Okay...I really Hate Those NOTW Stickers

I thought "Not W"--



But I haven't seen the NOTW stickers yet. Thanks for enlightening me if and when if I do.

Because I grew up in some towns that had absolutely piss-poor public education systems where my brothers were abused by their teachers. We were pulled out and home-schooled until I was in high school. I absolutely support the public school system and would never say that my taxes should not go to it or that everything possible should not be done to improve it. But as things stand now, the authoritarian power-structures at the schools I went to, and the lack of adequate education, were not things to which I would subject a child--not a "human resource to be used for the benefit of others." I want those things to improve. I want teachers to be paid decently and to be given the freedom to teach with passion and innovation rather than to the dictates of a standardized test. I want school to be egalitarian and always a genuinely free, publicly run venture in which the classism and profit have no place. But if the school district in which I live is going to do damage to my child I am not going to leave him or her in that setting. Ever.

I don't have any idea what the NOTW stickers are about, as I haven't seen one. I do know that if not every student is cut out for public school at present, and doing your best to promote the health, well-being, and learning ability of an individual child is in no way selfish.

As I state in the OP...I understand why some parents want to protect their children from the dangers of the current Public School System(s). I would feel the same. However, I would also encourage people who home school to contribute an equal amount of time in working towards improving the public school system. It is the future of our country...unless the Department of Education is disbanded as some Republicans support. I don't blame parents for trying to protect their children. It's only natural. Some parents cannot afford to home school - time wise and financially. They have no choice but to use public schools. As more and more people start homeschooling, the less resources are available to improve a once very effective public school system. The fact that public schools have failed miserably is no reason to abandon them. This is the time to invest in them, to pay the teachers a living wage and to provide the resources they need to be successful.

-P

What I don't get are the "peace and love" ones - if you read history - religion has been the cause of much death and destruction in this world. As George Carlin once said - religion is the leading cause of death on this planet!

7:14 I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
17:15 I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.
17:16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
17:17 Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
17:18 As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.

It seems to be saying that Christians should be in the world but their ideas should be not of this world (i.e. from a higher source).

I would interpret that to mean do good works in the world, not separate yourself from it. But maybe that's just me.

Which will, no doubt, cover lots of those with these stickers eventually.

Holier than thou's against the rest of us sinners.

I've been seeing this for the past year now.

NOTW has always been a gimmik to attract the middle class video-gamer/skateboard slacker crowd to "religion" without the difficulty of actually reading the bible or responsible, critical thinking on the nature of human ethics and morality.

Not as bad as the "Joel's Army" hyper-Xtian youth training camp groups, but there is still that undercurrent of belonging to some sort of "special secret better guys" club marketed to those with low self-esteem and rapidly decreasing opportunities that NOTW gets most of their profit from.

Yes, I'm a bit vicious about this sort of thing, but they are the ones declaring a holy war against even their own who don't fall in line.

Haele

and ashamed of theirs!

Have to keep an eye out.

My complaint is with Christians being OF this world and fucking with my short atheist life despite their savior's unambiguous instructions to renounce the world, quit their job, give away all possessions and praise God while awaiting the end of the world, which Jesus said would occur before 100AD.