Identity crayons. Gender ‘snowpersons’. Social Justice Acrostic Poems promoting social causes like Black Lives Matter. Those are just three of the components of an LGTBQ education plan Atlanta-based retailer Home Depot promoted in partnership with the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) as part of its own in-house DEI programs.Also included as resources for educators are a ‘gender support checklist’ for teachers and a website titled ‘Definging LGTBQ Words for Elementary School Students’ to advise them on how to talk to students as early as Grade 1 “to help students understand differences and treat others with respect.”Some of the words included are ‘pansexual’, ‘queer’ and ‘non-binary’. The checklist told teachers to probe into students’ family lives to see if parents are “supportive” of their child’s gender identity..TOOL TIME: Lowe’s home improvement latest to get hammered in anti-DEI push.REVERSE COURSE!: Harley-Davidson latest to buckle under DEI blitz.BOTTOMS UP: Jack Daniel’s the latest to dump DEI policies.It’s all part of the HRC’s ‘Welcoming School’ bullying prevention program it is introducing into US schools. In 2022 Home Depot made the program a key plank in its ‘Diversity Partnerships’ campaign in partnership with the HRC.“The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Foundation works to make transformational change in the everyday lives of LGBTQ+ people,” according to Home Depot’s announcement. “While The Home Depot has partnered with the HRC Foundation in the past to advance meaningful change, we’ve expanded our partnership to support multiple initiatives that align with key commitments around advancing education for all, specifically within diverse communities.”One lesson plan in the program has kindergarten to second-grade kids read a book called ‘Red: A Crayon’s Story’ whereupon the teacher facilitates a session using crayons to encourage students explore their ‘identity’.“Each student will create a crayon about themselves that explores their inner identities,” the lesson plan said. “It is important to teach young children that we cannot assume someone’s gender identity based upon their gender expression.”“Let students know that gender is your internal sense of being a girl, boy, both or neither. There are many ways that people identify their gender, and there are many genders,” the lesson plan reads. “A simple way to explain this to students is that when a baby is born, a doctor or midwife looks at their body/anatomy and says they are a girl, boy or intersex. However, babies can’t talk yet, so they can’t tell us how they feel. When they start to talk, they may say they are a girl or a boy, both or neither.” .The irony is that it wasn’t the self-described ‘Warrior-Against-Woke’ Robby Starbuck who brought the news to light after pressuring rival Lowe’s to do the same earlier this week. Rather it was Fox News that leaked the details which were picked up by the New York Post.A double irony is that Home Depot co-founder and unabashed Trump supporter Bernie Marcus told a World Economic Forum audience in January, 2023 that the “woke generation” was “lazy” and “entitled.”“"I can tell you right now, after some meetings I had yesterday, you can't hire people. They don't want to work. Nobody wants to work anymore, especially office people. They want to work three days a week. It's incredible. How do you have a recession when you have people that don't want jobs?""They're entitled, they're given everything," continued. "The government, in many cases, if you don't work, you get as much money as when you did work… And so you get this laziness, which you have, and it's basically a socialistic society."
