Raising Olives on Public Schools

[emmiedahl]

I would have a shit-fit if my school had hymns, prayers or nativities. Yeah, I am a bit of a bitch about this stuff.

[pomology]

In my children's schools, evolution cannot be touched without "balance", which means equal time given to creationism. Creationism is not a basic tenet of science, so why???? And if we are going to be all fair, maybe the kids should learn how Hindu texts hold that the world exists.

There is nothing about sex or contraception or homosexuality in the middle school health classes. Really, I think those are important facets of adolescent health. The Muslims don't make up a large enough group in my area to demand curriculum changes, so there is only one religious group to blame for that one.

Every morning, children in Washington say the Pledge of Allegiance along with a certain controversial phrase that was added less than 100 years ago to set us apart from our 'evil, Godless' enemies.

Not to mention, that 95% of the kids and a higher ratio of the teachers are Christian in my area. So, it comes up. I could go on and on and on. Not that I want all of this stopped, but saying the public schools are Godless is a stretch.

Ew. My sincere sympathies emmiedahl. :(

[kaetrin]

They've all conveniently forgotten (or more likely never knew) that a big reason why there isn't prayer and Bible reading in schools is because the Protestants and Catholics in the early 20th century couldn't agree on stuff like which version of the Bible to use. It never was the godless heathens messing stuff up for them and getting them kicked out; they managed it quite well on their own.

(I forget the details but there's a really interesting book, which my husband used once when teaching a media and rhetoric class, on the printing history of the Bible in America, that discussed this issue.)