Concerned Parents Face the Tyranny of Cancel Culture

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Parents who oppose the imposition of sexualized or pornographic material on children face two major threats.  They may face intimidating visits from the FBI.  Or, like Julie Mauck, they may find themselves canceled. 

Mauck — a real estate agent in Watkinsville, Oconee County, GA, and county chair of Moms for Liberty — lost her job because of a smear campaign by the LGBTQ+ community.  Her alleged crime?  At a library board meeting, as a concerned citizen and mother, she requested that a book containing sexually explicit material be moved to the adult section, where minors would need parental consent to see or borrow it. 

Mauck eventually found a new job, but it took a fight and cost her three months of joblessness.  She now runs her own brokerage firm.  Not one to go quietly, she has sued Athens Pride, an LGBTQ+ collective that falsely denounced her to her employer as having said that all LGBTQ+ are pedophiles.  Her complaint — in the Superior Court of Athens-Clarke County, GA — is being pursued by Coalition for Liberty, a non-profit opposing the indoctrination of school children in radical ideologies.

Before going into the details of Mauck’s fight, however, look at how the Biden administration has emboldened leftist-woke groups and intimidated conservative groups.  In the cultural war threatening to destroy America, the battle for the minds of innocent children is crucial.  So, the president himself is keen on having the FBI intimidate parents who raise concerns about what children are taught in school.  Breitbart reported this, quoting Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. 

Based on the evidence they collected, Rep. Jordan and other Republicans on the committee believe that, in 2021, a coordinated effort was contrived to raise unfounded fears about “threats and acts of violence” against school officials.  This was to justify FBI action against parents.  The Department of Justice (DOJ), the White House, and the National School Boards Association (NSBA) were involved in the effort.  Damning emails between Attorney General Merrick Garland and others are part of the committee’s report. 

A September 29, 2021 letter from the NSBA, signed by its president Viola Garcia and CEO Chip Slaven, crafted at the request of U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona, called on Biden to use the DOJ, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the U.S. Secret Service’s National Threat Assessment Center, and other federal agencies to safeguard board members from alleged “attacks.” 

At the time, parents had been raising perfectly reasonable issues about the promotion of pornographic material, the teaching of critical race theory, the imposition of gendered bathrooms, and the overstrict masking and social distancing rules for public schools.  The NSBA, accusing such parents of “domestic terrorism and hate crimes,” suggested the use of counterterrorism laws, including the Patriot Act, against them.

The president responded with alacrity, saying “he was excited…to go after parents” with the FBI.  On October 4, 2021, the DOJ issued a memorandum, signed by Garland, saying it would initiate a series of measures against such attacks.  The president invited Garcia, who stated that government is better than parents at making decisions for children, to come to the White House.  She was rewarded with an appointment to the National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB), which sets policy for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), also known as the “nation’s report card.”

On October 22, 2021, after the full impact of its statement could be experienced by parents, the NSBA wrote to members, conveniently repudiating the letter to the White House and admitting that some of the language was uncalled for.  Though the NSBA’s website does not carry this repudiation, a letter to NSBA, initiated by the attorney general of Indiana and signed by the attorneys general of 11 other states, details some of these machinations, lending weight to the later findings of the House Judiciary Committee’s report.

But the damage was long done.  The message was communicated to parents — that they could have the FBI showing up at their doorstep if they rightfully voiced their concerns about what their children are exposed to in school.  Also, to militant leftist, woke, and LGBTQ+ groups — they had the administration’s support.  Ironically, these are groups that have demonstrated a capacity for the sort of violence feared by parents.

As the House Judicial Committee report concluded, the coordinated actions were “all about intimidation” — weaponizing the government to go after political opponents, in this case, parents, and secure their silence. Jordan calls the “dedicated line of threat reporting” set up by Garland a “snitch line on parents.”  In a follow-up letter to Garland, committee members wrote that the NSBA letter to the White House “strengthens our concerns that the Biden administration is chilling protected First Amendment activity.”

Mauck’s case does not directly relate to schools, though she opposed the corruption of young minds.  And she wasn’t visited by FBI officials.  What she faced instead was cancel culture, which Donald Trump described as “the very definition of totalitarianism” and a tactic that makes “decent Americans live in fear of being fired, expelled, shamed, humiliated, and driven from society.”

Her ordeal began at the July 10, 2023, meeting of the Oconee County Public Library Board of Trustees to discuss whether Flamer, a graphic novel by Mike Curato, should be moved to the adult section.  During the fall of 2022, Flamer had tied with another book as the most banned in American public schools. She said children should have parental consent to borrow the book, which contains nudity, sex acts, profanity, self-harm, and other age-inappropriate content.

The same day, Athens Pride CEO and president Danielle Carmella Bonanno emailed Mauck’s managing broker — Bob Allen of Greater Athens Property — that Mauck had indulged in “hate speech.”  Bonanno sought disciplinary action against Mauck.  On June 13, 2023, Fiona Bell aka Felix Bell contacted Allen and lied about what Mauck said at the library meeting.  Bell also submitted an ethics complaint to the Georgia Realtors Association, asking for Mauck’s dismissal.  The complaint alleged that Mauck had violated Article 10 of the National Association of Realtors’s code of ethics, which says “realtors must not use harassing speech, hate speech, epithets, or slurs based on race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status, national origin, sexual orientation, or gender identity.”

Together, Bonanno and Bell managed to convince Allen that Mauck had a) equated all LGBTQ+ with pedophiles, b) falsely claimed that “pedophiles are a protected class,” and c) made antisemitic and anti-Chinese statements.  The day after Bonanno’s email, Allen told Mauck he would end his association with her, though this was formally in effect on August 23.  As a licensed agent in Georgia, Mauck was only permitted to list and sell real estate through a licensed broker like Allen, so she was unable to work.

In November, a three-member panel at the Georgia Realtors Association concluded that Mauck had violated the ethics code.  The panel said, “Anything you say in your personal life will be used against you,” although her statements on protecting children have no relation to her work.  It did not seem to matter that Bonanno and Bell’s allegations were blatantly false.  Mauck appealed the ruling, and fortunately, two months later, another panel ruled in her favor.  She has since been receiving text messages and social media posts threatening her with doxxing.

Her lawsuit against Athens Pride, in which Bonanno and Bell are co-defendants, seeks to restore her reputation and business, recover damages, and hold the defendants responsible for their personal attacks and interference in her constitutional right to freedom of expression.  The Coalition for Liberty is also spearheading a national pushback against attempts to punish and silence those who don’t subscribe to the LGBTQ+ narrative.

Mauck believes she will prevail.  Her courage mirrors that of J.K. Rowling, the once-celebrated author of the Harry Potter series, who stands strong despite being pilloried for her views on transgenderism, saying, “It isn’t hate to speak the truth.”

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