State Sen. Brad Zaun responded to a critical comment from Democrat State Sen. Zach Wahls at a Greater Des Moines Partnership event last week. Wahls said it is frustrating to see a lot of Iowa being in the news for “some of these divisive, socio, cultural issues.”
“I know Sen. Zaun and I have some pretty strong disagreements about this,” Wahls said. “Saying that we’re going to, you know, go after teachers and librarians is not going to make Iowa’s public education stronger. Trying to privatize Iowa’s public schools is not going to make Iowa a more attractive place to live.”
Zaun has been one of the most vocal supporters of parents concerned about sexually inappropriate books being in school libraries across the state.
“Regards to teachers — there’s so much misinformation out there,” Zaun said. “It was brought to my attention by several parents some of the garbage that’s being taught to our kids. It is not appropriate. They are teaching our kids, there’s situations in several books that they have out there that it is appropriate for adults to have a sexual relationship with a child. I don’t know if there’s anybody in here that thinks that’s healthy for our children.
“There are situations where cousins are together. Fourth grade, doing things that I can’t tell you. I would love, and I’m getting attacked right now, to email people. But the truth of the matter is that if I tell people the actual illustrations that are being taught in these books and I send that to someone that’s under 18 years of age, I’m distributing child pornography.
“All I want our schools to do is to teach our kids to be successful once they get out of school. Give them the tools that they need. And I think we need to put a stop to that garbage. Even The Des Moines Register editorial person even said it makes a lot of people uncomfortable to even look at this stuff. I’m not trying to get rid of teachers. I just think they need to focus on making sure our kids are successful and productive once they get out in the workforce.”
