A GOP senator says he kicked Education Minnesota representatives out of his office after they expressed support for teaching kids “perverted stuff.”
Sen. Nathan Wesenberg, R-Little Falls, said four teachers who were lobbying legislators on behalf of Education Minnesota, the state’s teachers union, visited his office last Wednesday seeking support for SF 1311, an omnibus education policy bill.
The conversation got heated when the teachers expressed support for books that contain graphic sexual content, according to Wesenberg.
Wesenberg said he keeps copies of four books on his desk that parents in his district have found in school libraries. Those books include, “It’s Perfectly Normal,” “Sex is a Funny Word,” “It’s So Amazing,” and “It’s Not the Stork.”
“It’s Perfectly Normal,” which is for ages 10 and up, is one of the most controversial and challenged books in the country because of its graphic nudity. Some have called it “cartoon pornography.”
When the teachers expressed support for the books, the conversation got contentious, Wesenberg claimed.
“I told them, ‘If you agree with what’s in these books, you need to leave my office,'” Wesenberg said. When one of the teachers refused to leave, Wesenberg said the conversation turned into a shouting match. The teachers were from Milaca and Princeton, he said.
Wesenberg told the union reps the books are inappropriate and should not be in public schools because they “groom” children.
According to Wesenberg, one Milaca teacher “got in his face” and said “someone has to teach” the material. The teacher then claimed that “you Christians are the problem,” Wesenberg said.
“We’ve got this stuff in our schools,” Wesenberg said. “[These books] are teaching kids how to masturbate and give each other blow jobs and have sex.”
Wesenberg said the books have no place in public schools. The teacher disagreed with him and asked him who he thinks is supposed to teach the material.
“Nobody,” Wesenberg said. “We shouldn’t be teaching this to our kids at all.”
He said parents should discuss those topics with their children, not schools, and exposing students to the material is “child abuse.”
“If I have to have a conversation with my children, I will have that conversation. It’s not your job as a teacher to teach this verbiage to my kids,” Wesenberg said he told the teacher.
After refusing to leave his office after being asked multiple times, Wesenberg said the teacher followed him into the hall where the shouting match continued.
The Education Minnesota representatives accused Wesenberg of not supporting education because he opposes SF 1311.
“I do support education. I don’t support this bill,” Wesenberg said. “The bill is not supporting education. It’s supporting a bunch of garbage.”
SF 1311 includes new mandates on “ethnic studies” courses for school districts and directs the commissioner of education to “embed ethnic studies into state academic standards.”
Wesenberg said Education Minnesota is trying to bully people into supporting the bill. The union did not respond to a request for comment.
“There’s a bunch of junk in the bill we don’t need. We keep spending more money and our our education system continues to get worse,” he said. “Throwing money at it isn’t the solution.”
Sheila Qualls
Sheila Qualls is an award-winning journalist and former civilian editor of an Army newspaper. Prior to joining Alpha News, she was a Christian Marriage and Family columnist at Patheos.com and a personal coach. Her work has been published in The Upper Room, the MOPS blog, Grown and Flown, and The Christian Post. She speaks nationally on issues involving faith and family.
