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Dear Editor:
I want to address and provide some perspective to the public on the weight of my identity as a mother, as a brown woman, and as a conservative in light of recent online attacks.
The left has attacked my rights and identity as a conservative brown woman, and now, as a mother. Using my identity to discredit my vision for the city of Fishers – the city I know and love – is inexcusable and extremely disheartening. Being a mother has been my greatest honor, and my identity as such is something I take a great deal of pride in.
As many people know, I stepped away from an amazingly fulfilling career in the United States Air Force so I could focus on being a mom. I deployed in June of 2002 when my daughter was nine months old, and when I returned six months later she was walking and talking. I knew, at that moment, fighting the enemy abroad was no longer for me, and I decided to return home to my husband and daughter.
While my daughter was in school, I was an exceedingly active mom – attending field trips, three term PTO President at Geist Montessori Academy, Karate Mom, and a Cheer Mom. Now, I am the involved mom of a college graduate pursuing a doctorate in chiropractic’s. I love being a mom.
During my daughter’s high school years, I was an adult mentor working with high school students who participated in A Promise To Keep. It was great to be a sounding board and support conservative messages that were not depicted in the media, music, and television. It may not have been the ultimate choice for everyone, yet it was a message and a framework some used to model their high school and college years.
When I joined the Moms for Liberty Facebook page in July 2022, my goal was to aid in empowering not just moms, but all parents and guardians, by means of an honest culture of liberty. I do not believe Moms for Liberty to be the “extremist group” it has been made out to be.
Rather, it is a group of very caring and compassionate mothers coming together to defend our rights and our children’s rights. I fought for my daughter, Micayla, and I will continue to fight for all the children of Fishers. That is exactly what it means to be a mother.
I recognize that being a brown conservative woman is difficult for many people to understand. No community is a monolith, and my skin color is not my politics. I, too, “have been endowed by my Creator with inalienable rights.”
Further, my unique experiences have colored my life – my family has a history of military service dating back to the American Revolution; every generation of my family has served in the military and its many wars. My parents were married for 50-plus years and my mom was devoted to her family and did not work outside the home. I worked my way through college earning my degree and commission into the United States Air Force (accepting student loans I paid in full). I lived and worked in countries where people do not have the same rights I enjoy as an American woman. I am a single mom and a one-income household, and I know how to be cost-conscious. I am a woman of faith and I have been a catechist since 1998. I am self-employed and I know the required discipline of success.
I know I do not stand alone in my beliefs and that my platform of Safety, Prosperity, and Building Community resonates with the majority of residents and young adults in Fishers. If you would like to continue further discussions about Fishers interests, feel free to refer to my webpage for my Saturday “Breakfast with Tiffanie” events. I believe civil discourse is most valuable during this divisive time.
I want to thank all the beautiful women and mothers for their grit in the fight for our children’s futures.
Tiffanie Ditlevson
Candidate for Fishers City Council, At Large
While it’s unfortunate that anyone would choose to comment on parenting ability or anything associated with being a mother, as they are irrelevant to her run at CC, rest assured that a majority of Fishers residents aren’t worried about how Tiffany Ditlevson parents – We’re worried about how Tiffany Ditlevson plays divisive politics, wastes hundreds of thousands of dollars in Fishers taxpayer money via the HEPL Library Board playing cancel culture warrior and how she refuses to denounce her support for and from a nationally designated extremist group, Moms 4 Liberty, whose HamCo chapter just embarrassed our community nationally by openly quoting the most famous fascist dictator in history. Calling Tiffany Ditlevson out for doubling down on her divisive conservative viewpoints is NOT an “attack”. These are the real concerns community members have and we will not be gaslit by anyone who aligns with or associates with those who support demonstrable hate groups.
This is not the type of accountability we need in Fishers from a public official, particularly in the divisive time we are in. Moms for Liberty is a hate group and Tiffanie is a member. Full stop. They could have posted a different quote. As an example, how about “We believe the children are our future” – Whitney Houston? Whitney didn’t murder 6 million people. And same message, but no, they purposefully chose Hitler. Completely insensitive and out of touch with reality. I’ve seen people try to justify this too, and they also are completely insensitive and out of touch.
No one is attacking Tiffanie as a mom. This letter is just a way for her to put her accolades out there, as she is receiving negative press for her affiliations with Moms For Liberty and her HEPL book “moving” (making teen books generally inaccessible – a form of book banning). Just another politic play and we aren’t having it.
Also, I hope you keep comments up as Tiffanie refuses to allow the public to comment on her page and there are minimal ways to communicate with her. Yet another reason why we don’t need her as a public official.
I tried to have a dialogue with Tiffanie Ditlevson, and she blocked from her campaign page me after respectfully asking her what was going on at the library. By the time election day happens I bet half of the voters will be blocked.
And what women’s rights is she talking about? Is she pro-choice? That has nothing to do with City Council.
I have been to HEPL board meetings. She has no idea what is going on. It’s been frankly embarrassing for her. The waste of tax dollars is absolutely extremist politics. People should be able to parent their own children without the help of the government. We don’t need the government selecting books for our teenagers. And we shouldn’t be spending $330,000, which could be going for programing and more books.
Many of us have parents who have been married for 4 plus decades and many of us paid our own way through college. Many people have been in the military. Instead of answering questions and being transparent Tiffanie is trying to change the subject. If she wants to be in office she should be able to speak openly to her constituents and not block them after a question.
Tiffanie is destroying parental rights and wasting tax dollars. The fact she didn’t speak out against Moms for Liberty, the most divisive group in Hamilton County, after they quoted Hitler, is disturbing. And now she is defending her involvement…
Please come to the HEPL board meetings and see her in action before you vote for her this fall. That is if she actually stays long enough. Apparently she just wanted the position on her resume. She in the past has left after about 30 minutes. She even did a podcast saying she thought she could be in and out. She had no idea it would be actual work. I can only wonder how she will act on the City Council. More waste of taxpayer dollars by someone who doesn’t even want to be there.
It is NOT cost-conscious to spend $330,000 on a library book review only to NOT have them not even follow the policy they had written. They had no plans to follow the policy, which was evident in the meeting last week.
Hamilton County’s Candace Owens
It should come as no surprise that those who actively criticize Conservatives talk out of one side of their mouth about Equity and Inclusion and then out of the other, attack one’s beliefs and demographics. As such, they lose the credibility and moral high ground they seek.
“Unfortunate” and “irrelevant” hardly scratch the surface as proper adjectives to describe such attacks. How about disrespectful? Highly inappropriate? Unbecoming? Uninclusive? Unneighborly? When do we return to debating ideas respectfully as opposed to tearing other down?
Finally, anyone who validates their position that Moms for Liberty is a Hate Group by indirectly or directly referencing the Southern Poverty Law Center should strongly reconsider their perspective before they lose their credibility, if they haven’t already. Southern Poverty Law Center is consistently rated as having significant left-leaning bias, has been denounced for labeling upstanding organizations as hate groups, and has apologized and settled lawsuits for mislabeling organizations as hate groups. Their reputation stands as it is and they should certainly not be used as a credible source to validate one’s position.
No one is attacking you as a Republican woman of color. What people are holding you accountable for is that you call a hate group, who quoted Hitler and coughed through a moment of silence to honor those who lost their lives in the Holocaust, “caring and compassionate.” You won’t denounce them. You embrace them. We know who you are because you show us through your actions and your words.
People are not attacking her identity; they are attacking her actions.
Tiffanie says “I will continue to fight for all the children of Fishers,” yet at the last HEPL library board meeting two children asked the board to continue to cause them to go to the adult section to find books. Yet the board — including Tiffanie — continues push put to move teen books to the adult section – many if not most of which don’t include the “porn” that keeps getting mentioned. The last book Tiffanie voted to move had nothing sexual in it at all.
You don’t protect kids by sending them to the adult section.
Moving books, spending tens of thousands on new lawyers, spending $100,000+ to simply move books round, wanting to track people’s movements with FLOCK cameras, and supporting a group that quotes Hitler all while ignoring the pleas of the teens coming to the library board meetings. These are some of the actions people are attacking – actions, not identity.
“I will continue fighting for all kids in Fishers” what about the 2 kids that spoke at last library meeting stating they didn’t want to go to adult section to find books written for teens-she doesn’t seem to be fighting for them.
In defense of Tiffanie Ditlevson: Tiffanie is a self-made successful professional woman. Her family provided a good foundation and she took it from there. For many many years she has worked tirelessly to improve OUR city—Fishers. I for one appreciate what she has accomplished in her “spare” time—as if being a mom and running a business wasn’t enough. She is one of the most intelligent, polished, well spoken, energetic and enthusiastic people I have ever known. I am proud to be one of her supporters. I look forward to having her sit on the city council so she can accomplish her platform—improve roads, other infrastructure and public safety.
Lynne Goodin
Leader of the Liberty Belles
It’s unfortunate that Tiffanie feels that anyone is attacking her because of the color of her skin. I can only speak for myself when I say my issues with Tiffanie Ditlevson are regarding her politics. Unfortunately, because racism DOES in fact exist in our country and in Hamilton County, I cannot say this is a surprise to me. But I do find is disappointing that she would blame all democrats for the ignorance of a few. We’ve seen too many times in history how blaming the actions of a few hurts innocent people and I hate to watch a candidate capitalize on that. This just reaffirms my opinion that she is not the right person to represent me or my family.
She stated ‘I will continue to fight for all the children of Fishers’. I don’t agree with that statement since teenagers spoke at the June 22, 2023 library board meeting asking that they do not have to go to the adult section of library to check out books written for teens. She along with three other library board members didn’t even follow the policy they created at the last board meeting. What good is a policy if it can be over-ridden by board members if they don’t like a particular book. Let parents decide what books are right for their families-not library board members. You don’t send kids to the adult section to find books intended for teens or kids, if your objective is to protect them from adult content.
Tiffanie is my neighbor. She’s kind and well-spoken. I like her as a person, but I have zero interest in allowing her to influence public policies. Some people get into politics for the benefit of the public, some people get into politics for personal gain. From my personal interactions with Tiffanie I get the impression that the public would not benefit from her service.
After reading some of her comments, I have questions. Did Tiffanie pay her student loans or did she benefit from the GI bill?
It’s fascinating that she chooses to place blame on being a “conservative brown woman.” Let’s ignore accountability and just go full Karen. Should we pretend she’s not wasting tax dollars on frivolous library projects? Should we ignore her support for wasting tax dollars to cancel school contracts? Should we ignore her alignment with political groups that, ironically, don’t seem to understand the meaning of liberty? FYI, it means freedom from arbitrary or despotic government or control. You know, things like… banning books, limiting or denying women’s access to healthcare, limiting or denying children the right to choose how they want to present to the world, I could go on, but, that isn’t liberty. I think the word you’re looking for is fascism. Moms for Fascism. Fascism Belles. These would be more accurate group names. If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, let’s call it what it is. A fascist.
Tiffanie, I don’t care what color you are. I don’t care about your sex, gender, economic status, career choice, what color you choose to paint your house, or the fact that you leave a Christmas tree up year round. I do care that you waste public funds and impose on public liberties though. Make better choices and you won’t be judged so harshly.