Framing Family as Harmful: What’s Really Happening in Our Schools?

Awake at the Wheel | Ep 88

In this conversation, Malini Ondrovcik and Melanie Bennett discuss the significant changes occurring in the education system, particularly in Ontario. They explore the implications of critical race theory, the framing of family as harmful, and the rise of ideological content in education. Melanie shares her personal journey into education advocacy, highlighting the challenges of censorship and the consequences of dissent. The discussion also touches on the media's role in shaping public perception and the potential for segregation in educational practices. Overall, the conversation emphasizes the need for critical thinking and open dialogue in addressing these complex issues. In this conversation, Melanie discusses the implications of Critical Race Theory in education, the challenges faced by educators, and the role of journalism in shedding light on these issues. She emphasizes the importance of free speech and the consequences of censorship in both the UK and Canada. The discussion also highlights the need for parental engagement in education and the power of informed activism to drive change.

We want your questions! Future episodes will feature a new segment, Rounds Table, where Malini and Dr Amitay will answer your questions, discuss your comments, and explore your ideas. Send your questions to rounds@aatwpodcast.com, tweet us @awakepod, send us a message at facebook.com/awakepod, or leave a comment on this video!

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Transcript

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although I'm sure many people call me conservative now, I still don't consider myself that I was pretty progressive liberal. I mean, I used to work in environment and climate change, I'm not the religious right, you know, even though the CBC recently tried to imply that I am, That article really is talking about how critical race theory is a core part of education. for example, as a woman, I am unable to learn from anybody who is not a woman. If I was a black child, I am unable to learn from anyone who is not black. Like, what is that actually implying Hello and welcome to awake at the wheel. So in many previous episodes, we have spoken about the various changes that have been happening within our school system. Here in Ontario, in Canada and across North America. Frankly, much in much of the information that's being shared with children is getting farther and farther away from the focus on academics. Recently, the Waterloo District School Board, has been training their staff on a variety of different ideas and elements surrounding family and the fact that this concept, is viewed as now harmful and rooted in white supremacy. Recently, Melanie Bennett published an article that was exposing the 49 slide, internal staff training that was being presented, to school staff. And this discussed concepts such as, the term family being offensive to racialized individuals, in addition to the fact that words like objectivity, perfectionism, as well as worship of the written word uphold white supremacy. So to discuss this a little bit further, today we are joined by Melanie Bennett. Melanie is a researcher as well as an investigative journalist for True North. And she covers topics such as culture, public policy and education. So hi, Melanie. Thanks for being with us. Hi. Nice to be here. So can you tell our listeners a little bit more about yourself? Well, I, I sort of fell into journalism, quite recently after many years of, perhaps obsessive interest in what's going on in education after after having my own, I don't know, getting a little bit burned by it. I was actually in the UK for a very, very long time previously, and if you could tell. But, Yeah. So I just that's that's what I do now. Now, I, I've spent years investigating on my own stead, from a previous career. I used to be research in a previous career. So, yeah, I just had an interest in what was going on, and I started uncovering all these crazy things, meeting all these people with all their stories, verifying all this information. And the interesting thing is to start getting a feel for how the education system has is being transformed. You don't actually have to have crazy sleuthing skills. You know, I think you can start really picking up on that just from reading the policies that are coming out. You know, but then when you start getting more information, you start getting into eyes and seeing what's behind those policies. Then it gets really weird. So yeah, that's a little bit about me. So I'm pretty pretty education focused. And can you talk a bit more about what it is about education that piqued your interest? Are you a parent or are there things that you learned from, others whose kids you know are in the system? Yeah. Well, I'm a parent. I, I came to Canada in 2017 and, obviously had kids in school, and that's kind of how I came across. But it took me a little while to come across it. It wasn't immediate, but there were signs and I certainly started looking into it. Started with the trans issue, although that's not that wasn't really in my family. It was sort of adjacent. And, yeah, I although I'm sure many people call me conservative now, I still don't consider myself that I'm pretty. I was pretty progressive liberal. I mean, I used to work in environment and climate change, for a long time in consultancy and it took me a little while to sort of twig that the trans thing wasn't what I thought it was. And I guess the word is piqued. I got piqued, and that, you know, kicked off an interest in the schools because it was coming from a perspective of the schools were encouraging this, and I couldn't really believe that at first. So I spent a lot of time looking at the policies. And I'll mention the board. Actually, it was the York Region District School Board and their policy, their, gender identity and expression guidelines. I think it's called I mean, that's pretty crazy. And in there it states very clearly that their policies to keep confidential information about transitioning from parents. And so that that's what kicked it off. And then when I realized what was going on with the trans issue, how ubiquitous that was, that obviously kicked off an interest in, well, what is this ideology? Why is this allowed? And then that brings you to things like the Human Rights Commission and, you know, the policies, the, policies that are intersectional and so on, so forth. And now currently, I've been doing a lot of work around, critical race theory and culturally relevant pedagogy in education, but they're all linked. And so, yeah, I mean, that it was it was the trans issue. That's really what kicked me off. Yeah. So in preparing for this episode, I actually sat in for my computer. I'm like, I don't even know where to go with this because there's so much crazy stuff. Like the article that you wrote, I think was so insightful in laying out what some of the problems were. And even the problems with those who are speaking out like other educators, other reporters and so on. You mentioned actually Chanel Fall, who we've had on this podcast, who's come under a lot of fire for speaking out about these things. So have you been worried about bringing these things forward as a parent and just as a citizen? No, no, my first instinct was to just tell everyone and talk about, okay, that's not entirely true. It was clear to me. Listen, like like when I say I was a progressive liberal, I was a progressive liberal, I wasn't. And even though I worked in climate change, I wasn't an activist type, I was I'm a nerd, really. I it's academics, sort of nerdy things. So although although now academics look like they're constantly protesting, that wasn't really my style, but definitely progressive. And I definitely understood at first that socially I would have problems because I was as my, I think someone in my family who I shall not name, said that I was going down a right wing rabbit hole and and that really, I know it's now I laugh about it, but certainly at the time I'm like, oh my God, am I really going down a right wing rabbit hole? Do I want to be considered right wing? Other people going to think of me as right wing? Am I what it but I'm. But what I'm seeing is factual. I'm reading it in these policies that can't be right. And so you go through all of these questions in your own mind. But I didn't have any kind of institutional pressure on top of that. This was purely social pressure of how I was going to be viewed within my own family and friends and so on, so forth. But eventually I got over that. I took some time. I got over that, and I, and I felt like I had to do something about it because it became clear to me that I had been locked in my own echo chamber, my left wing echo chamber, for very long time. I didn't understand how fulsomely I had been self-censoring my self-censoring, my own thought processes and what I was willing to look into and not look into. And so that was like, that was an experience in and of itself. But now, now I don't care, you know, if people want to view me in a particular way, they can view me in a particular way, because ultimately, what I'm seeing going on in education is a program is an ideological program based on on philosophies that are in my personal opinion, a little bit nonsense but presented, well, not a little bit. I mean, it is nonsense, but it's presented as evidence based facts and so on, so forth. And you see this program of censorship and I understand well, I have empathy for those people who feel they can't speak out who who don't agree with this. But I also feel like I have a little bit of insight into the individuals, the institutionalized individuals who this is their career. Maybe they support it, maybe they're just a little bit whatever about it, but they'll keep pushing it because, you know, we want to be on the right side of history. We want to be the good people. And this is like what the good people do, because there's a lot of censoring of your own thought process. Right? And honestly, in this story, I feel like I've seen some of that from the director of education, just the feeling I'm getting from him. But that's just me speculating about it. But I feel like I have I've developed because I don't come from I'm not the religious right, you know, even though the CBC recently tried to imply that I am, I'm not even a conservative. I'm definitely coming from an I was a progressive liberal. I'm certainly, of a liberal variety. So I mean, in a nutshell, I feel like I have a bit of an understanding of all the different sides of the aisles over time, I've gotten to know those conservatives, and I've gotten to know those religious, Christians and Muslims and all these people that in the past, I might have felt a little bit uncomfortable were the getting to know. Right. So, yeah, I'm just a bit of an oddball. But I think that there, there needs to be more of that. Not to to pander here, but I think that your approach makes a lot of sense in what used to be liberal and what used to be conservative, I don't think is what it is today. Right. So being able to explore our own values and beliefs and opinions and so on, that takes a lot of critical thinking and humility, I think to be able to explore that. Yeah. Well, I've always believed in freedom of speech. What I'm shocked at as somebody coming from the UK is the you have to understand. When I did understand what woke was tangentially when I was in the UK, but I was definitely one of those people. I was like, that's so stupid, it doesn't exist. What are you even talking about? Right? So it's not until I came to Canada that I, that I really it took me a number of years, but I really started understanding and remember I worked in environment at the time. So it took me a little while to really understand that. But then the the thing that shocks me the most there is the rejection of the freedom of expression of those that you disagree with, politically speaking. Right. It's very targeted and people very much fear. And I went through it very much fear. This idea of being labeled right wing, like, that's the nastiest word, right? You're you're you're a bigot. You're a Nazi. You're you're just right wing now, even far. Right. Just just admit it because it is a bad word right in these. And there's a censorship around that, this fear around that. So even as a liberal, I support freedom of expression. Right? I absolutely support freedom of expression. In fact, I'll just I'll just point this out. Even in my reporting, I tried to reach out all the time to those that I actually have intellectual disagreements with and, and I, I've invited a, I guess you could say an anti oppressive education scholar, one of the more successful ones in Ontario to come onto my show. And, and it looks like you will be coming onto my show. So we're going to have a discussion from his perspective of critical race theory in education of anti oppressive education. What it means. Right. So, I, I, I still want to reach out to lots of different people. They want reach out to me now because I've been coded as, as, a nefarious force. Yeah. And it's, it's interesting in reading, through your article and through those slides, I did seek to understand where they maybe were coming from as far as, like, family, for example, upholding white supremacy. And I actually came across, an article regarding a study that was done in 2021 published in The American Psychologist, and it was done by, I think, 3 or 4 authors, from the University of Minnesota. And they talked about what they refer to as the whiteness pandemic and how and then they tied in family into that. And it upholds, I think, as you pointed out, in the slides as well, it upholds, male supremacy, white supremacy. It was just a it blew my mind. And it was completely crazy to me that all those years ago, I guess this topic had come out, but now seems to be making its way into our schools. Well, listen. So the let's talk about critical race theory, the the concept of whiteness is integral to critical race theory. But it there's a strange distinction here because in there is a hateful sort of anti-white element, but also there's a nerdy scholarly element to it as well, where they really a lot of them, and I say them a lot of these supporters of critical race theory, these scholars will are able to parse out this idea that they're talking about systems and structures and not actually white people. Right? That is a thing that genuinely some scholars do. They can parse out those ideas. However, it does transform into anti-white bigotry even within the scholars themselves at some points. Now, whiteness is supposed to be about systems and structures. Now, why is that applied to families? Simply the core of critical race theory is a Marxist doctrine. And so you have, collective identities, some of which are dominant, some of which are not. We we see that as marginal and and dominant. Right. And so whatever is dominant in this case it would be whiteness is oppressive. But within within that what is upholding that whiteness as well. The whiteness comes from this European Eurocentric white, white culture. Right. And that's their practice is the nuclear family. And so the only way that you can truly have liberation is if you dismantle it just with disrupt and dismantle. And so these things are repeated. These concepts are repeated constantly. So when the school board comes out, I mean, the first thing I did after the statement came out, oh, by the way, the school board put out a statement after my article because I had so many complaints. And in there they're saying that it lacks context and so on. So the first thing I did on the Monday morning was send the all of the trustees and the communication team along emails to talking about that context. And I and I brought up that whiteness is a core principle of critical race theory. And I described sort of, very, briefly what I just described now. And is this or is this not a critical race theory? Because if not, the context is all in those slides. There are very clear. And this is completely in line with those principles. But they they just ignore me completely. And one of the frustrations that I'm glad that people picked up on the, the slide of, of the family because I think it is important for people to understand that, yes, these things, the whole concept of critical race theory is disrupting and dismantling whatever the hegemony is or whatever the the dominant class, the oppressor class is. Right. But there was more to that article. That article really is talking about how critical race theory is a core part of education. And this is just an example of that that is in line with the practice. So anyway, I write this letter to the to the board. And I am hoping that someone will address the core of what I'm actually saying because I didn't I'm not blaming the board for doing this because they're right when they say it's because of the Ministry of Education, it's because of the Human Rights Commission there. Right? They actually there are numerous, policies in place that require this, specifically by name. But everyone focused on that one slide and it I know it's important for these things to get out there if there's something that catches people's attention, but I don't want the board to get hate, I think, believe it or not. But I do want people to be informed because I think what can come out of these these practices, this ideology can become very, very hateful. Yeah. And I don't want the board to get hate, but I want them to be exposed because over the last few years, you know, whether it's the York, Waterloo, Toronto, like, we're seeing all these school boards being run like little fiefdoms. We see anybody who speaks out having their career threatened or destroyed and, you know, and you actually seen someone take his life on for, say, you know, Bosco, because I said how hateful it can become and how antagonistic. And so, yeah, I, I'm all on, I'm full on for the exposure and most importantly. But it doesn't happen is having people have being held to account. Explain yourself if you have nothing to hide. If this is all you know, good, you know, there's a practice. If there's science behind it, show us. Don't you know, don't, don't, don't say to us, trust us. We know what we're doing. We're the educators. Because we've seen enough evidence anecdotally, mostly, that that's not true. So I'm glad that you're exposing others to. Yeah, well, the chair may mailing rad. No. May death Raglan is just the chair of the water. The board went on a CBC radio article. Talk. It was like a seven minute, eight minute, sorry radio show talking about the the statement again. But also we love families and so on, so forth. But in that Arctic, interview, she said that the board was transparent, that they that they appreciate all viewpoints, and that they welcomed, basically that they welcomed dissenting opinions. But in the in the emails that I sent, I forgot to mention that I actually asked them for the sake of transparency, for the sake of the public, if you want them to have the context, can you release the full set of slides? Right. Kind of knowing that they're not going to respond to that. But that's also my point is, if you don't talk to people, if you don't actually engage with the because there's many, many parents on that board that have been pushing back for a long time and they just get smeared and, you know, they change policies to get rid of these parents. And, you know, there's a real targeting of anyone who's dissenting. But so if they're not willing to engage with those parents, if they're not willing to talk to people, like, because I'm actually very, very well informed in the, in the actual, scholarship of, of this stuff, if they're not willing to, like, I have to I have to get a lot of this stuff through Pfizer leaks. Right. So I'm going to get the information one way or another. And it's, you know, you can either choose to act in good faith with people, with well-informed people, or you can just keep smearing them. So look, the way that I look at it is consequent actions have consequences. And I am sharing the truth. And if they don't want to engage with me, I actually think it's going to make them look worse in the long run. Right. And speaking of consequences, and I don't I don't know the story. So you can share with us how did this exposé, so to speak, which seemed I didn't see anything hateful. I didn't see any derogatory names or anything. Maybe I missed it, I don't know, I saw it, I like I didn't see any of that. How did that lead to you? Or getting banned from Twitter or X? And is a permanent. Is it one month? What have you been told? Well, I'll just say this I, I'm actually very well behaved on Twitter. I mean, I expose things all the time. I have done for years and stuff far worse. And then this and I've never been banned. I've never had my account suspended or anything like that. But that's because I'm, I'm respectful. I, I, I tend to stick to the facts. I'm not hugely opinion based, although sometimes I'll share my opinion, but like most of my work, is very much about sharing the receipts, sharing the facts, sharing what I'm finding out, explaining things to people and so that particular post, which is still a pinned post, I believe this is just my speculation. I believe that there were after the statement went out, I believe on the Friday. Then there was a board meeting that Friday. The chair also gave a statement at the board meeting. Apparently there was some threats to Laura Lindow, who is included in my article. I believe that I was reported by people at the board or perhaps some activists, and I suspect it might be copyright claims because that's happened before to other parents who posted things about that board. Now, I can't prove this, but I am investigating to find out if that's the case. So right now the pinned post so you can see my my profile. It doesn't. To the casual observer it doesn't look like I'm banned. It's there. But if you actually look try to comment. None of the replies are there. You can't see any of my replies. There's no slides, so it's clearly targeted to that particular post. Right. So but what? So I mean when I was suspended for four years it was permanent. But when Elon Musk got x I was brought back, I was resurrected. So you know, and I found very it was impossible to get a good response. I kept getting the same stuff. It's hateful, blah, blah because I dare, said he she because I. Posted without comment all the slides were there. They were just the slides. No comment. Right. So but when you when you wrote to X, to find out what happened, what have you been told? Listen, I found out on the Monday morning when I looked at when I looked at my, my Twitter and my first response was to appeal and immediately I wrote, I'm a journalist. I posted a, an article that, as I know, has upset some activists and scholar, education activists, and I suspect that they may have mass reported my account. That's what I said to Twitter in my appeal, actually appealed it twice just to see if it make a difference. But I yeah, I haven't heard anything yet. But I mean, immediately, I just I just had a feeling it was it was at. Okay. So you still don't know. All right I don't know I they didn't tell me what I did. They didn't say. They didn't mention any particular post. It was just gone. And so weird because like, that sounds like the bad old days of Twitter where people were being, you know, banned, suspended, you know, left, right and center. Again, mine was a ridiculous case. So I'm hoping. Yeah. But okay, so this is the thing, right? I'm. No, I'm a journalist with a an actual news organization. Now, I know some people in this country think that true North and Juno are not real news and so on, so forth. But we are we have accreditation as journalists. And so what the board has done is actually okay. I can't say that the board has done this because I don't know this, but if it turns out that the board have asked Twitter to censor my posts, what they would have done in that case is censor a journalist. And I don't know what the implications are of that because I'm not a I'm not a regular citizen. This, these are real slides. They, they admitted to those real slides. And so if you admit that this is real and you're saying that you're transparent, why would you have a journalist censored for posting it? Right. And speaking of which, have you had any anybody from the mainstream media, quote unquote, reach out to you and ask you about what's been happening? Okay, listen, the board director went on the city news Mike Farwell show. They and and also city news. I wrote about the article, the CBC radio com up with the guy's name. But the chair went on that show and the CBC wrote an article about me. None of the people reached out to me. But to be fair, I also noted that, Rebel News did reach out to me, but I wasn't on a I wasn't available when they when they wrote about it, they asked me to be on their show, but I couldn't make it. And then even the Echo Times wrote about it, and they didn't reach out to me either. So a lot of people have been writing about it. Nobody's actually asking. But what I actually did reach out to all of those people and say, if you'd like to talk to me about my work, get in touch. Right? And I know Infowars at least was talking about it. That's, I reposted that as well. At. Least they linked me. Right? But they didn't reach out to you directly. No, no. Okay. How frustrating is that when you know, again, people are talking about you, but they're not talking to you? I don't really mind. I mean, listen, I I'll play the fighting game with the legacy media just because it's fun and because they are not understand basically what they're doing. In my personal opinion, is playing a PR game. They're protecting, they're protecting politicians and bureaucrats. So I'll play that game and I'll fight back. But the rest of the stuff, I don't really mind if people cover my work and, you know, move it around, because the whole point of me becoming a journalist and investigative journalist at that in the education field is I want people to have this information. I want them to create, media around it. I saw some TikToks and some videos about this. So I want people to do that. And so I'm not pressures on on getting the credit, but I will push when it comes to things like the CBC, you know, calling some academics and some universities to basically try to discredit me as some, religious right person without even talking to me and not addressing the substance of my article. Again, just trying to make to paint me in a certain in a certain way without even without even talking to me, that I will fight back. And that's what I was getting at, because, yeah, if it's just a story, that's one thing. And the story is bad enough, the original story, what the board is doing. But the fact of like the the consequence, the blowback from it, I think that's what's so important because again, when you're silencing the people who are raising dissent, we're asking questions who are, you know, asking for transparency. That to me is as is as big a story is not a bigger story. Well, when I listen, I have an account on blue Sky and I can tell you that all of the local Kitchener legacy media people that covered me are all friends with each other on there. So, I mean, I don't know what that means. Take from that what you will, but curious indeed. Okay, I don't I don't go on blue sky, find it too hateful. Well it's interesting, like I say, I like, look, if people won't talk to me, I'm certainly going to go investigate them right. Okay. So again, Melanie, I have so many, you know, because we've talked about this so often. And, you know, we really try to promote, you know, an understanding or awareness of what is happening. So we have so many questions now I got a bunch. But do you want to jump in because I want to yeah. I had some kind of surrounding your thoughts about the content of the slides itself, but Oren did you want to talk more about kind of the, the high level media part of it, or can we go into the. The let's go to the let's go to actually what happened? I mean that's the or you know, the content of the slides. And the content. Yeah. Okay. So one of the things that really stood out to me in your article, there's two things I did actually, one of which being that there's a researcher that found it, I think it was a PhD student that you were, discussing there who found in his research that there isn't actually a real tangible difference in academics that's being made with all of this ideology being taught. These kids are very much fluent in, the substance of I. I'm being biased in what I'm saying. I recognize this, but the, the ideology that they're being taught, they're fluent in that. But it's not enhancing academics in any way, in any tangible way. It's not translating into that. So what do you think of that? Well, it's not meant to. It's it's not meant to. I know they the, the scholars saying Ed. Was sure that. Yeah. But if you, if you go into the scholarship around culturally relevant and responsive pedagogy, which, by the way, is just the applied methodology for critical race theory in education, it's not really they say that it's supposed to have high achievement, but it's not designed for that. It's a lens through which to see the world. Right. So when you're teaching math, you still teach math, you just teach anti-racist math. So Stephen Reich is a really great academic. He was a lawyer in his previous career, and he decided to retrain. So he, during the pandemic. And he joined the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. And then he wrote this really fantastic master's thesis, which basically says is critical race theory in Ontario education. I mean, the Tldr is, yes, and it's a really brilliantly written thesis. He's got a sharp sense of humor. Obviously, being a lawyer. And I've been following his research very, very closely because what he did or what he has done in his, master's and several papers, is he quantitatively and, as well, let's start from the beginning. He did a quantitative analysis of the frequency of use of, ideological terminology versus what's called the science of learning. So the science of learning is actual evidence based practice. So when you when you can measure outcomes and results right. And he compared the science of learning to the ideological frequency of use of words. And what his research found was that, is what we know is the frequency of the use of ideological words has a really shot up over the last 20 years. But the most interesting thing that I was not surprised to see, but was happy to see in a, in a published, paper, is you would expect this stuff to be more frequent under a liberal government because people like to blame the liberals for this. But in fact, it is far more prevalent under the conservative government. So the Doug Ford government has been the worst asset. They have not stopped any of it obviously was introduced in other governments, but it really took off during the Progressive Conservative Doug Ford government. So that's a really interesting part about his thesis. And another, similar quantitative analysis that he did was in 2022, there's a report called the Right to Read Report, which was, very critical of the use of CRT, culturally relevant responsive pedagogy. And they said, you can't do that. It's it's basically ruining kids abilities to read like it's it's bad. Stop doing it. That's what the report said from the Ontario Human Rights Commission, by the way. Which is quite shocking, but as it, as as it turns out, the Ministry of Education did put out a new reading curriculum. So Steven did another quantitative analysis looking at before and after the Right to Read report. Has the ideological content reduced? And the simple matter is no. So they're doing they just keep keep doing it all the time. And so he's a really great, he's really great at that analysis. And he's really sharp on the roots of, of all these different ideologies, particularly critical race theory. Yeah. So he's a great read. I mean, if any of you are a bit nerdy listening, go look up Stephen Reich's, research is great. Well, we should put, maybe in the description. I'll put a link so people can access that easily. Yeah. And my next thought or question, I guess it ties in to that. And they know that a lot of, the practices in hiring are centered around hiring more, racialized, indigenous, black, Bipoc and, and so on, teachers. And the idea is to ensure that students feel represented and are these people who are looked at. In the education system. And I just seeing themselves reflected in the education system. And I have always taken issue with this now, especially take issue with this, you know, being a person of color, I also have a disability. I'm also a woman. It never, never occurred to me going to school in the 90s whether my teachers said or not. What is that exactly? And that's I to point. That, as a, for example, as a woman, I am unable to learn from anybody who is not a woman. If I was a black child, I am unable to learn from anyone who is not black. Like, what is that actually implying exactly? And the the point that I was going to make was exactly that. That what about qualities that aren't racial or related to disability or gender? What about seeing excellence reflected in the educators? What about seeing values reflected in the educators? There's all kinds of other things that I identified with, with my teachers that had nothing to do with race or gender. So it's just. The concept, the concept of merit, within the critical race theory framework, is also viewed as a Eurocentric concept, and so be that, because there are different ways of knowing and that is this in science is simply one form of knowledge. And we have to understand, we have to bring it. Well, that's not really critical. Race theory is a bit more postmodernist, but which is slightly different thing. But it all kind of melds into one big pot. Right? So this idea that yeah, yeah, you can only learn if, if so okay. If, if you, you need to see yourself reflected and was it in that article. Yes. It was in the, the watching the article I did mention I think it's why I brought up the black student excellence. I can't remember what it's called. Now. Off the top of my head, there was this this group, affinity group, affinity group, where they're the slides are talking about how they're keeping it secret. They're based. They basically have this this group called affinity Group, which is for Bipoc students and staff only, but they're keeping it quiet from everybody else because otherwise, somehow it's. They don't feel safe. They don't say. But it's essentially segregated groups, like racially segregated groups. And I know they're painting it in this veil of of love and kindness, and we're doing it to help you and so on, so forth. But really, we're just bringing segregation back, right? Yeah. Well, and I talk, often on this podcast, but my son's my son is half white, half brown. And he because I was talking about this whole concept and, your article and slides with him and he's like, so am I welcome in that group. Do what? I make people feel unsafe because I'm half white. I'm like, I don't know. I feel like that's good. That was a big group was invite only. So imagine imagine if it's at your child's school and some kids are going off to this secret club that no one knows about, that you're only getting invited. What happens when. What happens when the other kids find out about it? Exactly. So those are the kinds of things that I think some of these ideologues aren't taking into account, or possibly don't care. I don't know, but I'd like to think that it's because maybe they're not really thinking through what it is that they're doing, because they do. I think a lot of the educators do actually want to. They are empathetic people. I think the empathy drive can be hijacked and unfortunately turned into something which can be negative. And I think that's kind of happening with critical race theory. But for the most part, I think they have good intentions. So yeah, I don't know if the I don't know if I can share a story. There's a story I want to tell you, but I don't know if I'm allowed. Can you change some details so that it's not. A that's what I'm trying to think of. Okay. And how about if you tell it and you afterwards think I don't want to do it. We can cut it out because we do at it. If someone says, oh, I don't want to say that. Oh, I know, I can't see. This is a thing about having I realized if I, if I shared this story, I, I would be outing, a source. But the gist of it is, and you're just gonna have to take my word for it that this person observed where a school with, white racial minorities. So it's it's a lot of, it's a high immigration school, because of this separation of races. And some of them were treated better than others, that the white kids were helping out on a particular activity because they were being rejected by all the other kids. After a race related lesson. But that's not the story. The story is because those white kids ended up doing the other activity because they were being rejected on the basis of their race. Then there were complaints from the from the racial minority kids that the white kids were getting special treatment, so they got in trouble. Come on. So what I'm saying is these have real and this is but oh, by the way, this is a primary school. These are like grade two, grade three kids, right? What a mess this is creating. Right. And so I look forward to the day where I can actually share the like those kinds of things a little bit with more detail in evidence. Because I right now I can't because the people who are involved in this story would get into trouble. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And that's a crazy thing to be talking about that we can't talk about what's going on in school because people will get fired. They will have their pensions taken away, you know, like that's it. We're talking about public education. Yeah. And I hate to harp on that whole topic of, feeling like you're too you can identify with your teachers based on race, but I just, I, I reflect on my experience in the school system, the public school system back in the 90s, living in Windsor was a predominantly white population, especially the neighborhood that I went to school in. And it it didn't occur to me, it didn't bother me. And then as I got later into the years and got involved in my son's school and in the school board and things like this, I would hear, these concepts, but I wasn't yet aware of critical race theory for some reason. I think just where I did my schooling and where I entered the world, there is a gap in my knowledge there, and I was completely oblivious to this. But I would sit back and listen and feel like I, as a person of color, was being told how I should feel and what I need and what I don't need. It was just such a bizarre experience for me. Yeah, but I, I imagine, I imagine a lot of those kids in the story that I just told wouldn't be behaving this way had they not been made to think in a racial way. Now there's something in critical race theory called, basically to be race conscious. Now, I'm sure a lot of people have heard about critical consciousness and, false consciousness and things like that. So there's this theory and method is applied to school with the critical race theory. And so in, culturally relevant and responsive pedagogy. But in it I've seen lesson plans that for teachers. So a teacher receive a lesson plan that they're going to deliver. And in it the pre reflection of the lesson, which integrates the CRP, basically says colorblindness is an insidious practice of racism. And what we're trying to do is develop race consciousness. Because only through race consciousness can we really liberate the racialized students. Well, that ends up so when we're talking about see themselves reflected in the classroom, it's developing race consciousness. So it's have you think about things on a racial level. So when I talk about critical race theory, I talk about it as not a lesson plan or CRP. It's not a lesson plan. It's a way in which to view the world is a worldview lens that is race conscious. Right. And so we're applying that from kindergarten onwards. And so that ends up being this seeing yourself reflected in all of those things on the race consciousness. You end up like what the story I've just told. Right? So it. Backfires. Well, it it is it is backfiring. I imagine it's a lot more frequent than we imagine, but I, you know, I'm only one person. I only hear so many stories, but I've certainly heard a few where I'm just like, this needs to be made public. People need to know. So as far as you know, letting people know, there are certain people, including Chanel, Jonathan K, myself, who receive, you know, these leaks basically. Yeah. So are you seeing, like, an increase our teachers, principals, trustees, anyone like, are you getting, like a plethora of all this, all these, you know, information about the slides and everything? Or is it trickling in? What are you getting? I started receiving things from people, so I just started doing this on my own. And when I started speaking out, I started, I that's when I developed my. I opened a Twitter account because I was never on Twitter before, not really on social media. And over a period of a year, I was sharing all this stuff that I was learning and and finding. And over time, I did develop connections with certain people who I guess I built trust, and they started sending me things every now and again. But it was just infrequent. And over the last I would say eight months that started becoming more and more frequent. And since I've become a journalist, it's just shot up. I don't know if it's now because I have like a news platform behind me or, what? But yeah. So now I'm in a enviable position at the minute where I have to choose what I can cover because there's, there's so much material. Right. And, and I imagine that's going to increase over time because right now it's really the I think the people who know what I'm doing tend to be in Ontario. And I suspect that with Juno, that might broaden out a little bit. So I'm kind of predicting that that will increase in volume. So yeah, now it's it's a question of okay, we'll pick out the things that are going to have the most impact and tell the story better. Okay. And speaking of impact. So you know, you talked about like the all of you know, people labeling you as right wing blah, blah, blah, blah. As far as professionally, personally, especially now in the last few weeks or last week of the story came out. Are you getting like a lot of people, I will say this one more time cause I started with the previous guest. We had Barbara Kay on, and, you know, I mentioned I used the word cowardice versus bravery, and she, you know, she was much more polite. So, you know, I don't want to call people cowards if they don't speak out. I still see there's a lot of cowardice, okay. And so people are terrified of speaking out, of being shamed of being, you know, excluded and so on. So for you, what has the experience been in the last while, in particular over the course of your journey as a journalist, you know, publicly saying these things, are you getting, you know, like like what's what's life looking like for you personally, professionally? I mean, I, I have sometimes I'm very empathetic to the people who don't want to. They don't want to lose their jobs. Sometimes I can be very empathetic to that. And at other times I'm very critical. Other times I will feel like this is just a bunch of cowardice because by not talking about these things, all you're doing is extending the pain and it's going to get worse. So I, I kind of flip flop between those feelings. But what I have come to realize is that you don't you don't you don't need everyone to say everything all the time. Although it would be nice to see a little bit more courage in Canada. But it's also useful to have people who are functioning or appearing as though they're functioning within these systems and getting along and going along and all these things, because those are incredible people that send me really great stuff. So there's lots of different people doing lots of different things. I and yes, there are people who've covered these sorts of things in in Canada, but we don't we also don't have, a lot of coverage on these issues in the, in the same way that America has had. Right. So maybe that's going to change. I do suspect that we still let let me tell you, in the UK and in America, you actually have so-called right wing media, conservative conservative legacy media or mainstream media now. Yes, they get Pooh poohed and yes, they get insulted and so on and so forth, but they exist other than the National Post, we don't really have that in Canada. And I think that is made it very difficult to get some of these issues out. Right. Because certainly the legacy media won't cover them, although now they're covering me. So I don't know, maybe I, maybe I can, I can, I can do my part to help get it out into the public. But I think because of that, I think a lot of people don't fully understand what's going on if they're not particularly in those industries themselves. Okay. And what about when I talk about the cowardice and everything part of it? Again, I understand I would never expect somebody to lose a career, you know, over speaking out. And you got to take care of yourself, your family and so on. But even just a social element, so, I mean, it sounds I think, I think I know the answer already, but you don't sound like somebody who would be bullied into, you know, to not speaking out and so on. So personally, what has it for there been any repercussions? Is a few people getting nasty emails like, what's the blowback for you? I don't I don't get hate mail. Well, I mean, I've had the occasional hate mail. And I'm sure that's going to increase substantially from strangers, of course. But and I and I've had some touch and go moments, there are family members that considered me to be a right wing bigot and so on, so forth. But I, I do think that in the long run, these things are going to iron themselves out. I think that we are currently at when I say we, I do kind of mean across the West, including the UK, because for me it's like Canada, UK, in the UK is going through it right now in a very similar way. Die and all of this stuff and I think we're kind of under a spell in the West especially. And what do you say we I'm mostly mean liberals or people even like vanilla liberals from 20 years ago who haven't fully continent or, you know, realize that this stuff is evil because they're still saying, well, I can't listen to people like Melanie Bennett because she's a right wing bigot. So we don't we don't we don't read Juno News. That's conservative media, right? We don't listen to to rebel because they're bad. So I think there's a lot of especially liberal minded people in places like the UK and Canada that don't quite get it yet. And of there's a lot of liberal people who are who have spoken out. I mean, Chanel is a great example of that. Most of the people that I've encountered, that I've now considered my friends in this stuff have been have come from a liberal, background, if you want to call it that. But each one of them, one of the common things is that something happens to them personally for them to really fully realize that these things were not as, as they were sold. And I and that's what I'm that's what I mean by we're kind of under a spell that and I say ‘we’ the lies the liberals I think are still kind of under spell for the most part, and don't quite realize that these things are. Yeah, not as sold. Right. So what do you think? Just. And you're absolutely right. I Malini and myself, in other contexts, I've heard from countless people who described exactly what you said, that that was their awakening, you know, and most people, they weren't originally right wing. They're called right wing, but they were centrist or left or liberal. Yeah. So if you thought like what quality allow somebody to be able to see this reality and be able to say, that's not the reality I was sold versus the ones whose cognitive dissonance reduction kicks in and they can't see reality and distort reality to maintain their, you know, sense of internal cohesion. I don't know, I've thought about that a lot. I come from an empirical science background, and I remember it being drilled into me at university that you had to change your mind with new evidence. But then looking back, I definitely spent years ignoring a lot of evidence that came to me, and I would dismiss it as just, oh, that's just denial. That's just right wing. So I did actually ignore a lot of evidence. But ultimately, when faced with the horror which is transitioning young people through the education system, something about that forced me to reevaluate that and say, look, I've been presented with this evidence right in front of me that I have to investigate and understand. But for other people, they keep refuting it, refuting another difference to me that I think for me personally, that made a difference, is that it wasn't an abstract concept that I was facing with this new evidence. It was in my life that was having a direct personal impact on me. So I think that made the difference. But I don't know for other people, I and that's I think so many researchers and, you know, people invested in this have asked questions like that. What makes one person speak out and another not why is one person so called fearless? And we'll say whatever needs to be said and other people to to make. And I and I really don't know. I mean, I'll say this, I've been told my entire life that I'm abrupt and I speak my mind. And so maybe there's an element of that as well. Yeah. If we went to the big five language, everything, it seems to be a common quality about people. Either they're disagreeable or they're not so agreeable to the point of being obsequious. They're able to, you know, if need be, they're able to speak out. I've never I I'm not afraid of confrontation. Right, right. So okay. That's probably that's probably a character trait that helps. Coming from the UK. Sorry. Melanie. Melanie, if I can ask Melanie another question, and I don't know if it's, you know, I'm seeing this all the time in my news feed. I don't know if it's overblown or overwrought, but in the UK, you can talk about the can, in the UK can the, you know, these hate speech laws, the the censorship laws, the, you know, people being, you know, arrested for tweets. I know there's one particular person who was supposedly inciting violence, but for other people just saying something like, you know, like, I don't I'm against mass deportation or mass immigration and so on. No unfettered immigration. They are, you know, being charged, are being arrested and so on. And so what is your knowledge and what do you think of when you're hearing this? Am I getting like a distorted view or is this really happening from what you know? Oh no, it's really happening. Yeah. So that was after I left that these things started becoming more official. So the non crime hate incidents I think you're referring to non crime hate incidents where you can someone can anonymously make a complaint about you. That is a non crime. And then that can go on your record. But it's not actually like you're not charged or anything. So but it would affect your ability to get a job or you know, would come up on a, on a record check and then that more often. Some examples of that. Sorry to cut in like that's crazy to me. Yeah. So for example, if we were in the UK and the Waterloo board decided that they wanted to make, you know, accuse me of of being a racist based on my article, then they could make a complaint to the police service is a non crime hate incident. And so it would go on my record. I wouldn't necessarily know about it, but it would be hate speech stuff like incidents. And I don't know, I'm not an expert on the ins and outs of that. But you could you could only find out it would be possible for you to only find out with a criminal record check. So let's say, for example, when you get a job. Frequently you have to have criminal record checks that could come up and you could not, you know, get work based on that. So that's a thing. And then the arrests for speech. Yeah. That, that's also a bit of a problem. Or is it 3000 in a year more than Russia? So is, is is on the attack and the concern, I mean, when I talk to my family in the UK, that's that's a big concern that I've had. I've had many conversations about supporting free speech. And I mean, they're just as socialist as Canada. Look, I, I'm definitely not socialist. I was never socialist. I don't support socialism. I'm Marxism. And I'm seeing all of this socialism pretending like it's liberalism in the UK too, where people are like, well, speech should be free, but not without consequences. And I keep hearing that which just grinds my gears because I don't, I just, I, I'm trying to be polite to family because I don't want to make mortal enemies for life. But I keep wanting to push back. And it's like you, you you don't know what you're advocating for until I come for you and I and I do get a sense of for for many people, dismissing the severity of these actions because what they're seeing is, again, this is an echo chamber thing from, from people on the left is, well, the people they're going after, they are saying hateful things. Right. And we do need to quell that because the far right is increasing. And so there are consequences to speech. Melanie and I don't I don't think that they're able to process this idea that it's it doesn't stop at you. So that's the difference between them and me, in the sense that I've had something personally happen to me. And there have been personal consequences. And so now I'm like, okay, maybe I need to think twice about this, but I but just too many people seem unable to see the consequences if the bad thing is happening to people they don't like. So that is a thing in the UK too. And far too many people seem to be supporting that. Yeah, they always say, you know, the barrel of the gun. It's eventually going to be pointed at you. Okay, we're in a totalitarian state and that's what it's becoming. And again, it sounds like hyperbole. It's, you know, sounds like. When you don't exaggerate. Exactly. But look at what's happening. And before it was insidious. Now I think it's just blatant, you know, some of what we're seeing, and then, you know, and it's gaslighting because I listen. The, the prisons are so full in the UK that after the riots in August last year, they had to empty the prisons to put in people for speech because they got branded as far right extremists by Keir Starmer. So like, I mean, what does that tell us. We're going to take out the violent criminals, You know, just all the worst of the worst. We're going to take them out of the prisons, basically, if they had, if they were, I think like a quarter left on their sentence, then they would they released a lot of these prisoners, violent people on to the streets so he could put, you know, your grandma in there because she says, good for them for Ice or something like that. I mean, look. We. I don't I'm not advocating to advocate for violence or anything like that, but but it just seems it's disproportionate. Yeah. And again, I was saying it was gaslighting because Keir Starmer I was last a couple weeks ago last month was talking about the free speech. And we're all for this and everything. Like, again, it's Orwellian to use an overused term. Yeah, but nobody likes Keir Starmer. I think he's like approval rating right now is maybe 16%. So yeah, it's it's it's appalling. But you know so when you. Yeah. But look what happened is we thought hey we're finally getting a change. And then all it takes is a new face and, you know, an existential threat apparently to Canada. And suddenly we get the same, you know, meet the new boss, same as the old boss. So, yeah, I hope I don't know what can happen in the UK. But I mean, what we're seeing there portends what's happening here. I think it's important for Canadians to pay attention to the UK, and I think it's important for the British citizens to pay attention to Canada because our, we all have the same problems, but different ones are taking a different priority or, are a bigger problem in a different way. But for example, the free speech problems in the UK that's coming this way. Right. So if our own government can find a way to make that happen, they're going to do that. So all of Europe, it's not necessarily just just the UK, but just like a lot of the D and woke stuff is becoming much, much bigger over there. Although it's not as big a thing right now. So I think we can all do paying attention to each other's countries because they're very similar. And I think that the those who wish to have more authoritarian control, are definitely taking notes off each other. Yeah. So what what's your hope with all of this, Melanie? Like what? Let's say ten years from now? I don't know, 20 years from now. And you're you're not reporting any longer. What do you hope people have learned from you? What difference do you hope you make? Or what do you think or hope would set you apart from other reporters? Well, I'm not a reporter. So a reporter, just journalist and news. Well, I'm an investigative journalist, so it's the only reason I underline that is because it's my job to really get into the nitty gritty of the details. So I do work with reporters, and they'll just they're telling you the facts about what's going on there. But I just reporting in front. Yeah. Well, I hope honestly, I hope that through my work. Well, what already makes me a bit different from other journalists who cover these things is I have noticed through my own, you know, pre journalism days that a lot of the journalists didn't seem to understand, the ones critical didn't seem to fully understand the issue. And there's some critical details missing. Like, for example, the National Post recently put out an article saying that, Paul Calandra as Bill 33, which is supposed to apparently remove di from education. So everybody's celebrating public ownership. But if you actually read the bill and this is going to be in a lot of my articles coming forward, it does nothing of the sort. And so I feel like at least my hope is that I can inform the public in a in a way that is understandable and clear of the source of all these issues. And so if you have. So why is it a prob why are these things a problem and where do they come from. And hopefully what we could do about it down the line like that would be my goal. I'm not, I'm not even thinking about 20 years down the line like I'm literally thinking about next week. Yeah. 20 years. Who knows when. So to that point, actually, what we close this podcast with is leaving our listeners with what they can do with all of this, because I think that sometimes the discussions that we have can be overwhelming or, you know, people are left with, okay, well, now what? So based on what we've discussed today, what are some, some takeaways or what can people do with all this information. Well, if we're talking about education specifically, I would really like people to become better informed. And obviously I'm just going to point to my my articles for that. I do provide a lot more information about the, the source policies and things like that in my reporting, and I will be doing that continuously going forward. So I think to be really informed about the issue is, number one, because I'm seeing a lot of people who are just being reactionary online and not necessarily engaging with the reality and day to day life. So if you if you have an interest in doing something about this, become informed in the first place. Understand the policies, read the policies. But the other thing that people can do is they don't need to become journalists. They don't need to become like, you know, activists themselves. They can literally engage in their own children's school. They are going to come across issues that, you know, there's going to be pushback. It's not going to be fun, but that's one way of doing it. There's also not enough people write letters, and it's just such a simple thing to do. And by the way, a handwritten letter, even better, a handwritten letter from a child. Even better. Right? Write to your local, politician. Write to the your ministers of education in your provinces. Right. And if you do that from a place of being well informed, they're more likely to listen to you as well. Right? So we all, all of us, all citizens, need to become more engaged in the civic process. And to do that, we need to understand what that process is to begin with. So I would say, yeah, I mean, the simplest thing you could do, writing letters, because they are I think there are a lot more effective than what people realize. Yeah. And I love that idea of a handwritten letter from a student who's being impacted by these things. Yes. Yeah. Yes. And where can our listeners find you. And we'll also. Why is on Twitter. Why and anymore. I mean by all means go, go follow me. Maybe even like I'm just going to self-promote here. Maybe y'all need to complain to to Elon Musk. Be like this journalist needs to get back on Twitter. But I'm Finkledusty on Twitter. That's a funny story. I won't get into it. I'm also on Substack, but I'm just regular Melanie Bennett on Substack. And obviously my do all my Juno, publications go up on there as well. I also have a show on Juno, YouTube channel. So they have a little playlist for my show. It's called disrupted. Yep. And I put all those links in the description. Yeah. Okay. And so thank you so much for coming on Melanie. How you with time I always appreciate you know what you're posting. And you know I think we need more voices like that. So on that note until next time keep your eyes on the road and your hands upon the wheel. Cheers.