Moms for Liberty Wants to Make American Kids Oblivious to Sex Ed: Report

Right-wing extremists and Republican politicians attended the Moms for Liberty annual summit in Pennsylvania in June, one session included an activist who complained about the concept of "consent" in sex education.

Hundreds of participants rallied in Philadelphia to share their aggrieved worldview at a series of talks from right-wing activists. The Southern Poverty Law Center designated Moms for Liberty an anti-government extremist group.

Although the session on “Comprehensive Sex Education: Sex Education or Sexualization” led by conservative education activist Kelly Schenkoske was closed to the press, True North Research obtained a recording of the speech, which Popular Information received, the outlet reports.

The panel was part of a larger initiative to eradicate or rethink sex education in public schools.

Schenkoske took exception to “consent” as a concept that should be taught. In her opinion, children that learn about consent are vulnerable to sexual exploitation because they “are often taught to be obedient,” she said.

In her opinion, consent is “confusing,” plus, “there’s a benefit to teaching kids how to say no and to have those boundaries.”

She said that sex education used to focus only on safety, birth control choices, and sexually transmitted infections. She criticized comprehensive sex education for including topics like “sexual rights and sexual citizenship” and “sexuality,” which addresses gender identity and sexual orientation, according to Popular Information.

In her view, public schools should not discuss topics such as sexuality with children since they cannot process information.

She also opposes curricula that recognize LGBTQ+ people while not labeling them as abnormal. “[Heteronormativity] is the norm that a male and female relationship [is] the norm. But this idea is very much to remove or to get away from that concept,” she said, Popular Information reports.

Members of Moms for Liberty fought against sexual education curricula in New Jersey, Maryland, Montana, Wisconsin, and Texas.

At the end of the talk, audience members were invited to a question-and-answer session. Some speakers made bizarre claims.

“In Michigan, we voted on Proposal 3… we literally voted our parental rights away,” one person claimed. “[W]e have lost our parental medical rights of our children… the schools have all the things that they are able to pass out, the abortion pills, they are able to start transgender, trans, you know… Your child can go to the clinic between 2nd and 3rd hours and have their abortion pill… This is in our middle school and high schools.” The person added, “[a] boy can start the process of cutting his penis off right there in his high school on his lunch.”

Schenkoske played into the false narrative the person had offered.

“[Y]es, there’s other states that are making changes abruptly,” she responded.

There is no truth to the claims that the audience member made.

Recently, Schenkoske similarly made untrue claims, arguing that the Maui wildfire tragedy resulted from a government plot to take homeowners’ land, according to Popular Info.

She also lacks a background in sexual education and is not a certified teacher. She recently told far-right-wing online personality Tim Pool that her Bachelor’s degree is in English, the outlet reports.

Another attendee complained about an Illinois law that “put LGBTQ history into the grade schools,” suggesting that “it’s generating conversations that are highly inappropriate because the kids don’t know what that is.” As a result, the children started “asking about it,” prompting their parents to “freak out.” The person indicated they are “telling people to homeschool” to keep LGBTQ+ content from history classes.

Under Illinois HB 0246, public schools must “include a study of the roles and contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people in the history of this country and this State.” According to the 2019 law, schools must teach students by the eighth grade about the contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people to state and U.S. history.