Bethany Mandel responds to CNN hit piece with thread detailing 'what we're up against' in the Right's war on woke kids' entertainment

Author and CNN opinion columnist Nicole Hemmer recently wrote a piece exposing “the emerging right-wing children’s entertainment industry”:

I wrote about the emerging right-wing children's entertainment industry — and the history behind it — this week for @CNNOpinion: https://t.co/InkZ43lNUM

— Nicole Hemmer (@pastpunditry) April 8, 2022

Here’s how Hemmer’s piece kicks off:

“Are your children being brainwashed?”

That’s the question that greets visitors to the Tuttle Twins website, which sells libertarian children’s books. The books, written by Connor Boyack, are meant to protect children from the “socialism and woke-ism” that the website says American educational and cultural institutions are “pushing into the minds of our kids.” A cartoon on the site shows a mother wielding a Tuttle Twins shield while protecting her frightened children, absorbing the arrows of socialism, Marxism, collectivism, and “media lies.”

The Tuttle Twins books, regularly hawked by right-wing radio host Glenn Beck, range from board books to graphic novels to economics curriculum guides. They join a growing array of conservative children’s literature and programming which coincide with the current right-wing attacks on schools and children’s entertainment that conservatives claim are sites of political and sexual indoctrination.

In addition to the Tuttle Twins, there are the “Heroes of Liberty” series (biographies of conservative icons like Rush Limbaugh and Margaret Thatcher aimed at middle school readers), the Brave Books series authored by prominent conservatives (like Dana Loesch’s pro-gun book “Paws Off My Cannon” and Rep. Dan Crenshaw’s cancel-culture book “Fame, Blame, and the Raft of Shame“), and an array of anti-trans books like “Johnny the Walrus” and “Elephants Are Not Birds.”

If you’re someone who gets all your information on the “right-wing children’s entertainment industry” from people like Nicole Hemmer, what she’s written will probably scare the crap out of you. And that’s Hemmer’s goal: to scare people, not to inform them. Hemmer wants to create and perpetuate an image of non-woke children’s entertainment as the product of right-wing knuckledraggers whose goal is to raise future generations of transphobes and bigots.

But if you’re the sort of person who prefers to get all your information from people who are actually informed about issues, you’ll read this thread from Bethany Mandel, who, with conservative children’s book publisher Heroes for Liberty, is working tirelessly to give parents an alternative to woke children’s lit:

The reality is we are all seeing the writing on the wall. We understand that they’re committed to ideologically capturing our kids, deluding them into these notions of radical gender ideology while they’re too young to critically examine the reality- that a boy cannot be a girl.

— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) April 11, 2022

Lots of us realize that the market is ripe for content that parents can trust, without having to prescreen it. It’s why we’re creating books and why @realDailyWire is banking many millions into kid’s visual entertainment to counter Disney. https://t.co/kmiFgr4HOS

— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) April 11, 2022

There’s a huge appetite for non-woke kids’ entertainment, and companies like the Daily Wire and Heroes of Liberty are eager to satisfy it.

At @HeroesOfLiberty we’re making lemonade from lemons and turning the CNN hit piece on us into an opportunity. You’ll get a free month and a free book on a @HeroesOfLiberty subscription when you enter the code THANKSCNN.

— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) April 11, 2022

Our friends the @tuttletwins are doing a similar promotion. Let’s fight to win, folks. https://t.co/GBXlBKSAZJ

— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) April 11, 2022

Along with @RachelReneeRee1, I have a new Instagram account exposing this woke kid’s lit content and spotlighting what our kids should be reading instead. https://t.co/BfOoxn26HP Here’s a comment we just got. If you think your kids are safe, I’ve got some bad news for you. pic.twitter.com/RzuDG51iwc

— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) April 11, 2022

People like Nicole Hemmer and liberal outlets are terrified that conservatives are finding ways to turn the tide in the culture wars. And that terrifies them. They’re driven by fear that others might be waking up to inconvenient truths about the Left.

I find it strange CNN is publishing op-eds about kids entertainment by someone who isn’t a parent. This is so representative of the entire debate. If CNN wants to publish an actual conservative parent, @IWF has a whole Rolodex of folks who can contribute.

— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) April 11, 2022

Maybe CNN should give some of them a call one of these days.

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Update:

CNN’s little gamble appears to be paying off very well … for the good guys, that is:

Hey @cnn, that op-ed you published attacking @tuttletwins?

It’s directly responsible for driving over 10,000 books being sold today.

And counting…

Thanks! Let’s do this again soon? ✌🏼

— Connor Boyack 📚 (@cboyack) April 9, 2022

Maybe Nicole Hemmer should write another piece! Let’s see if CNN can’t boost sales even higher!

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