2. I guess Brad’s father didn’t know about his son because when he caught them, Brad’s father started beating Brad. Not a slap kind of beating, a belt kind. And Brad still hasn’t come to school. Bob said Patrick was “in bad shape.”
3. It got to a point where Brad was getting stoned or drunk before school. It’s not like he and Patrick were fooling around in school. They only fooled around at parties on Fridays, but Patrick said Brad couldn’t even look at him in the hall, let alone speak with him. And it was hard, too, because Patrick really liked Brad.
4. Bob gave Patrick an eighth of marijuana with a Christmas card.
5. My sister just kind of looked around, uncomfortable. I reached my hands up to my hair and realized that a lot of it was gone. I honestly don’t remember when I did it, but from the look of my hair, I must have grabbed a pair of scissors and just started cutting with. Regardless, I decided to never take LSD again.
6. I was with Sam. And we were both naked. And her legs were spread over the sides of the couch.
7. Do you know what “masturbation” is? I think you probably do because you are older than me. But just in case, I will tell you. Masturbation is when you rub your genitals until you have an orgasm. Wow!

There are about 14 more passages about sex that I could share (and remember I was just skimming this book) but I will spare you. I think you get the point.

Queer, there, and everywhere : 23 people who changed the world

This book, also found in Hixson High Schools Library, says that Abraham Lincoln was gay, Eleanor Roosevelt had a three-way and explains how it was normal for men in Rome and Greece to be married to have children but they got their sexual satisfaction from men and young boys.  

About the Author: Jason Vaughn, Media Coordinator for The Tennessee Conservative  ~ Jason previously worked for a legacy publishing company based in Crossville, TN in a variety of roles through his career.  Most recently, he served as Deputy Directory for their flagship publication. Prior, he was a freelance journalist writing articles that appeared in the Herald Citizen, the Crossville Chronicle and The Oracle among others.  He graduated from Tennessee Technological University with a Bachelor’s in English-Journalism, with minors in Broadcast Journalism and History.  Contact Jason at news@TennesseeConservativeNews.com