On Wednesday, the Arizona House Education Committee narrowly approved, and sent on to the full House of Representatives, HB 2713, a bill that would prohibit public schools from discriminating against students on the basis of their religious belief or expression. It permits students to engage in prayer and religious activity on an equal basis with other activities, but does not permit the school to require participation in religious activities. It includes provisions prohibiting banning of religious attire and jewelry when similar secular items are permitted and another section that prohibits discrimination for or against a student in grading coursework in which the student expresses a religious viewpoint or religious content. Yesterday's Yuma Sun and the Oklahoman both reported on the bill. One of the issues discussed during committee debate was whether teachers could grade down a student who applies Biblical notions of creationism in answering test questions. Rep. Doug Clark said it depends on how the question is asked. A teacher could legitimately ask students to answer a question "based on the theories and science taught in class".
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
.jpg)
Posts
6 comments:
This seems a rather inocuous bill (and one that does little more than codify existing case law). I wonder why it only "narrowly passed" in the committee?
Marco
Snort. So, what? Now every test that someone passes out in class has to explicitly contain the statement, "Using only the theories and science in the class, please answer the following questions."? If you don't after all, but merely ask the question, they could, according to this bill, put any stupid crap they want down and you can't give them an F.
As for why it "narrowly" passed... It was probably the lest batshit insane version of the bill they could come up with, without it being blindingly obvious that it was all total horse pucky from religious wackos who want *their* views to actually have the *only* right to expression.
Case in point, the new Florida science standards, which the same sort of morons got involved in, crowed success and joy about when passed, then blanched in horror and started ranting that they where tricked and lied to, when someone pointed out that tacking, "scientific theory of", didn't do jack for them, especially when the same standard said, "And will teach the *definition* of theory as used by scientists, as well as the methods used to derive scientific facts."
This is the same BS. They figure they got a one two punch with it, they get some idiot to admit that prayer **wasn't** allowed at schools, a blindingly stupid lie, so needed defending, and then they slip in, along with it, "If teachers don't explicitly demand a scientific answer, misquoting irrelevant Bible passages will still get you an A on the test."
Its a sort of win-lose for sane people, and sadly, the nuts probably haven't quite realized its a lose-lose one for them. I am slightly ashamed to admit living in the state that let thing through.
Kagehi,
Did you read the bill, because what you're describing isn't what's written.
The bill simply states a teacher cannot discriminate against answers that contain religious viewpoints when such viewpoints are germaine to the question asked. Thus, if a teacher asks questions about the theory of evolution -- a rather valid scientific theory -- talking about young earth creationism would be entirely inappropriate and would warrant an F (as it should be). However, if a teacher asked her students a general question about the origins of the modern civil rights movement, and a child wrote about its Christian and Jewish bases, then the teacher couldn't discriminate against the answer just because it expresses religious viewpoints. What's so controversial about that?
Another part of the bill says religious behavior (e.g., prayer and bible study) is protected on an equal basis with other secular activities. How that's BS is hard to imagine. There are numerous cases of children being denied the ability to read their Bibles or draw pictures of Jesus in school. Why should those children be singled out when children are allowed to read "On the Road" or draw pictures of John Lennin?
Like I said, it's all pretty inocuous stuff.
Marco
Sigh.. I can't agree. See, you think, because its what they claim, that these laws are being pushed to "protect" their free expression. The reality, as one can see by examining pretty much everything else they have ever previously tried, and what their reaction usually is when people slip language in that derails their intent, is to win via public opinion. They have no proof that non-school sanctioned prayer *is* being denied at schools. Hell, all the evidence I have seen suggests that instead you can start a prayer or Christian youth group on most campuses in this country without a problem, but trying to start a secular group that dares to suggest you don't need god to think, be moral or what ever else, and you have a snowballs chance in a blast furnace of getting official recognition at probably 80% of them. And, even if you do, the first thing you will see happen is that the same people pushing to "protect" their freedom to pray for better test scores during lunch will try to slander, sue or protest you out of existence.
They failed to get what they wanted on one specific case. They didn't get to insert religion into "all" subjects as a valid answer, even when it wasn't relevant. *HOWEVER*, they got part of what they wanted. They got a state legislation to implicitly admit that a) secular society is trying to prevent prayer in schools, thus **requiring** a bill to be passed to protect it and b) secular society is attempting to prevent "the truth" from being heard, by failing students, when they so much as mentioned religion in the context of answering a question on a test.
You have to trace the history of events. At one time bringing Bibles onto campus, etc. wasn't a problem at all. Some Bible groups got pushy, and some schools opted to actually *endorse* specific religions, this generated some serious anger from some people, who protested. Protests where tagged by a small minority as "persecution" and even the slightest case of not pandering to them was also tagged as persecution. Schools got sued when they tried to pander to the religious more. Someone pointed out this was blindly illegal, so they panicked. How do you allow something on campus without looking like you endorse it? Simple, don't allow it, so you don't have to worry about it. **NOW**, the wackos that had been pushing for direct endorsement all along, and actually do so illegally *often* in many southern states, had "proof" that they where right all along. It didn't matter that, almost universally, when it came to religion, *all* religions where banned on campus, not just Christians and that even secular groups that claimed a position on the subject where banned, on the principle that they might count as religion, nor that, almost universally, even at schools that don't ban outright, it is **still** easier to start a Christian youth group than a purely secular one.
Simple reality is, school boards are often stupid about this stuff. Rather than coming to same sane consensus on what constitutes "endorsement" and which allows for Bibles or groups to exist, while remaining separate from the school itself, they opted to come up with 500 different paranoia induced positions. The nuts, whose mission has always been to promote the idea that some vast 5% of the population who don't believe is conspiring the undermine the 15% of the nation that represent the true church, love this, since *now* they have lots of media coverage of cases they hand picked to feed to their pro-Christian, and often pro-fundie, news sources, which show a vast number of schools doing the same thing to people who, "Just want to read their Bible during lunch", that has been almost universally done to other less known faiths, and unbelievers, since the first state school was founded. Their answer - Force the state to admit a conspiracy exists, add protections for things that existing laws **already** protect, and intentionally muddy the waters, instead of doing what good law makers should have done, and clearing the damn mess up by stating clearly what is and isn't endorsement, rather than instead implying that the nuts where right all along.
They shouldn't be singled out. But they damn well shouldn't be defended by language that all but implies that 95% of the damn country is being persecuted by the 5% that don't want to listen to some preacher babble before a ball game, and who, with the exception of probably 0.001% of those people, never gave a #$#@ if they read their Bible at school in the first place.
At best, the bill restates something that shouldn't have been an issue in the first place. At worst, it implies legitimacy for a position that is disingenuous and completely hypocritical. Without such hypocracy and the paranoia it led to among schools who opted, in the confusion, to back peddle into pure stupidity, such a bill would have never been necessary.
Kagehi,
Lot's of hyperbole, swearing, and ad hominem attacks, but very little of substance in that last post.
The reality is equal access has often been denied religious groups in public schools. Sometimes students are actually singled out because of religious viewpoints they place in schoolwork (case in which a 5 year old's drawing of Jesus was censured in a school mural comes to mind quite easily). What's the big deal about passing legislation to ensure this doesn't happen in the future?
As for the argument the legislature didn't need to pass the law -- that's probably correct. But legislatures are free to pass laws that codify already existing case law or constitutional standards. Such legislative actions merely consolidates and gives teeth to certain things, such as really caring about religious freedom in public schools.
Instead of being stupid, this legislation seems like a prudent approach for those who care about individual rights and religious freedom.
Marco
This bill is essentially identical to one that is now LAW in Texas and is working its way through the Oklahoma legislature. The bill not only codifies what is already permissible (and therefore not needed), but adds sneaky elements that are clearly unconstitutional. There was plenty of opposition in Texas and now in Oklahoma, where many organizations oppose it. For more details see the posts on Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education:
http://www.biosurvey.ou.edu/oese/
Post a Comment