Schools Alerted to Agenda of GLSEN-Sponsored 'No Name-Calling Week'

by Jim Brown
March 3, 2004

(AgapePress) - A pro-family leader is warning about the true agenda behind a project to end bullying and verbal harassment in public middle schools.

The Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) has teamed up with Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing to create "No Name-Calling Week." Continuing through Friday, the project includes educational activities purportedly aimed at providing schools with tools to eliminate bullying in their communities.

However, Bob Knight with the Culture and Family Institute, says given GLSEN's track record, he has no doubt this is an attempt to promote homosexuality to kids under the guise of trying to make schools safe.

Bob Knight

"What they ought to do with No Name-Calling Week is actually urge the homosexual activists in the schools to stop calling Christian kids and other traditionalists 'bigots,' 'haters,' and that sort of thing," Knight says. "They're far more prone to cast morality as a form of bigotry than you will find other kids being hateful to the gay kids these days under official auspices."

The observance began on Monday with simultaneous events at the Simon Wiesenthal Center Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles and the New York Tolerance Center. More than 3,500 school administrators and educators across the U.S. are currently taking part in the project.

According to Knight, the project promotes the acceptance of deviant behavior. "The schools should teach civility and tell each child that every other child deserves dignity and respect," he says. "You can do this without also promoting homosexuality."

According to Knight, GLSEN's message is that to achieve "full dignity," children need to be told that homosexuality is normal and healthy, and that anyone who says otherwise is a "hateful bigot."

"That's just untrue [and] it's unnecessary," Knight says, "and schools should not submit to this propaganda campaign."

"No Name-Calling Week" targets children in grades 5 to 8, and was inspired by a young adult novel titled The Misfits. Other organizations lending their name to the observance include some that have shown anti-family tendencies in the past -- such as Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, Girl Scouts of America, and Planned Parenthood Federation of America.