Dear Friends,
We want to update you on some encouraging progress.
One of FPA’s major policy focuses this year has been legislation protecting children from pornography through age verification requirements. This effort is part of our broader Let Parents Parent campaign, because parents are the primary guardians of their children’s innocence. We’re seeing some great success in this effort so far this year, and your support is making it possible.
Recently, I traveled to Nebraska to join our friends at Nebraska Family Alliance in advocating for one of these bills. I testified in a committee hearing about the danger pornography poses to children, and how easy it is for them to unintentionally stumble upon it on the internet.
We also recorded a podcast with them talking about these dangers and how parents and churches can respond to them.
Family Policy Alliance has also convened a Coalition of allied organizations, legislators, and expert witnesses dedicated to getting these bills passed in the states. Armed with model legislation and advocacy materials, this coalition has gotten these bills introduced in more than 15 states, with many likely to pass. We are actively crippling the pornography industry with these bills, and your support is what makes it possible.
Stay tuned for more updates from us on the progress of this effort. We invite you to join us in prayer and in speaking up about the threat pornography poses to children.
Finally, if you are not already partnered with us in this effort, please consider doing so.
We will not stop until the pornography industry can no longer prey on our innocent children.
For our kids,
Joseph Kohm
Director, Public Policy
Dear Colorado Friend,
I want to alert you to a dangerous bill moving through the Colorado legislature that would force schools to “socially transition” children without their parents’ consent or knowledge.
HB 24-1039 would mandate that schools accommodate a child’s attempted “gender transition” by requiring that all Colorado public and charter schools use a child’s “preferred name.” Failure to comply with the use of a child’s preferred name would be considered discrimination under this new law.
The legislation goes so far as to require the Colorado Department of Education to provide recommended policies for schools to implement “non-legal name change” practices in every public or charter school in Colorado by July 2025.
Parents have the Constitutional right to direct the upbringing of their children, including decisions like so-called “social transitioning.” But this proposal is the first of its kind in the nation, representing a radical departure from long-established parental rights and instead setting up schools as decision-makers in the lives of children suffering from gender dysphoria, regardless of parental involvement.
HB 1039 is currently moving through the legislature and could receive a vote in the House any day before it moves to the Senate for further consideration.
Please send a message to your state lawmakers today telling them that this legislation is wrong for Colorado families, and you expect them to oppose it when it comes up for a vote.
Sending a message is easy in our Action Center and takes just a moment.
Your voice is needed, so please act today.
Sincerely,
John Paulton
Vice President, State Alliances
Living in a woke world as a conservative can be difficult. Raising children in a woke world is even more difficult! Parents, this new podcast episode is for YOU. Today, you’ll hear from an expert on children’s rights and parenting in this crazy world we’re living in.
Katy Faust is founder and president of Them Before Us, a global children’s rights non-profit, which defends a child’s right to their mother and father. She’s a mom on a mission against the overreach of progressives, especially when it comes to our nation’s children.
Our Vice President of Education, Amanda Banks, is joined by Katy Faust to discuss her book, Raising Conservative Kids in a Woke City. Tune in to learn how you can make an impact on the next generation of Americans!
LIVE TODAY on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube,
SoCon Report or by clicking the image below
10:00am PT / 11:00am MT / 12:00pm CT / 1:00pm ET
At Family Policy Alliance, our vision is a nation where God is honored, religious freedom flourishes, families thrive, and life is cherished. To stay up to date on the fight to protect families and learn how to take action, follow us on social media!
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See you in the comments section,
Emma Rarden
Digital Specialist – Producer
Did you hear the news? At a U.S. Senate Hearing last week, Mark Zuckerberg apologized to families whose children suffered as a result of social media use.
As families held up photographs of their deceased children, Zuckerberg pledged to invest in greater safety efforts.
So, will parents finally be able to rely on big tech companies to protect their children from abuse, exploitation, pornography, and other unwanted content?
Of course not.
We don’t ask our children to cook dinner without explaining how to safely operate an oven. We don’t even take them on a walk without instructing them to hold our hand, when they’re little, or to look both ways, when they’re old enough to walk alone.
We teach them how to protect themselves and others in all of these situations (and many more). Why? Because we love our children.
Using technology is no different. We can’t leave it up to big tech companies to protect our kids. It is up to us to protect them and teach them how to safely navigate life online.
Here are three tips to get started:
- Take an inventory of all technology devices.
You know what technologies your child has access to at home–tablets, phones, computers, and televisions–but do you know what technologies are available to them at school? Monitoring your child’s time spent online is impossible without first knowing all of the devices they use. Ensure proper safety apps and programs are downloaded on each device and that an appropriate amount of time is being spent on all of them, combined. - Make technology expectations clear.
As parents we hope that our children have a good head on their shoulders, but it’s unfair to have expectations for our children without ever directly expressing them. Talk to your child about your expectations for their behavior and time management while using technology. Be their best resource on how to appropriately use technology and keep conversations open so that both you and your child can bring up any concerns. - Know the potential harms associated with technology.
It’s easy to bury our heads in the sand and just accept technology as a way of life in the 21st century, but it’s up to parents to know the threats of on-line bullying, sexploitation, social contagions, drug sales, and more so that we can properly train and warn our children. We will never begin to form a battle plan if we can’t even identify the enemy.
We know that the ever-changing nature of the internet makes it hard for parents to keep up with all of the threats facing our children. But there are resources available for parents who want to grow in their knowledge of how to protect their children, including our Back-to-School for Parents guide. Our free guide is designed to help parents like you be better prepared to protect and advocate for your children.
Tech companies may be feeling the demand for greater safety protocols online, but they are still driven by profits. Parents, alone, are driven by their child’s well-being. We look forward to partnering with you to protect them.
From one parent to another,
Robert Noland
Director, Marketing
P.S. – Keep an eye on your inbox! New resources to help parents better protect their children are under development. We can’t wait to share them with you.
Dear Friends,
We have a request for your help. This week, Senator Tim Scott introduced the Families’ Rights and Responsibilities Act.
Parents know their children best and love them more than anyone else. But recent years have seen unprecedented attacks on parents’ fundamental right to direct the upbringing of their children. The Families’ Rights and Responsibilities Act will ensure this fundamental right is not ignored or overruled by government officials simply because the government disagrees with the parents.
The Families’ Rights and Responsibilities Act will also protect parents’ rights to choose schools and make medical decisions for their children.
The U.S. Supreme Court has consistently recognized parental rights as fundamental, and this Act will ensure that courts treat parental rights with the highest legal standard of “strict scrutiny” when federal policies burden parental rights.
Along with our friends in the Promise to America’s Parents Coalition, we need your help to ensure Congress passes this Act and protects parental rights.
Send a message to your Congressional Representative today and tell them you expect them to sign on as cosponsor of the Families Rights’ and Responsibilities Act!
Getting as many cosponsors on the bill as possible will help ensure the House votes to pass it. Contacting your Representative only takes a minute in our Action Center; by doing so, you will ensure parental rights are protected in federal law.
For families,
Joseph Kohm
Director of Public Policy
The Left is trying to destroy God’s ordained plan for family leadership, causing disdain for parental authority and reimagining culture to include more government control over the next generation.
But you know that children—yours, your grandchildren, or even your neighbor’s children—are not political pawns to be won.
Thanks to the support of social conservatives like you, 2023 saw Family Policy Alliance (FPA) on the front lines of the fight to restore parental rights and Let Parents Parent.
Our updated, comprehensive Back to School Guide is a valuable resource that’s educating parents about their rights and teaching social conservatives how to better protect children from the Left’s pro-abortion and LGBTQ agendas–agendas that continue to creep into our nation’s classrooms. Take advantage of the Back to School Guide and share it with a friend so that you, too, can champion the rights of parents in our schools.
While schools are ground zero for the Left’s attacks, their plans to indoctrinate children go well beyond the classroom. Their messages often dominate on social media, through the judicial system, and even through sporting events. The ambush on our homes can feel overwhelming, but there is good news: Your generous support is allowing us to grow our defense of parental authority to be equally comprehensive.
After seeing how the Left used the judicial system to punish parents holding traditional sexual values, we drafted model legislation for 2024 that will protect parents from judicial activism in custody battles. Our Model Custody Protection Act seeks to prevent judges from favoring parents who affirm children’s transgender identities over those with traditional convictions about human sexuality.
Additionally, FPA has endorsed model legislation to implement age-verification requirements for children’s social media use. Social media has played no small part in conditioning our children to accept the Left’s agenda. The Protecting Kids Online Act simply seeks to restore parents’ control over their underage child’s online activity, including of the content they see.
In 2023, FPA also helped five more states enact legislation to #SaveGirlsSports. The Left’s attempt to infiltrate athletics with their liberal agenda has far-reaching consequences for both the women athletes who are losing out and the next generation of children who are waiting to see if we will defend God’s design of men and women. Thanks to your support, more than 1.5 million female athletes–both at the high school and college level–won’t have to compete against men.
The fight to restore parental rights is far from over, and the Left never stops in seeking to claim ground that was never theirs to start with.
But we stand on solid ground.
We look forward to advancing reforms that restore parental authority in 2024, and with your help, we will continue to reclaim our homes one school board, one state, and one generation at a time.
May God bless your home now and in the new year,
Robert Noland
Director, Audience Engagement
Can you imagine your elementary-school-aged child or grandchild going to their school’s book fair and finding pornographic material available to purchase and take home? That could be happening in a school near you, if your local school hosts Scholastic book fairs.
Scholastic Books, the world’s largest publisher and distributor of children’s books, recently decided to offer a collection of books to elementary school students that covered controversial topics including pornographic LGBTQ+ material. After controversy with the Left, Scholastic buckled under pressure, possibly resulting in an even more dangerous policy regarding these books.
Join our Joseph Kohm and Amanda Banks as they take a deep dive into this controversial story and provide you with the information you need to take action and help protect kids. Tune in to our video podcast and ask your questions LIVE this morning!
TUNE IN Tuesday November 14 on Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube
SoconReport or by clicking the image below
7:00am PT / 8:00am MT / 9:00am CT / 10:00am ET
You might be thinking, “I’ll watch the podcast and share it with my friends, but what can I do now?” Sign our open letter to Scholastic Books, telling them that selling sexualized, pornographic material in schools is unacceptable. You can do that here.
At Family Policy Alliance, our vision is a nation where God is honored, religious freedom flourishes, families thrive, and life is cherished. To stay up to date on the fight to protect families and learn how to take action, follow us on social media!
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See you in the comments section!
Emma Rarden
Communications Specialist – Producer
Dear Friends,
Earlier this week, we alerted you to the story that iconic Scholastic Books had scrapped plans to protect elementary children from certain pornographic and sexually explicit titles appearing in their school book fairs. If you missed it, you can read more about the situation HERE.
Already, thousands of our readers have taken action by signing our open letter to Scholastic! If you have done so, thank you!
If you have not yet signed the open letter to Scholastic, please do so by clicking HERE now. (But please come back to finish reading this important message…because there is more!)
Right now, we do not know if Scholastic will do anything. That means that we need to continue to press upon them how dangerous it is to sell sexualized, pornographic content to children of any age.
Much like Target and Bud Light, some large corporations really don’t care what people think until they see their bottom line being affected. Ultimately, it’s all about the money.
But we have a plan, and you can help.
Family Policy Alliance is asking you to help in one more simple way – and this one will require just a little homework from you, but we think it will be worth it.
Because schools must invite Scholastic into their buildings to sell a single book, school board members have the power to tell Scholastic that they cannot sell books to any student. The message is that Scholastic must change their policy, or they will not be allowed back into schools.
To send that message, we must notify school board members who share our values and want to protect children. They must be informed about the harmful material Scholastic sells in schools and they must be willing to take action to stop it.
Here is where you can make a difference.
We need to know who the strong, reliable, conservative school board members are in your area so we can provide them with the background material and tools they need to protect children from harmful materials.
There are over 90,000 local school board members in 14,000 school districts across the nation, and knowing who to reach out to is a daunting task. Your help in narrowing our focus to those best positioned to take action on this issue will be immensely helpful.
Here is where your homework comes in.
For any school board member whom you feel should be involved, CLICK HERE and provide the following: Their name, an email address and the name of your school district, city and state. If you do not have all of this information, share as much as you can! If you are fortunate enough to have several good school board members, please send us contact information for all of them.
We appreciate your help in firing up elected officials at the grassroots level!
Your input here is key to activating what we hope is a national effort to stop schools and corporations from pushing pornography on schoolchildren of any age.
Again – click HERE to give us contact information for any reliable, conservative school board member(s) in your area and we will reach out right away to equip them with the tools they need to take action on this issue.
Thank you,
Robert Noland
Director, Audience Engagement
Dear Friends,
Recently parents across the country have been taking action to eradicate pornographic material in school libraries and curricula. Such content simply has no place in our schools. Pornography is deeply destructive in a child’s life; and in a time when the average age of first exposure to pornography is between 8 and 11 years old, schools need to be sure they are not facilitating such exposure.
But can you imagine your elementary-school-aged child or grandchild going to their school’s book fair and finding that same pornographic material available to purchase and take home?
What school would allow this and ask parents to pay for such content?
Scholastic Books, the world’s largest publisher and distributor of children’s books, has been iconic in the school book fair realm, having sold books to young readers for over 80 years. Scholastic is, however, not the wholesome company you might think.
Scholastic recently decided to offer a collection of books to elementary school students that covered controversial topics including LGBTQ+ material. Scholastic had proposed steps to ensure that these controversial, pornographic titles were segregated as a special category of books. Schools could even decline to sell the titles in this category outright if they wished.
The policy was short-lived when last month, Scholastic buckled under pressure from the Left to scrap the policy. They fell to outlandish (woke) claims that by protecting children, they were being discriminatory and banning books.
In fact, Scholastic apologized for their efforts to protect elementary children when they promptly reversed course.
Scholastic should not offer such content to children in the first place, but now, given this recent policy reversal, it is presumed that students of any age will eventually be able to find and preview pornographic content at Scholastic books fair without restriction. (Note: Scholastic already provides controversial, pornographic titles for sale to older children without restriction.)
What can you do?
We are asking you to sign our open letter to Scholastic Books telling them that selling sexualized, pornographic material in schools is unacceptable and asking them to stop selling pornography to children of any age.
Book fairs are usually fantastic opportunities for children to fall in love with reading, however pornography and gender politics appear to be tainting this once wholesome realm and endangering children.
Please take action by signing onto our letter to Scholastic today.
Sincerely,
Robert Noland
Director, Audience Engagement
PS Please use the buttons below to share this message on social media and with your friends and family who need to weigh in as well.
It’s officially back to school season! But, do you really know what your child is going back to? Whether you’re a parent, grandparent, or involved in another way, you may be asking “What’s happening at my child’s school?” In today’s woke culture, it’s a fair question.
Whether it’s extremely explicit books, or boys in girls’ locker rooms, or schools leaving parents in the dark about medical decisions – there are many situations to be aware of, and they could be happening at the school your child attends. In today’s podcast episode, Meridian Baldacci and Autumn Leva discuss what is happening in schools across the country, and why parents are alarmed. Most importantly, they give you practical steps you can take to protect your family.
TUNE IN Friday, Sept 22nd on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, or SoConReport
Or by clicking the image below
10:00am PT / 11:00am MT / 12:00pm CT / 1:00pm ET
We’ve got you covered as your family heads back to school: meet Back to School for Parents! It’s a condensed guide for busy parents about what’s happening in your child’s school, how to identify areas of concern, and how to advocate for your child and your rights.
In the guide, you’ll learn about your rights and your child’s rights, gain suggestions about how to respectfully advocate for your child, and access links to additional helpful articles and resources.
And best of all? It’s completely free! Download your free guide here today to learn how you can start protecting your child at school.
At Family Policy Alliance, our vision is a nation where God is honored, religious freedom flourishes, families thrive, and life is cherished. To stay up to date on the fight to protect families and learn how to take action, follow us on social media!
See you in the comments section!
Emma Rarden
Communications Specialist – Producer
P.S. Have you checked out our NEW podcast? We pick the brains of newsmakers and experts to break down what’s happening now on the issues YOU care about. With new episodes weekly, you’ll be up to date on all things that affect your family. Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or Google Podcasts.