Establishment Media:
Jennifer Chambers is a writer for The Detroit News and her latest opinion article titled Fed-up parents press Michigan school boards over masking, other divisive issues will not disappoint her bosses. As she ignores facts in order to support the narrative.
Chambers is not new to this as she wrote and an article back on January 9, 2021, in which she failed to include specific details she was provided in regard to Rochester Community Schools’ Superintendent and BOE and their failure to communicate effectively and an outright lack of public transparency.
Chambers did print “Bull said she has no plans to resign and district officials have been communicating with parents weekly via email and during two school board meetings every month about decision-making around remote learning vs. in-person school.”
The problem was that the district was not in fact communicating weekly via email. Chamber was made aware of the inaccuracy and it was never corrected.
In this most recent article, Chambers makes the claim that Moms of Liberty is “a controversial national organization launched by moms in Florida to support “parental rights” in public schools.”
Yep, that is it, no other information was provided to explain how or why the Moms for Liberty is controversial.
When Chambers mentions that “Tuksal is part of the Michigan Parent Alliance for Safe Schools, which has been working county by county and school board by the school board to get mask mandates in schools.” there is no added adjective such as controversial.
There is no question that mask and vaccine mandates are controversial. The word comes from controversy which is defined as “a discussion marked especially by the expression of opposing views.”
Media’s Responsibility
Jesse Singal recently said “The mainstream media has a responsibility to report facts honestly, whether or not they line up with preexisting narratives or ideological priors. If they fail to do so, their actions will only drive America further down its present, dangerous path.” This was in response to the horrendous coverage by the establishment media of the Rittenhouse case.
The Detroit News and writer like Jennifer Chambers are doing the same things. Standing up for individual rights is bad. Government mandates based on irrational fears are considered good or noble causes by the thought police at The Detroit News.
Luxury Beliefs:
Now that let’s look at what is really going on and what this debate is really about.
Rob Henderson describes luxury beliefs as, “These are ideas and opinions that confer status on the rich at very little cost while taking a toll on the lower class.”
Henderson provides this example of a luxury belief.
“One example of luxury belief is that all family structures are equal. This is not true. Evidence is clear that families with two married parents are the most beneficial for young children. And yet, affluent, educated people raised by two married parents are more likely than others to believe monogamy is outdated, marriage is a sham or that all families are the same.”
If They Really Knew
Here is how Chambers described MacFarland and Tuksal.
“MacFarland, 39, works as a supervisor in purchasing and has a master’s degree. She became more involved in the education of her two children last year by watching Troy School District Board of Education meetings online and attending them this spring in person.”
“Tuksal, 46, has two children in school, a fifth-grader, and a freshman. She is an engineer by trade with a college education. She has been, as she describes it, a full-time CEO of the Tuksal household since the kids were little. In 2018, Tuksal said she became more active as divisions in the nation grew more stark.”
Working mom compared to self-identified CEO of their household (for close to a decade). Not hard to see which one of these moms might just have some luxury beliefs if no way aside from the fact that she has hours per day to dedicate to her variation of online advocacy.
It does appear that Tuksal is able to provide her students with a very nice at-home setup for learning. This afforded her the ability to take the position of keeping the schools closed despite the harm it was doing particularly in the homes of students with two working parents that do not have the luxury of a “CEO of household.” To then pass judgment on parents that were voicing their concerns about the damage that was being done to their students when they are out of school, to be honest just feels tone deaf. I think it would be easy to see why why working class families, particularly those with two working adults, might feel the need to establish their own voice or presence in the world of social media and advocacy.
The reality is that Tuksal clearly could not fully comprehend what it was like for students and families that have experiences different from her own. What she did instead, was leverage the media to create an echo chamber of parents with similar luxury beliefs and make an effort to impart their demands on those with differing ideals.
Perception vs. Reality
Another Troy parent, Kelly Jones, was quoted in the article by Chambers as saying, “Activist means showing up for your community and showing up in the classrooms. I have yet to see any of these people show up and make this community better.”
Jones, and other more affluent members of our community, need to understand that there are parents that are not able to volunteer at the school as much as they would like. Does that make them less of a parent? For working class families, taking a day off work to volunteer means loss of ages? Is it a status symbol to volunteer at your kid’s school? I thought people did it because they liked being around their kids and had the good fortune to do it. As a society, we need to be aware of the varying social, financial, and health needs of all families rather than labelling parents who lack time to volunteer as inactive.
Looking at the events scheduled for the PTA at my kid’s school 12 of 16 starts at 9:15 AM or 9:30 AM. What parents are most likely going to be able to regularly attend these events? The Tuksals of the world or the MacFarlands? Should the working class parents be labelled as inactive for being unable to attend these untimely events.
I was raised by a single mother and I have no memory of her volunteering at my school in my childhood. I do remember her getting up and going to work every day. At times working two jobs to provide for my siblings and myself. That has had a lasting impact on me and one I am working to pass down to my children.
In these extraordinarily difficult times, as a community, shouldn’t we be looking for ways to support all forms of families and coming up with solutions that work for all, solutions that take into consideration the tangible impact of our decisions? Why is the voice of those with luxury beliefs the one that is being elevated by the media as opposed to common sense or common experiences?
Misinformation:
It seems like every day there is a new version of the boy that cried wolf. Everyone is a victim of something and words have lost all meaning. As stated before the establishment media has a well-documented trail of lies on very important topics.
This allows Tuksal to say “We can’t allow our voices to be silenced. What we advocate for is important: to follow the science.”
Dr. Makary, a medical expert stated on Bari Weiss’s podcast Honestly
“First of all, I don’t think masks are a binary thing. It’s not “mask” or “don’t mask.” It’s universal masking versus selective masking, and we should use selective masking in perpetuity. That is, if you have symptoms or if you’re at high risk or you want to, you choose on your individual volition to go ahead and wear a mask. If you use universal masking as a heavy hand beyond its utility, you alienate the authority of public health and you discredit the ability of those of us in medicine to say, “Hey, we need you to run because there’s a fire” in the future. You can only cry wolf so many times. And we have to remove restrictions as aggressively as we put them on, or else we lose credibility altogether.
Now, do the masks work? Cloth masks barely work. The cluster randomized trial was in adults, and we know kids are less efficient transmitters, so we’re fooling ourselves. Also, kids with learning disabilities are now showing up to speech pathologists because they can’t speak well because they’re not visualizing the foundation of words. We’re hearing guidance counselors talk about an influx of kids with all kinds of disconnect problems. Five percent of school-aged kids wear glasses. When they wear a mask, they’re fogging up their glasses. One kid told me he took off his glasses in class just because he can’t see with them on in the mask.
What are we doing? We’ve lost our sense of being reasonable. If there is an active outbreak maybe a surgical mask makes sense. But what we’re doing now is using an indiscriminate mask policy at times when it may not even be working, and we don’t have any data that it is.”
The question is what science does Tuksal have access to that Dr. Makary does not?
I don’t think it is too big of a reach to think Dr. Makary is not the one putting out misinformation here on the need for masks. Tuksal’s claim of following the science is in fact spreading misinformation (something Chambers should have known and reported on if her goal is to be a credible source of reliable news).
Tuksal claims of being silenced
Later, Dr. Makary had this to say about what doctors are scared to say when talking about vaccinating kids,
“I’m going to be very honest with you. And by the way, a lot of pediatricians have shared this sentiment with me, and they’re afraid to say it publicly. It’s not a one size fits all strategy. It’s not a binary categorization that you’re either pro-child vaccinations or anti-vaccinations. I don’t think kids should be getting the anthrax vaccine, but that doesn’t make me an anti-vaxxer. The risk benefit analysis is unique, and it changes by whether or not the kid’s had Covid. If the kid had Covid, which is half of kids in that age group, they don’t need a vaccine. They can get one dose, and some pediatricians may recommend that. If the kid has comorbidity — and we think that’s the composition of the 94 kids who have died of Covid in that age group out of 28 million — I would recommend it.”
Check out the full conversation between Bari Weiss and Dr. Makary on her Podcast Honestly (check out all of her episodes and her news on SubStack- she is great)
If doctors are scared to give patients their honest opinion, how does the health system function? I do not think it is the parent asking them for their medical opinion that has them scared. I can only speak for myself, but I want to be able to trust that the medical opinions given by my doctor and that of my children is honest and not catering to an agenda or towing “company line.”
Tuksal, and others pushing misinformation, have put many in our community at risk. There are many just like her leading these groups of misinformation in the name of correcting misinformation. There is a big difference between someone that is being mislead by the media and taking an active role in misleading people. To be an active leader in spreading information, there is a responsibility to know if the information is true or not. Are we requiring this of the people leading our charges?
Failed Leadership
Chambers reported Nancy Philippart from the Troy BOE as saying, “she supports parent activism but believes many parents who come before the board have not taken the proper channels to resolve issues before bringing them to the board, such as first going to teachers.” This is a common sentiment from the RCS BOE educations as well.
Trustees and Superintendents seem to be forgetting that teachers are living with their poor leadership and decisions. So, directing parents to the teacher or even the principals is just passing the buck. When parents have a specific concern about their student in a specific class, that is a situation that calls for teacher and parent dialogue. In regards to talking to teachers about district wide policies and expectations, it feels more like deflection than teacher support.
These BOE Trustees are there to provide oversight and accountability to the superintendents. Who are charged with making essential decisions about the way in which our students are taught. In the past, trustees benefited from being on boards in well-respected districts where parents gave them the benefit of the doubt and did not pay as close attention to the decision making and oversight as we all should have. I can own this because prior to 2020, I was one of them.
When COVID hit it exposed a lot of leaders that were in positions they were not qualified for and being tasked with decisions and responsibilities they were inequipt to navigate and handle. Now the narrative is, how dare you question them if you have not volunteered at multiple events during your workday?
Call To Action
Well, guess what? Too bad. More people are paying attention now. Working parents are using their precious few hours on weekends and evenings to pay attention and get involved. Those that could not volunteer during the school day but have skill sets that are helping to expose waste and incompetency within the school districts, are now speaking up. If you were not paying attention before, now is the time to get involved. And if you are brushing off the voices of families in these communities, what is the harm in listening, two way dialogue, and coming together for the common good of our students and communities? In reality, I think we all want to be a part of the solution.
Independent Sources Used in this Article
- Bari Weiss: is a journalist and the author of “How to Fight Anti-Semitism,” which won a 2019 National Jewish Book Award. From 2017 to 2020 Weiss was an opinion writer and editor at The New York Times. Before that, she was an op-ed and book review editor at The Wall Street Journal and a senior editor at Tablet Magazine. 2020 winner of the inaugural Per Ahlmark award “in recognition of her moral courage and eloquence in defending the principles of democracy.” She also the winner of the Reason Foundation’s 2018 Bastiat Prize, which honors writing that “best demonstrates the importance of freedom with originality, wit, and eloquence.” In 2019, Vanity Fair called Weiss the Times’s “star opinion writer.”
- Rob Henderson: My name is Rob Henderson and I grew up in foster homes in California. After working as a busboy, a dishwasher, and supermarket bagger, I joined the Air Force at the age of 17. Most of my enlistment was spent abroad, stationed in Europe and deployed in the Middle East. After serving, I attended Yale on the GI Bill and was subsequently awarded a Gates Cambridge Scholarship to study at the University of Cambridge. Once described as “self-made” by the New York Times, I am now a doctoral candidate in psychology at St. Catharine’s College, Cambridge. I have written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Quillette, among other outlets, and have appeared on several podcasts including Honestly with Bari Weiss and The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast.
- Jesse Singal: is a contributing writer at New York Magazine, the cohost of Blocked and Reported, and the author of The Quick Fix: Why Fad Psychology Can’t Cure Our Social Ills. You can read more of his writing, including his initial coverage of the Rittenhouse case, on his newsletter, Singal-Minded.
- Dr. Marty Makary: A professor at Johns Hopkins School for nearly 20 years. Dr. Makary is also a member of the National Academy of Medicine; he has published more than 250 scientific articles; and he is the author, most recently, of “The Price We Pay: What Broke American Health Care and How to Fix It.” He offers a no-nonsense approach to the two pandemics he sees plaguing the country: the coronavirus and the “pandemic of lunacy.””
Thank you for pointing out the lunacy of this Detroit News article. If there is anything that Tuksal says in any group I am in, I immediately dismiss her tone deaf stupidity. She has no concept of reality.