While I seriously doubt that figure, it's probably more like 80% don't attend church services EVEY Sunday. If it were true that that many don't go to church at all, , secularists orgs ought to send researches to the area to find out what they're doing right to achieve such impressive non-attendance levels.
I like the emphasis on "non-attendance levels." Because why should we have to attend something else just because we don't want to attend a religious thing? Not attending the religious thing should be enough, and yes, I agree wholeheartedly that such non-attendance at Christian events is enough of a marker of success. Those who make that choice not to join have already declared their preference to be left the hell alone, and that is worth celebrating.
Especially since the superintendent was so sure no parent would opt for the secular option. That tells me the town(s) in the district are highly religious, almost certainly, mostly Christian.
I was one of those kids. I showed up at CYO because the alternative was getting the hell beat out of me. I abandoned the church about six months out of high school.
Do Christians really believe that the reason non-Christian, American kids aren't going to church is that they've never heard of Jesus Christ? That that's even possible?
You sure it's not Jesus Rivera, who owns the taqueria with his wife Shelly? Or maybe Dr. Jesus E. Medina, a ENT-Otolaryngologist in Oklahoma City? Maybe Jesus Moreno, a Chicagoland electrician?
Also a Jesus Alou in baseball, not to mention fellow baseball players Jesus Aguilar, Jesus Montero, Jesus Sucre, Jesus Guzman, Jesus Delgado, Jesus Colome, Jesus Flores, etc.
Yes. Even though God Jesus is omnipotent and omniscient, and could simply make every human into one of his loyal, god-fearing subjects, somehow he still relies on the Sunday faithful for marketing and sales. None of the church leaders has bothered to explain this to the masses, and nobody has questioned it.
Even if Wood was fully prepared, resourced, and staffed to make it happen, I think I still wouldn't endorse it.
I think the secularist response to "we want kids to be able to choose to get out of school classes for bible classes" should be "we don't want kids to be able to choose to get out of any school classes", NOT "we want kids to also be able to get out of school classes for secular classes."
IOW: that public school art class the kids are skipping to go to bibe study? That art class IS the "secular alternative" we should be endorsing. I'm not looking to pull kids away from the district's curriculum to teach them my ideas. I'm looking to support that curriculum.
That is the end goal, to keep the kids in the school for the actual education. But once these groups get their hooks into the schools like they are, there needs to be a fight to pull them out. The schools are already under funding the electives, having students leave the classes to go to bible indoctrination isn’t going to convince the penny pinchers on the board or the voters to put more money into the classes, it will be more motivation to pull money out. “Fewer kids are sticking around for this elective, let’s cut the funding to save money since we don’t need to educate those kids in art.”
We need to have some sort of leverage, which is providing a service that the Christian nationalists will balk at. An atheist class, you know more real knowledge rather than fairy tales and fearmongering, will do it. But also allow Jewish kids to do their Hebrew classes during school or offer Islam classes might do it as well. The Christian nationalists will either have to give in to their so called enemies or pull out altogether. And if they don’t, we have legal recourse. But if there’s just “well, art class is really fun” nothing will be done and the situation will only get worse.
The atheist groups aren’t going to schools where the religious aren’t invading because, you’re right about this, the goal is to keep the kids in school. But where the religious are working to undermine education, this response is necessary.
God forbid, they cut football to save money. That has no business in schools anyway. Like Little League it can be handled by an outside organization. If they need to gut programs, gut sports and gym. Mostly seems an excuse for "teachers" to bully the fat and geeky kids.
I did almost say that they would cut art programs to save money for football. But I didn’t want to go too far off topic with that.
Absolutely, schools spend far too much money and attention on athletics and not nearly enough for academics including the arts. Art and music and the rest are part and parcel of academics, not extra to make it more interesting. They are core to functional academics. If you aren’t interested in art or music doesn’t mean you should be able to eschew them altogether. They are only the physical representations of how our brains comprehend the world, the patterns in math are first discovered through art and music. We learn to read and write through art, but as soon as it’s apparent we have those skills, we drop the art. No. We should be using reading and writing to enhance our art and art to enhance reading and writing.
Sorry, I’m a little crazy for art education. But let’s all watch our children give each other concussions. It’s way more exciting.
While I agree with your premise, the sad reality is that such things generally don't happen without a hard push in an unexpected directon. Privilege doesn't just say "oops, our bad, sorry" and find equitability.
I think the way to push back against these things is to offer such a good art class in school that there are zero kids opting out of it. Or at least only those kids whose parents force them to opt out. If this church is spending $19k/year, and the bus ends up transporting 1-2 students (who are already Christian) per semester to the church for alternative bible class, I'll bet that church would stop offering it pretty quick.
This is generally how it works at the HS level. Most districts already have it 'on the books' that any school can offer a Bible elective. They only require that a class (or group of parents) collect signatures of enough students to fill a classroom, to justify hiring/assiging a teacher to that elective. But funnily enough, very few districts have such classes. It not surprisingly turns out that most HS students aren't interested in giving up a college prep-geared elective for a bible study elective. So the primary 'barrier' turns out to be student interest in a regular, school-provided alternative percieved by the students as useful or interesting. Nothing more needed.
Yeah, no. A "good art class" isn't going to sway those who want to Bible-up (nor their parents). It's just not how things actually work in reality, despite it being preferable. Hell, in certain districts, *not* participating in Abrahamic mythos cosplay is grounds for ostracism...or worse.
Remember, the folks pushing theofascism aren't the live-and-let-live welcoming churches and their goal isn't peaceful coexistence.
It does work in reality, I just told you that. Bible electives are legal, yet they are extremely rare. Because even amongst Christians, there are few parents who will do that opportunity cost calculation and decide Bible is the way to go. That's at the HS level where the value of an academic alternative is naturally seen as high, but that strategy can apply just as easily to any grade level. Make the alternative high value, fewer people take the Bible thing.
The only way these proselityzers really get a grip is if the school or teachers are allowed to 'punish' students for not attening them (i.e. by saying the alternative is to sit quietly. Or by making it clear they have a higher opinion of students who take it). That's what we need to avoid. And as far as I can tell, this school is avoiding it. Does it suck that the board/legislature forces them to allow Bible as an off-campus option? Yes, yes it does. But inside the scope of the law, I don't see how the school is doing much wrong here. The bible alternative is opt-in and results in missing a regular art or music class. Having tha art or music class be really valuable, really popular with the students, is probably the best the school can do.
IF art and/or music classes were *actually* any good. Aye, there's the rub. I was forced into taking half year art/half year music classes in 7th grade, that were basically an excuse for the teachers to focus on the 3 or 4 kids out of 30 who supposedly had some talent and abuse those of us who supposedly didn't. It wasn't til I was in my late 20s that I found out that I actually do have some art and music abilities, but that took careful, supportive experience and teaching and people who knew me actually being interested in what I could do. The whole idea of such school classes have left a bad taste in my mouth for 55 years now. I agree though that every kid deserves to have those wonderful experiences that I did have much later on.
Schools shouldn't be viewed as pools of potential believers. This just pisses me off so much, misusing public schools to troll for followers. And this guy Wood isn't doing anyone any favors with his nonsense. Yes, I would like to see these churchy programs eliminated. But being a loco, screaming jerk is not the way to go about it.
What it REALLY is is a waste of time and taxpayer money. That time could be spent in INSTRUCTION, rather than INDOCTRINATION, yet there are school officials who will allow this foolishness to go on because they continue to be hornswoggled by the notion that religion and faith are positive influences on individuals and communities.
If parents really want their kids to learn religion, they can send them to Sunday School. They should NOT be wasting public resources which are dedicated to public schools.
Not only did we have music, starting in fourth grade, we had a trip to Severance Hall to hear The Cleveland Orchestra. Oh, did THAT sink the hook in me!
The school I went to and the boardschool I spend the rest of the week were separate entities. What I loved was the mandatory Wednesdays afternoon activities (swim or ballet for half a year and whatever your parents signed you for the rest of the year, for me it was theatre for the 2nd, 3rd and 5th grade, informatic/computers* for the 4th).
It's a waste. And a disservice to the kids whose parents make them do it. But at least, in this particular instance, the kids who don't do it are getting a regular, quality, class. Thus 'none' students have no incentive to choose the bible study. And so as a proselytization tool, I think it's going to fail. Like a bible study HS elective, the only elementary kids who do this will be the ones who already believe.
The much worse way - which some places have done but it doesn't sound like this is one of them - is to prevent the 'stay' kids from doing any useful learning with their time. So kudos to the district for following this bad law in the way that's least destructive to child education. Faint praise, maybe, but they can't really go against the law and get rid of it altogether. Best they can do is "while you are gone, classes will proceed as normal." Which is what they seem to have done.
𝘜𝘨𝘩. How can anyone win when everyone in the game is a loser?
Don't try to bluff your way to a win unless you have the resources and a plan to follow through when the theocrats call your bluff- because they 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭; they're playing for keeps. So come prepared, or else leave it in the hands of someone more capable of backing up their talk, like TST or the FFRF. Otherwise, you'll end up looking like... well, like 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 clown.
Unless there's a truly brave Satanist with a secure and stubborn kid in the town, TST would have no luck in this instance. American Atheists or Secular Coalition for America would be good choices. FFRF would be wonderful if it was "school-sponsored" but the parents being allowed to "take the students out of elective classes" makes it technically not the school's doing but the parents. It comes back to the American disdain for the Arts. Don't introduce the kids to art and they won't learn they like it and consider it as a career option.
This is fuel for Christian propaganda. All done to give people the false impression of how it's better to have Christian programs than atheist programs because "secular" programs are run by worthless cranks while Christians are run by "better, knowledgeable" people. Never mind there are certain "secular" organizations that are run by better, knowledgeable, well organized people, such as The Secular Coalition for America for instance.
Now I wonder if he's an actual Fundie Christian in disguise or something.
To all the naysayers who thought Seattle never stood a chance and would be bounced from the playoffs without a single win: How do ya like THEM apples? Made history and shocked the hockey world, we did. Cale Makar takes Jared McCann out of the playoffs? We knocked Makar and his whole team out of the playoffs and guaranteed a new Stanley Cup winner. You know what they say about payback.
And before the Kraken's victory? The Seattle Thunderbirds of the WHL beat the Kamloops Blazers in the Western Conference Championship round. The TBirds lead the series 2 games to none. Both the Kraken and the Birds are back in action tomorrow.
[if American Secularists were to offer the program they’ve proposed during lunch, “and a parent wanted to sign their child out to go to that, then that would be a parent’s right to sign their child out to go to that.” He added, however, “You know very well that’s not going to happen here.”}
This is downright chilling to me. It's an acknowledgement that no one would dare do anything that would exposé them as non-believers, it would likely be almost as bad for any other religion except for maybe Jewish kids. It's saying 'I know my people and they're gonna turn any atheists parents and their kids lives into hell if they try that'. Who know what's up with this Woods character, considering the prevalence of all kinds of abuse from actual clergy of actual churches, he isn't completely in the wrong about objecting to being asked questions that aren't being asked of the religious programs. The answer isn't to not ask him, it's to put some kind of monitoring in place for any program granted access to kids.
I think a bigger issue is how the Ohio effort gets around the establishment clause issues, it's like the increasing use of clever tactics, like the forced birther laws in Texas, that impose religious crap on everyone but in ways that shield the religious aspects from the law. There's a lot of great lawyers on our side at institutions like FFRF, CFI, etc, maybe they need to find more devious ahole attorneys, but that leaves a bad taste in the mouth. Fighting the good fight shouldn't mean you have to stoop to the devious, dishonest, and despicable tactics the faithful are all too eager to engage in.
The idea is that the church going students will get out of classes to go to Sunday school in front of all their non-church going peers. Making the non-church goers jealous and beg their parents to take them out of school too. The churches can’t leave it to Wednesday nights and Sunday mornings because that is not visible to outsiders. Kids who want to play on Sunday will just get an unhappy “I can’t play, I have to got to church.” But in school the other kids see the church kids leave and they say “I get to leave school to go to church!” All happy like.
It never would have worked on me because art class was always my church.
"...Atheist/Science release time. The curriculum will include American Education standard Biology, Astronomy, and General Science."
What's the atheist part. I learned about all those subjects is school and religion/atheism never came up. Looking back, I'm pretty sure most of my teachers were religious. I can't say for sure because religion was rarely brought up and then it was a casual mention and not part of the curriculum.
Atheist indoctrination isn't better than religious indoctrination.
Christians never stop trying to mark their territory in the public schools, paid for with everyone's tax dollars. Their overwhelming need to indoctrinate children before they've reached the age of reason, speaks to how little confidence they really have in their message. Why is it ever acceptable to present things to children as facts, an educated adult would almost certainly reject if hearing them for the first time?
In 2003, George Barna published the results of his research, showing that children were the most important population segment to minister to, as 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘴𝘵 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘢𝘣𝘴𝘰𝘳𝘣 𝘴𝘱𝘪𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘶𝘢𝘭 𝘵𝘦𝘢𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘥𝘶𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝙙𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙡𝙤𝙥𝙢𝙚𝙣𝙩𝙖𝙡 𝙫𝙪𝙡𝙣𝙚𝙧𝙖𝙗𝙞𝙡𝙞𝙩𝙮..* Barna argued that a child's moral development was "set" by the age of nine, in contrast to the tactics of many churches focusing on teaching older children. Barna wrote that "habits related to the practice of one's faith develop when one is young and change surprisingly little over time", and that "the older a child gets, the more distracted and vulnerable he or she becomes" to what he described as "nonfamily influences". Barna also found that children who converted to Christianity before their teenage years were more likely to remain "absolutely committed" to Christianity.
It's been noted here (and on previous versions of Friendly Atheist) many, many, many times that the reason churches aren't seeing people in their pews anymore has more to do with their stances on specific issues and how they've behaved on those issues than anything else.
So when I read about a church official of any stripe complaining about how “Eighty percent of children in our county are not in church,” and going on to say “Ninety percent of them are in the public schools" my immediate reaction is along the lines of 'so stop being jerks to so many people and prove your claims about being morally superior, duh.'
I think that atheist parents should be using these school-based indoctrination programs to help their kids learn how to mentally resist this sort of forcible lockstep thinking in the future. From the political shenanigans we've been watching lately, the kids are going to need it very, very soon.
“Eighty percent of children in our county are not in church,”
There's your Good News, right there.
While I seriously doubt that figure, it's probably more like 80% don't attend church services EVEY Sunday. If it were true that that many don't go to church at all, , secularists orgs ought to send researches to the area to find out what they're doing right to achieve such impressive non-attendance levels.
I like the emphasis on "non-attendance levels." Because why should we have to attend something else just because we don't want to attend a religious thing? Not attending the religious thing should be enough, and yes, I agree wholeheartedly that such non-attendance at Christian events is enough of a marker of success. Those who make that choice not to join have already declared their preference to be left the hell alone, and that is worth celebrating.
Except I suspect they're exaggerating numbers made of whole cloth.
Liars for Jesus lying? Who would have thought?
Especially since the superintendent was so sure no parent would opt for the secular option. That tells me the town(s) in the district are highly religious, almost certainly, mostly Christian.
Therefore the claim that 80 percent of kids are not in church seems a little suspect. As usual, they want to have it both ways.
Shocking. Totally.
As long as it's not mixed cloth. ; )
Or red.
Right. We don't want to upset those creatures from "The Village'"
"Christians know their biggest obstacle is children who can think for themselves."
Nailed it.
I was one of those kids. I showed up at CYO because the alternative was getting the hell beat out of me. I abandoned the church about six months out of high school.
Do Christians really believe that the reason non-Christian, American kids aren't going to church is that they've never heard of Jesus Christ? That that's even possible?
Jesus who? ; )
Jesus Martinez ... you know ... the guy who mows my lawn once a week! 🤪
Nice stereotyping there.
Jesus was apparently a popular Jewish name at the time. He could just as easily have been Saul Christ, or Morty Christ.
You sure it's not Jesus Rivera, who owns the taqueria with his wife Shelly? Or maybe Dr. Jesus E. Medina, a ENT-Otolaryngologist in Oklahoma City? Maybe Jesus Moreno, a Chicagoland electrician?
No, not that Jesus. The one who sits in the third row in my science class.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lL8_cfi-bCw
Gesundheit!
Ask a Christian. They'll be absolutely thrilled to tell you.
He used to play for Manchester city, but I think he's transferred to Arsenal.
https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Ftse4.mm.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid%3DOIP.6ykCI17Khi1EmXE7v5d3HQHaEK%26pid%3DApi&f=1&ipt=1fd675c45cb990b4463ffee46b27b87620a6de4d8bc41de0faffe4c5c3155abc&ipo=images
Also a Jesus Alou in baseball, not to mention fellow baseball players Jesus Aguilar, Jesus Montero, Jesus Sucre, Jesus Guzman, Jesus Delgado, Jesus Colome, Jesus Flores, etc.
Jesus, that guy is everywhere!
And that's just in baseball. Lots in futbol, too.
Now batting...the centerfielder...number 1....Jesus....Christ...Salamanca...number 1.
True, but this is Gabriel Jesus – obviously a closer relation.
Wait, he's part angel, part son o' god?
Impressive.
Yes. Even though God Jesus is omnipotent and omniscient, and could simply make every human into one of his loyal, god-fearing subjects, somehow he still relies on the Sunday faithful for marketing and sales. None of the church leaders has bothered to explain this to the masses, and nobody has questioned it.
“you will not get anything from me, I don't care if you have photos of yourself with Bill Nye and look pretty on Fox News.”
If he really wanted to flatter you , he should have called you Jeopardy Champion.
Even if Wood was fully prepared, resourced, and staffed to make it happen, I think I still wouldn't endorse it.
I think the secularist response to "we want kids to be able to choose to get out of school classes for bible classes" should be "we don't want kids to be able to choose to get out of any school classes", NOT "we want kids to also be able to get out of school classes for secular classes."
IOW: that public school art class the kids are skipping to go to bibe study? That art class IS the "secular alternative" we should be endorsing. I'm not looking to pull kids away from the district's curriculum to teach them my ideas. I'm looking to support that curriculum.
That is the end goal, to keep the kids in the school for the actual education. But once these groups get their hooks into the schools like they are, there needs to be a fight to pull them out. The schools are already under funding the electives, having students leave the classes to go to bible indoctrination isn’t going to convince the penny pinchers on the board or the voters to put more money into the classes, it will be more motivation to pull money out. “Fewer kids are sticking around for this elective, let’s cut the funding to save money since we don’t need to educate those kids in art.”
We need to have some sort of leverage, which is providing a service that the Christian nationalists will balk at. An atheist class, you know more real knowledge rather than fairy tales and fearmongering, will do it. But also allow Jewish kids to do their Hebrew classes during school or offer Islam classes might do it as well. The Christian nationalists will either have to give in to their so called enemies or pull out altogether. And if they don’t, we have legal recourse. But if there’s just “well, art class is really fun” nothing will be done and the situation will only get worse.
The atheist groups aren’t going to schools where the religious aren’t invading because, you’re right about this, the goal is to keep the kids in school. But where the religious are working to undermine education, this response is necessary.
God forbid, they cut football to save money. That has no business in schools anyway. Like Little League it can be handled by an outside organization. If they need to gut programs, gut sports and gym. Mostly seems an excuse for "teachers" to bully the fat and geeky kids.
I did almost say that they would cut art programs to save money for football. But I didn’t want to go too far off topic with that.
Absolutely, schools spend far too much money and attention on athletics and not nearly enough for academics including the arts. Art and music and the rest are part and parcel of academics, not extra to make it more interesting. They are core to functional academics. If you aren’t interested in art or music doesn’t mean you should be able to eschew them altogether. They are only the physical representations of how our brains comprehend the world, the patterns in math are first discovered through art and music. We learn to read and write through art, but as soon as it’s apparent we have those skills, we drop the art. No. We should be using reading and writing to enhance our art and art to enhance reading and writing.
Sorry, I’m a little crazy for art education. But let’s all watch our children give each other concussions. It’s way more exciting.
"We need to have some sort of leverage, which is providing a service that the Christian nationalists will balk at."
I think a course titled "Deconstructing the Bible" would do it.
Only once they figured what deconstructing meant.
Wasn't Hemant doing this in his series of "Everything That's Wrong With Genesis, Exodus, etc. etc."
While I agree with your premise, the sad reality is that such things generally don't happen without a hard push in an unexpected directon. Privilege doesn't just say "oops, our bad, sorry" and find equitability.
I think the way to push back against these things is to offer such a good art class in school that there are zero kids opting out of it. Or at least only those kids whose parents force them to opt out. If this church is spending $19k/year, and the bus ends up transporting 1-2 students (who are already Christian) per semester to the church for alternative bible class, I'll bet that church would stop offering it pretty quick.
This is generally how it works at the HS level. Most districts already have it 'on the books' that any school can offer a Bible elective. They only require that a class (or group of parents) collect signatures of enough students to fill a classroom, to justify hiring/assiging a teacher to that elective. But funnily enough, very few districts have such classes. It not surprisingly turns out that most HS students aren't interested in giving up a college prep-geared elective for a bible study elective. So the primary 'barrier' turns out to be student interest in a regular, school-provided alternative percieved by the students as useful or interesting. Nothing more needed.
Yeah, no. A "good art class" isn't going to sway those who want to Bible-up (nor their parents). It's just not how things actually work in reality, despite it being preferable. Hell, in certain districts, *not* participating in Abrahamic mythos cosplay is grounds for ostracism...or worse.
Remember, the folks pushing theofascism aren't the live-and-let-live welcoming churches and their goal isn't peaceful coexistence.
It does work in reality, I just told you that. Bible electives are legal, yet they are extremely rare. Because even amongst Christians, there are few parents who will do that opportunity cost calculation and decide Bible is the way to go. That's at the HS level where the value of an academic alternative is naturally seen as high, but that strategy can apply just as easily to any grade level. Make the alternative high value, fewer people take the Bible thing.
The only way these proselityzers really get a grip is if the school or teachers are allowed to 'punish' students for not attening them (i.e. by saying the alternative is to sit quietly. Or by making it clear they have a higher opinion of students who take it). That's what we need to avoid. And as far as I can tell, this school is avoiding it. Does it suck that the board/legislature forces them to allow Bible as an off-campus option? Yes, yes it does. But inside the scope of the law, I don't see how the school is doing much wrong here. The bible alternative is opt-in and results in missing a regular art or music class. Having tha art or music class be really valuable, really popular with the students, is probably the best the school can do.
IF art and/or music classes were *actually* any good. Aye, there's the rub. I was forced into taking half year art/half year music classes in 7th grade, that were basically an excuse for the teachers to focus on the 3 or 4 kids out of 30 who supposedly had some talent and abuse those of us who supposedly didn't. It wasn't til I was in my late 20s that I found out that I actually do have some art and music abilities, but that took careful, supportive experience and teaching and people who knew me actually being interested in what I could do. The whole idea of such school classes have left a bad taste in my mouth for 55 years now. I agree though that every kid deserves to have those wonderful experiences that I did have much later on.
Schools shouldn't be viewed as pools of potential believers. This just pisses me off so much, misusing public schools to troll for followers. And this guy Wood isn't doing anyone any favors with his nonsense. Yes, I would like to see these churchy programs eliminated. But being a loco, screaming jerk is not the way to go about it.
𝐼𝑡’𝑠 𝑎𝑙𝑠𝑜, 𝑓𝑟𝑢𝑠𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑦, 𝑙𝑒𝑔𝑎𝑙 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑐𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑐𝑡 𝑖𝑠𝑛’𝑡 𝑡𝑒𝑐ℎ𝑛𝑖𝑐𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑜𝑟𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑟𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑔𝑖𝑜𝑢𝑠 𝑒𝑑𝑢𝑐𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛. 𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑦 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑙𝑒𝑡𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑘𝑖𝑑𝑠 𝑔𝑜 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑑𝑢𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑐𝑒𝑟𝑡𝑎𝑖𝑛 ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑠 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑠’ 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑚𝑖𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑜𝑛.
What it REALLY is is a waste of time and taxpayer money. That time could be spent in INSTRUCTION, rather than INDOCTRINATION, yet there are school officials who will allow this foolishness to go on because they continue to be hornswoggled by the notion that religion and faith are positive influences on individuals and communities.
If parents really want their kids to learn religion, they can send them to Sunday School. They should NOT be wasting public resources which are dedicated to public schools.
They are only allowing it during non mandatory classes. Part of what makes it such a waste is they are calling art and music non mandatory.
Yeah, treating the arts as 'less than' is a huge disservice to the kids....and society.
There's more to life than STEM-related subjects ... and that's coming from a retired electrical engineer.
Reading, 'Riting, 'Rithmetic.
At my time we didn't have music lessons* before 6th grade but it was mandatory. Art classes too.
* There is now as long with a secondary language.
Not only did we have music, starting in fourth grade, we had a trip to Severance Hall to hear The Cleveland Orchestra. Oh, did THAT sink the hook in me!
The school I went to and the boardschool I spend the rest of the week were separate entities. What I loved was the mandatory Wednesdays afternoon activities (swim or ballet for half a year and whatever your parents signed you for the rest of the year, for me it was theatre for the 2nd, 3rd and 5th grade, informatic/computers* for the 4th).
* Theatre was not available this year.
I would bet that language is legal, not a value judgment. I.e.:
Mandatory = state/school board makes us offer it and says every kid must take it
Voluntary = we the district or school have legal authority to decide if we offer it.
It's a waste. And a disservice to the kids whose parents make them do it. But at least, in this particular instance, the kids who don't do it are getting a regular, quality, class. Thus 'none' students have no incentive to choose the bible study. And so as a proselytization tool, I think it's going to fail. Like a bible study HS elective, the only elementary kids who do this will be the ones who already believe.
The much worse way - which some places have done but it doesn't sound like this is one of them - is to prevent the 'stay' kids from doing any useful learning with their time. So kudos to the district for following this bad law in the way that's least destructive to child education. Faint praise, maybe, but they can't really go against the law and get rid of it altogether. Best they can do is "while you are gone, classes will proceed as normal." Which is what they seem to have done.
𝘜𝘨𝘩. How can anyone win when everyone in the game is a loser?
Don't try to bluff your way to a win unless you have the resources and a plan to follow through when the theocrats call your bluff- because they 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭; they're playing for keeps. So come prepared, or else leave it in the hands of someone more capable of backing up their talk, like TST or the FFRF. Otherwise, you'll end up looking like... well, like 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 clown.
Unless there's a truly brave Satanist with a secure and stubborn kid in the town, TST would have no luck in this instance. American Atheists or Secular Coalition for America would be good choices. FFRF would be wonderful if it was "school-sponsored" but the parents being allowed to "take the students out of elective classes" makes it technically not the school's doing but the parents. It comes back to the American disdain for the Arts. Don't introduce the kids to art and they won't learn they like it and consider it as a career option.
Don't you know that most art is pornographic and demonic ?
Only the good stuff.
Being pornographic and demonic is what gives that art its charm.
And where would we find this "good stuff"? Asking for a friend.
There might be something online.
Louvre and Orsay museums to start.
Like a famous French painting ?
"The Fallen Madonna with the Big Boobies?"
Oh wait, that was a German painting (Van Klomp).
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-bristol-46397261
Van sounds a little bit more Dutch to me. But even so cheap at the price.
It's about a lower part of the model body and you know it 😁
This is fuel for Christian propaganda. All done to give people the false impression of how it's better to have Christian programs than atheist programs because "secular" programs are run by worthless cranks while Christians are run by "better, knowledgeable" people. Never mind there are certain "secular" organizations that are run by better, knowledgeable, well organized people, such as The Secular Coalition for America for instance.
Now I wonder if he's an actual Fundie Christian in disguise or something.
My first thought was that this was a clever ruse by some church to make atheists look bad, but then I remembered they're probably not that smart.
Allow kids to skip classes without penalty?
That happened when I was a kid. As a Catholic child, we called it Catechism. You can see how I turned out.
You never sexually harassed an altar boy ? How shameful !
Oh, I had sex with an altar boy. But I was one myself at the time. :)
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
Blessed is he who cums in me.
There must be enormous throngs of blessed guys in your neighborhood then.
Alas, my halcyon days are behind me. The opportunities are few and far between. :)
I can't say I did that.
* Go scold DM*
OT:
UNLEASH THE KRAKEN!!!
*NoGodz wears big grin*
To all the naysayers who thought Seattle never stood a chance and would be bounced from the playoffs without a single win: How do ya like THEM apples? Made history and shocked the hockey world, we did. Cale Makar takes Jared McCann out of the playoffs? We knocked Makar and his whole team out of the playoffs and guaranteed a new Stanley Cup winner. You know what they say about payback.
And before the Kraken's victory? The Seattle Thunderbirds of the WHL beat the Kamloops Blazers in the Western Conference Championship round. The TBirds lead the series 2 games to none. Both the Kraken and the Birds are back in action tomorrow.
Life is good. :)
The SeaDragons had a rough afternoon though (I was visiting my Dad yesterday, so I was watching baseball, basketball, and the XFL)
Meanwhile the Mariners, who've been...suboptimal...put up 10 runs and beat Toronto.
Braised with a touch of vanilla. Thank you I am about to finish my soup and didn't know what to have for dessert.
[if American Secularists were to offer the program they’ve proposed during lunch, “and a parent wanted to sign their child out to go to that, then that would be a parent’s right to sign their child out to go to that.” He added, however, “You know very well that’s not going to happen here.”}
This is downright chilling to me. It's an acknowledgement that no one would dare do anything that would exposé them as non-believers, it would likely be almost as bad for any other religion except for maybe Jewish kids. It's saying 'I know my people and they're gonna turn any atheists parents and their kids lives into hell if they try that'. Who know what's up with this Woods character, considering the prevalence of all kinds of abuse from actual clergy of actual churches, he isn't completely in the wrong about objecting to being asked questions that aren't being asked of the religious programs. The answer isn't to not ask him, it's to put some kind of monitoring in place for any program granted access to kids.
I think a bigger issue is how the Ohio effort gets around the establishment clause issues, it's like the increasing use of clever tactics, like the forced birther laws in Texas, that impose religious crap on everyone but in ways that shield the religious aspects from the law. There's a lot of great lawyers on our side at institutions like FFRF, CFI, etc, maybe they need to find more devious ahole attorneys, but that leaves a bad taste in the mouth. Fighting the good fight shouldn't mean you have to stoop to the devious, dishonest, and despicable tactics the faithful are all too eager to engage in.
“Eighty percent of children in our county are not in church,”
If it was the truth why would parents sign for a church program during school hours ?
Maybe this "atheist group" should ask some advices to Donda academy founder.
The idea is that the church going students will get out of classes to go to Sunday school in front of all their non-church going peers. Making the non-church goers jealous and beg their parents to take them out of school too. The churches can’t leave it to Wednesday nights and Sunday mornings because that is not visible to outsiders. Kids who want to play on Sunday will just get an unhappy “I can’t play, I have to got to church.” But in school the other kids see the church kids leave and they say “I get to leave school to go to church!” All happy like.
It never would have worked on me because art class was always my church.
"If it was the truth why would parents sign for a church program during school hours ?"
Good question. I would say so 20% of students (not really the students, the parents) can virtue signal.
"...Atheist/Science release time. The curriculum will include American Education standard Biology, Astronomy, and General Science."
What's the atheist part. I learned about all those subjects is school and religion/atheism never came up. Looking back, I'm pretty sure most of my teachers were religious. I can't say for sure because religion was rarely brought up and then it was a casual mention and not part of the curriculum.
Atheist indoctrination isn't better than religious indoctrination.
Christians never stop trying to mark their territory in the public schools, paid for with everyone's tax dollars. Their overwhelming need to indoctrinate children before they've reached the age of reason, speaks to how little confidence they really have in their message. Why is it ever acceptable to present things to children as facts, an educated adult would almost certainly reject if hearing them for the first time?
Their aggressiveness in doing this is because of the 4/14 window.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/930cd09e67c2c9c9b9830733867542f76e7e5fa424b7653952b5d1b558afe810.jpg
In 2003, George Barna published the results of his research, showing that children were the most important population segment to minister to, as 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘴𝘵 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘢𝘣𝘴𝘰𝘳𝘣 𝘴𝘱𝘪𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘶𝘢𝘭 𝘵𝘦𝘢𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘥𝘶𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝙙𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙡𝙤𝙥𝙢𝙚𝙣𝙩𝙖𝙡 𝙫𝙪𝙡𝙣𝙚𝙧𝙖𝙗𝙞𝙡𝙞𝙩𝙮..* Barna argued that a child's moral development was "set" by the age of nine, in contrast to the tactics of many churches focusing on teaching older children. Barna wrote that "habits related to the practice of one's faith develop when one is young and change surprisingly little over time", and that "the older a child gets, the more distracted and vulnerable he or she becomes" to what he described as "nonfamily influences". Barna also found that children who converted to Christianity before their teenage years were more likely to remain "absolutely committed" to Christianity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_evangelism_movement
Emphasis mine. I had a Captain Cassidy article on this, but I couldn't find it. 🤬
Edit: Found it! :)
https://onlysky.media/ccassidy/what-the-4-14-window-tells-us-about-christianitys-future/
Evangelicals Evilgelicals are the real groomers.
Always knew I was weird.
It's been noted here (and on previous versions of Friendly Atheist) many, many, many times that the reason churches aren't seeing people in their pews anymore has more to do with their stances on specific issues and how they've behaved on those issues than anything else.
So when I read about a church official of any stripe complaining about how “Eighty percent of children in our county are not in church,” and going on to say “Ninety percent of them are in the public schools" my immediate reaction is along the lines of 'so stop being jerks to so many people and prove your claims about being morally superior, duh.'
I think that atheist parents should be using these school-based indoctrination programs to help their kids learn how to mentally resist this sort of forcible lockstep thinking in the future. From the political shenanigans we've been watching lately, the kids are going to need it very, very soon.
My immediate reaction is "good!" 😁