A Facebook post by a New Jersey mother complaining about sex-biased posters at her child’s elementary school has sparked a surprising response from the US military.
A senior U.S. military official was called on to resign Wednesday after responding to a Facebook post by North Burlington Board of Education member and mother Angela Reeding that flagged her for what she described as “security” to local police. . concerns.”
Lt. Col. Christopher Schilling took issue with a post on a local Facebook group in Reading, warning parents that his 7-year-old’s school has posted posters depicting different types of sexuality, including the virtues of being “polysexual,” at the entrance.
The posters were reportedly part of a mission to create a “safe space” for all students to feel “good and accepted.” 9-year-olds participated in the creation of these posters, detailed on the Chaos and Control substack page where the story was first reported.
Reading condemned the display in a primary school hallway as “depraved” and said it should be “illegal to sexually assault my children” and presented parents with a wall of LGBTQ-themed posters.
The last thing he expected was a response from a high-ranking military officer.
“I was more surprised. I was scared,” Reading told “Tucker Carlson Tonight” on Wednesday. “I actually pulled my kids out of school the day I found out. When the U.S. military came after you because you expressed concern about a public poster that everybody could see. , it was amazing and I was worried for them.
On his personal Facebook page, according to a screenshot, Schilling Reading’s post said there were “security concerns,” adding that Joint Base was working with local law enforcement to “monitor the situation” and “ensure the continued safety of the entire community.” “.
“Why do elementary schools help/allow elementary KIDS to study sex and make posters,” the mother wrote on Facebook.
A senior US military official saw Angela Reading’s post on social media and flagged it to the local police.
“The current situation surrounding Ms. Riding’s actions has raised safety concerns for many families,” he wrote. “Joint Base Management takes this situation very seriously and from the beginning Security Forces worked with multiple state and local law enforcement agencies to control the situation to ensure the continued safety of the entire community.”
However, Reading said his post was “really moderate”.
“I actually thought it was age-appropriate to expose a 7-year-old to words like transgender and pansexual,” Reading told Carlson. “I said that all people deserve love and respect. My post was very clear about this. Still, it has provoked a response, and it’s frightening that we don’t have the right to speak up and raise concerns about our public education system in this country.
Reading added that while he was outraged by the response to his post, he believes Schilling is a “bad actor” who does not represent all members of the U.S. military and that North Hanover has many “phenomenal” military families. and teachers live. .
Still, Reading said military intervention and police pressure made him afraid to speak out.
The administrator of the Facebook group told him that North Hanover Police Chief Robert Duff had demanded it be removed, Reading said.
“I said, ‘I don’t want the National Security Service to come after me.’ Take the post down. I don’t want to deal with it. I agreed to take the post down,” he said, adding that he later contacted the police chief and “brought up the First Amendment.”
“We should not use government resources and our positions to force individuals to delete Facebook posts,” he said. “I also shared with him the post he had already seen. There was nothing wrong. It didn’t break any law, it didn’t break Facebook’s rules.”
The Joint Base confirmed to Fox News that it had notified law enforcement of the social media exchange, “a common practice of sharing information between law enforcement agencies.”
“The military’s purpose is to protect us from external enemies, not to police Facebook posts,” Carlson said.
He added that he hoped Schilling would be “removed from his command tonight.” As for the police chief, Carlson said, “I hope that Chief Duff will be relieved of his position immediately.”
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