Ok, so it wasn’t fit to print in a school newspaper. Krystal Myers now has a bigger soapbox to stand on, with her letter printed (under her own byline) in The Knoxville News Sentinel. Here, see for yourself.
As of this writing, all comments are positive. Of course, three comments is perhaps early in the game.
To reiterate my view: the school may have been well within their rights to suppress publication to prevent disruption. They acted legally, but not intelligently. The bigger question is, how will they deal with the behavior Ms. Myers describes in her column? There, they are acting neither legally nor intelligently. They need to clean house.
It makes me wonder if some people behind the scenes in the school system haven’t actually been thinking about these issues, too, but were too intimidated to speak up (ie for fear of losing their jobs and being blacklisted from further employment in education in the region). I wonder if the Cranston fiasco, as surreal as it all was (except for Jessica’s brave and principled stand) may have actually given hope to silent freethinkers and/or supporters of a strong secular nation? Perhaps the continuation of Krystal’s story before a much wider audience is something that some in that community of educators and parents were quietly hoping for?
The third one doesn’t exactly seem positive: it suggests that prayer at a school function is just okay by the author, who claims to be an atheist.
(Also, can I say just how irritating it is that these news sites require registration to comment? I guess that they want to build a longer-lasting readership, but I’m not willing to make an account to comment on one article. Places like FTB that I comment on regularly are another story entirely for me, although I think I would still prefer to have both options open.)
You are quite right, TCC. That’s what I get for reading before coffee.
Kudos to the Knoxville News Center for running the story. I am sure they will take some heat for running an article like that in the bible belt.
It is also great to see such young and well-spoken atheists such as Krystal and Jessica A in recent times. Hopefully, some of their peers will find them to be a source of inspiration and speak up as well–there must be numerous instances of similar crap happening all around the country that we never hear about.
When I looked, there were 150+ comments. Support – about 60 % and also all the usual crap … “ram her beliefs” and “why so offended if you don’t believe” and “still trying to find herself” and “Dawkins is unsure about god” and “the first amendment is to keep gov’t out of religion, not the other way around” and and and