By Adam Pagnucco.
Council Member Kristin Mink has made national news for saying that “some Muslim families” are on “the same side of an issue as white supremacists.”
Mink was referring to an effort by some MCPS families to opt out of parts of MCPS curriculum that are inclusive of LGBTQ+ people. The effort has spawned a lawsuit and a recent protest. Of the three families who are suing, one are Muslims, another are Roman Catholics and the third has parents who are Roman Catholic and Ukrainian Orthodox. The protestors included Muslims and Christians.
Fox News has posted video of Mink commenting on the issue at a school board meeting on June 6. That video only contains a short excerpt from her remarks. Following is a complete transcript.
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Good afternoon, Dr. McKnight and esteemed members of the board and everyone who has gathered here today. I’ve had a lot of really good conversations this morning with many of the people who have testified here. And, you know, and it’s more complicated, I think, than a lot of people would like to think it is. This issue has unfortunately put, it does put, some – not all of course – some Muslim families on the same side of an issue as white supremacists and outright bigots and you know they’re… However, the folks who have talked here today, I would not put in the same category as those folks. Although, you know, it’s again complicated because they’re falling on the same side of this particular issue.
But many of the members of the Muslim community who have been activated around the opt out issue are, you know, members of Muslim organizations that I have advocated side by side on other issues about. Issues around, you know, housing, welcoming immigrants and feeding our neighbors and providing health care and all of those sorts of things.
So this is kind of a different, this is a different situation. So as I’ve been having these conversations, I’ve been trying to understand, you know, why it’s falling the way it is. And trying to understand the perspective of some of our Muslim neighbors and community members who have felt the way that we’ve heard today. And I do genuinely hear and believe that there is a desire to not do harm to the LGBTQA+ members of our community. They’ve been very clear in our conversations, and I think we’ve heard here today that it’s important to them to not remove those books from our schools, to make sure that they are available to the LGBTQA+ students and community there so that those students can see themselves in the curriculum.
And the place where we differ is that I think that they’re feeling that to allow Muslim families to opt their children out of those books, those pieces of literature that are LGBTQA-inclusive, that that does not harm the LGBTQA+ community. And the fact is that it does. You cannot put, you cannot say that this is a particular demographic of people who, when they appear in books, now we allow some people, we allow some families and students to say we’re not going to read those books. There’s no way to do that without sending a clear message to the LGBTQA+ community that you are seen as different, as othered, and other people don’t need to learn about your existence or have you included in the curriculum.
Montgomery County Public Schools has a responsibility to teach a fact-based, science-based curriculum and the science here, the scientific and medical community, has come to a clear consensus that LGBTQA+ people exist. When we have children’s books that represent, you know, a child who has, who is transgender and whose parents are telling them that, or acknowledging that this is a child who was born and was identified as a baby as one gender and turns out that this child is actually another gender, the scientific and medical community, there is widespread consensus that that is the reality.
And so MCPS has a responsibility to include and reflect that reality in our curriculum. The same as we have the responsibility to teach about evolution. There are religions that don’t agree with evolution. We don’t allow them to opt out of those portions of our science curriculum. And so, you know, those families who may not believe in evolution are welcome to teach a counter-narrative at home or in their own religious institutions and to say here’s what you’re going to learn about in school and here’s what our family believes. You know, all different religions of people have the ability to teach around the facts and the science that are going to be reflected in MCPS curriculum but we cannot modify our fact-based, science-based curriculum to reflect particular religious beliefs that are not aligned with that science-based curriculum.
And that is equity. And that’s not an infringement on particular religious freedoms, just as we cannot allow folks to opt out of teachings about evolution, we can’t allow them to teach about this. And that said, I do want to acknowledge that I think it’s important to have some nuance in these conversations depending on who we’re talking with. If there are folks who are not intending to come with hate or harm, I think they’re good healthy conversations that can be had there and I appreciate those I’ve had and that said, it is essential that we continue to reflect our community accurately and include everyone in the materials that are present there.
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The video is embedded below.