First in a Series
What is social justice? Like the word ‘sustainability,’ no one seems to know the definition. The term is ping’d like a pinball between people who, when hit with it, robotically nod.  No one gives thought to what it means–least of all the left.

And the social justice crowd wants to make sure your Portland Public School student is steeped in it. They call it “Re-thinking” the schools. It’s a misnomer, however, because no thinking is required by you or your little bots who sit in the seats in government schools.

But social justice isn’t justice at all. Justice allows for equal treatment under law. Social justice strives for equal outcomes.

As Dennis Prager outlines here, there’s a chasm of difference between real justice and jerry-rigged social justice:

From “ReThinking” Website

Social justice means left wing equality. So there is no social justice if there are rich people and poor people. Definitionally that is social injustice. Justice has no problem with [people] being rich and poor. Social justice has a problem with there being rich and poor. If the rich got rich justly there is no problem with it, but social justice distorts the meaning of justice in the name of the egalitarian ideal that motivates the left.

In Portland a cadre of “social justice” educators is holding a series of “training” sessions for teachers on inculcating our kids with their idea of “social justice.” The latest one is tonight.

TGIF: Teaching and Organizing for Social Justice

 Dear Portland Area Rethinking Schools friends,

Please join us for our next Rethinking Schools event:
  Teaching and Organizing for Social Justice
  When: Friday, January 27th; 4 pm – 6 pm
  Where: The Subud House (3185 NE Regents Dr. — at Mason. Take NE 33rd, turn at the light at Mason, opposite Wilshire Park.)

Here’s what they plan for your three to nine year old children:

Geared toward early childhood/primary teachers (pre-K through 3rd), childcare workers, parents and anyone with a stake in the education of young children, this workgroup will focus on ways to teach 3 to 9-year olds with an orientation toward social justice. We’ll collectively select topics and our discussions will involve sharing experiences as well as engagement with readings. Initial readings will be drawn from Anti-Bias Education for Young Children and Ourselves and Rethinking Early Childhood Education. Depending on the particular interests of the group, themes might include: developmentally appropriate ways to help children understand/explore race, gender, class, ability and family structure; creating an anti-bias learning community;

Here’s their stated purpose:

Modeled after the Caucus of Rank-and-File Educators (CORE) that has transformed the Chicago Teachers Union, Social Equality Educators (SEE) is a new rank-and-file organization of educators inside the National Education Association. The first chapter of SEE formed in Seattle in 2009 and there is now an effort underway to start a Portland-area chapter. SEE seeks to transform education in terms that empower students, teachers, and the communities that our public schools serve.  As members of the NEA we understand that the union has a vital role to play in creating an equitable education system.  As educators, we understand the importance of using culturally relevant and holistic curriculum to empower our students. We come together to fight the corporate reform of our schools and to organize for a socially just education system.

They’re especially oriented toward fill-in-the-blank justice such as “environmental justice:”

especially focused on environmental justice issues–climate change, water, “extreme energy”-

Why not American values and American exceptionalism? Because you can’t sell Marxism and sameness with individualism and exceptional behavior.

In fact, according to the Education Action Group this is where this group of believers come from:

traces the migration of the extreme left from economic Marxism to “cultural Marxism,” replacing the theory of class warfare with a cultural war which pits revisionism against our best values and traditions. Freed from the moorings of our shared history and outlook as a nation, this cultural Marxism replaces the values of the melting pot with those of a stubbornly maintained cultural and linguistic diversity. It mocks the motto E Pluribus Unum (out of many, one) and emphasizes division, conflict, and competing interests.

More on the program today. More to come at Victoria Taft blog. 

UPDATE: ON THE PROGRAM TODAY12:45 kyle olson author of Indoctrination: How ‘Useful Idiots’ Are Using Our Schools to Subvert American Exceptionalism.