-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
George Nathaniel III, a pastor of a church in Minneapolis and school bus driver in Burnsville, Minnesota, was terminated from his school bus driving job. Nathaniel said: “To fire a bus driver for praying for the safety of the children” is not right. It is wrong to fire someone for praying for the safety of the children, but Nathaniel is misrepresenting the facts to portray himself as a victim of the War on Christianity.
Nathaniel related a typical bus ride: “We start out with a song,” he said. “Then each person will pray if they want to pray. If they don’t want to pray, they don’t have to pray.” Nathaniel would lead the prayer.
The voluntary nature of the prayer has been addressed by the Supreme Court in Engel v. Vitale (1962). J. Black, wrote in the 6-1 opinion:
Neither the fact that the prayer may be denominationally neutral nor the fact that its observance on the part of the students is voluntary can serve to free it from the limitations of the Establishment Clause …
In his concurrence in Vitale, J. Douglas cited McGowan v. Maryland (1961), where J. Warren wrote: “The First Amendment commands government to have no interest in theology or ritual,” and that on “matters of this kind government must be neutral.” J. Douglas also noted:
The First Amendment leaves the Government in a position not of hostility to religion, but of neutrality.
Ruth Dunn, communications director for the Burnsville-Eagan-Savage School District, said, “We do consider the school bus to be an extension of the school day when it pertains to student behavior and support.”
Teresa Nelson, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota, noted that the bus driver has a “captive audience of kids on a school bus” and that Nathaniel’s actions would violate the Establishment Clause.
Operating a school bus should occupy the driver’s complete attention. A momentary lapse could be disastrous. Leading singing and prayers would distract even the most competent driver.
As Jeffrey Shulman notes: “at common law the parent had a “sacred right” to the custody of his or her child, that the parent’s right to control the upbringing of the child was almost absolute.” Nathaniel, in leading the children in prayer, had usurped their parent’s authority.
Nathaniel just couldn’t resist. He had a captive audience of children who were too young to object and lacked the education to offer reasoned counterarguments to his faith claims. If religious faith was anything more that imaginary, its adherents wouldn’t need to pick on the most gullible members of society.
“To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead, or endeavoring to convert an atheist by scripture.” (Thomas Paine)
H/T: Austin Cline, Laurie Blake and Erin Adler, CBS Minnesota, Ed Brayton.
OT
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/16/neshaminy-high-school-redskins-newspaper_n_4288031.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — When a high school newspaper at a suburban Philadelphia football powerhouse decided the word “Redskins” had no place in its pages, the paper’s student editors found themselves called to the principal’s office.
The dispute between Neshaminy High School’s paper, the Playwickian, and school administrators is a strange twist on the fight over what students can and can’t say: this time it’s the students urging restraint.
The Playwickian editors started getting heat from school officials after an Oct. 27 editorial that barred the use of the word “Redskins” — the nickname of the teams at Neshaminy, a school named for the creek where the Lenape Indians once lived.
“Detractors will argue that the word is used with all due respect. But the offensiveness of a word cannot be judged by its intended meaning, but by how it is received,” read the editorial backed by 14 of 21 staff members. (An equally well-written op-ed voiced the dissenting group’s opinion.)
The ban comes as Native American activists and a few media outlets, along with President Barack Obama, challenge the moniker of Washington’s NFL team, which visits Philadelphia on Sunday.
At Neshaminy — where the welcome sign sometimes reads: “Everybody do the Redskin Rumble” and the football team is 11-1 with a shot at its second state title— news editors had pledged to stop using the term “Redskins” as far back as 2001, but sometimes wavered. This year’s staff decided to take it on full-force.
“You are not afraid to write about the hard and sensitive issues. You take risks on editorial pages — bravo!” judges wrote last month in a student journalism contest, when the Playwickian earned a top award.
Nonetheless, Principal Robert McGee ordered the editors to put the “Redskins” ban on hold, and summoned them to a meeting after school Tuesday, according to junior Gillian McGoldrick, the editor-in-chief.
“People are (saying), ‘Just give in. It doesn’t really matter.’ But it’s a huge deal, that we’re being forced to say something that we don’t want to,” said McGoldrick, a 16-year-old junior.
McGee called the editors’ motives “valiant,” but said the dispute pits the rights of one group of students against another.
His approximately 2,600 students must each publish an article in the Playwickian for course credit. He doesn’t think anyone should be barred from writing about the Neshaminy Redskins, especially, he said, when the harm alleged is open to debate.
“I don’t think that’s been decided at the national level, whether that word is or is not (offensive). It’s our school mascot,” said McGee, who said he’s consulted with the school solicitor and others. “I see it as a First Amendment issue running into another First Amendment issue.”
School officials had also ordered the Playwickian to run a full-page, $200 ad — submitted by a Class of ’72 alumnus — celebrating the “Redskin” name, McGoldrick said.
In response, the nonprofit Student Press Law Center and other groups bought a rival ad detailing the “Freedom of Expression” students enjoy under state and federal law. That ad is set to appear in the edition due out Wednesday, although the alumnus pulled the pro-Redskins ad late last week, McGoldrick said.
Both the student law center and the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania believe school districts are on shaky ground if they try to compel students to use a given word, especially one the students deem offensive.
“I understand that there’s an inclination to want to protect a tradition at the school. But the First Amendment is a longer and a better-established tradition,” said Frank LoMonte, executive director of the Student Press Law Center in Arlington, Va.
“It’s exactly what we tell young people in the abstract we want them to do: use their voices in positive ways to bring about social change. And yet when they tried to do it in practice, the school slapped them down,” he said. “That’s a bad place for an educator to be.”
davidm2575:
That is exactly what the government is doing. The government is not taking the action of paying Nathaniel for driving a school bus. It is not taking the action of allowing him to drive a school bus.
Gee. I guy who is neutral about absolutely nothing, personalizes everything, believes anecdotes prove the rule, makes up his own cirriculum. What could be wrong with that?
Elaine,
That is an amazing link and a very troubling story. Just what are those administrators thinking? If my daughter was at that school, I would find a way to get her out of harms way. Disgusting.
gonna leave this one alone… because i can see a lot worse happening on the bus then this and still the parents, and others would find something to complain about…,
hope all the parents and bloggers involved with the negative comments remember this story and others like it when project blue beam happens..
when they see a holographic light show in the show pretending to be GOD saying they have been lied to and misdirected. all these years and are forced to worship satan or be re-educated……
and make no mistake im not wishing that on anyone.. but the responses and actions to stories like this. is exactly what (they) are hoping for to usher in their god
The Pastor is ignorant of the power of prayers. The Pastor !
His wishes to pray for the safety of the bus and the kids is very noble, but he can do so in his heart with a silent prayer and end of story ! Or maybe not ?
MM,
“That GAWD and FLAG had just conspired
To make one thing from two”
….. 1+1=ONE …. the first oldest profession. :o)
……. then they hired prostitutes to sell it.
“[The Holy Roman Emperor, Henry IV,] was forgiven and the bans against him lifted in exchange for his public promise to obey [Pope Gregory VII] in all things. Then the pope demonstrated for all that he had acted only in accordance with God’s will. Taking a piece of consecrated bread from the altar, he called upon God to make the bread stick in his throat and choke him to death if he was guilty of any wrongdoing. He swallowed the bread with ease, and the assembly went wild with cheers and shouts. They had actually witnessed with their own eyes that God had given His approval to this blessed pope’s actions.” — John J. Robinson, Dungeon, Fire and Sword: the Knights Templar in the Crusades (Great Britain: Brockhampton Press, 1999)
Which political/religious historical episode — along with some contemporary American versions of it — inspired me to compose:
Boobie Unconscious Projection
(from Fernando Po, U.S.A., America’s post-linguistic retreat to Plato’s Cave)
The Boobie Grand Ventriloquist
Put on a sight to see
He showed just how projection works
And did it all for free
(Except for a “donation” that
He called “gratuity”)
A giant statue sat on stage
As huge as any tree
A little man then sat upon
A giant wooden knee
And threw a voice out of himself
Like it had come from “HE”
In normal tones of voice this man
Impressed no one at all
But when he shouted “GAWD IZ GRATE!”
A hush consumed the hall
And into Boobie minds there seeped
A sick miasmic pall
The statue never moved an inch
As wooden things don’t do
But on its knee the little man
Had started turning blue
(It seemed that he had held his breath
And counted up to two)
“Don’t let him die!” the crowd beseeched
In rapt insanity
Then color came back to his face;
He breathed more easily
(It seemed that he had exhaled once
He’d counted up to three)
“HE heard your prayers!” the man rejoiced
“As you can clearly see!
And what is more, you’d best believe
That HE looks out for me.
I’m just HIS trusted messenger
Who brings HIS plans for thee.”
“I cannot move but by HIS will.
I serve at HIS command.
This BIG GUY that you see right here
Would rather not demand;
But if HE has to, you can bet
That here’s what HE’s got planned …”
The little man brought down the house
And as the curtain fell
The Boobies clapped and danced and sang
Enchanted by the spell
They’d all heard GAWD HIMSELF dispense
Commands that went down well
In Boobie red-state USA
The trick works quite the same
Where Boobie George has jury-rigged
A “GAWD” that “hears” its name
Invoked each time that Boobie George
Desires to light a flame
But out in “heartland” USA
Where trees and acres live
A different symbol scheme requires
The Boobies to forgive
The Boobie George’s brain that leaks
Much like a mental sieve
You see, with all the things gone wrong
At home and overseas
The sacrilegious thought might grow
That GAWD had heard no pleas
From wounded, dying soldiers or
Those looted Iraqis
So bumbling Boobie George ginned up
A Rube Goldberg machine
That cranked out TV symbols of
A patriotic scene
Implying GAWD had exercised
HIS choice to intervene
One symbol looked just like a flag
The old Red-White-and-Blue
But blown up to gigantic size
So none would miss the cue
That GAWD and FLAG had just conspired
To make one thing from two
The GAWD-FLAG that George had designed
Contained no flaws or blights
Its crude associations let
No mind elude its slights
As Boobies found their simple thoughts
Compressed to rude sound-bites
The image of the little man
In GAWD-FLAG’s awesome lights
Consumed the Boobie targets who
Could not escape its sights
It hit them, like the sailors say,
Between the running lights
And Boobie sailors in the crowd
Went psycho — lewd and hushed:
They spent like drunken Reagans and
At Cheney’s language blushed
They didn’t know to go hog-wild
Or just feel simply crushed
And Boobie soldiers looking on
In groups of two’s and three’s
Morphed suddenly in Photoshop
To number as the bees
That swarm about a honey comb
Adoring queens who tease
And Boobie airmen out on leave
From their academy
Felt suddenly compelled to stop
Harassing property
Preferring to assault fellow
Cadets, both he and she
And Guardsmen working at the jails
Saw all of this and more
They took it in and then commenced
To beat their charges sore
Why not, when all their leadership
Had gone to sleep to snore
Associating little man
With GAWD-FLAG has its price
Convincing fearful Boobies that
They needn’t act so nice
Combining fright and power to
Turn humans into lice
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2005
“For surely it is folly to preach to children who will be riding rockets to the moon a morality and cosmology based on concepts of the Good Society and of man’s place in nature that were coined before the harnessing of the horse! And the world is now far too small, and men’s stake in sanity too great, for any more of those old games of Chosen Folk (whether of Jehovah, Allah, Wotan, Manu, or the Devil) by which tribesmen were sustained against their enemies in the days when the serpent still could talk.”
— Joseph Campbell, Primitive Mythology: the Masks of God, revised edition (1959; New York: Penguin Arkana,1991)
I found the title for this discussion thread a bit off the mark. As I understand, the bus driver in question did not get fired for “praying” — i.e., publicly bawling like a baby for an invisible mommy and/or daddy to come and magically replace his dirty diapers with clean ones — but for trying to brainwash impressionable captive children into behaving in such an absurd and primitive manner. Adults have the right to their own arrested infantilism — i.e., religion — but they don’t have the right to invoke the power of the state in support of their efforts to undermine rationality and independence of mind in other people’s children. As Thomas Jefferson put it:
“Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong.” (Notes on Virginia, 1782)
Better golden silence than religion. Better chance of finding something actually worthwhile to think about that way. What tedious, tail-chasing claptrap.
BarkinDog, role in the hay sounds complex, did you mean roll? :o)
Proselytizing, is kinda like molesting in public. No sex, No touching. Just EFFing with young peoples minds.
Do it with people that agree Mr Bus driver. Leave innocence alone. Parents have the right to screw up their kids in the way they choose,… NOT YOU. ….
Yechh. but true. Freedom is free, parents come first.
He was praying for rain. Other times he prayed for a Dallas Cowboys win over the Marlins. He quietly prayed for a role in the hay with the Principal but no one heard that one. She heard it and fired him.
Sexist Christian Motivational Speaker Gets Owned By Awesome High School Students
The Huffington Post | By Amanda Scherker
Posted: 11/14/2013
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/14/sexist-motivational-speaker-texas-justin-lookadoo_n_4274655.html
*****
Richardson High Schoolers Learned Today That “Dateable Girls Know How to Shut Up”
By Lauren Smart
Nov. 13 2013
http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/unfairpark/2013/11/richardson_high_schoolers_lear.php
Excerpt:
Around 1 p.m. today, the hashtag #lookadouche showed up on the Twittersphere. A group of students at Richardson High School were skipping regularly scheduled math or science classes to attend an optional PTA-sponsored assembly.
The day’s guest speaker was a motivational speaker who has co-authored faith-based dating books, Dateable: are you? are they? and The Dateable Rules. His name: Justin Lookadoo.
The students first learned of Lookadoo on Tuesday, when teachers informed them that today’s classes would be canceled or shortened because of a special assembly. Upon hearing the news, Dr. Jaime Clark-Soles, mother of a RHS student and a professor at Southern Methodist University, visited Lookadoo’s website. She, along with several other parents, took their concerns to the principal and other school officials, as well as to their social media networks.
“I am extremely troubled by the fact that Richardson High School would bring in an ‘expert’ speaker who holds the dangerous, misogynistic views that advance a rape culture such as those expressed on his website,” Clark-Soles said. “I was given no information about an unnamed speaker on an unnamed subject.”
At first the assembly was to be postponed, then students were told it would take place but be optional. It went on as scheduled.
On his website, which was made public to the students, Lookadoo touts materials that include a list of “Dateable girls rules.” On that list are rules including, “Be Mysterious. Dateable girls know how to shut up” and “Let him lead. God made guys as leaders. Dateable girls get that and let him do guy things. … Which means they don’t ask him out!!!”
As for the “Dateable Boy,” Lookadoo and co-author Hayley DiMarco want young people to know: “Being a guy is good. …They are stronger, more dangerous and more adventurous and that’s okay.” Also: “Men of God are wild, not domesticated. …They fight battles, conquer lands and stand up for the oppressed.” You can read all of the “cool rules” here.
Sarah Roeschley, the associate director of senior high youth at King of Glory Lutheran Church in Dallas, says her high school group reaches many of the RHS students. She calls Lookadoo’s ideas “antiquated and sexist, gender-stereotyped B.S.”
nick spinelli 1, November 16, 2013 at 5:04 pm
DavidM never throws epithets and yet they are constantly hurled @ him. He’s Ghandi like in that regard. I disagree w/ some of his points but grow more and more admitting of him as he withstands the abuse w/ dignity and class.
===========================
You are superhuman.
Creationists on Texas Panel for Biology Textbooks
By MOTOKO RICH
Published: September 28, 2013
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/29/education/creationists-on-texas-panel-for-biology-textbooks.html
Excerpt:
AUSTIN, Tex. — One is a nutritionist who believes “creation science” based on biblical principles should be taught in the classroom. Another is a chemical engineer who is listed as a “Darwin Skeptic” on the Web site of the Creation Science Hall of Fame. A third is a trained biologist who also happens to be a fellow of the Discovery Institute, the Seattle-based center of the intelligent-design movement and a vice president at an evangelical ministry in Plano, Tex.
As Texas gears up to select biology textbooks for use by high school students over the next decade, the panel responsible for reviewing submissions from publishers has stirred controversy because a number of its members do not accept evolution and climate change as scientific truth.
In the state whose governor, Rick Perry, boasted as a candidate for president that his schools taught both creationism and evolution, the State Board of Education, which includes members who hold creationist views, helped nominate several members of the textbook review panel. Others were named by parents and educators. Prospective candidates could also nominate themselves. The state’s education commissioner, Michael L. Williams, a Perry appointee and a conservative Republican, made the final appointments to the 28-member panel. Six of them are known to reject evolution.
Some Texans worry that ideologically driven review panel members and state school board members are slowly eroding science education in the state.
nick,
It’s also about science textbooks.
nick,
Look to folks like the Gablers for a reason why some textbooks–and school curricula–are not of the highest quality.
*****
Textbook Publishers Learn: Avoid Messing With Texas
By ALEXANDER STILLE
Published: June 29, 2002
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/29/arts/textbook-publishers-learn-avoid-messing-with-texas.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm
Excerpt:
”Out of Many,” the work of four respected historians, is one of the biggest sellers among American history college textbooks in the United States, but it is not likely to be available to Texas high school students taking advanced placement history. Conservative groups in Texas objected to two paragraphs in the nearly 1,000-page text that explained that prostitution was rampant in cattle towns during the late 19th century, before the West was fully settled.
”It makes it sound that every woman west of the Mississippi was a prostitute,” said Grace Shore, the Republican chairwoman of the Texas State Board of Education. ”The book says that there were 50,000 prostitutes west of the Mississippi. I doubt it, but even if there were, is that something that should be emphasized? Is that an important historical fact?”
The publisher, Pearson Prentice Hall, has quietly withdrawn the book from consideration by the board. Wendy Spiegel, a vice president for communications at the company, said it had another textbook that better fit the state’s curriculum.
Textbook battles are legendary in Texas, where conservative critics frequently complain of liberal bias, and liberals counter with charges of censorship. The latest round, on July 17, when the board begins public hearings on which history and social studies books to adopt, promises to be particularly fierce. Nine conservative organizations have formed a coalition, recruiting 250 volunteers to vet more than 150 books.
The outcome has far more than regional interest. After California, Texas is the biggest buyer of textbooks in the United States, accounting for nearly 10 percent of the national market. In fact, conservative activists in Texas say they have already received calls from leading publishers anxious to discuss the forthcoming history and social studies adoptions. Many publishers write their books with the Texas and California markets in mind, but complain of political pressure.
**********
Texas Conservatives Win Curriculum Change
By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
Published: March 12, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/13/education/13texas.html
Excerpt:
AUSTIN, Tex. — After three days of turbulent meetings, the Texas Board of Education on Friday approved a social studies curriculum that will put a conservative stamp on history and economics textbooks, stressing the superiority of American capitalism, questioning the Founding Fathers’ commitment to a purely secular government and presenting Republican political philosophies in a more positive light.
The vote was 10 to 5 along party lines, with all the Republicans on the board voting for it.
The board, whose members are elected, has influence beyond Texas because the state is one of the largest buyers of textbooks. In the digital age, however, that influence has diminished as technological advances have made it possible for publishers to tailor books to individual states.
In recent years, board members have been locked in an ideological battle between a bloc of conservatives who question Darwin’s theory of evolution and believe the Founding Fathers were guided by Christian principles, and a handful of Democrats and moderate Republicans who have fought to preserve the teaching of Darwinism and the separation of church and state.
The controversy over textbooks is mainly about history textbooks. Do away w/ them and have each school create their own curriculum sans textbooks. It will make history teachers work and weed out a lot of the lazy incompetent ones. However, as you know, the textbook industry is a major cog in the education industry.