THE REAL NEWS

MARCH 1997 BOX 39068, Point Grey RPO, Vancouver, BC V6R 4P1 Tel: (604) 463-1611 Fax : (604) 463-1601

These motions passed at the local level and now will be presented to the BCTF at their annual general meeting, March 15-18 in the form of Recommendation 5 which reads: "To strengthen the capacity and efficacy of BCTF leadership on social issues, including poverty, racism, sexism, violence, and homophobia." and Resolution 102 which reads: "That the BCTF create a program to eliminate homophobia and heterosexism within the BC public school system." These two initiatives will most probably be ratified, or, worse yet, sent to a committee to be implemented, without even being voted on --unless a clear message is given to our educators that this sexuality engineering has no place in our children’s education. Coquitlam school board has been approached to implement a pro-homosexuality curriculum for K-12 and to provide training for teachers.

GALE is not new to the education front. There was lesbian input in the Learning for Living Curriculum. In 1993 Gale distributed a mailing to all schools in BC which included the recruitment pamphlet, "I Think I Might Be Gay or Lesbian", a comprehensive list of recommended books for elementary and secondary school libraries, and information of additional resources centres. (See our newsletter of the fall of 1993.) In 1994-95, the BC Education Ministry paid $10,000 to subsidize a school counselors’ package on homosexuality which included a booklet and referral numbers for local gay groups. GALE also publishes a monthly newsletter and hosts parties. Their goals include encouraging homosexual teachers to come out of the closet to be a role model for students.

Our BC school boards are scrambling to meet budgets. Sometimes they fail, as in North Vancouver, and are replaced by one ministry appointment. Aside from putting our children’s health at deadly risk, how can we afford another program and possibly another school? And how can we expect already exhausted teachers to take on yet another "social" curriculum?: Besides, education ministry spokesman Shawn Robbins says we already address "homophobia" in a general way through the CAPP Program’s anti-discrimination unit.

Why are our children being targeted so the morals of a tiny, vocal, subculture with a high-risk lifestyle can be imposed upon them? Homosexual men and women do not procreate naturally. The average life span of a homosexual man is 42 years. Our children, as a captive audience in the public school system, are being indoctrinated to believe that this homosexual lifestyle is not without major, self-inflicted, negative consequences. For their sake, this must stop!

Please phone your local teacher’s association. If you can’t find their number, phone the School Board Offices and ask for it. Ask to speak to the local teacher’s association president. Ask if Recommendation 5 and Resolution 102 were voted on and overturned.

If either of these issues were not specifically voted down, the ability of individual teachers to consider parental concerns and culturally acquired morals is in jeopardy. The next thing we as parents must do is to let the school trustees know (politely and in secular language) in no uncertain terms that parents do not want homosexuality being taught in the schools. Or you can pull your children from the public system.

The issue of homosexuality being taught in the schools has two facets: the human rights side and the moral side. Activists are using the human rights arguments ("Our children are being beat up and abused, etc., because of their decision to be involved in this lifestyle.") to force acceptance of programs to normalize homosexuality. We must be able to separate these two facets clearly. Every parent agrees that all children must be able to feel safe in school, but we already deal with this issue with anti-discrimination curricula, including a component of CAPP. As far as the moral side of the issue goes, Education Ministry guidelines state "The highest morality shall be *inculcated" (*taught or impressed upon the mind by frequent repetitions or admonitions -- Merriam Webster Dictionary). Morals are something that we as parents have to become more and more vigilant about in the world around us. They will affect us. We must learn to defend them.

This issue has not been won or lost yet. Get involved!

Are you unsure about who to vote for when the candidates’ names are placed before you? Do you sometimes wonder how to tell if the candidate will really represent your views once nominated or elected? Here are three questions that you can ask any candidate for election at any level of government. The questions are most effective when used in private or over the phone -- rather than at an all candidates meeting, where time and opportunities are limited. The questions may be tailored for School Board, Municipal, Provincial, and Federal Elections as well as nominating meetings of the party of your choice. It will be easy to distinguish which candidate will represent your views, once they have all been asked. At the municipal and school board levels, it would be helpful to also attend one all-candidates meeting, if you have time, just to confirm your choice.

The questions are as follows: 1) Did you decide to become a candidate to represent Judeo-Christian values in the riding/city/municipality/ provincial legislature/at the school board level? 2) Would you refer to these generic morals and values when making decisions? 3) Would you be willing

to take a stand, however unpopular with the media, based on these Judeo-Christian values in your position as ____________________?

If the candidate does not want to ally him/herself with a specific denomination, explain that these are generic values, not allied with any sect or denomination, but crossing all major religious and cultural boundaries.

Once you’ve found your candidate, help to get him/her elected by volunteering in any way you are able to. Everything you are able to do will be a help to them.

In our last issue, we told you about two of our members who had attended an "International Women’s Day" (IWD) organizational committee meeting at the offices of the Vancouver Status of Women (VSW), where they were attacked in the hall outside the meeting room by women who had been permitted to attend the meeting (though our members had not been permitted to attend.). Despite the police report, medical reports, photos and police recommendations to lay charges, the administrative crown counsel decided that criminal charges would not be laid. One of the victims, Sissy von Dehn, appealed to regional crown counsel, Robert Wright and the incident is now again under review. Individuals have been identified, names given to police and charges may possibly be forthcoming.

Radio station AM1040 and talk show host Charles McLean had Mrs. Von Dehn and our other member, Mrs. Peggy Holland, as guests on the talk show but VSW declined to participate. VSW has threatened to sue AM 1040 as well as REAL Women of Canada (for a press release which went out nationally over the incident). The VSW denies any affiliation with IWD and its organizing committee.

In a news article in the February edition of Kinesis entitled "Man-handled by anti-choicers" IWD committee members reportedly told our members that "International Women’s Day is a feminist -- and therefore pro-choice -- event. Cenen Bagon of the Committee for Domestic Workers and Caregivers Rights and NACSOW says: "The most important thing for me is that . . . the struggle for women’s equality includes the struggle for reproductive rights. That is why the anti-choice can never be part of our IWD nor of the women’s movement as a whole." A recent newsletter of the BC Coalition of Abortion Clinics says "the IWD committee passed a unanimous motion that would require all IWD participants to support the pro-choice position."

So now we know for sure: International Women’s Day should really be called International Feminist’s Day. The feminists will always strive to keep some women (feminists) more "equal" (read favored) than other women!

You can write to the Ministry of Attorney General, Regional Crown Counsel Mr. Rogert H. Wright, QC, 2nd Floor, 222 Main Street, Vancouver, BC V6A 2S8 (fax: 660-1654) and let him know your opinion on this situation where all Canadian women are not equal before the law.

You can also write to the City of Vancouver, 453 West 12th Avenue, Vancouver, BC (Fax: 873-7419) and request that funding for the Vancouver Status of Women be stopped immediately. This request should also be copied and circulated (cc’d) to Honorable Sue Hammell, Minister of Women’s Equality, Room 342, Parliament Buildings, Victoria, BC V8V 1X4. Fax: (250) 387-4312. AND to Honorable Hedy Fry, Minister of Women’s Equality, Parliament Buildings, Ottawa, Ontario, K1A 0A6.

About a dozen members of REAL Women of BC participated in the IWD Rally and March in downtown Vancouver on March 8th, all carrying signs. Our signs were mostly pro-life, but one dealt with discrimination against women by IWD and two expressed the sentiment that Families are a woman’s most precious possession. We were told several times from the podium to go away, and that we were not allowed to be there at the IWD event. But because the media and police were there, we were in no danger. We smiled, stood our ground and held our signs up higher. We occupied a spot together at the end of the march, and then disbursed to go home. As long as there are IWD events such as this one, REAL Women of BC would like to maintain a presence in the crowd, to illustrate that we must have equality among women before we can have equality for women.

We studied the three R’s in a climate of respect. The teacher’s greatest concern was whether or not we chewed gum, whispered in class or had an accurate aim at the wastebasket.

Now, in this age of exploding knowledge and sophisticated research we hear increasingly about learning problems. Parents struggle to understand the report cards, and the teacher says about 8-year-old Johnny’s reading problem, "Don’t worry. He’ll read when he’s ready."

When an idea like OBE comes along it sounds like the solution. Surely it means my child will master basic skills before going to the next grade.

Not necessarily. Outcome learning used to mean academic content. But today it’s about attitudes. And master the material? Yes, Johnny must have the right answers, but the important answers are to the attitude questions.

Over the years, the door has been opened to whole-child education--body, soul and spirit. This has allowed for affective (emotional/attitude/ behavioral) education. In this global era, politically correct global citizens are more valuable than responsible Canadian citizens. To achieve this, cooperation must be the highest virtue.

On the surface it appears so, and many educators believe it does. But under the mask is the ugly face of tolerance at any price. The door may say "child-centered", but look behind it. Our children are herded into large socialistic classes which suggest to them that they are abused, racist, neglected, sexually ignorant, and in need of various brands of spiritual empowerment. Respect for others is aimed at jeopardizing their own convictions. The tyranny of tolerance is forced upon them. These programs are expensive, deprive our children of academic class time, and tend to portray parents as inadequate.

Another door opens. Enter the Career and Personal Planning Curriculum, the mandated vehicle for OBE. It’s problems are basically three-fold. 1) Its affective, 2) it’s assessed, and 3) it’s compulsory. Suddenly our children, kindergarten to grade 12, are forced to attend non-academic classes or risk not graduating.

Our secondary students must spend 30 hours on job experience. Not reading, writing, computing, but job experience. Surely this is good. Look again. They are having to sacrifice additional academic class time. And Willard R. Daggett, guru of learning-outcomes education admits: "Skill requirements on the job change at a rate 4-5 times faster than curriculum and organization change in our schools, leaving a gap between what students learn in the classroom and what is expected of them in the workplace" (Bankrupt Education: The Decline of Liberal Education in Canada, Emberley & Newell, p.39). Furthermore, the goal for these children is simply blue-collar workers, productive for the economy. U.S. critics tell us Outcome-Based Education is the only method which allows the system to follow the child and assess his/her economic value.

This relates to personal attitudes and morals. It’s coercion to conform to the current social agenda. Right down to our primary tots, the children wade through hours of sex education that promotes risky behavior and doesn’t even give a clear definition of "health". Parents are appalled at the assignments their children bring home that dredge up values, hold them up to the light and dissect them (e.g., "Do you agree with your parents’ faith?"). It’s a ministry-approved snoop into family systems. Subtly but systematically the convictions we have taught our children at home are being broken down and remolded. These compliant future citizens will be satisfied in a controlled society. They can’t read very well or make sound judgments, but all the better. The State will do that for them. Who currently stands between them and the State? The family. Drive a wedge with OBE and there is direct access to the child. The Infant’s Act and UN Rights of the Child will "protect" them.

This is a gross violation of our Charter of Rights which is to ensure our freedom of conscience, thought, belief, opinion and expression. Further, in November of 1996, the BC Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner found the CAPP program to contravene the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act established in 1992. Through CAPP our children are required to submit information about their families which their parents don’t have access to, and the material is kept from year to year. CAPP breaks the law!

The attitudes of our children will be graded (assessed) as to whether they are meeting the prescribed outcomes (giving the right behavioral answers) and their progress is tracked through a Personal Education Number (PEN) and Student Learning Plans (SLP). Even if the students are permitted to opt out of portions of CAPP, their attitudes will be tracked because they must meet the outcomes. It is predicted that teachers will also be tracked on how well they are teaching to the outcomes. The plan is to include home schools and private schools--no one will escape. And school boards are on their way out. Parents will lose their last advocate.

We in BC are not alone. Parents all over Canada are angry over similar intrusions into their classrooms and families, but when they approach the system they are met with denial and accusations of being misinformed. Parents in the U.S. have met the same wall, but they are persistent. Part of the backlash felt in the current Presidency comes from those who say enough is enough.

The Federal government in Canada has trespassed provincial jurisdiction in order to achieve this global agenda. CIDA has played a large part in global education. Our education goals come right out of the U.S. Goals 2000. Their educrats come and teach ours. The National Association of Secondary School Principals, in their booklet, World Class Schools (p.16), states, "...In the town of Maple Ridge near Vancouver in British Columbia, Canada, a quiet revolution has been occurring with little publication or fanfare." It goes on to describe the Thomas Haney Centre as the first of four model OBE schools in North America!

Our children are defenseless victims in a plan to take them away from us while we are paying the bill. We have a choice and we must make it fast--take back our education system or lose our children. We can begin by lobbying Education Minister Paul Ramsey to put a halt to compulsory affective education, and give us what most parents cannot give our children--academics.

Address your letters to:

Hon. Paul Ramsey, Minister of Education

Room 137

Parliament Buildings

Victoria, BC V8V 1X4

Fax (250) 387-3200

It is important to send copies to the places below. Under your signature note:

Use the following addresses or fax numbers:

Ottawa Conference on the Family will take place April 10-12 at the Radisson Hotel-Ottawa Center. The Conference will begin on Thursday evening with a stand-up reception for Members of Parliament and a key-note address by Dr. Brian Stiller, the retiring president of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada. Other keynote speakers during the event include Dr. John Patrick of the University of Ottawa, pro-family lawyer David Brown, Liberal MP Tom Wappel, Dr. Mark Genius of the National Foundation for the Family Research and Education and Focus on the Family International VP Jim Daly. Please give some serious thought of attending and contact Candace Martens or Jim Sclater at 604-684-8333 for more information.

The national conference of R.E.A.L. Women is being held in North Bay, Ontario, on May 2 and 3, l997. Some of the keynote speakers include Senator Anne Cools and Chris Sarlo, who is the author of "Poverty in Canada". Please consult your Reality issue of January/February l997 for details.

Ujjal Dosanjh, Attorney General and Minister Responsible for Multiculturalism, Human Rights and Immigration, has commanded that Sunday, May 4, l997, shall be known as PRAYER DAY in the province of BC. The Proclamation contains the following clauses: "WHEREAS prayer has proved to be a vital force in the lives of individuals and an important source of inspiration in the homes and schools of our Province, and WHEREAS the traditional family unit is the strength of our Province, and WHEREAS the first Sunday in May is an appropriate date to celebrate the ushering in of Spring and renewal of all of us through prayer…….". British Columbia is the only province in Canada to declare such a day. A fax copy of the Proclamation may be obtained from 589-4383. Please obtain one for your church and community bulletin boards. Make this date known in BC!

Cheryl Howard, mother from Courtenay, BC, is developing a case in court over whether the CAPP program should be mandatory. Cheryl’s eldest daughter, an honour roll student, has been told she will not receive her Dogwood Diploma and will not officially graduate from high school because she has dropped out of the CAPP program. (See BC Report, Dec. 30, 1996, p.34). The newly organized, non-profit group, BC Coalition of Parents, is seeking to spearhead civil action. Please join in the battle to stop the CPP program K-12 from being mandatory for graduation by supporting this organization with a donation made payable to BC Coalition of Parents, RR #4 S-455 C-35, Courtenay, BC, V9N 7J3, Ph/fax (250) 338-0908.

Please specify which petition you would like.

The Pro-Life Society of British Columbia has launched a post card campaign to the Federal Minister of Health, David Dingwall and Roussel of Montreal. The cards are available in sets of 4 (2 each) 25 sets for $7.00, 50 sets for $14.00. This includes shipping. Partial birth postcard also available, contact the office on availability. Please phone 574-0225 or fax at 574-0944 for ordering or write to BC Pro-life,#202-5638 176^th Street, Surrey BC, V3S 4I6.

On March 13, l997, the following press release was issued by the Communications Director for the Pro-Life Society of British Columbia, Ted Gerk, and the President of Campaign Life Coalition of BC, John Hof.

"Today’s announcement by NDP Health Minister Joy MacPhail that she has "weeded out" from regional and community health councils people who support pro-life, is a frightening and ominous disregard for the democratic process. ……….Joy MacPhail has disenfranchised a large segment of the population with her pronouncement, by basically declaring anyone with pro-life views to be an "enemy of the people", and not welcome in government. What’s next? The "weeding out" of the Public Service, ensuring anyone who works for government signs a form declaring their pro-abortion views? The "weeding out" of the judiciary, ensuring that only judges that support the government’s philosophy will be appointed. (Allegedly already tried with the appointment to the judiciary council of Garson Romalis). The "weeding out" of the medical profession, ensuring only professionals that support abortion will be given positions of power?"

"McPhail has declared that it is right and proper to discriminate against those who hold a different philosophical viewpoint to that of her government. A scary and frightening prospect. It merely fuels the fire that the "Closer to Home" initiative is anything but, it’s closer to Victoria…and this government has no intention of listening to anyone but their own supporters…while conducting one of the largest asset grabs in the history of Canada!"

"We challenge this government to make all positions on regional and community health boards to be 100% democratically elected - we are not afraid to take these issues to our local communities - it is the NDP who cowers at the thought of being answerable to the local community."

Pro-Lifers plan to launch a series of complaints with both the Office of the Ombudsman and the BC Human Rights commission, citing the government for discrimination."

On Monday morning, February 10, your provincial executive was contacted by Gwen Landolt on the National Board with a request for lots of phone calls and faxes to be sent to Ottawa immediately to express our views on a particular issue. (This time, we were to contact Hon. Jean Charest, leader of the PC Party to tell him that we appreciated the pro-family stand which the PC Senators had taken en masse in opposing passage of Bill C-41 through the Senate. See the November/December 96 issue of REALITY for more details on how Bill C-41 will affect the family.)

We have been informed that Mr. Charest’s office received more than 600 telephone calls and over 200 faxes and e-mail letters regarding this matter. Over two-thirds of these were against the passing of C-41 in the proposed form. Thank you for your prompt action.

If you would be interested in being contacted with these occasional requests for immediate action into Ottawa please let us know via email, through our Web site, or by phone, mail or fax. See the front page of this newsletter for the appropriate addresses and numbers. We will then contact you whenever urgent action is needed. Your participation is greatly appreciated!