A story versus the facts
Here's an interesting excerpt from this issue of the American Spectator:
The Stories We Get Told
By Lawrence Henry
Published 11/4/2005 12:05:23 AM
At one of my wife's business conferences, I found myself seated at dinner across from a nice white-haired old lady who had raised her family in Lexington, Massachusetts. Looking for a topic of conversation, I asked, "Have you kept up with this business about David Parker?"
"Have I!" she exclaimed. "My daughter is a community activist, and she's been telling me all about it. Do you know that that Parker moved to Lexington two years ago and just waited for the right time so the right-wing religious types could push their agenda on Lexington's public schools?"
I hope I didn't drop my jaw.
"But that's not true," I said, starting the discussion (which stayed most polite) along today's familiar path: a story versus the facts. Against stories, I have begun to think, facts scarcely stand a chance anymore.
HERE ARE THE FACTS about David Parker. He went to the office of Estabrook Elementary School principal Joni Jay on April 27 this year to object to his five-year-old son's having been exposed to material that described same-sex couples as one of several normal family groupings. As Wendy McElroy writes on the Fox News website, "By law, Massachusetts's schools must notify parents before discussing sexuality with children." Parker and his wife had not been notified, despite having exchanged many e-mails with the principal on the subject.
Somebody, it is unclear who, probably Lexington superintendent of schools William J. Hurley, called the Lexington police. The police arrested Parker on a trespass charge. Parker spent the night in jail.
A demonstration, with a police permit, was held in support of Parker on September 6. It attracted people from beyond Lexington, the issue having been publicized thoroughly on conservative websites. (The newspapers and TV stations almost completely ignored it at first.) An organized crowd of counter-demonstrators also showed up. When TV trucks appeared, some nasty confrontations developed, apparently started by the counter-demonstrators (many of them also from outside Lexington, and also attracted by Web postings).
By then, the fable had taken hold of Parker as a mole for a right-wing religious juggernaut determined to take over Lexington's public schools. Alternatively, he was a martyr to the "homosexual agenda." In fact, Parker did not object to material about same-sex families being in public school curricula. Personally, he and his wife, though they are Christians who have renewed their faith, do not proselytize, nor even describe their religious views, though invited to do so. He speaks carefully, rationally, in a sophisticated manner.
He just wanted to be notified of same-sex family material in the daily lesson.
Never mind. It all got buried by stories.
The Stories We Get Told
By Lawrence Henry
Published 11/4/2005 12:05:23 AM
At one of my wife's business conferences, I found myself seated at dinner across from a nice white-haired old lady who had raised her family in Lexington, Massachusetts. Looking for a topic of conversation, I asked, "Have you kept up with this business about David Parker?"
"Have I!" she exclaimed. "My daughter is a community activist, and she's been telling me all about it. Do you know that that Parker moved to Lexington two years ago and just waited for the right time so the right-wing religious types could push their agenda on Lexington's public schools?"
I hope I didn't drop my jaw.
"But that's not true," I said, starting the discussion (which stayed most polite) along today's familiar path: a story versus the facts. Against stories, I have begun to think, facts scarcely stand a chance anymore.
HERE ARE THE FACTS about David Parker. He went to the office of Estabrook Elementary School principal Joni Jay on April 27 this year to object to his five-year-old son's having been exposed to material that described same-sex couples as one of several normal family groupings. As Wendy McElroy writes on the Fox News website, "By law, Massachusetts's schools must notify parents before discussing sexuality with children." Parker and his wife had not been notified, despite having exchanged many e-mails with the principal on the subject.
Somebody, it is unclear who, probably Lexington superintendent of schools William J. Hurley, called the Lexington police. The police arrested Parker on a trespass charge. Parker spent the night in jail.
A demonstration, with a police permit, was held in support of Parker on September 6. It attracted people from beyond Lexington, the issue having been publicized thoroughly on conservative websites. (The newspapers and TV stations almost completely ignored it at first.) An organized crowd of counter-demonstrators also showed up. When TV trucks appeared, some nasty confrontations developed, apparently started by the counter-demonstrators (many of them also from outside Lexington, and also attracted by Web postings).
By then, the fable had taken hold of Parker as a mole for a right-wing religious juggernaut determined to take over Lexington's public schools. Alternatively, he was a martyr to the "homosexual agenda." In fact, Parker did not object to material about same-sex families being in public school curricula. Personally, he and his wife, though they are Christians who have renewed their faith, do not proselytize, nor even describe their religious views, though invited to do so. He speaks carefully, rationally, in a sophisticated manner.
He just wanted to be notified of same-sex family material in the daily lesson.
Never mind. It all got buried by stories.
posted by David Parker at 9:40 PM
