Public Warned About NEA Measure Promoting 'Diversity' of Marriage Alternatives
by Jim Brown and Jenni Parker
June 22, 2006
(AgapePress) - - A conservative activist is concerned over a recent proposal to amend the National Education Association's so-called "diversity" policy. She feels the proposal advocates same-sex "marriage" and polygamy and promotes the idea that these and other non-traditional sexual unions should be regarded as equivalent to traditional, one-man, one-woman marriage.
The proposal submitted for the National Education Association (NEA) annual convention, which begins on June 29 in Orlando, Florida, would add language to the group's diversity policy, making changes many pro-family advocates find troubling. The suggested amendment states, among other things, that "legal rights and responsibilities with regard to medical decisions, taxes, inheritance, adoption, legal immigration, domestic partnerships, and civil unions and/or marriage belong to ... diverse people and individuals," regardless of their age, sexual orientation, or marital status.
Linda Harvey of the pro-family group Mission America believes this NEA proposal could radically change what U.S. school children are taught in classrooms across the country. "It's basically saying any kind of legalized form of anything you're going to call marriage is going to be okay with us," she asserts, "and [that] we will want to, of course, promote that to our students and our faculty."
Harvey calls the proposal "outrageous" and describes it as "simply one more radical move by the NEA to promote anything and everything out there that is immoral." Adding the proposed language, she warns, "definitely would open the door to teaching that polygamy, common-law marriages, marriages [at] all ages" are all equally acceptable.
The Mission America representative says the proposed "diversity" policy amendments advocate "virtually any kind of definition you want to put on marriage" and then suggest, in effect, "that all of these different 'diverse' forms of unions would have to be presented to kids in an equal relationship to one another." And with the NEA's longtime involvement in pro-homosexual activism, she contends, the proposal will likely be approved.
Harvey says Christian teachers who pay dues to this powerful union should reconsider their investment in its efforts. She insists that amending the NEA's diversity policy will only serve to further advance this powerful group's liberal political agenda.
AFA 'Outs' the NEA's Pro-Homosexual Diversity Resolution
The Tupelo, Mississippi-based American Family Association (AFA) notes that the NEA's disturbing resolution endorsing homosexual "marriage" and other non-traditional unions has recently been pulled from the union's website. Reportedly, that move followed in the wake of an alert issued by AFA to its supporters, announcing the resolution and its implications.
AFA chairman Donald Wildmon says the removal of the resolution from the NEA website has the educators union "catching the wrath" of homosexual activists. "The NEA was trying to sneak this resolution past teachers and administrators, as well as the general public," he contends, "but they got caught."
Wildmon says the NEA yanked the resolution from its Internet site within hours after the pro-family organization made the measure public. The teachers union did not return phone calls from AgapePress regarding the proposed amendment or its removal from the website after it was publicly exposed.
Dr. Don Wildmon | |
Nevertheless, the AFA spokesman says the liberal educators union is still expected to present the "diversity" proposal in favor of homosexual "marriage" and other alternative unions at its annual meeting next week. "The homosexual pressure groups are angry and will force NEA to present the resolution," he asserts, "and we expect it will pass overwhelmingly." The NEA wants to promote homosexual marriage "in every avenue they have available, including textbooks, to all children at all age levels and without the permission or knowledge of parents," Wildmon says, "and their plans will include every public school in America."
For that reason, the pro-family leader adds, AFA encourages pro-family teachers and administrators to withdraw from NEA membership and join other educational associations more in tune with their beliefs.
