“Advice For Parents” Protesting School Indoctrination On Dealing With The Media
“cultivate relationships with local reporters; make their job easier. Write the articles FOR them. Give them quotes, and 800 words written”
I spoke this morning at the Parents Unite conference in Boston on Diversity of Thought in K-12.
The topic of my almost 40-minute lecture was Framing The Media Narrative And Moving To Action. The video will be available at some point, and I’ll post it here along with a transcript and my slide presentation.
Some of the advice I gave concerned how parents objecting to school policies and instruction, including on Critical Race issues, could interact with the media. Most parents have never had to do that, and don’t understand some basics, particularly when dealing with local or national mainstream media.
While you eagerly await the video, one attendee conveniently live-tweeted that part of my lecture as well as some general advice:
Advice for parents from Legal insurrection: cultivate relationships with local reporters; make their job easier. Write the articles FOR them. Give them quotes, and 800 words written. Do things by email, so you have a record if they misquote you.1/
— Insomnochick "feels the spirit" (@insomnochick) October 1, 2021
Advice for parents from Legal insurrection: cultivate relationships with local reporters; make their job easier. Write the articles FOR them. Give them quotes, and 800 words written. Do things by email, so you have a record if they misquote you.1/
Record interviews if it’s legal where you live. If not, tell them you’re recording. Keep answers short, so they have more trouble misquoting your or taking you out of context. Say what you want to see in print. 2/
Focus on the message: you are for equality, non-discrimination, and you oppose the racialization of education.3/
Find what you’re good at, use that to your advantage; what matters is everyone DO something. All hands on deck. CAUTION: BOLO plants, with crazy signs and disinformation. Stay ON MESSAGE. Make sure you self-police! /4
Find people who are good at what you’re NOT, cultivate relationships, work together.
Advice from ME: you cannot stay quiet and expect others to save you. DO something, that’s what it’s going to take. /END
Nicole Solas, who first told her story on Legal Insurrection and now is a national media star on parental rights, boiled it down further:
Parents, write your stories about opposing school indoctrination FOR the media. Claim your narrative and give it to the media to publish. Make their job easy. It worked for me. @LegInsurrection
Parents, write your stories about opposing school indoctrination FOR the media. Claim your narrative and give it to the media to publish. Make their job easy. It worked for me. @LegInsurrection https://t.co/HOrsPjosTl
— Nicole Solas, Domestic Terrorist (@Nicoletta0602) October 1, 2021
[Featured image: Speakers clockwise: Charles Love, Dr. Wilfred Reilly, Ian Rowe, and me, via Erica Sanzi on Twitter]
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Comments
Excellent. Thank you.
Most reporters are to put it bluntly, lazy. they love to take a press or media release and massage it into a story.
Present yourself as calm and composed person no matter how much anger is within you. Some will use your outer anger against in an attempt to paint you in an even worse light to the point where the story becomes about you and your emotion opposed to the actual message you want to deliver.
Indeed. Use rational, evidence based arguments keeping away from pithy or sarcastic comments. Don’t provide the rope your political opponents will use to hang you. Ensure that a slate of speakers at a school board meeting have all rehearsed their speech. Make sure the speech stays within the time allotted to each speaker. There should be a common narrative theme among the speakers.
Make sure that the speakers follow a coordinated theme in which their comments build upon and buttress each others presentation. This allows each speaker to focus on a separate point for their 2 minutes allowing a succession of speakers to address the whole v each speaker recovering the same ground. Maximize the limited time allotted to deliver a well reasoned and irrefutable argument.
Emotion and passion are fine but understand that it can allow our opponents to paint an unflattering narrative. Stick with provable facts and a less emotional delivery. Avoid conjecture which you cannot prove because the opposition will seize on any single inaccuracy or unprovable conjecture, no matter how likely, as evidence that your entire argument is discredited.
The speakers chosen need to understand that the local news may broadcast their speech. If the media is hostile they will select portions of the presentation from the least disciplined speaker to cast all the speakers in a poor light.
My local paper is now all stringers, more or less non-full time.
They get paid by the story in many cases, so sending them one is a win-win.
That’s a nice theory, but we are talking about the *media* here. If you show up as a group of a hundred calm, rational people who are against racism and segregation no matter what it is disguised as, and some left-wing nutjob with a Confederate flag shows up screaming obscenities as a ‘supporter’ of your cause, the media will be ten-deep around the nutjob and ignore all of you.
Remember the 1/6 riot. There were ten thousand Trump and American flags there, and one nut with a Confederate flag. In the end, perhaps a photo or two of the Trump flags were published, and every single newspaper and video clip had the nut with the Stars and Bars in it.
The media considers it a point of pride to make you look like nuts and fools. It takes an immense amount of work to keep them honest, or at least vaguely in the vicinity.
I vote for the “Torch and Pitchfork” signs.
Give it back to them twice as hard as they give it to us……right, Maxine?
I really like the signs idea.
I particularly appreciate the “don’t wait for someone to tell you what to do” spirit. Do something! Build relationships and self-police.
Nothing is too trivial. Do what you CAN do and find others who can do what you can’t but be useful. Dominate your own space and be ready to help each other. If you’re not motivated by now and haven’t gotten your own house in order, you are almost certainly in the way.
Also, if the FBI asks to talk to you, REFUSE without a lawyer. They are looking to set an example to scare other parents. Even if they say their questions are about someone else.
What? Why would the FBI want to talk to you because you spoke at a school board meeting. Honestly , you people always seeing the FBI everywhere are kind of bizarre
No, if the FBI wants to talk to you, AGREE with certain provisions. “Of course, officer. Let’s set up a time at my attorney’s office. We’ll record the whole thing and get you a copy so there’s no confusion about what was said. What time is good for you?”
The FBI will refuse. They don’t want to be recorded, and they don’t want your attorney at your elbow giving you advice.
As much as possible present your objectives in a positive light. You’re not just protesting CRT. It is about having a curriculum that is age appropriate which accurately presents the history of race relations in the U.S. with emphasis on the progress made and where improvement is needed. Defend without apology that it is the founding principles of this nation that has made that progress possible.
Explain you favor schools that see students as individuals and not as just a member of some mass class whether it be by race or economic status. You want a curriculum that reflect that instead of one that pigeonholes them and may very well set them up for failure. You are pro student. You are pro child. Which as a parent is your absolute right. Don’t ever forget that.
I belonged to the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) in the 1980s. It’s well worth researching and joining. My “homeschooled” son is now in his 50s, and is homeschooling his two children.
hslda.org.
I have a feeling Bill Jacobsen and Legal Insurrection is about to explode in popularity! I’m also pretty sure that the advice given will not only help parents fighting CRT but for all of us who have been considering joining the fight against every single tyranny going on in this Country today.