South Dakota Republicans are determined to impose on our children health education that doesn’t work and deny them public health practices that do work.
The execrable Representative Tony Randolph (R-25/Rapid City) compounds his doltishness by proposing House Bill 1162 to strangle sex education and expand abstinence education in South Dakota. HB 1162 would require parents to opt in for their children to receive any sex education. Parents would have to file their written permission two weeks ahead of any sexy instruction or presentation “with the school district board of trustees”… which is either a trick to completely ban sex ed—”board of trustees” is not a term used in South Dakota school law—or a sign that Randolph cribbed this ostrich bill from some out-of-state culture-war group.
Showing his further contempt for education and educators, Randolph would require schools to give the kids whose parents decline or forget to opt their kids into useful health education “an extra study period during the instruction or presentation.” Randolph thus dictates curriculum—or in this case, a mandated absence of curriculum—to local schools, telling them they can’t create meaningful alternative learning experiences and must instead give study hall to the kids whom he’s protecting from pictures of penises.
HB 1162 also adds detail to the “abstinence education” already mandated by our “character education” statute—and yes, it does take some real characters to keep promoting abstinence “education,” which research and experience show does not work. Randolph’s bill forbids schools from providing any instruction on the use of contraceptive products or methods and, for good measure, throws in a subjective and unenforceable restriction on “materials and instruction” that are “excessively graphic or explicit” or “include explicit descriptions of sexual activity that encourage erotic, lewd, or obscene behavior.” Throw those vagueries into statute, and no school will risk putting any diagrams of reproductive systems or any description of reproductive activities in any textbook, because, heck, teenage boys get off scribbling simple and inaccurate depictions of organs on bathroom stalls; imagine the erotic and lewd sensations created by actual scientific diagrams of the parts from which we all spring!
Rep. Randolph wants to deny kids knowledge proven to help them lead healthier lives. His Majority Leader, Representative Lee Qualm (R-21/Platte) wants to deny them vaccines that keep them alive. House Bil 1235 would prohibit all schools, public and private, K-12 and post-secondary, from requiring immunization for enrollment. Such a move means more children will get sick and die:
If this bill passes, Dr. Mark List from Avera says there could be consequences.
“If nationwide vaccination rates go down and down and down, we’re going to see more and more of these cases like measles and infectious organisms come back and wreak havoc on our communities,” said Dr. List.
He says vaccinations are one of the most important things when it comes to public health.
“It’s very important to not only prevent disease, but also prevent the spread of disease,” said Dr. List.
While he does believe people have the right to make their own choices, “that’s true except in the cases of infectious diseases,” said Dr. List.
He says choosing not to vaccinate could negatively impact others.
“This is not just about individual, personal health and parental choice. It’s about the safety of the public,” said Dr. List.
“Why we require vaccinations is because when a child becomes infected they become a bio weapon and can spread the disease to all the other kids in the class, including kids who may be too sick to get the vaccinations or are too young to get certain vaccinations” [Miranda Paige, “Doctor Responds to New Vaccination Bill,” KSFY, 2020.02.05].
Anti-vaccination bushwah is already putting children and adults at greater risk. That Representative Qualm would promote the unscientific lies against sensible public health interventions is irresponsible… but, alas, entirely in keeping with the destructive ignorance that characterizes the South Dakota Republican Party’s approach to this year’s Legislative Session.
Hmmmm, is “begat” after “begat” after “begat” “excessively graphic or explicit?” I might know a book our school needs to ban.
Destructive Ignorance.
That pretty much sums up the
SDGOP.
Pack ‘o Dopes.
I sure as hell would not want this Tony clown to wire my house. Dude has his wires crossed and he is over amping. How in the world could such a dummy get an electrical licence? Box Elder sure knows how to pick the worst of us to represent them, too many chemtrails it would seem.
The LRC’s profile of Randolph says he’s an “electrical contractor.”
I can imagine the moron at Ace buying supplies. “I want a couple of those things, you know, that you put on the ends of wires with the two flat things that, this is so humiliating, go into the holes in the wall.”
Ace person: “You bet. Male connectors.”
Randolph: (screaming and foaming) “Why do you have to be so obscene?”
If you do not Educate, how do you know what you are Abstaining from?
LOL, probably what put him over the edge.
Sure, why not? Let’s go back to the days when little Suzie and little Jimmie met out behind the barn to investigate nature’s mysteries. What is it with Republicans and issues of sex? Is it repression? Frustration? They just can’t seem to stay out of your bedroom, bathroom, locker room, underwear,… Robin Williams said it best in “Good Morning Viet Nam,” I never met a (person) more in need of a (well, you can watch the movie.)” :-)
Soon we will return to the stone age.
Rep. Randolph is not a serious legislator. He takes legislation from an out-of-state source and doesn’t even bother to figure out how it fits into current South Dakota law. Pathetic.
He also might spend a little time figuring out how schools teach about sex. Schools already incorporate abstinence in an overall sex education curriculum.
I have news for Rep. Randolph. The vast majority of parents want comprehensive sex education taught in schools. Yes, they want abstinence taught, but they are also want each child to have knowledge about contraception and how it works.
That’s my doc!! And I can attest, he is about as far as one can imagine an MD can be from a “promoter” or practitioner of medical “intrusion” into anyone’s individual life. Informed decisions and cautious moderate actions is what he’s all about.
Local schools CAN’T create meaningful alternative learning experiences? Like drag queens showing teen girls how to put a condom on a banana? Rep’s Randy & Queefer exhibit their subconscious lucidity when showing what their imaginations are truly afraid of.
Wingnuts know abstinence only sex education is as big a joke as drumpf being a stable genius. Wingnuts also know the only way to prevent girls from not abstaining is to force them to wear chastity belts so they don’t tempt little boys into becoming drumpflike sexual predators.
With wingnuts, the female is always the problem, never innocent boys or even established old sexual predators. Gotta punish them some more females for the foibles of randy, hormone enraged men.
End result… when boys get girls in a family way, wingnuts don’t punish them darling little rascals. They rain fire and brimstone on the soon to be forced to be Moms, whether they are ready and willing, or not.
Qualm has 4 kids, did he deny them their protective immunizations? Will he deny his grandchildren protection? I would like to see their immunizations records from the State of South Dakota. How does his grift work?
SD GOP Conservatism: WE will tell you when your marriage can end; WE will decide the public safety value of vaccines; WE will tell you what treatments your children cannot have; WE will tell your schools what to teach. WE will tell you what businesses you must accept . . .
That Randolph is one sick puppy. Must be a nightmare living in his house.
Fine bill if it also says parents who choose to not vaccinate their children will be held financially responsible for death or permanent injury.
We require car insurance regardless of religion.
Robert Kolbe – since you seem to be in support of a culture that excuses killing someone via monetary compensation – I believe that is a feature of Iraqi and Afghan culture – will honoring honor killings or assenting to acid attacks on “sluts” be next?
Richard Schriever, you should look up the term “weregeld”. Excusing killing people if adequate compensation was given to the dead person’s family was a key part of English, German, and Scandinavian law and culture for centuries. For many South Dakotans, it’s just their heritage.
GERMANIC LAW: The size of the weregild was largely conditional upon the social rank of the victim. There used to be something of a “basis” fee for a standard “free man” that could then be multiplied according to the social rank of the victim and the circumstances of the crime. The weregild for women relative to that of men of equal rank varied: among the Alamanni (Southern Germans) it was double the weregild of men, among the Saxons (Northern Germans) half that of men.