Evangelical Group To Convert Kids As Young As 5 At Portland Pools, Parks

So they shouldn't go to school and be educated?

 

Someone with that much of an issue with public education would find a way to work it out.

Handing out condoms would be anti-religious in the same sense teaching evolution in science class is. There's a certain point where nonsensical primitive superstitious beliefs simply cannot be sensibly respected, even within the framework of freedom of religion. Also I'm assuming no school forces any child to accept a condom. They presumably are just made available if wanted.

Rules against religious assembly in school are necessary as schools are necessarily secular institutions. Again, that doesn't make them anti-religious, it is just part of the what is necessary for all religious beliefs to exist on an equal footing without any particular one being promoted or endorsed.

 

The public education system does not have a secular agenda. That's just a bullshit rallying call made up by the religious right.

 

If your definition of "anti-religious" is "teaching kids the knowledge that we've accumulated over the last couple thousand years," then yes, schools are anti-religious. Of course, that says some pretty negative things about religion.

My definition of "anti-religious" doesn't presume that religious people are anti-knowledge (as yours presumes), and instead would be predicated on directly encouraging kids not to have a religious faith. Giving them the knowledge that might cause them to question religious faith is not direct. Everyone should have as broad a knowledge base as possible and then make their own decisions based on that.

 

Yes, but I don't think exposing kids to some beliefs you don't share is de facto "anti-religious." If that's the case, life itself is anti-religious, and anti-secularism and anti-anything, because you're always going to run into exposure to beliefs you don't share.

If public schools were actively attempting to stamp out religion, I'd agree that they were anti-religious. Schools are simply offering knowledge and plenty of knowledge that we've accumulated over time doesn't correspond well with belief systems that are two thousand years old or older. That doesn't make such knowledge "anti-religious" in any active way.

 

In my experience if someone is really convicted about something they will find a way. For example I'm not buying it's necessarily an impossibility that a poor working parent couldn't homeschool. It wouldn't surprise me if accredited (but religiously edited) homeschooling courses were available online through Christian institutions.

Doing anything at all is apparently anti-religious by your definition.

Forcing a child to take a condom against their wishes would be. Simply making them available is not.

the 1st amendment necessarily has to have some practicality in its application. we have freedom of speech, but nobody is really free to yell fire in a crowded theatre. similarly we have freedom of assembly, but it isn't practical to allow without any consideration of consequences under all possible circumstances.

 

I just hate proselytizing, especially to kids, although it is legal and they have the right, I just wish they wouldn't. If I brought a kid to that pool, I would ask them politely not to talk to my kid. If they refused, then I might practice my freedom of speech and make sure their words weren't going to make it past mine.

But I would point them out to the kid and explain that those people were not to be listened to or respected.

 

I'm not a expert on any of this, so I could be wrong, but freedom of assembly in schools is fine, the Christians or Jews or whomever may assemble, they simply can't do it using school funds (stuff), so they can't have a teacher supervise and they can't use the art supplies to make a banner. But they can meet on their own in prayer groups at lunchtime or after school, and in many public schools there are groups that assemble to pray. Just not at a school wide assembly or in class or in any way that may be construed as being sanctioned.

 

...and shit in a hole in the ground, died from the common cold, believed people of color were not actually people, thought the world was flat...

Ahh...those were the days.

 

Sounds like you're a 100% supporter of Obamacare then?