Family · Nationwide · September 11, 2026
Coalition Reported Working to Remove Sexually Explicit Materials From Schools
What Alinsky tactic is being used
2 of the thirteen rules are in play here — campaigns rarely run just one.
Rule 1
“Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.”
The story's whole force comes from a reported "coalition" whose member organizations, states and districts are not named — the report itself concedes it does not identify them. A movement that exists only as a described presence is power borrowed from what the reader assumes is there, on either side of the fight. The same works in reverse at a board meeting: a parent who implies an organized mass behind them invites the board to test it.
Counter-Rule 1 · Reality Over Perception
Count the actual numbers. The phantom army depends on nobody checking whether it exists.
Do the counting before repeating anything. Ask the parents' group or the district for the actual record — how many formal reconsideration requests have been filed in your district in the last twelve months, by how many named households — and write the numbers down. Speak only for the people who have actually signed their names, and say plainly "I don't yet know who the coalition is" rather than filling the gap.
Rule 11
“If you push a negative hard and deep enough, it will break through into its counterside.”
"Sexually explicit materials in schools" is a maximal label attached in this report to no title, no page number, no district and no state. Pushed hard enough without particulars, the claim flips: one overstated example at a public meeting lets a board dismiss the whole concern as a phantom, and the parents who brought verifiable material get dismissed with it.
Counter-Rule 11 · Proportional Truth
Refuse to overclaim, even where it would help. One exaggeration hands the other side the only weapon that works permanently.
Before you speak, obtain the actual book and the actual page, and quote what is there and nothing more — including the grade level it was shelved or assigned for. Use the district's own written criteria rather than your adjectives, and concede openly where a title is arguable. Refuse to sign or forward a list of titles you have not personally checked against the district's catalog.
Chapter 3 sets out the rules; Chapter 15 answers each of them in turn. This is that pairing applied to this story.
Know where you stand
The free 4-minute assessment identifies your mountain and your institution’s capture phase — so alerts like this one arrive matched to where you actually stand.
Facing this yourself? Ask. Describe what is happening and get what the book, Scripture, and the law of your state say, with the exact words to use. Your first one is free.