Religious Extremists Infiltrate Louisiana School System

[Modern School]

Yes, Christian extremists are at it again, this time in Louisiana. A series of high school life science textbooks have come up for approval before the Louisiana state board of education, and they are being attacked by fundamentalist religious groups like Louisiana Family Forum, a branch of Focus on the Family, because they include evolution and natural selection. As usual, the fundamentalists are demanding a disclaimer that these topics are “just theories,” and insisting that creationism be taught side by side. Keep the Science in the Textbooks, say Louisiana teachers. Dr. Jason Van Metre, who teaches at A. M. Barbe High School, wrote an open letter to the state board of education, saying that the notion that natural selection is controversial is ludicrous. In 2008, Louisiana Family Forum succeeded in getting lawmakers to pass the Louisiana Science Education Act, which allows local districts to provide “supplemental materials” that deny evolution and global warming.

In many ways, I prefer battles like this over the ed deform battles that are so much in the fore today. The religious zealots who challenge evolution are usually true believers who cannot be swayed, yet their arguments are so flimsy that they often lose in court. In contrast, the ed deformers who support merit pay, high stakes testing and charter schools are embedded in the highest levels of government, Wall Street and corporate America, and have the power and will to completely alter the education system from the ground up. Some of the ed deformers may sincerely believe in the merits of their program, but the real power brokers behind the ed deform agenda have huge financial stakes in it, which makes them particularly scary and not very entertaining. The anti-evolution zealots, in contrast, have all sorts of nutty ideas that are really quite amusing, like the notion that dinosaur fossils were left by Satan to throw us on the wrong track, or that the teaching of evolution has caused an increase in crime, or the idea that bananas must have been designed by an omnipotent creator because they fit so neatly in the human hand.

For the rest of this particle, please go to http://modeducation.blogspot.com/2010/12/religious-extremists-infiltrate.html

[Maraya1969]

1. I wonder what they would do if someone asked them to teach Buddhism

[Manifestor_of_Light]

2. Already been litigated, from Louisiana to the Supreme Court.

Edwards v. Aguillard

482 U.S. 578 (1987) was a legal case about the teaching of creationism that was heard by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1987. The Court ruled that a Louisiana law requiring that creation science be taught in public schools, along with evolution, was unconstitutional because the law was specifically intended to advance a particular religion. It also held that "teaching a variety of scientific theories about the origins of humankind to school children might be validly done with the clear secular intent of enhancing the effectiveness of science instruction."

In support of Aguillard, 72 Nobel prize-winning scientists,<1> 17 state academies of science, and 7 other scientific organizations filed amicus briefs which described creation science as being composed of religious tenets.

Within two years of the ruling a creationist textbook was produced: Of Pandas and People which attacked evolutionary biology without mentioning the identity of the supposed "intelligent designer". Drafts of the text used "creation" or "creator" before being changed to "intelligent design" or "designer" after the Edwards v. Aguillard ruling.<3> This form of creationism, known as intelligent design creationism was developed in the early 1990s.

This would eventually lead to another court case, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, which went to trial on September 26, 2005 and was decided in U.S. District Court on December 20, 2005 in favor of the plaintiffs, who charged that a mandate that intelligent design be taught was an unconstitutional establishment of religion. The 139 page opinion of Kitzmiller v. Dover was hailed as a landmark decision, firmly establishing that creationism and intelligent design were religious teachings and not areas of legitimate scientific research. Because the Dover school board chose not to appeal, the case never reached a circuit court or the U.S. Supreme Court.

[14thColony]

3. I say we let em win, but let's do it right!

When they say "teach creationism" (in whatever manner they might say it) what they mean is "teach my particular, narrow view of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic creation myth as approved by my pastor."

Now is that fair and inclusive? After all, I'd submit that if we need to "teach the controversy" anywhere, it's here. So to be fair, I say let's give them what they want, but teach EVERY SINGLE CREATION MYTH EVER DOCUMENTED BY ANY HUMAN GROUP, WHETHER THE GROUP IS STILL AROUND OR NOT ('cause just because they're gone doesn't mean they might not have been right!).

So that's Sumerian, Egyptian, Hyksos, Apache, Navajo, Commanche, Inuit, Jomon, Dogon, Siberian, Serbia, Anglo-Saxon, Jute, Frisian, Greek, Roman, Phrygian, Frisian, Sarmatian, Scythian, Romani, Aryan, Hindu, Zoroastrian, Vandal, Goth, Maori, Aztec, Inca, Ethiopian, Tuareg, Phoenician, Phocan, Vedic, Varangian, Norse, Gaelic, Brythonic, Punic, Basque, Mongol... you get the idea.

EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM, because otherwise you're trying to disfavor one "creation theory" compared to another.

This directly attacks the primary strategic weakness (versus scientific weakness) of the Creationist argument: they inherently assume that if they win it will be THEIR creation myth, out of the many thousands out there, that will get taught. Why? And is that not automatically favoring one "religious family" (Judaism-Christianity-Islam) over ALL OTHERS? How's that fair or legal?

"Welcome to Junior High in Louisiana kids. As you know, because of the recent Supreme Court win that many of your parents were involved in, the 7th and 8th grades will be exclusively dedicated to Worldwide Creation Theory." Just imagine how much they'd pay for textbooks alone.