March 2023
Hello liberty lovers of Riverside County!
In the news: Upland schools are racist
Upland is not in Riverside County, but it’s right next door, and was the latest flashpoint in the roiling debate over what schools are for, can do, and should be. As such, we over here in Riverside County can look over the fence and see a cautionary tale unfolding in the neighbors’ yard.
The basics are simple: In February, a scandal erupted at an elementary school Valentine card exchange. Several students gave and received some pretty stupidly racist hand-drawn cards. This is apparently a pattern. From the 28 February Press-Enterprise:
At a news conference in Los Angeles on Monday, the families said they have been dealing with racist bullying at the school for years with little to no response. One family shared they had numerous communications with Pepper Tree Elementary regarding their four children starting in 2017.
“This time last year when my son was called monkey in class the only reason we stopped our complaint was the principal assured my wife and I that there would be training. There would be diversity training,” said Rome Douglas, father of the child involved in the second card incident.
The Douglases said their children have experienced microaggressions such as name calling and unwanted touching from fellow students, which has made it difficult for them to go to school each day. They said they have reached out to the school repeatedly requesting training or education and were assured the issues were being addressed.
“We believe in advocacy and have been down to the school,” Douglas said. “There have been quite a few emails asking for training, for education, diversity training we’ve been promised and we’ve been told recently that none of these promises were ever fulfilled.”
Now, the families plan to file a claim with the school district, attorneys said Monday. It was not immediately clear if the claim had been filed. Such claims are typically precursors to a lawsuit.
It's easy to get out in the weeds on microaggressions and their validity. Not everyone agrees that they even exist. Regardless of your stance on the issue, however, what is clear is that in the perception of the people involved here, they are real and a problem. As a matter of respecting others’ beliefs, let us take them at their word and stipulate that this is all for real. If your kids aren't safe at school, WHY WOULD YOU KEEP SENDING THEM? What absurd collectivist faith keeps you laying your children on the sacrificial altar of the state, begging the high priests of equity to please perform the rituals of diversity training that will shield your children with talismanic tolerance?
Public school is clearly not giving these families what they want. It hasn’t since 2017! Why would they think it ever will? Public schools as an institution exist solely to perpetuate themselves, and they do that by keeping as many students in the seats as possible. “The schools” don’t care an iota about the children. For them, children mean funding and that’s it. So no, parents of Upland, you’re never going to get what you want.
Any discussion of education requires a clear caveat: there are plenty of teachers and administrators who genuinely care about educating children. But they are working in a system that is teetering on the brink of total collapse, kept alive solely by predatory public-sector unions ensuring their bought-off government lackeys keep public schooling legally compulsory. The teachers and other site-level staff are as much victims of government here as the families.
This kind of failure is endemic to the whole government enterprise. There are some benefits in the nooks and crannies (a broken clock is right twice a day) but writ large it's a scam perpetrated by vicious busybodies who view those they "serve" as widgets to be organized, not people to be appreciated. "Good" government officials are the ones trying to keep government out of people's way. Good government officials want as many people as possible to not need government. Good school staff work to educate students while keeping those students as shielded as possible from “the system.” The proper response to government system failure is not forlorn hope that it will ever get fixed. It's figuring out a way to work around it and live without it.
Some parents do this. Some parents pull that trigger and pull their kids out, and they are worthy of salute. In many cases, this just means transferring schools to find those educators truly trying to educate despite the system they are yoked to. But some families go all the way; some homeschool, some unschool, some engage private options.
The obvious counterclaim here is that not everyone has the time or resources to truly manage their family’s education needs like this. But again, in the example above, these parents believe their children are in real danger. If you think your child is in danger, whatever the kind, why would you ever agree to wait for someone else to fix your problem? Why would you allow “dangerous abuse” to continue based on the promises of a bureaucrat? How could you look yourself in the mirror, knowing you sent your child into an environment of emotional (and maybe even physical) trauma, because you couldn’t bring yourself to act? Parents who exit their children from the education edifice do not face an easy road, but they all understand that government simply isn’t going to be the answer they are looking for. They’re right.
Even when it is doing something reasonably beneficial, government is never the answer. It’s a consequence.
Calendar Notes
In February the LP of California held their annual organizing convention. All five members of your RivCo Executive Committee were there, in addition to several other members from the county. County Chairman Loren Dean even got roped into moderating a debate between LP presidential hopefuls Chase Oliver and Lars Mapstead! In general business, almost every seat on the state ExCom was up for election, and a group of young fresh faces were elected, hoping to bring new energy to the state-level party organization. We wish them well in their endeavors as we focus on the local action here in Riverside County.
As part of that new organization, we welcome a new Southern Area Coordinator: Mr. Garrison Ham of Oceanside. RivCo’s own Tara Young was the last SAC (thanks for being awesome, Tara!), and we are lucky to have her now as one of our local county vice chairs. Garrison has already met with the combined chairs of the southern area (San Bernardino, Riverside, San Diego, Orange, and Los Angeles counties), and some great ideas are getting kicked around that will be shared as soon as they are shareable.
Looking ahead here in the county, we’re going to try and organize an April Tax Revolt shindig concurrent with our Q2 Central Committee meeting. At the very least, we’ll meet for lunch and complain about taxation, by which we mean theft (or extortion, or robbery, depending on your point of view). Know a place where we can gather? Let us know! We’ll send out a special alert here once we get details hammered out.
Have a great March!
Closing Thoughts from the Chair
Schools made themselves a focus of special attention this last month, but the Upland schools are not the only ones. Stories of schools failing students are rampant all over Riverside County, too. LPRC Treasurer Joshua Clark and I were both at the fateful Riverside Unified School District meeting the day the “SOHCAHTOA Scandal” erupted. These problems are unending, and they’re just not going to get fixed.
There are lots of ways to educate kids. Compulsory public education must stop being one of them.
But what can you do about it? If you’re already homeschooling or unschooling, keep doing that. Keep yourself versed in the ins and outs of how to do it and do it successfully. If you don’t have kids or feel like your kids are doing at least okay in school as it is (awful as it is), start volunteering. Get into a booster club, or PTA, or volunteer with a school club, or do some tutoring. Get educated on what’s going on in the schools (public, private, or otherwise) near you, and help students navigate school wherever you can. When the public schools collapse (and they will), lots of parents will be terrified. They will look for people with good ideas about what they can do next. Be one of those people, in place to help. That’s the essence of libertarian community activism. I invite you to make it part of your life.
–Loren Dean