There are many prescriptions floating around for putting out the wildfire of wokeism that’s scorching our society and leaving a largely irreparable trail of devastation. Several are solid. But a large number are well short of great, for they’re either off target or unrealistic. One critical tactic, or rather area of emphasis, has been largely ignored, until now.

To fight the left’s ruthless campaign to twist the minds of America’s youth and forever change America, conservatives must unite behind the essential building block of American society: the American family. In short, we must take control of school boards to put an end to ideological indoctrination in the form of the teaching of anti-American principles in classrooms across the country. If we do that, we will reclaim our country’s future and the dream that America promises for our children and grandchildren.

In 2009, Americans of all political stripes responded to the Obama administration’s massive government overreach by forming what became known as the Tea Party. This grassroots movement was concerned about socialized medicine, tax increases, trillion-dollar deficits, and bailouts for the largest and most corrupt financial institutions in our nation’s history.

Americans have always cared about protecting their hard-earned money from government waste and public programs inimical to their values, and rightfully so. But you know what Americans care infinitely more about? Their children. And woke culture warriors, who make up the left’s vanguard, just decided to wage the most aggressive and offensive war on America’s children at exactly the worst possible time for the Democratic Party. The left should get ready for a movement that is far stronger, far bigger, and far angrier than the Tea Party was at its acme.

What started as a handful of small groups of parents in pockets across the country has now reached fever pitch. It’s tough to keep up with all of the viral videos of parents confronting their local school board officials over the woke — and, frankly, evil — agenda being thrust upon our children. The complaints stem from incontrovertibly bigoted Critical Race Theory curricula to the New York Times’s sordid fake history, known as the 1619 Project, to the sexualization of our youngest children with books that teach carnal acts and supply unscientific ideas about gender and biology.

Conservatives, unfortunately, left the door wide open for these destructive teachings to make their way into our classrooms and communities. For decades, teachers’ unions have heavily invested in local politics, resulting in left-wing takeovers of some of our country’s most influential school boards. Because of this, these school boards now shield and protect corrupt teachers and administrations rather than holding them accountable to the parents who pay their salaries, as originally intended. And because of massive financial backing of teachers’ unions, school board officials are neither afraid of losing elections nor backing away from their promotion of the woke agenda.

It’s no exaggeration to say that school board officials feel invincible. It’s why they are doubling down on radical curricula, and, further, attacking not only parents, but also teachers who are resisting it. In Loudoun County, Virginia, a Democrat stronghold, school board officials have been caught red-handed compiling lists of parents and teachers who oppose Critical Race Theory in order to harass them, and, in the case of the latter, get them fired. Loudoun County officials were recently seen interrupting distraught parents by, ludicrously, telling them to fix their masks. Alas, it should come as no surprise that the Loudoun County School Board ended this week’s meeting early and watched as police arrested parents who refused to leave the meeting. Their actions exemplify their hubris.

At the heart of the woke agenda is a disdain for everyday people. Woke leftists truly believe that everyone besides themselves are morons. As such, they think they can fool us. They think they can control us. They think they will never be held accountable. This itself reveals that the woke agenda is anti-American. The entire premise of the American experiment of self-governance is that regular citizens know more than the elites and “experts.” Such a representative democratic system allows the people to stand up and serve as a check against corruption.

If we can’t stop schools from teaching our kids that all white people are racist, that women can have penises and men can have babies, and that America is an irredeemably nefarious imperialist enterprise, then we certainly won’t be able to stop tax increases or socialized medicine. If this new conservative movement fails, it means the American experiment is destined to fail.

The challenges are significant, but my bet firmly remains with the Founders and everyday Americans — parents and family advocates who love their children and their country more than anything else. This fight is the definitive one, for it’s about the souls of our children and, thus, the future of our nation. “Woke” is the perfect way to describe the left’s insane and malevolent agenda, because it just stirred the most powerful of all sleeping giants: the American family.

Terry Schilling is the president of American Principles Project and founder of APP’s Big Family, a membership advocacy group that organizes families in politics. To find out more, visit www.SaveTheFamily.app.

The views expressed in this opinion piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

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Wokeism Has Awakened The Most Formidable Opponent: The American Family