12yo Texan Girl Told to Write that God is Fake!

[Ethel mermania]

first time I have been called that. It's not about hurt feelings though, it's about the government school taking any postion on religion.

Which is not something that was done. You not understanding that "myth" does not mean "false" does not change this.

myth
\ˈmith\
noun
: an idea or story that is believed by many people but that is not true
: a story that was told in an ancient culture to explain a practice, belief, or natural occurrence

[Salus Maior]

If this is true,

It's not.

Well, then good. We can all move on with our lives.

Or continue arguing about...stuff.

[Leetmerica]

Not sure what you're referring to

The fact that the title of the thread and the OP are vapid lies that you bought into without question.

I cannot speak on the vadilty of the story, but the scenario itself is pretty black and white.

[USS Monitor]

[

1) Public prayer wasn't banned, compulsory public prayer was by religious people themselves. Even the fucking case was filed under the name of a religious family.

I was referring to atheist efforts to end public prayer at government assemblies.

Save it for church. Why do you need prayer at a government assembly?

2) Our money has only had that motto since the 1950s and that was as a reactionary move to those "atheists commie bastards" over there in what was the USSR, so it doesn't hold much weight.

My point was that this "freedom from religion" bs was a recent machination.

You would be wrong. The way it is worded in the 1st amendment is more explicitly supportive of freedom from religion than freedom of religion. It doesn't say "freedom of religion shall not be infringed," which would parallel the language about freedom of speech and suggest that religion was being protected. It says "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion," which is more about keeping religion out of the government than about protecting religion.

The 14th amendment bans religious discrimination at the state level.

3) "Our Creator" is vague enough to mean Michelle, the goddess of handjobs.

Yeah, but we both know they weren't referring to Michelle the goddess of handjobs. And there are countless times in all the founding documents were they mentioned God directly as the creator, the father etc.
They believed in separation of church and state because they didn't want the church having undue influence over the state. As in England, where they have a state church. It has nothing to do with preventing Christian influence over the United states or it's government. The main thing the founders were concerned about was the different sects of Christianity, and that one shall not gain power over the other.

They didn't want the church to have undue influence, but that has nothing to do with limiting religious influence! Do you know how moronic this sounds?

Just for fun, a quote from the declaration of independence;

"And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, We mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.”

A document which has no legal power and does not specify if they are talking about Jesus, Odin, or Amaterasu.

Yeah, because the supreme court is an infallible and infinitely wise body of 9 godlike visionary beings who are above mistakes or criticism. Even they've admitted they were wrong before, having overturned their own decisions with prejudice after the fact. Such as dredd Scott and the Japanese internment decision, just off the top of my head. Oh, and separate but equal.

On what constitutional grounds do you think they are wrong about separation of church and state? What part of the constitution suggests that we are supposed to have Christianity as a national religion?

This argument is like saying "the winners write history." It doesn't prove anything by itself. It needs to be accompanied by an explanation of how your interpretation is better than the commonly accepted one.

For example, if you wanted to argue against Texas v. White, you could argue that the most perfect union is a voluntary one. That would address the logic used in the ruling, as opposed to just going, "Well, the Supreme Court isn't perfect, so this must be wrong."

[USS Monitor]

I don't waste time debating to tell hardcore atheists, secularists, and evolutionists that evolution is against the laws of logic... I merely state my opinion, and then... Leave.

I'm pretty sure you wasted people's time in this thread.

[Deutsch Militarstaat]

Yeah like everyone is saying what you said started off in saying that the teacher was wrong in saying that and blah blah blah and then you just went on to say shit like "atheism is a religion" and other crap about atheism? Is this thread about debating what happened to the girl or is it you trying to get people to say crap about atheism?

I'm actually surprised the thread has stayed on track about the story itself and that it hasn't devolved into a debate over whether atheism is a religion, macroevolution, etc.

I honestly completely fail to see atheism as a religion. He said that we have to have faith that a god doesn't exist. The way I see it, atheism is just lacking faith that a god exists, there is no element of faith.

[Onukara]

Teachers should not force religious beliefs on students, no matter what those beliefs are.

A Christian teacher should not force Christianity. An atheist teacher should not force atheism.

[Free Tristania]

Teachers should not force religious beliefs on students, no matter what those beliefs are.

A Christian teacher should not force Christianity. An atheist teacher should not force atheism.

Agreed. I wonder whether the Americans differentiate between schools like we do: there are public schools and "special" schools (religious schools).

[Deutsch Militarstaat]

@TheQeiiamStarCluster

No, simply because I don't want to. I hate writing long paragraphs when I could do productive things.

And a productive thing is being ignorant and making illogical arguments? How is evolution against the laws of logic? Even most religious people accept that evolution happened. I guess it's useless to argue with creationists...

[Snoops1]

Very interesting...


Political Compass:
Economic Left/Right: -2.13
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -1.03

_[' ]_
(-_Q) If you support Capitalism put this in your Signature!

[USS Monitor]

No, you don't. All the nonsense you constantly post about it proves how uneducated you are on the subject.

Meh, debating with you is such a waste of time. It was a mistake for me to post here. Bah.

Also don't repsond to this post or I will send battlecruisers at your country

Your "battlecruisers" are no match for my big sexy gun turret!

Seriously, that's not how you win people over to your way of thinking. Maybe if you had some evidence to support your assertions, you might get more use out of debating.

[USS Monitor]

On the surface? Yeah, I guess there's a lot of dirt in the soil.

The ocean is filthy too. That's where fish have sex.

And they pee and shit in the water. It's like having a kiddie pool where the kids pee in the pool and nobody ever cleans it.

[Grave_n_idle]

The snopes article doesn't support your position.

My position is to ask whether God is real, as part of any assignment, is inappropriate for a public school class.

It's not asking if god is real. It's presenting that question as one to be categorised.

Those two things are different.

[Grave_n_idle]

It wasn't asking whether God was real. It was asking to categorize the claim.

Which is inappropriate for a public school classroom. By categorizing god...

That didn't happen.

[USS Monitor]

Teachers should not force religious beliefs on students, no matter what those beliefs are.

A Christian teacher should not force Christianity. An atheist teacher should not force atheism.

Agreed. I wonder whether the Americans differentiate between schools like we do: there are public schools and "special" schools (religious schools).

The US has both public and private schools. Private schools can be either secular or religious. Public schools have to be secular due to the religious freedom protections under the 14th amendment.

[The Austria-Hungary]

Oh dear...

Dear Atheists, Christians, and Agnostics about to argue below:

It doesn't matter whether or not God is real. This is not about God. This is about a teacher forcing their religious views upon impressionable children. They should be fired, and never allowed to teach again.

Before the ignorant people come to me saying "Oh, but Atheism isn't a religion!". Yes it is. It requires just as much faith as Christianity. You can't prove God doesn't exist, but you have faith that he does not. So just accept that as fact, because it doesn't make any real difference.

Now, on the subject of God's existence, I shall begin with the wonderful myth of Macro-evolution. No, it's just wrong. Not a fact. You can't possibly claim something as fact when your measurements give a year predating humanity (to our knowledge anyway), because we have no proof that such a year existed. To then claim that the measurement proves such a year exists, is massively ignorant. The measuring method could be entirely wrong, which wouldn't be surprising. Science is knowledge, and knowledge requires facts. Therefore, by definition alone, Macro-evolution is NOT science.

Now, God. God is literally the same basic idea. God is just as scientifically feasible as the Big Bang. Miracles. What are miracles? A miracle is a surprising and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore considered to be the work of a divine agency. These happen. I'm not here claiming God is a magical creature, but rather a natural being. One who has achieved a state of understanding to the point where he is able to manipulate matter in a quick and easy way.

Yes, it may sound somewhat ridiculous, but just open your mind to some new ideas. Pride is dominating and completely ruining the Scientific Community today. People are so afraid to admit they're wrong that they manipulate the facts to fit their theories, and this is leading to a group of sheeople that blindly follow their "intelligent" idols. The only difference between Atheism and Christianity is their deity and morals. Christianity follows a single great being incapable of wrong who creates rules for them to follow. Atheism on the other hand, is a religion that worships men that society deems to be "intelligent". They then listen to the aforementioned society and trust on the corrupt being that they are to make a set of rules that they believe are "right" for society.

What should happen to the teacher, and what's your over-all opinion of the situation?

Let the debating begin.

They cannot do that. It goes against the first amendment, which guarantees freedom of religion!

[Cybraxia]

They cannot do that. It goes against the first amendment, which guarantees freedom of religion!

Nice job quoting THE ENTIRE OP.

[Ethel mermania]

Which is inappropriate for a public school classroom. By categorizing god...

That didn't happen.

According to the snopes article, it did.

[Vassenor]

They cannot do that. It goes against the first amendment, which guarantees freedom of religion!

It also guarantees the freedom to be an atheist if one so desires.

[Ifreann]

The ocean is filthy too. That's where fish have sex.

And they pee and shit in the water. It's like having a kiddie pool where the kids pee in the pool and nobody ever cleans it.

Exactly!

[The Wolven League]

As a one-time event, this is most certainly not proof of the flawed American education system, as some have probably leapt to stating. Although I'm definitely not saying that the American education system isn't flawed.

[Winzig]

They cannot do that. It goes against the first amendment, which guarantees freedom of religion!

The issue is that the first amendment secures the freedom of speech, and although I would say that the tutor was a bit of a dick, he was well within his constitutional rights to do what they did.

[Gim]

As a one-time event, this is most certainly not proof of the flawed American education system, as some have probably leapt to stating. Although I'm definitely not saying that the American education system isn't flawed.

It's just that one teacher, I know, but American educational system leans towards America bias, since they think Vietnam War is actually a tie between the U.S. and Vietnam.

[Onukara]

American schools teach that we lost the war in Vietnam. It was a crushing defeat, since this big world superpower got it's ass kicked by such a tiny and poor nation. We lost, big time.

[Minoa]

I do not follow any religion, but this is too extreme in respect of personal beliefs in my opinion.