Thu 16 Mar 2006
Quickly, what is the best way to ensure the survival of an uneducated population? Move it to Kansas! Not content with being the vanguard of the miseducation movement, the Sunflower State’s Board of Education has re-written rules governing sex education in the state to allow more parental control of student participation. Now, I am not against parental control in education. But I am against excessive control to the point that the religious beliefs of the parents conflict with important educational lessons like sex ed. Parents send their kids to school to get educated, to pursue studies of knowledge previously unknown to them and expand their minds to learn how to incorporate new facts into their lives. This isn’t something that should be limited in any way. If your religious beliefs conflict with what your child is learning, it should be your responsibility to use your time AT HOME to teach whatever you want your child to learn. Schools should be realms of uninhibited knowledge and discovery. If you don’t want your child to participate, take them out of school and begin a home education program. Social conservatives have no place in changing the way schools work to actively decrease the amount of available knowledge. It serves our children, society, and species very poorly to suppress knowledge for the sake of religious or “moral” control.
March 16th, 2006 at 1:13 pm
Being from Kansas, attending public school there, I now attend the University of Missouri. The one good thing is that local school boards don’t have to follow what the state board says. I was in the Shawnee Mission School District, and the idea that they wouldn’t teach biology was preposterous. Out biology teachers (I’m a biology major by the way) wouldn’t even mention creationism, it was biology class not theology! Shawnee Mission is one of the largest school districts being a Kansas City suburb, and will probably continue to teach sex ed. as it always has. I don’t know about the rural districts, they’ve probably taught a back-water version of creationism and not taught sex-ed for years anyways. So I guess my point is that the Kansas board of ed. seems to be all about headlines, because in my experience the educated parts of Kansas don’t listen to them. But as I said, I moved to Missouri just to be safe, may still be a red state, but they teach science so far.
Famous Kansas bumper sticker: “Kansas: Where evolution is out-lawed, and the monkeys are in control.”
March 16th, 2006 at 1:27 pm
Kansas Kraziness
The New Wisdom - March Madness? How about Kansas Kraziness?? “What is the best way to ensure the survival of an uneducated population? Move it to Kansas! kansas already had a bad rap. We were told in grade school that…
March 22nd, 2006 at 10:15 pm
“Schools should be realms of uninhibited knowledge and discovery.”
While I do agree that parental interference in decisions regarding curricula should be limited, I do think allowing schools to be “realms of uninhibited knowledge and discovery” is a big mistake. Take the case of the teacher in Colorado who was indoctrinating his students with liberal hate speech, equating Bush to Hitler. So, you see, there has to be some checks and balances. My 2 cents.
March 28th, 2006 at 6:39 pm
If you had taken the time to analyze that news story instead of just watching the report on FOX News, you’d know that the teacher compared Bush’s methods to those of Hitler, not Bush himself to Hitler the man. Using nationalist pride to convince a population to do everything you tell them is exactly what Hitler did to convince ordinary German citizens that invading neighboring countries was good and OK. I’m sad to confront you with this painful truth, but that IS similar to what Bush and the GOP have done with terrorism. What Senator or Representative wants to be known as the guy who voted against the “Patriot” Act? If you don’t see that dissent is being punished or ridiculed in such ways as to prevent any dialogue or opposing viewpoint of the GOP from reaching the public, then you are not exposing yourself to enough different viewpoints.
March 29th, 2006 at 7:09 pm
With all due respect MrKedder, I listened to excerpts from the tapes in question several times. Thus, I do realize that the teacher was comparing Bushs’ methods to those of Hitler. However, it seems to me that the only reason he would make such an ignorant statement is because he wants to vilify President Bush and liken him(the man)to Hitler(the man). If you take that statement for face value it is the same as saying that Bush operates in the same ways Hitler did. Thus, Bush is equally as evil as Hitler. Come on.
That aside, you’re missing the point. The issue here is not the content of the teacher’s rhetoric. However, it is the fact that he was spewing hate speech to students who are very impressionable and in a position of powerlessness. Bottom line, if you are going to express opinions in a classroom as someone in a position of power - especially in a public school- all sides of an issues need to be examined.
Also, if you did your homework you would know that numerous liberals opposed the original Patriot Act. Remember Harry Reid, who exuberantly proclaimed that he had “Killed” the Patriot Act? Apparently he had no problem being “that guy.”
There is abundant dissent in America today against Bush and Conservative policies. Every single day you see it in the mainstream media and on college campuses, etc. Bush isn’t preventing dissention. He rarely speaks about it, because he so strongly beleives in his message. There is no hidden agenda to take over the world or something of that nature as your message implies. The idea that I’m not exposing myself to enough different viewpoints is ridiculous. I’m exposed to different viewpoints everyday. I just beleive what I want to beleive, and what I feel is right.
I find it ok to disagree with Bush and Conservatives in general, but to undermine him is another thing entirely.
April 1st, 2006 at 11:43 am
Harry Reid voted against the renewal of the Patriot Act, not the original. Check the Congressional Record and see that ONE Senator, Russ Feingold, voted against the original Patriot Act in September 2001. The votes on the recent renewal of the expiring provisions of the Patriot Act is something completely different.
And again, you’re flying off the handle and using the expression “hate speech”. Were you in the class? Were you there, listening? No. You’re basing your judgement on the fact that a student recorded and replayed 20 minutes out of a much longer discussion. And it was obviously a biased student at that, considering where (FOX) he decided to take his amazing journalistic discovery to. You’re willingly accepting that there are pieces of the teacher’s class that you haven’t heard but that you feel comfortable making an assumption that you know everything that was said or done in that class that day. Even if the teacher had a perfectly balanced argument or dialogue about Bush, if you only hear half of it, of course you’ll think that it’s “hate speech”. That’s just ridiculous.
And what does that mean, disagree in general? You’ll only disagree with the President up to a point, and after that you’ll just do what you’re told and accept what you’re given? If that is the case, then WOW, you are the perfect Republican. I’m glad that there are at least some people out there willing to express their views all the way, even if it means working against the President, especially this one. As for undermining, how much did you protest when the GOP Congress of the 90s went after Clinton for a sexual indiscretion? You don’t think that was undermining a president?
America wasted a lot of money on that little Republican adventure, and no one wants to mention how petty and partisan it truly turned out to be. Admit it, you don’t care about people undermining presidents, just this one. It’s the fact that it’s happening to poor George W. Bush, who’s such a good man, a charismatic man, a charming man, a lying man who can convince a lot of people that he’s right and moral and just, when in fact he is no better than any other man who’s ever held that office. He is the same as every other commander in chief that has ordered soldiers to kill in ways that cost the lives of innocent civilians and send American tropps to their deaths. He’s the same as every other president that turned a blind eye and deaf ear to the suffering of the less fortunate in his own country because it conflicted with his business interests.
“Hate speech” is a ridiculously overused turn in this debate. It implies that Bush is being maligned based on something like his race or his religion or his heritage, gender, or sexual orientation. He’s not. He is being analyzed and countered by people who oppose his actions and his policies, which it is perfectly OK to work against. There’s no free pass for a president, and if there were one, there would be people that work against it. And that’s why I’ll defend this teacher against thought police that would try to suppress his dissent just because it is objectionable to a few people that believe in George Bush as the second coming of Jesus Christ or something like that. “Hate speech”. Unbelievable, that that is the expression you chose to describe someone voicing dissent against the President. Unbelievable.
November 30th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
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