On Ryan Walters, White Supremacy and its Beef With Education

So remember Oklahoma Superintendent of Schools Ryan Walters? You might recall that yesterday Ryan announced that every Oklahoma high school will have a Turning Point USA chapter to "promote free speech, open engagement, dialogue about [U.S.] American greatness, a dialogue around [U.S.] American values." Oklahoma is 50th in the nation in education, but sure! Why not?

Well, this morning, during a news interview with a local news affiliate, Ryan abruptly announced he's resigning as the Superintendent of Schools to become the CEO of the Teacher Freedom Alliance. Who are they?

The Teacher Freedom Alliance is a conservative nonprofit that says it assists educators “in their mission to develop free, moral, and upright American citizens.” What it actually does is target teachers unions who are aiming for inclusivity and equity in education while amplifying the voices of the hateful, racist bigots that teach and handle school administration in some areas of the country.

During his resignation announcement, Ryan happily proclaimed “We’re going to destroy the teachers unions. We have seen the teachers unions use money and power to corrupt our schools, to undermine our schools.”

Ryan then abruptly left the news studio, running from reporters as they tried to get some kind of timetable on when he made this decision, when he would be leaving his role as Superintendent, or if he felt destroying teachers unions across the country was a good idea. As you can see in the video, he had no additional comments at this time.

So, let's summarize: Ryan Walters sold out the Oklahoma educational system to Turning Point USA, giving a middle finger to thousands of children the state of Oklahoma are failing because learning doesn't matter when you can spend education funds to "combat woke", then bounced with no notice, lining his pockets by jumping to a hateful nonprofit where he can do the kind of damage he's done to students in Oklahoma on a national level.

Ryan is, for lack of a better term, a douche.

This situation saddens me. Children are hurt because of a ridiculous white supremacist bigot and a white supremacist nationalist agenda. Oklahomans voted for this man. He sold them on a vision of their state education system that decenters legitimate educational standards and amplifies their belief that their whiteness is in danger and needs to be protected at all costs. And the scariest thing?

Oklahoma ain't the only place in the United States with a Ryan.

(Somebody's) Lord help us all.

On Oklahoma, TPUSA in High School, and "Owning the Libs"

Oklahoma is 50th in the nation in education.

50th.

But today, Oklahoma Superintendent of Schools Ryan Walters announced that every Oklahoma high school will have a Turning Point USA chapter to "promote free speech, open engagement, dialogue about [U.S.] American greatness, a dialogue around [U.S.] American values."

50th. In the nation. In education.

Their kids can't read and write. They aren't excelling. The Oklahoma Board of Education has historically put little funding into support programs or additional educational tools for Oklahoma students to try to turn this around. And now the little funds the Oklahoma Board of Education has, funds which will be lessened even more by all of the Federal budget cuts to education, will now be used to pay for Turning Point USA to have a propaganda wing in every high school in Oklahoma because we all know they aren't showing up for free.

50th.

These kids deserve much better than this.

But you know, "owning the libs," y'all.

On Tylenol, Charlatans, and Sheep

If you believe y'all's president, RFK, Jr. (a man that sounds like he eats a carton of lit cigarettes a day, staged a bear homicide in Central Park, spouts conspiracy theories, and has a dead brainworm in his head from eating suspicious meat), and Dr. Oz (a failed daytime talk show host who doesn't currently have a medical license that shills "miracle drugs" and was so unelectable that y'all's president had to give him a job) when they tell you, without proof, that autism is linked to acetaminophen usage during pregnancy?

I'mma go out on a limb and guess that you were takin' them horse pills at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Y'all's president literally told pregnant folx to, and I quote, "tough it out," ignore their doctors, and not use Tylenol (he had to start calling acetaminophen 'Tylenol' during the press conference because he couldn't pronounce acetaminophen) when they are experiencing fevers and pain during pregancy because, you know, lets endanger the mother and child with an uncontained fever.

Y'all's president also advocated for breaking up childhood vaccinations and pushing back the hepatitis B shot for newborns — a public health strategy that has brought the infection in children to the brink of elimination — to age 12 because, and I quote, "it’s too much liquid, too many different things are going into that baby.” Oh, and he also said hepatitis B was strictly an STI. I'll let you do with that what you will.

SIGH.

Autism is a natural part of human variation and genetics, but you know, why acknowledge facts when you can vilify and target millions of people?

This "medical advice" comes from a bunch of folx with zero credibility, no evidence, no studies, and no supporting research of any kind.

Nothing these folx said yesterday is valid.

This is just another rung on the ladder of this administration's concentrated attack on folx with autism.

This is just another rung on the ladder of this administration's mission to hurt as many people as possible.

But a whole bunch of y'all are still gonna champion this administration's destruction of all of us, ignore facts and science, and "do your part" by following directions, possibly doing medical harm to yourselves, and mistreating the folx in your life with autism by regurgitating this nonsense in their presence because that's what you think a "real (U.S.) American" would do, regardless of the facts presented to you.

Facepalm.

This Week's Opening Thought: September 22, 2025

This week's opening thought: After this past weekend's full-on hate rally masquerading as a memorial service, and seeing the sea of people of pallor who showed up to "pay their respects" to a white supremacist bigot with tears in their eyes and a distortion of the purported "values of Christianity" in their hearts, I found myself once again playing my least favorite game: What Will It Take?

What Will It Take? focuses on me asking myself one question: what will it take for people of pallor to be uncomfortable enough to feel like "enough is enough" and stand up and fight for, well, everyone? Themselves, oppressed communities, targeted communities, everyone?

I've been playing this game for at least 30 years now, y'all.

What Will It Take?

Hell if I know.

After all my years on this planet, and decades of my own learning around the intersections of white supremacy and history, I honestly have no clue what it will take to get people of pallor to recognize how dangerous this country is for marginalized, targeted, and invisible communities and decide they're ready to fight.

I have no clue what it will take for people of pallor to collectively realize that white supremacy harms them, too, and that it's time to do more than show up to a "No Kings" rally.

And I'm flummoxed when it comes to understanding what it'll take for people of pallor to realize that we've been long past "talking it out," "finding a middle ground," choosing to "not get into political conversations," and well into dealing with an escalating level of danger that will eventually subjugate, eradicate, and oppress most if not all of us.

What Will It Take?

What will it take for y’all to fight?

I honestly don't know.

Y'all do always seem more than ready to fight and "stand up" against Black and Brown folx, melanated folx, trans folx, and queer folx for pointing out the harm, hate, or discrepancies in y'all's words and actions, though.

Huh.

Guess I know the answer to the question after all.

On Candace, Anti-Blackness, Self-Hatred, and Begging for the Hand of the Massa

What’s always wild to me about Black folx who are so stuck in anti-Blackness, self-hatred, and white supremacist ideology is that they spend their entire lives hoping, praying, that people of pallor will care about them and give them the head pats and validation that they so desperately yearn for, for the willingness to hate and help oppress their own people.

These Black folx never receive the recognition they believe they deserve from whiteness for participating in harming their own people, because they never fully comprehend that they are tools of the master, discarded by whiteness once they’ve served their purpose. They ultimately find themselves with nowhere to go, isolated from their own people, with no other person or societal institution of pallor interested in taking them in because they’ve been drained of their perceived usefulness and have burned every possible bridge to support and care they once had. When this happens, they, of course, try to crawl back to the Black collective, hoping we’ll forgive and forget. Suddenly, they’re “Black again,” trying to endear themselves to the Black collective, adopting or re-adopting AAVE. Suddenly, we’re their brothers and sisters again! They know how it feels to be “held down by the man!” So, after they “prove themselves” with a few phrases and colloquialisms, they believe Black folx should forgive them, let them come back in from the cold, and invite ‘em back to the cookout.

Instead, the Black collective ignores their asses and leaves ’em out there in the streets alone because they’ve proven they cannot be trusted to take care of Blackness - ours or even their own.

So, defeated, they crawl back to whiteness, living on the outskirts of white supremacy, hoping they’ll do or say the right thing that will once again get them the comfort of whiteness that they ultimately yearn for. They do things like cry and have an online, videotaped breakdown over not being invited to the memorial service of a white supremacist bigot that they buddied up to for years, even while said white supremacist bigot spent years openly and happily talking about how he believed Black women were “inferior” and “lacked the brain power” to do anything other than procreate. And after all that hootin’ and hollerin’ and carryin’ on?

They still find themselves with no invite, on the outside looking in, hoping that one day the master will let them back on the plantation or Black folx will let them back in out of pity.

That one day never comes.

What a wild existence.

Sh-- wouldn’t happen to me, though.

[Image description: A group of Black people laughing. Above them are the words, “The Black Collective’s reaction to Candace Owens being upset that she wasn’t invited to Charlie Kirk’s memorial service.”]

Image description: A group of Black people laughing. Above them are the words, “The Black Collective’s reaction to Candace Owens being upset that she wasn’t invited to Charlie Kirk’s memorial service.”