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[Jeffahn]

"Posted by Ed Brayton on April 21, 2005 03:01 PM

The Thomas More Law Center, the same legal group defending the school board in Dover, PA, is threatening to file a lawsuit against the Gull Lake Public Schools for telling two junior high science teachers that they could no longer teach creationism in their classrooms. Michigan Citizens for Science, an organization whose board I sit on, has been involved with this case for several months behind the scenes, since being notified of what was being taught there by a parent whose child was in the class. That parent is a biologist and was shocked when his daughter brought home not only pro-ID material, but young earth creationist material as well, including classroom material claiming that the Grand Canyon had formed in a single year as a result of Noah's flood. The parent contacted us and we made contact with the Gull Lake administration, the school board and the teachers. We worked to resolve the situation without the bounds of the law and responsible curriculum standards, even holding an in-service day with the teachers to show them the lack of scientific credibility in the material they were using."

http://www.pandasthumb.org/pt-archives/000975.html

...

 

[Pimpwerx]

Michigan? Shouldn't these 'tards be from the South or something? Jesus, it's a public school. Religion and its hokey concept of the origins of life have no goddamn place in public schools. Hopefully these fools lose the case and then their jobs. You really shouldn't be teaching if you can't grasp the reasons why ID isn't taught in schools. I would be embarassed to head that Science department. PEACE.

 

[etiolate]

They just need to set some striaght up rules and people need to relax. I learned about Islam and their whole part of history at my public junior high school and no one gave a crap. I sure as hell didn't. Iit's learning about a period of history and a set of theories.

edit: And I just realized ID stood for Intelligent Design. Cue Mandy.

 

[CrawfishPete]

christ, a buddy from college went to Gull Lake.

 

[Hitokage]

Michigan? Shouldn't these 'tards be from the South or something? Jesus, it's a public school. Religion and its hokey concept of the origins of life have no goddamn place in public schools. Hopefully these fools lose the case and then their jobs. You really shouldn't be teaching if you can't grasp the reasons why ID isn't taught in schools. I would be embarassed to head that Science department. PEACE.

No, if schools want to have a comparative religion class or cover such material objectively in a history class, that's OK. But teaching religion in science class is NOT.

 

[geogaddi]

No, if schools want to have a comparative religion class or cover such material objectively in a history class, that's OK. But teaching religion in science class is NOT.

*sigh*

 

[Dilbert]

*sigh*

What?

 

[Jeffahn]

*sigh*

Is that sigh with presumption or without?

...

 

[Mumbles]

No, if schools want to have a comparative religion class or cover such material objectively in a history class, that's OK. But teaching religion in science class is NOT.

More to the point, teaching long-outdated theories as though they had any relevance to modern science (eg. young earth creationism) is not. It's kinda like letting holocaust deniers and those "moon landing was faked" people teach 20 century history class.

 

[acidviper]

Creationism rules. The world is 3000 years old and the Nazis planted all the dinosaur bones. Oh yeah you can't read this post because the only reading you need in life is the Bible. But not just any bible, only the King James Version of the Bible. Somehow King James' revisions trump whatever the writers mustered together over 3000 years of bible writing and Crusade killing. Oh yeah and this is all to make sure that there is no way possible that all humans originated from Africa and that all the white people descneded from black people.

 

[MC Safety]

Creationism rules. The world is 3000 years old and the Nazis planted all the dinosaur bones. Oh yeah you can't read this post because the only reading you need in life is the Bible. But not just any bible, only the King James Version of the Bible. Somehow King James' revisions trump whatever the writers mustered together over 3000 years of bible writing and Crusade killing. Oh yeah and this is all to make sure that there is no way possible that all humans originated from Africa and that all the white people descneded from black people.

Bishop Usher determined the world was created in 4004 B.C. Where have you been?

Also, I am for teaching the world was created when Odin broke the frost giant into pieces and that gremlins are the reason planes fly.

 

[jiggle]

Nazis planted all the dinosaur bones.

Jesus Horses, duh.

 

[demon]

*sigh*

..intriguing...

 

[Hitokage]

*sigh*

Ok, you wanna have a go? Argue that the push for creationism in schools isn't a fundamentalist christian movement and that "intelligent design" and "creation science" aren't attempts to get around seperation of church and state by omitting overt religious references. BUT, you have to do it without making disingenuous science-is-dogma claims.

 

[cvxfreak]

That parent is a biologist and was shocked when his daughter brought home not only pro-ID material, but young earth creationist material as well, including classroom material claiming that the Grand Canyon had formed in a single year as a result of Noah's flood.

No wonder. :lol

 

[Rlan]

How the fuck did people decide that the Grand Canyon was created by Noah's flood? Which bible carrying English chap discovered America thousands of years before Columbus and documented it? Was it ever mentioned in anything or was it just made up and followed?

 

[FoneBone]

Ok, you wanna have a go? Argue that the push for creationism in schools isn't a fundamentalist christian movement and that "intelligent design" and "creation science" aren't attempts to get around seperation of church and state by omitting overt religious references. BUT, you have to do it without making disingenuous science-is-dogma claims.

Be quiet -- you're just part of the ELITIST GODLESS LIBERAL CONSPIRACY.

 

[Hitokage]

How the fuck did people decide that the Grand Canyon was created by Noah's flood? Which bible carrying English chap discovered America thousands of years before Columbus and documented it? Was it ever mentioned in anything or was it just made up and followed?

The claim that the Earth is only 6000 years old involves denying all sorts of things(nearly all of science being one of them)... because it takes a lot more than 6000 years for a river to erode a canyon as big.

 

[Flynn]

The claim that the Earth is only 6000 years old involves denying all sorts of things(nearly all of science being one of them), because it takes a lot more than 6000 years for a river to erode a canyon as big.

I thought the grand canyon was made by Pecos Bill or Paul Bunyon.

 

[MC Safety]

Idiot.




It was October 23, 4004 BC.

Retard.

It was October 23, 4004 at 9 a.m.

 

[slayn]

in a mythology class I was in there was some creationist myth where some god whose name I forgot cut off his dad's testicales, ate them, and then laughed about it. And like the semen that dropped during all this formed the world or some such.

I want them to teach that belief in school.

 

[Flynn]

in a mythology class I was in there was some creationist myth where some god whose name I forgot cut off his dad's testicales, ate them, and then laughed about it. And like the semen that dropped during all this formed the world or some such.

I want them to teach that belief in school.

That story is no longer considered a creation myth, proponants of this theory of the origins of life have taken to calling it A.B.O.T.E.D. or

Spoiler

Accidental Byproduct of Testical Eating Design.

 

[Triumph]

*sigh*

You're right. Thank God that Reason and Logic have no place if you read and believe in the Bible. It's almost as if it was back in the late 1930's, where reason and logic had no place if you read Mein Kampf and the Nazi Party Platform. Ooops! Those two pieces of historical fiction obviously HAVE NO RELATION TO EACH OTHER WHATSOEVER! YOU KEEP ON BELIEVING, LIKE JOURNEY SAID!!! Makes for better Karaoke and Revolution(non-Nintendo kind) anyhow.

 

[captainbiotch]

Education should be privatized.

 

[Triumph]

Education should be privatized.

:lol

Oh really? Let us know how you derived that conclusion. Please, I want to know how the average student or below average student can benefit from privitization or school vouchers.

OH WAIT. THEY CAN'T.

 

[DDayton]

:lol

Oh really? Let us know how you derived that conclusion. Please, I want to know how the average student or below average student can benefit from privitization or school vouchers.

OH WAIT. THEY CAN'T.

Actually, they can. Create a private school dedicated to working with below average students, and then use government funds to work with them. At the very least, you might have the option to change class sizes around. I'd like to hear your logic as to how a below average student benefits from being in a standard classroom, actually... heck, private schools aren't being held to the requirements of "No Child Left Behind" -- the way the teachers' unions talk, that very fact ensures that the children are better served!

Oh, wait. Sorry. I must be wrong. We all know how state-run universities are the only schools worth mentioning... the private sector could NEVER run an academic environment properly!

 

[Jeffahn]

Here's really good post in reply to the panda's thumb story:

"The Thomas More Ctr is adopting a legal tactic that facially seems idiotic, but is quite clever and has been used to great effect by Fundamentalists before them.

Realize that the purpose of this lawsuit is not to win. They know there’s no legal argument here, but winning is not the point. The idea is simply to grab headlines and mobilize the base. The court is merely a pawn in a complex game with long-range goals - a game that cannot be won in one dispute. The judiciary, sans slick media representation, makes a handy vilifying target when the case is over and lost. Indeed, losses are an integral part of the strategy. Only with a string of losses can you best appeal to the Fundamentalist Christian id - persecution.

Persecuted? How can an 85% majority be persecuted? Well, reason isn’t a player in this game but ‘faith’ (alongside paranoid delusion) sure is. Nothing riles up the base more than persecuted Christians, and reasonable or not, it keeps the money coming in. And there’s nothing more Christ-like than being persecuted.

Notice how the phrase ‘hostility to Christianity/religion’ has seen an upsurge in Establishment Clause cases of late, often mentioned by Scalia himself. The only time we hear about ‘hostility to Christianity’, however, is when some plaintiff finally gets fed up with having it crammed down his throat by the state. Christians can’t see that because for them, their imposition is simply the truth. If we started littering various state capitals with 3 ton statues of buddha, however, you can bet your ass they’d wake up and recognize the imposition in a hurry.

To get back to the point, which is that losses are an integral part of this new litigatory architecture, you might ask - well, they surely don’t mean to lose forever, so what is the point of losing all the time? Besides headlines and support derived from those headlines, these losses eventually morph into plenary political power. And the real wins can then take place at the legislative level.

You can see a perhaps microcosmic example of this in action right now with regard to the current filibuster putsch on capital hill, which wouldn’t have been possible without the 11th Circuit’s rejection of the ill-advised Save-Terri-Schiavo bill.

Those judges, who were nearly all Republican and who colored well inside the judicial lines in that case, are being vilified as ‘activist’ when nothing could be further from the truth. Indeed, what DeLay & Co. *needed* in that case *was* an activist judge. This argument may be too subtle for the majority of America, and indeed the cable news networks. But it may work.

And then, it may not. Republicans in Congress supporting the social conservative agenda may not have fully digested and internalized the polls on Schiavo, but it suggested that the Fundamentalists may have overplayed their hand, in which case much of the support for these projects which spring from the same lobby-induced pressures (like the attacks on evolution in school), may sink along with.

Perhaps their wave crested and rolled back for good (for now) with Schiavo and support for related projects and agenda will similarly drift back out to sea. (mind you, I’m not suggesting that they’ll stop plugging up the courts with bullshit - only that the waning political support will force politicians to abandon their support)

~ s"

...

 

[maharg]

in a mythology class I was in there was some creationist myth where some god whose name I forgot cut off his dad's testicales, ate them, and then laughed about it. And like the semen that dropped during all this formed the world or some such.

I want them to teach that belief in school.

They do... in the greek mythology class. The father god was Uranus, the first chief God of greek mythology. His youngest son, Cronus, envied him and hated him for locking him up in *ahem* the bowels of his mother (Gaia) and so he cut off his father's testacles and from their blood came various sorts of monsters of Greek mythology.

Cronus then became the chief God of the Titans until he was deposed by Zeus, who killed him and all his brother Titans and became chief god of the Olympians.

Greek mythology totally pwns all other western religions.

 

[Banjo Tango]

Actually, they can. Create a private school dedicated to working with below average students, and then use government funds to work with them. At the very least, you might have the option to change class sizes around.

You don't need privitization to create smaller classroom sizes, you just need better funding. The Oregon Public Education system has had a LOT of its funding stripped out by groups with things like "Concerned Citizens" and "Fiscal Responsibility" in their name... and as a result, its dropped from being one of the best in the nation (3?) to somewhere in the 20's to 30's.

I'd like to hear your logic as to how a below average student benefits from being in a standard classroom, actually... heck, private schools aren't being held to the requirements of "No Child Left Behind" -- the way the teachers' unions talk, that very fact ensures that the children are better served!

The reason people complain about NCLB is because:
1) It isn't being funded fully
2) It's based around a (very expensive) repeated testing process. That money *could* be going to pay for higher teacher's salaries and smaller / better equipped classrooms... but no, that'd be too direct of a solution.

Oh, wait. Sorry. I must be wrong. We all know how state-run universities are the only schools worth mentioning... the private sector could NEVER run an academic environment properly!

The point is to make sure EVERYONE has access to a good education, not just those who can afford it.

 

[slayn]

They do... in the greek mythology class. The father god was Uranus, the first chief God of greek mythology. His youngest son, Cronus, envied him and hated him for locking him up in *ahem* the bowels of his mother (Gaia) and so he cut off his father's testacles and from their blood came various sorts of monsters of Greek mythology.

Cronus then became the chief God of the Titans until he was deposed by Zeus, who killed him and all his brother Titans and became chief god of the Olympians.

Greek mythology totally pwns all other western religions.

Cronus actually wasn't the one I was thinking of (he didn't EAT his dad's testicules afaik). I took a greek and roman mythology course and we deviated off into other smaller mythologies.

my point was I want them to teach that in grade school next to christian creationism and evolution and present it with equal weight as to its possibility of being true ^_^

Greek mythology was pretty cool though (though norse will always be my fav) but ROman mythology blew. They basically reached a poitn where they said, 'you know what? Our gods blow, lets just steal everyone else's'

I meant they had a god of bridges. Who the hell needs a god of bridges? Might as wel have Jim-Bob the god of shoes.

 

[DDayton]

You don't need privitization to create smaller classroom sizes, you just need better funding. The Oregon Public Education system has had a LOT of its funding stripped out by groups with things like "Concerned Citizens" and "Fiscal Responsibility" in their name... and as a result, its dropped from being one of the best in the nation (3?) to somewhere in the 20's to 30's.
The reason people complain about NCLB is because:
1) It isn't being funded fully
2) It's based around a (very expensive) repeated testing process. That money *could* be going to pay for higher teacher's salaries and smaller / better equipped classrooms... but no, that'd be too direct of a solution.

The point is to make sure EVERYONE has access to a good education, not just those who can afford it.

You're slightly confusing me with that last sentence.

If private schools were allowed to get government money, then many people would be able to afford it. That's not the issue then, right? The issue for people is something like "government money should only go to government schools." If it were merely about the accessibility, it wouldn't make any sense... there are several private schools willing to educate kids for about 1/2 of what the public school system is paying for them.

Oh, and higher teacher salaries have nothing to do with the educational value of the instruction, unless you are implying that all teachers out there would suddenly improve if they got a bit more cash each year. Dumping money on problems, especially governmental problems, rarely does any good.

Charter schools could be handy, though... let a public school create its own curriculum, manage itself, etc.. I've seen a few public charter schools that have done very well.

 

[etiolate]

You don't need privitization to create smaller classroom sizes, you just need better funding

There's far too much beauracracy seperating goverment funding from the actual classroom. Just adding more money doesn't solve this problem.