Ms. Rachel Can Be Replaced. Your Values Cannot.

Three and a half years ago, when I became a mom, everyone told me I needed Ms. Rachel.

Experienced mothers I trusted swore by the YouTube sensation. They said she was educational and helped babies and toddlers talk, so I put her on.

My son was instantly mesmerized.

The whole thing felt bizarre. A middle-aged woman in overalls and an oversized pink headband speaking in an exaggerated baby voice while her husband danced alongside her. Something about it felt off. But I was a new mom. What did I know?

So I pushed past my gut reaction. Maybe this was simply how babies learn.

Then Jules appeared on TV in my son’s toy room. A female performer with short hair, facial piercings, a denim jacket, and a deliberately androgynous appearance who identifies as “nonbinary.” That was my hard stop.

My son was still learning “momma” and “dadda,” how to walk, how to talk, and the names of the people and things around him. I was not interested in introducing woke gender ideology to a baby who was still trying to understand the most basic things about the world around him.

I told my husband to turn it off, did my best to scrub Ms. Rachel from our algorithm, and moved on.

At the time, I knew almost nothing about Ms. Rachel beyond what I had just watched. Three and a half years later, parents know far more about who she is and what she stands for than I did then.

Every week brings another reminder of how political Ms. Rachel has become.

She has promoted the LGBTQ+ agenda, taken her activism to Capitol Hill over ICE detention, made Palestine advocacy a major part of her platform, and publicly aligned herself with Zohran Mamdani, joining him, in front of a group of children, to sing “Wheels on the Bus.”

She has also contributed more than $22,000 to Democratic and progressive campaigns, including thousands to a democratic socialist candidate. And just the other day, self-described Marxist streamer Hasan Piker publicly rushed to her defense.

She built an enormous audience of babies and toddlers with first words, colors, and nursery songs, and now uses that platform to weigh in on gender and sexuality, immigration, and economics. I refuse to let her values into my home or allow them to be normalized for my children.

As parents, we care deeply about who teaches, coaches, and cares for our children. The adults speaking directly to them through a screen should be held to the same standard.

I take my responsibility for raising the children God entrusted to me very seriously.

Jesus used some of the strongest language in Scripture when He warned adults about causing little ones to stumble. In Matthew 18:6, He says: “But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.”

I have three little kids now, and they absorb far more than they can understand. They are too young to recognize when something presented as normal is rooted in woke ideology or conflicts with the biblical values we are raising them with.

Thankfully, parents have choices. I fill my children’s world with books, toys, puzzles, and music that reflect our faith in Jesus Christ and love of country. When we do use screens, we turn to programs like Good News Guys, Minno, and Superbook.

My son leads our family in prayer at meals and asks to pray for other people. Not a day goes by without him bringing up Jonah and the whale, David and Goliath, Job, a worship song, or a Bible story he wants to act out or read again.

What young kids see becomes what they ask about, and what they hear becomes what they repeat.

My children are also learning their letters, numbers, colors, and words just fine.

They did not need Ms. Rachel to do it.

And yet Ms. Rachel has become unavoidable in modern motherhood. She is on YouTube, Netflix, and in the toy and baby aisles. I can barely walk through Walmart without seeing her plastered across some children’s product.

Being everywhere does not make her necessary.

Ms. Rachel can be replaced.

Your values cannot.

***

Jillian Anderson King is a former Washington Redskins Cheerleader Ambassador and ABC’s The Bachelor and The Bachelor in Paradise contestant. She’s a Mombassador for Moms for America, an ambassador for Turning Point and Turning Point Faith, and a proud Christian Conservative mother and wife. Jillian is also the founder of The Kings Firm, a strategic communications firm.