Stamped is one of the books accepted in Lexington School dDistrict 2 by the School Board there. The highly controversial book promotes Critical Race Theory and Black Lives Matter along with its founders as heroes. Lexington District One was sued over CRT curriculum.

Many of you may remember when trips to the school library included heavy anticipation of looking at
the latest National Geographic Magazine. The exposed breasts of tribal women caused many to go astray from focusing on the true purpose for being there. However, a trip to any of the libraries in Lexington District 2 will most likely make the topless natives in National Geographic seem unimportant. The pornography and graphic sexual content, the immoral subject matter of the books willingly offered to our children IN THE SCHOOL LIBRARIES, will surely startle you.

There is an ideology being grafted into the minds of our children. This ideology is coming from the top down, and its sole purpose is to normalize a lifestyle that is completely abnormal and unacceptable.

There is a grass-roots effort from concerned citizens and parents to fight this intentional corruption of
our children. The group is Parents Advocate for Children’s Education i.e., PACE Lex2. Since March of this year, 29 books in the libraries of the elementary, middle and high schools have been contested by this
group. They have endeavored to read these books and write specific reasons that these publications are
not acceptable for our schools. These books encourage the ideology and knowledge of LBGTQ, CRT, Trans-gendering, rape, profanity, violence, and detailed sexual behavior.

This is a photo of a TikTok video promoting the library and avoiding “toxic” people. Note the text says that “Being in a book club is boring!”

IMG_9590 Perhaps you are not that concerned that these books are available to our students. I ask you to take note that it goes much further than that. It is a personal endeavor from the teachers, counselors, and librarians to push these reads. A perfect example is the Instagram and TikTok posts by the Airport High librarian, Eden Muller. She posted a display she had created in her library entitled, “Have A Blind Date With a Banned Book”. The display shows books wrapped in brown paper that have “Hot Hot Hot” across them. The yellow and red tissue paper resemble flames coming from the books and her TikTok post states that anyone who disagrees is “toxic” and blatantly encourages the students to “Read Banned Books” and “That’s Why We’re On Fire!” Nevermind the fact that TikTok itself was BANNED from all state devices. She chose to take these posts down after she learned that others were noting her illegal activity.

This screenshot of the Lexington District Two TikTok video shows a book on a library shelf the District promotes regarding the LGBTQIA+ movement. The text across the screen says “Read Banned Books!!”

Perhaps you wonder how in the world these books even made it to the school library? The librarians
themselves choose the books based on awards given by entities such as The American Library of South Carolina for Education and the South Carolina Education Association. The librarians then submit the purchase orders to the principals of the schools who then sign off on the purchase. Thus, our tax payer dollars are used at the discretion of a few administrators with perverted purpose.

Please allow me to offer specific examples of the discourse at hand. One book entitled “Bathe The Cat”
tells a humorous story of a family needing to assign chores to be done for the advent of Grandmother’s
visit. One such chore noted is for the cat to be given a bath. The cat then proceeds to keep changing the chore schedule on the fridge so that he avoids the bath.

This book is advocated for ages 3-6. It has a great story line. But unfortunately the family is two black
dads and 2 black children and 1 white child. Seriously? A child as young as age 3… our preschoolers… are supposed to digest this? And the magnets holding the calendar on the fridge are LGBTQ in the colorful artwork geared toward capturing a child’s interest. As the representative for the review committee positively stated when the book was up for appeal this week, “This book normalizes family.” The book was then voted by the school board to be retained at the elementary level.

A glaring example of the pornographic and sexual content being offered to minors is a book entitled, “The Passing Playbook” by Isaac Fitzsimons. The basic story plot is that Spencer, a girl at birth, decides to transgender. As “he” starts a new year at a new more liberal school, he finds his place and then establishes a sexual relationship with a boy, Justice. This is just one passage taken directly from this book for our high school students, which teachers and administrators approved to be retained in the library.

“Justice rested his back against the wall, Spencer tucked between his legs. He trailed kisses down
Spencer’s neck and nuzzled his nose against Spencer’s cheek. Spencer turned his head and let Justice kiss him. It was gentle at first. Then Justice brushed his tongue over Spencer’s bottom lip. Spencer twisted around so he was kneeling and covered Justice’s lips with his. Justice buried his fingers in Spencer’s hair. Then he slid his hands underneath Spencer’s shirt.” …

I suppose one should take comfort in the fact that upon appeal to the school board this week, Cindy Kessler, a school board member, gallantly decided to change the motion from “accepted in all high school libraries” to “only acceptable for eleventh and twelfth grade”. And the motion passed and the book remains.

And even though Critical Race Theory, or CRT has been ruled illegal for all South Carolina schools by the
legislature, this district chooses to ignore that law. “Stamped For Kids” by Ibram X. Kendi, Jason Reynalds,
and Sonja Cherry-Paul can be found in the middle school library at Fulmer Middle. According to Amazon, “this book makes Critical Race Theory accessible for children.”

The premise of this book is that if one is born black, they are “stamped” from the beginning. They have no avenue for success unless they fight back with violence. This book does not promote getting an education or developing character to succeed. Instead, it applauds the lives of Malcolm X and Angela Davis. It minimizes the achievements of Martin Luther King. It cites Black Lives Matter and its founders as heroes. Lexington District One was sued over such CRT curriculum and lost. Pickens Co has voluntarily removed this book from its holdings. Yet the teachers and librarians on the committee voted to retain it. It is up for appeal with the board in the near future.

The bottom line to all of this is that our educators are pushing these abnormal and disruptive ideas using
tax payer dollars to do so. They have voiced an attitude that “all of these students are our children” as spoken by the school counselor at Saluda River Elementary in his defense as to why there was no parent representative on the review committee that day. We strongly feel that Superintendent Hafner should be pro-active and assert her leadership to re-work district policy.

She further needs to take a moral stand to ensure that our schools and their teachers are following the law. Finally, it is imperative that parents and the community get involved. We vote for a new school board next year. We need conservative voices that care about the garbage being shoved into the minds of our children. Parents need to push back to protect the children we are paying to educate. Now you know. Now you need to act.

Lexington District 2 School Board members reviewed and approved these books. You may attend a Board meeting and also reach out to your elected School Board members at the addresses below:

LEXINGTON SCHOOL DISTRICT TWO
715 Ninth Street, West Columbia, SC 29169
(803)796-4708

Superintendent Lexington County School District Two, Dr. Brenda Hafner
(803) 739-8399
bhafner@lex2.org

Board Chair Beth “Beth” Dickerson Branham
beth@bethbranhamlaw.com

Vice-Chair Cynthia M. “Cindy” Kessler
ckessler@sc.rr.com

Secretary Elizabeth “Liz” Castles
l2b-lcastles@lex2.k12.sc.us

Kevin Key
l2b-kevinkey@lex2.org

Linda Wooten
lwooten15865@sc.rr.com

Christina Rucker
christina.rucker07@gmail.com

Abbott “Tre” Bray
l2b-tbray@lex2.org

Marianne Hatton has been a Realtor in the Columbia area for 35 years. She has won numerous awards in Real Estate sales. She has been previously published in USA Today as well as other venues. She has been living in West Columbia for the last 13 years. If you want to continue to see independent thought and reports please “like”, comment, share with a friend, and donate to support The Standard on this page to assure the continued availability of news that is ignored too often by the dominant media.

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