The Florida public school principal who declared that he was going to push prayer in his school — he even declared “The First Amendment was for Christianity, not other religions” — now gets his own poll. Only it’s a really stupidly worded poll.
Should optional prayer services be allowed on public school property?
Yes (88.8%)
No (11.2%)
Optional prayer services aren’t a problem and are allowed even now — go ahead, kids, you feel like praying over your school lunch? You can! The problem here is prayer led by or even promoted by school officials.
That is rather underhanded to phrase the poll that way. I know from personal experience just how uncomfortable led student prayer in a public school can be.
What an asshat. And what an asshatpoll.
It now appears the poll does not appear, the school superintendent is trying to put out the brush fire, and the paper’s readers’ comments are apparently not up for viewing. Davis had better live under a rock for a little while.
Where’s the poll? I get something about residency for foreigners who buy homes in America.
I got the same thing as Aquaria.
Should the US government give foreigners residency if they buy homes in America?
Yes (64.7%)
No (35.3%)
What’s the proper response to a poll that you know is carefully worded so that it will be useful as devious propaganda? If I were to answer honestly, given the poll’s wording, I would say optional prayer should be “allowed” everywhere; I don’t believe in thoughtcrime. But it seems clear that the results are going to be spun as indicative of a positive attitude toward official school prayer. What is the ethical thing to do in these cases?
I got something about an ex-pro wrestler who has been released from jail. How would I vote????
Nik K #5
Be honest and vote “allowed”.
@Nik K #5
I’d say that the most optimal way to show that internet polls are meaningless (which is the true purpose of this exercise) would be to vote that it should not be allowed. That’s just me, though.
‘Scuse me, but why would anyone vote in a poll that will be used by someone who says the First Amendment was for Christianity? I don’t get it.
I think the important word is “services”. The poll is not asking if a kid should be allowed to say a little prayer before lunch in the cafeteria, it is saying should optional prayer SERVICES be allowed. This would suggest services, possibly led by school officials, for which attendance would technically be “optional” (but most of us know that in reality, in a school setting, there is little that is “optional” if the administration and/or one’s peers are pushing it).
IMO the ethical thing would be to vote “no”.
(sorry, posted too quickly)
A vote against so-called “Optional prayer services” would not impact current freedom of religion for individuals (the kid can still say a private prayer before lunch, etc), but a “no” vote upholds the principle of separation of state and church by remaining consistent about – no formal religious services in taxpayer funded public settings.
OMGs I fail at punctuation and want italics.
The instigator of this lunacy appears to be a Pastor Steven Andrew, misleadingly quoting U S Supreme Court Justice Story.
Florida, eh? Hmmm…
If that were true, wouldn’t it be odd for the first amendment to endorse separation of church and state, and made not specific to Christianity (especially since the founding father lived in an era that new about other religion)?
One would think a school principal would have the ability to think/research things through before he say something outrageous.
The article is at Group prayer debate rages in Clay County, but no poll. Two words into the article and they misspell atheist.
Don’t they have gathering places, I think they are called “churches”, to pray to the ghost of a 1st century semetic carpenter? Why infest schools?
The original post by Pastor Steven is gone, but remains in Google cache. Apparently the recession was caused by the Yanks not pushing Christ in schools. I’m breaking copyright, because nobody would believe this shit.
And for good (evil?) measure, about the ministry says:
Apparently there is something in Psalms about this guy.
Gyeong Hwa
If the First Amendment was to separate Christianity, does that mean it allows combination with other religions?
Does anyone know what this Pastor person means?
—-
(Pikachu! How have you been?)
The poll is gone, but it allowed me to comment, and I cited the appropriate Supreme Court case, Tinker, and noted the requirement for ‘flagpole prayer’ that it be “exclusively student-initiated and led without official endorsement or interference”. Will watch to see if the comment stays up.
This is part of a nation-wide launch for pastors, parents and teachers to raise children in the “training and admonition of the Lord” following our Founding Fathers (Ephesians 6:4).
The founding members of the American political aristocracy were mentioned in Ephesians?
I know there are dozens of versions of that collection of goatherder fables around, but what the fuck version of the Bible is this?
lets face it.
What this really comes down to is a bunch of ignorant people, wanting to institutionalize their ignorance instead of fixing it.
I mean, read the comments from supporters of this kind of shit.
all brain dead morons.
all of them.
they just want to feel special, and church just isn’t enough for them apparently.
I can’t stand this sort of thing. There’s nothing stopping anyone from praying, they can pray silently every frigging second of every day if they like. “Dear God, free me from thinking and responsibility”, lather, rinse, repeat.
They’re never okay with that, though. It’s always about making a display of praying, of forcing it on everyone else. They never seem to say anything about that going against their own book of myths, either.
“training” Really?
His god needs training?
“admonition”, yeah well I can go along with that! His god deserves a lot of admonishing.
Your comment is there, Crowepps.
Nicely done, too.
It’ll be interesting to see what reactions it might get.
maxamillion said
Heh. Who was it said something like, “Had I been present at creation I would have had some useful suggestions for the creator”?
Ah! It was Alphonso X aka ‘Alphonso the Wise’.
Yeah, Alphonso. Me too.
Aww isn’t it cute how all these people with the most powerful, the most awesome, the most bestest deity on their side just love to rage impotently with their little hard-ons quivering with delight at the feeling of persecution they like to heap on themselves as they piss like a firehose at anything different to themselves.
I keep wondering (I know, it’s probably futile) if there is some way to frame this issue in terms that will make people like this understand that they would be shooting their own stupid noses off if they “let God back into the classroom” and if America proclaimed itself a Christian nation. Dude, you would be giving the government power over your religious life! You would not be free to worship in your own way–the government would tell you how! And in many parts of the country, they would be teaching kids wrong stuff about your Jeebus!
(Okay, maybe we don’t call him Jeebus in this case.)
I don’t know. Worth a shot?
Ugh. This again. Another amateur Dominionist swayed by the lies of the professionals.
Feralboy:
“Dude, you would be giving the government power over your religious life! You would not be free to worship in your own way–the government would tell you how!”
I think you’re exactly right of course. Strangely, the wacko fundie sect I escaped from is also, paradoxically, an extremely zealous advocate for “religious liberty” i.e. total separation of church/state. They set up their own totally separate educational system and completely eschew government funding of any kind in order to avoid any unpleasant interference by the state in their indoctrination process. (Predictably, the cost of such private education is exhorbitant and many believers exist on the edge of poverty for the sake of “educating” their children in “the Truth.” Another reason they are such a rare combination (from what I gather) of fundie xtian paired with strong efforts in church/state separation is a twisted doctrine so far off mainstream evangelicalism that they think prophecy predicts eventually THEY will be the specific target of persecution from the government on account of their unique beliefs. Therefore, they must strive to prevent that as long as possible.
“Normal” Christians (to use an oxymoron) don’t generally sense this great “danger” in letting god into the classroom and blurring the line between church/state because they just aren’t that paranoid. And the general “normal” public just isn’t going to go through all the personal misery and sacrifice of a private educational system. What’s the harm in a little prayer?? They just aren’t going to think it through.
@feralboy12, it depends on which flavor of xian they are. We could enforce the WBC god hates fags kind of religion on him and see how they like it. Freedom from religion means you are not “forced to be like Fred Phelps”
@Ichthyic – NIV has Ephesians, it is the book of Paul.
NakkiNyan
I rather think Ichthyic was referring to the entire quote:
Which, following standard form, would seem to indicate that the passage would be found at the cited location in the Bible. Which, of course, it is not.
True, my copy says:
Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.
> Pastors reading what they want to read again. That passage was for parents and children not institutions any way. Ironically the next passages are for slaves and masters … hmmm.
Yes, “F” nailed it.
The ethical thing to do…..
Vote in whichever direction brings the result back to 50:50 – that way it cannot be used in either of the nefarious ways the idiot wants.
So, it’s a voluntary mandatory prayer.
Locally, one home in my neighborhood has decorated itself in blue and white lights, Jesus-fishes and lit up crosses, apparently either in preparation for Harold Camping’s End of the World, or perhaps as some sort of anti-halloween/Jesusween thing.
[meta] hey, can we get rid of the popups from Zedo.com ?[/meta]
Vote in whichever direction brings the result back to 50:50 – that way it cannot be used in either of the nefarious ways the idiot wants.
naww, I can picture how a 50/50 result would be interpreted:
“People have no serious objection to xian school prayer, otherwise we would have seen more objection to it”
there is no way to win a poll like this.
it will be spun however best fits their agenda, no matter the results of it.
The best thing to do would be to simply not vote on it, of course.
because that’s the ONLY thing that will give it a sense of utter ridicule:
if say, only 20 people total voted on it…
I’m cool with this as long as the sweet call of the muezzin is broadcast over the school loudspeakers for the five daily prayers. And students are encouraged to voluntarily be skyclad for major sabbats and esbats.
Stupid old theocratic goat-fuckers….
The whole “first amendment only applies to christians” nonsene was first (as far as I know) promoted by AFA’s Bryan Fischer (See Right Wing Watch’s post here) I’m guessing this principal is a fan of Bryan’s.
From the “Reverend” Andrews vomitus:
The timing is right with millions of school children praying to bring God back to schools at “See You at the Pole” events across the USA.
Does he mean the Maypole, a pagan phallic symbol?
George Washington, in his Letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, Rhode Island, wrote:
J Michael Straczynski pointed out (although I believe he was quoting someone else) that the most important consequence of “separation of church and state” in America…
is that CHURCHES DON’T PAY TAXES.
If there’s no separation, each and every church (and mosque and synagogue and etc) is subject to tax on all its property and income and other assets.
Let’s see which god they [i]really[/i] worship: Jehovah, or Mammon.
Looks like I was too late to participate in the poll.
Who the heck designed that site? I know my 10 year old could do a better job.
At the flagpole?
Sure, why not?
What harm could come from linking religion with patriotism?
WhiteHatLurker wrote:
Christian assholes like to quote mine scientists. Pastor Steven Andrew actually had the nerve to quote mine the First Amendment:
The actual First Amendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;
The First Amendment according to Christian asshole Steven Andrew:
Congress shall make no law … prohibiting the free exercise of [Christian] religion.
Florida, eh? I’m not surprised. I have never before seen so much religious insanity since I moved to Florida five years ago. One of several examples: the religious attacks against our new public school science standards which for the first time in Florida history mentioned the word evolution. The new standards made evolution one of the big ideas of science. Christian assholes, including politicians, school board members, pastors, and other Christian tards did everything they possibly could to destroy science education in Florida to defend their dead Jeebus. Thanks to relentless ridicule the Christian assholes were unsuccessful. According to Florida’s public school state science standards adopted in 2008 “Evolution is the fundamental concept underlying all of biology and is supported by multiple forms of scientific evidence.“
Religious folk seem to like to go on about truth. The obviously dishonest nature of the poll gives the lie to any claims of this guy having the truth. The truth stands up for itself and does not need such chicanery to survive, just freedom of speech. My understanding of the reasoning behind the rules forbidding government involment in religion is that the Founding Fathers had seen the direct results of such involvement, first hand, in Europe and it wasn’t pretty. Europe was almost universally Christian at that time so it was Christianity in particular that they were keen to keep away from the levers of power.
Those who think that it is a great idea to have prayer in schools should take a look at us here in the UK where prayer is compulsory in state schools. The law is widely flouted because properly religious teachers are as rare as hen’s teeth and nobody wants to do it. A third of our schools are run by the Church of England and they do do the prayer thing, these schools tend to churn out religious sceptics and atheists.
I think that the difference between Europe and the US is that we had to free ourselves from religion’s vile influence the hard way, inch by inch via countless battles. Americans had religious freedom handed to them on a plate and many of them just don’t appreciate what they have. If I am wrong here, please feel very free to rip me to shreds, I can take it and will try to see it as a learning experience.
From one of the comments at the article:
He means of course, Madalyn Murray O’Hair. God killed her in a particularly gruesome way. Maureen O’Hara, the Hollywood actress and one of my all time favorites, is retired, but still alive, I’m glad to say. Sounds like there’s never a dull moment in this guy’s school district:
“How was school today, Billy?”
“Samo, samo. Flagpole prayer in the morning. Then we bullied each other until lunch. After lunch the usual raping and shooting. Oh, murder practice after school. That’s why I’m late, Mom. Sorry.”
Stonyground @48, I suspect you are on to something there. I’ve argued on occasion that perhaps *more* religion should be taught, not less, in order to stimulate critical thinking in a nearly undetectable way. Because as children are exposed to various religions, along with literature and learning the scientific method, slowly it begins to dawn on them, that religion(s) are just one of many worldviews, all claiming to be right. It’s a short step to figuring out that they can’t all be right, and thus none are right.
If the experience of the UK is any indication, it could turn out to be a case of “Be careful what you ask for– you just might get it.”
Hitchens has a quote in “God is Not Great” of a Catholic bishop to the effect that the single most dangerous thing to the Catholic faith is the teaching of comparative religion, but I was too lazy to look up the exact quote.
WhiteHatLurker:
Well, sure. The First Amendment can say anything you want it to say, provided you’re willing to stick extra words in.
DLC:
Blue and white? Support for Israel?
@stonyground #48 (and Mephistopheles #50):
I agree that the UK approach has shot itself in the foot (and unsurprisingly I can live with that).
I was sent to a Methodist Sunday School between the ages of 4 and 11, so the obligatory Primary School exposure to assembly, hymns and prayers seemed to be normal. However once I left Sunday School (I didn’t simply grow out of its age range; I told my parents that instead I wanted to be involved in the recycling schemes the Scouts ran on Sunday mornings), I realised just how proscriptive religion was. That year I started Secondary School and discovered that Religious Education was a compulsory subject up to the age of 16 — this rang alarm bells. After the first year of it I’d decided that all the biblical explication was utter bullshit, and that I was going to have nothing to do with any of it.
The good thing about that first year of secondary school was that we were taught in maths, chemistry and physics to deal with things from first principles, yet in religious education it was ‘you can only properly interpret this in light of God saying…’ or the like.
So I’ve been an atheist since I was 12. For this freedom of thought I am indebted to the UK religious schooling of the 1970s.
This is a gray area…prayer, by itself, is nothing but talking to an imaginary being in the sky–it would be impossible to ban that.
Strictly speaking, a faculty member sponsoring an OPTIONAL religious club at a public school should be allowed to lead the students in prayer. It would be about the same as a faculty member leading a book club holding an imaginary conversation with a character from the book in front of the students in the club (something I had the privilege of witnessing while I was in high school).
So long as the school does not favor one religion over another (or lack thereof) in policy or curriculum, prayer should be allowed. That is to say, a principal or a teacher should not lead a class (or the entire school) in prayer–but if it’s after hours and attendance is entirely optional, it is still legally protected speech.
To add one further comment, before I wizened up and became an atheist, I went through a brief childhood phase (I was 8) of wanting to be a priest (turns out, I’m an atheistic homo headed to grad school for developmental biology).
While my third grade class was on a field trip, a classmate of mine fell fifteen feet and broke his leg (compound femur fracture, to give you an idea of the force involved). On the school bus back, I led my classmates in prayer for him–and my teacher encouraged this.
Undoubtedly, this was profoundly inappropriate. However, given that participation was optional, and given the extraordinary circumstances, I would hesitate to say that the teacher allowing it was illegal.
To be clear, that the teacher encouraged it (she was a vehement southern baptist–and even talked about it in class) was certainly inappropriate. But disallowing an 8 year old from doing something that he thought would make a difference seems a bit excessive.
I have always been so irritated at the sheer number of people who think prayer is outright banned in public schools. When I was a teenager, I was still a Christian. I was even the school’s Christian club. And we prayed before class sometimes, in the hallways but not obstructing flow. And then I’d go to church and someone would whine about how prayer is completely banned. And then I’d tell them that I just prayed in school the previous week, and they would completely ignore me. The facts just didn’t fit with their persecution narrative, and it’s very easy to dismiss a teenager, so they went right on believing what they wanted to. And even while I was Christian, I was still adamantly opposed to any school-sponsored or mandatory prayer, but of course I was just some teenager so they’d never listen to me.
I’m an atheist now but one of the most irritating things about fundagelical Christians is their insistence on believing lies. And of course now they really won’t listen to me, not that they ever did before.
Now the poll is about Tim Tebow.
I have no idea what it’s about, but since it’s he abortion guy, I’m pretty sure the answers is “no”.