A North Carolina news outlet sparked outrage on social media after publishing an editorial cartoon depicting prominent GOP politicians as KKK bigots.
WRAL, an NBC affiliate based in Raleigh, NC, labeled Lt. Governor Mark Robinson and State Board of Education member Olivia Oxendine as members of the Ku Klux Klan for objecting to teaching Black Lives Matter’s critical race theory in the state’s public schools.
Under the proposed curriculum, children as young as elementary school age will be introduced to racial politics, gender and transgender identities and dismantling the nuclear family headed by 2 heterosexual parents.
The Black Lives Matter-authored curriculum teaches children that they were “assigned” a gender at birth and they can be whatever gender they choose to be.
In the cartoon, an elephant, holding a copy of the state’s proposed curriculum, is dressed in a Ku Klux Klan robe, while declaring, “we prefer to start with a clean sheet.”
Robinson, who is Black, slammed WRAL as “vile” for publishing the cartoon, drawn by 8th-grade social studies teacher Dennis Draughon, during Black History Month in America.
“On the second day of Black History Month, the first black Lt. Governor of North Carolina has been portrayed as such by one of the largest news outlets in this state,” Robinson said. “It’s something we cannot stand for.”
Oxendine, the board’s only Native American member, voiced her opposition to the proposed social studies standards, saying it gives “the feeling of America the oppressor, not America the land of opportunity.”
Twitter user @flyfischer4428 slammed WRAL, writing: “I CANNOT believe how offensive this is. @markrobinsonNC is black. Olivia Oxendine is a Native American. @WRAL, @wlos this cartoon should be a story by itself.”
Another Twitter user, @LotusBlossom44, wrote: “Wow. I thought WRAL couldn’t sink any lower. This is shameful in so many ways. Calling GOP the KKK for not wanting to include race-based ideologies in the educational curriculum?”
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