Public schools, because of the far left, are "more concerned with pushing woke ideology, pornography, and CRT (critical race theory) than focusing on academics," Oklahoma Secretary of Education Ryan Walters said on Newsmax Monday, speaking out after district officials in Tulsa agreed to pull two books out of a public school's libraries after parents complained they were obscene.
"I had parents that were reaching out, saying there are graphic novels in our school, and what we saw were graphic sex acts being depicted," Walters said on Newsmax's "National Report." "Frankly, it violates our child pornography law. It was sex acts between minors being depicted, and very explicitly in these graphic novels. There's no place for it. It's pornography."
The graphic novels, titled "Gender Queer" and "Flamer" were pulled after a social media outcry, and Joy Hofmeister, the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, issued a statement about her disapproval, reports Tulsa's NBC affiliate, KJRH.
But Walters said there are other schools throughout the state where offensive materials remain in the school libraries, and even nationwide, and called the "pornography in our schools" an "attempt from the far left to sexualize our young people and we have to get this nonsense out our schools."
He also said that when he brought the books to the attention of officials, the reaction was to "knock it off."
"I got an email from a parent this weekend from another superintendent, where they pointed out pornographic material in their library, and the response was 'Well, you know, we've got a committee. We'll look at it,' " said Walters. "This isn't how we do things … it's pornography. It's unbelievable what we have seen the far left do to our schools in the last 30 years. It is absolutely incredible."
The left, he added, has pushed ideologies like CRT that are telling kids to "hate their country, creating division, and then there's sexualizing our kids. This is absolutely the behavior of a groomer to put sexual material, explicit sexual activity, in front of minors, in front of grade school students, it absolutely has to stop."
The "motive" he added, is to "sexualize our young people, get them to hate our country, and vote against the Republican Party."
He also accused the Biden administration and the national teachers' union of "pushing these books."
"As adults, we protect children," said Walters. "We protect their innocence. We want them to learn, but putting pornography in front of a grade-school kid isn't helping grow their academic ability. It is absolutely indoctrination.
"We have to stay vigilant, but yes, administrators have to be held accountable. But too often, these administrators are more concerned with playing the woke Olympics rather than the academic success of our young people."
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Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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