Prop 8 – Like We Said, Don’t Worry Your Kids Aren’t Learning Anything At All.

Over at our Prop. 8 explanation and recommendation, one commenter took issue with out assessment of whether same-sex marriage would be taught in schools.

Here’s an excerpt:

So if this is the case why was my niece in kindergarten…read a book and taught a song about “You have two mommies, I have two daddies…” without notification of the parents or opportunity to opt out…. How do I go about opting my child out of the teaching same sex marriage/relationships in the “general curriculum?” If I can’t do that, it’s as good as “required”.

We would like to clarify our point.  First, whether Prop. 8 passes or not, some kids will continue to have two mommies or two daddies.  Same-sex couples will continue to have children and those children will continue to end up in the same kindergarten class as our commenter’s niece.  As the commenter’s example shows, marriage is not discussed in the kindergarten class.  The issue here isn’t marriage, the song is about different kinds of families – it’s about tolerance . Prop. 8 won’t change that, the song will remain the same.  We realize that this is the point that many Prop. 8 supporters are trying to make, that this teaching of tolerance will somehow be used to shoehorn same-sex marriage into the curriculum.

However, a look at the state standards for health education does away with the argument.  In a report from last August about the standards, the L.A. Times pointed out:

There is nothing in the Education Code about the age at which children should learn about marriage. The grades at which students should be taught certain subjects is contained on the content standards, and the don’t mention marriage until high school, at which point students are supposed to learn about the differences between just-plain dating, committed relationships and marriage.

However, we do agree with what our commenter implies, that she would not want the “two mommies, two daddies” song in the classroom at all. We here at Johnny California agree with her.

We do not have a problem with the content of the song, but we’re baffled that kindergartners are wasting their time singing about parents at all. These kids can go home and see what kind of parents they have.  Shouldn’t these kids be learning how to read?

OK, yeah, now we sound like grumpy cranks,  but we’re trying to make a point.

We here at Johnny California hope that everyone on both sides of the Prop. 8 issue ask themselves whether they will care as much about education after the election as they do now.  Seriously think about that question.  How truly concerned are you about the quality of your child’s education? No matter what side of Prop. 8 you’re on, how are we going to deal with the horrendous problems facing our education system?

California is one of the ten largest economies in the world, yet our 4th graders are 49th in the country in reading ,49th in math and second-to-last in science. Today, Gov. Schwarzenegger announced “immediate cuts in the range of $2 to $4 billion to the state education budget.”  Worse, there is another measure on the ballot , Prop. 6, which threatens to take even more money out of education and give it to law enforcement programs that “have no definable goals.”

So in these last days before the election, we encourage all voters, on both sides of 8, to do a gut-check. Knowing full well that Prop. 8 itself does nothing to change the education laws or standards, we encourage voters to ask themselves if they are truly fired up about education or are they just fired up about Prop. 8 and are using education as a straw-man argument to push their agenda?

The issue is not whether our kids are learning about same sex marriage or learning about tolerance.  The issue is whether our kids are learning anything at all.