Opinion: The Meaning “Family” Values

If you run into a group that uses the word “family” in its name, run the other way.

First, there was the Gambino Family, the most powerful organized crime outfit in America, which specialized in labor racketeering, loan sharking, prostitution, extortion and dumping violations. Celebrity wiseguy John Gotti took control of the Gambinos in 1985 by assassinating boss Paul Castellano outside a Manhattan steak house.

Then there was the Manson Family, the hippie gang who killed six Los Angelenos during the hot August of 1969.

When I was growing up, the toughest motorcycle gang in my hometown called itself The Family. The sign above their clubhouse read, “If You Don’t Know If You’re Welcome -- You’re Not!”

And now we have the Illinois Family Institute, which helped defeat an anti-bullying bill in the General Assembly, on the grounds that its real purpose was to indoctrinate children in the homosexual agenda.

Here’s what Institute blogger Laurie Higgins had to say about the bill, in a post entitled “The New Bullying Amendment Exposed.”

Imagine we’re playing the childhood game of “Red Light, Green Light.” Homosexual activists and their ideological allies see conservatives with their backs turned away from the game and know they have the green light. Some will career wildly toward their goal of total societal transformation, while others take baby steps, hoping no one will notice until it’s too late.

Don’t be fooled again. HB 5290 is not about bullying prevention. If we’re going to allow this unnecessary, partisan bill to pass, at least make sure it includes an opt-out for students and school employees.

In a subsequent post, Higgins wondered whether schools would extend the same tolerance to promiscuous girls, incestuous couples, or polyamorous arrangements.

To illustrate that “anti-bullying” programs that address homosexuality or gender confusion (aka “gender identity” or “gender expression”) are centrally about promoting “progressive” notions about homosexuality, just replace “sexual orientation” (a Leftist rhetorical creation) with another condition constituted by subjective feelings and volitional sexual acts.

(The post also included a cartoon of a Doc Marten boot labeled “Special Gay Agenda” crushing a church labeled “Religious Freedom.”)

The Institute lobbied for an amendment that would allow parents to remove their children from anti-bullying lessons that violated their religious beliefs. The amendment was tabled, so the bill failed, opposed by Republicans who said some anti-bullying programs are “pro-homosexual.”

And so an effort to stop bullying is defeated, thanks to another “family.”  

Buy this book! Ward Room blogger Edward McClelland's book, Young Mr. Obama: Chicago and the Making of a Black President , is available Amazon. Young Mr. Obama includes reporting on President Obama's earliest days in the Windy City, covering how a presumptuous young man transformed himself into presidential material. Buy it now!

Contact Us