The following is a copy of a letter to the governing board of the William S. Hart Union High School District.
Response to NAACP’s Oct. 8 statement on Thin Blue Line flag:
This is regarding the statement issued by the Santa Clarita chapter of the NAACP in response to the William S. Hart Union High School District superintendent’s decision to ban the Saugus High School football team from carrying the Thin Blue Line flag onto the field before games.
The players’ intent was simple: to express support and thanks to the local law enforcement officers who risk their lives every day to keep our community, and their school, safe.
Never was this more in evidence than it was on Nov. 14, 2019, during the shooting at Saugus High School, when law enforcement officers, both on-duty and off-duty, from our county Sheriff’s Department as well as other agencies, rushed onto campus in the face of danger with one goal in mind: protect the kids.
Anyone who doesn’t recognize the meaning and intent of this gesture by the Saugus football team is either too wrapped up in their own political agenda, or just plain tone deaf.
It was disappointing, too, when the edict came down from the superintendent’s office, without even the benefit of a public discussion at the board level. The district should have had a real, public conversation about the issue and how best to resolve it.
In the wake of that unilateral decision, the NAACP Santa Clarita chapter issued a statement not only supporting that decision, but also actually suggesting it didn’t go far enough. As the NAACP chapter’s flawed argument goes, the Thin Blue Line flag has been appropriated by some white supremacists and far-right activists — so it should therefore be banned for use even by those who intend it for what it is supposed to be: a show of support for law enforcement, nothing more, nothing less.
The NAACP has tried to create victims — where NONE exist.
The real victims in the Hart district are the more than 50% of the students who CANNOT meet the state standards for math or science, and the nearly 30% who lack the English skills to meet state standards. These students will have a very tough/difficult time in this modern world.
The NAACP should be addressing/helping those students, not targeting the football players thanking the law enforcement for their service in a VERY difficult situation.
Meanwhile, the NAACP chapter is preoccupied with its manufactured victimhood and trying to use it to impose its anti-law-enforcement will on the community: Their statement even says Thin Blue Line apparel — even if worn by adults — has no place at school-sanctioned events like football games.
Yes. They even want to tell us what we can wear, and what we cannot, when we sit in the stands at a football game.
The First Amendment is under attack in America. This is just the latest salvo. The Hart district, through its lack of leadership at the administrative and board levels, has walked right into it — and the NAACP Santa Clarita chapter is seeking to capitalize on it.
Sonja Schmidt
Canyon Country
