Middle America's creeping theocracy

Are there any high schools which offer Voodoo as an elective? Should there be?

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squinney wrote:

In our curriculum booklet it is listed as Bible History and is a Social Studies elective. However, going to the school site and looking under the Social Studies department I get this:

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"Religions in World Cultures/The Bible in History

Fancy a field trip to a Tibetan Buddhist center? Ever heard the Zen sound of one hand clapping? Ready to unlock the mysteries of Armageddon and the book for Revelation? If you wish to strengthen or re-experience your own faith or to become more tolerant of the hundreds of other faiths, take this course. "

Is this a public school? A course, an objective of which is to "strengthen or re-experience you own faith," would be a pretty clear violation of the separation of church and state.

El-Diablo wrote:

Yeah don't bring even Bible as literature into High School. Too much of a chance for a teacher to turn it into a religious class. Although by high school many kids are already atheistic in many ways.

The wrong teacher can turn any class into the wrong kind of class. This can be controlled to a large degree by by carefully crafted course objectives and benchmarks and a supervising administrator who'll hold a teacher to them. A naturally occuring check on the teacher's ability to negatively affect his or her students is the simple and timeless fact that most students feel that the vast majority of what comes out of their teachers' mouthes is pointless crap. It's been my experience, both as a student and as a teacher, that teachers are ineffective at swaying the religious or political leanings of their students; while frequently in open rebellion against their parents, most students have firmly internalized their parents' belief systems long before the teachers get them.

Should a 'Bible as Lit./Philosophy/History' course be scrutinized and carefully designed before being implemented? Hell yes; but we must avoid a reactionary stance--the Bible has dramatically affected western civilization and culture and continues to have a major impact in the world today. It would be valuable for students to graduate high school with an understanding of it.

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El-Diablo wrote:

real life, I see no problem in reading books ABOUT the Qu'ran in COLLEGE just like if they same were true with the Bible. College is diferent than High school.

About text books being biased this is true. They tend to always portray the positive except in the case of established "barbarians" such as the mongols and huns. Very rarely do we hear of the things the terrible things that went on in Christian Europe in the middle ages just as we don't really hear that which went on in Islamic empires. Now if it were the Mongols :rolleyes: we'd know every **** detail of torture and murder they used.

I did think it a little out of place that a public university would require readings from the Quran of all incoming freshmen, whether they signed up for an elective on Islam or not, don't you? Replace the word Quran with Bible and tell me if your answer is different.

What about the middle school curriculum where the kids role play as Muslims including learning to pray as Muslims? Why no comment about that?

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[

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I did think it a little out of place that a public university would require readings from the Quran of all incoming freshmen, whether they signed up for an elective on Islam or not, don't you? Replace the word Quran with Bible and tell me if your answer is different.

I just said I wouldn't care if they did this with the Bible since its COLLEGE. I really don't care if they assign you to read the Bible/Qu'ran/Rig Veda.

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What about the middle school curriculum where the kids role play as Muslims including learning to pray as Muslims? Why no comment about that?

Didn't read that link. I only read two. That is disturbing. The whole pretend jihad link was really bad.

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From link
In classrooms across the United States, students who follow its directions find themselves fighting mock battles of jihad against "Christian crusaders" and other assorted "infidels." Upon gaining victory, our mock-Muslim warriors "Praise Allah."

That's disturbing...

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Quote:

Should a 'Bible as Lit./Philosophy/History' course be scrutinized and carefully designed before being implemented? Hell yes; but we must avoid a reactionary stance--the Bible has dramatically affected western civilization and culture and continues to have a major impact in the world today. It would be valuable for students to graduate high school with an understanding of it.

Trust me I'm still in high school. We learn plenty of the Bible and Qu'ran. Both times we read it more as research than as literature or religion. And also we don't need to kid that the Bible and Christianity is not mentioned enough in History. Most history books tend to be very European-biased anyway. But that's ok. I prefer European history so I'm not complaining Razz

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El-Diablo wrote:

[
Quote:
I did think it a little out of place that a public university would require readings from the Quran of all incoming freshmen, whether they signed up for an elective on Islam or not, don't you? Replace the word Quran with Bible and tell me if your answer is different.

I just said I wouldn't care if they did this with the Bible since its COLLEGE. I really don't care if they assign you to read the Bible/Qu'ran/Rig Veda.

Quote:
What about the middle school curriculum where the kids role play as Muslims including learning to pray as Muslims? Why no comment about that?

Didn't read that link. I only read two. That is disturbing. The whole pretend jihad link was really bad.

Quote:
From link
In classrooms across the United States, students who follow its directions find themselves fighting mock battles of jihad against "Christian crusaders" and other assorted "infidels." Upon gaining victory, our mock-Muslim warriors "Praise Allah."

That's disturbing...

Yes it is. But the silence regarding it from the illustrious host of this thread has been DEAFENING.

Perhaps he only has an axe to grind where Christians are concerned.

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Real
If you have a question for me ask it. No matter how foolish.
You ask why Christianity only. Because in the US what other religion could we possibly be talking about?
However, I would be just as disturbed no matter the religion. I have little doubt that if a religion other than Christianity was being "pushed " in our public schools, you would be up in arms. Perhaps Islam or Judaism?

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Quote:

Real
If you have a question for me ask it. No matter how foolish.
You ask why Christianity only. Because in the US what other religion could we possibly be talking about?
However, I would be just as disturbed no matter the religion. I have little doubt that if a religion other than Christianity was being "pushed " in our public schools, you would be up in arms. Perhaps Islam or Judaism?

If you read his links he has a bunch of Islam lol. He posted them on the other page and if they are true they are a little disturbing.

But that raises an interesting counter-question real. Are you as disturbed by the creeping in of Islam as well as Christianity into public school? For me it is not a question of which religion but of one particular religion over all others regardless of which religion it is.

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There is also a question of prevalence. How commonly is Islam "taught" in schools, and commonly is that true of christianity?

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Quote:

There is also a question of prevalence. How commonly is Islam "taught" in schools, and commonly is that true of christianity?

Well you might be surpised. The only thing close to actual religion that I was taught in school was practicing the whole "THere is no god but Allah" chant. The closest to Christianity was when I had to Revelations for a report on Paradist Lost. However that was for research. The chant was not. I never understood why we did that lol.

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El-Diablo
In what country did you go to school? Surely not in the USA.

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Florida...

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So you were educated in a foreign country . . .

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Lol. I meant U.S. So i guess I didn't answer the question lol.

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Humor doesn't work if it needs to be explained . . . and frankly i don't for a moment believe that you were routinely indoctrinated in Islam in Florida.

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Unless you went to an Islamic parochial school. Neither do I.

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Frankly I don't remembered saying routinely indoctrinated. Did you just decide to add the word routinely? I said we practiced the "There is not god but allah" chant. We were told to stand up and repeat as a class the chant. For me it crossed the line, although I don't think anyone else even noticed the craziness of it. This was in 9th grade by the way, and the teacher was not muslim.

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This in Florida? Amazing. I'm surprised the citizenry demand the teacher be run out of town...

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The point about using the term routinely indoctrinated is that the subject of the thread is a course in christianity. I earlier posted the substance of the Supreme Court decision on such a course: In 1948, the Supremes held in McCollum v. Board of Education that because public schools have compulsory education requirements, this plan created a situation where students were forced to participate in religious instruction or risk being ostracized by teachers and peers. Unless you were routinely indoctrinated in Islam, your remarks are not about an equivalent activity. That should be easy to understand.

And i still don't believe you.

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Quote:

The point about using the term routinely indoctrinated is that the subject of the thread is a course in christianity. I earlier posted the substance of the Supreme Court decision on such a course: In 1948, the Supremes held in McCollum v. Board of Education that because public schools have compulsory education requirements, this plan created a situation where students were forced to participate in religious instruction or risk being ostracized by teachers and peers. Unless you were routinely indoctrinated in Islam, your remarks are not about an equivalent activity. That should be easy to understand.

You need to learn to read. I said this was the closest to religious interference in school that I have come across. I said that I never came across anything like this for Christianity. It was simply a statement that you all have extended into a topic unto itself.

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This in Florida? Amazing. I'm surprised the citizenry demand the teacher be run out of town...

Trust me I would have preferred that. I didnt like the teacher anyway. When I asked her if it was necessary to learn the chant as a group she gave a non-committal answer.

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Middle America's creeping theocracy

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