Pennsylvania parents and grandparents: you’ve been lied to for months by the teachers’ unions, the media and politicians about whether Critical Race Theory is being taught in our Commonwealth’s schools.

But the teachers’ unions may have overplayed their hand by streaming radical race and gender ideology directly into our living rooms and kitchens — and into the ears of parents, who beforehand had been largely unaware of what was being taught. Many across the state (and country) were not happy about what they heard.

First, we were told Critical Race Theory is a legal theory that is only taught in law schools. 

But after months of viral school board meeting videos, in which parents called out board members over their displeasure at radical curriculum, this lie would no longer suffice.

Next, we were told that it wasn’t really Critical Race Theory, but rather “honest history” that examines “how today’s racial inequality is a systemic legacy of this country’s history.”

But parents were having none of the semantic games. A philosophy that was meant to divide younger Americans, and teach them to filter every aspect of their lives through prism of race and oppression, has in fact united parents and grandparents to oppose it. And it’s not just staunch conservatives who oppose CRT in classrooms, as reported recently by Politico.

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No well-meaning parent of any race wants their child to be taught to judge themselves and their classmates by their racial background instead of by the content of their character.

Whatever vocabulary the classroom ideologues are using, the real goal is to turn Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a Dream” speech on its head. And it is so unpopular that currently 26 state legislatures, including Pennsylvania, are working on legislation to ban the practice.

No well-meaning parent of any race wants their child to be taught to judge themselves and their classmates by their racial background instead of by the content of their character.

So how are the teachers’ unions and Leftist politicians responding? By brazenly announcing that they are going to teach this curriculum to America’s children whether their parents want it or not. So says the head of the American Federation of Teachers, at least.

The National Education Association (NEA), America’s largest teacher union, recently pledged $127,000 to promote Critical Race Theory and to fight the legislative attempts to ban it in K-12 schools.

The NEA shockingly went further, also pledging $56,000 to find and distribute opposition research on organizations that oppose Critical Race Theory. This shows just how far the teachers’ unions have moved from actual education.

The American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the second largest teacher union in the country, announced plans to beef up its legal defense fund with $2.5 million more to legally defend teachers who suffer consequences for teaching CRT against state law.

These aren’t the teachers’ unions’ dollars alone. That’s your money, in the form of taxpayer dollars that go to teachers’ salaries, who in turn are forced to hand over a portion of their paychecks to teachers’ unions. The unions then use it to fund a political agenda that many teachers themselves oppose.

These aren’t the teachers’ unions’ dollars alone. That’s your money, in the form of taxpayer dollars that go to teachers’ salaries…

But wait, there’s more.

The left- leaning Zinn Education Project, an organization founded to promote the socialist vision of revisionist historian Howard Zinn, has put together a pledge asking teachers to commit to teaching children that America “was founded on dispossession of Native Americans, slavery, structural racism and oppression; and structural racism is a defining characteristic of our society today.”

More than 5,500 teachers across the country have signed this pledge, including some Pennsylvania activist teachers. 

What is their plan for the country when an entire generation of children have been taught that its foundations are evil?

For more than a year now, teachers’ unions have made it clear they are political entities first and foremost, and their priority is not our children’s education. But many teachers disagree with the political agenda, and CRT was their last straw. 

The Freedom Foundation has heard from numerous teachers in recent weeks and months who are tired of supporting these unions with their taxpayer-funded paychecks, and are opting out of union membership.

This includes teachers in Pennsylvania. We’re here to help.

For all their progressive rhetoric, teachers’ unions are among the biggest bullies in the country, silencing teachers who disagree into compliance — and working hard to maintain a failing monopoly on our kids’ education. But they’ve overplayed their hands, and many parents and teachers are finding their voice. 

Hunter Tower is the Pennsylvania State Director for the Freedom Foundation. @HunterTower