another setback for the homosexual agenda

[rone]

A federal judge on Thursday blocked a county school system from instituting a health curriculum that includes discussions of homosexuality.

U.S. District Judge Alexander Williams agreed with two groups that sued contending such discussions gave preference of religions that are tolerant of homosexuality over those that reject it.

Religions that are tolerant of homosexuality... like, what, Buddhism?  I love how fundamentalist Christian groups are using freedom of religion as a mallet in their fight against gays, as well as in their push to establish Creationism as a legitimate science.  "Your message of tolerance oppresses my religious right to hate fags and evolution!  Filthy hippays!"

In this case, Defendants [Montgomery Co. Schools] open up the classroom to the subject of homosexuality, and specifically, the moral rightness of the homosexual lifestyle. However, the Revised Curriculum presents only one view on the subject - that homosexuality is a natural and morally correct lifestyle - to the exclusion of other perspectives...
            - Judge Alexander Williams

This insane trend that you may teach something only if you also include any and all opposing viewpoints must be stamped out.  Seriously, what's the next step?  Teaching Alexander Abian's "Equivalence of Mass and Time" as part of any quantum mechanics class?

Comments

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

God. That's the school system I went through. Which had no fewer than three sex ed classes spread over twelve grades, and a volunteer organization (of which I was a member) that taught AIDS awareness, among other things.

And all that was in the 1980s and 1990s. Never thought I'd see the day when MCPS would be this regressive. Christ.

(Wait. Yes, I would. This is the same school system that used bussing to overcome demographics when I was a kid, in order to avoid the appearance of racial segregation in school enrollment. It's a long, ugly story, including the bit where a reporter for a local paper accused my mother of being racist because she thought magnet program enrollment shouldn't take student race into account. So never mind.)

[opadit.livejournal.com]

Flat earth! Flat earth!

[pootrootbeer.livejournal.com]

YOUR CHILDREN WILL ALWAYS BE EDUCATED STUPID UNTIL COWARDLY SCHOOLS ACCEPT 4-DAY EQUIVALANCE OF NATURE'S TIME CUBE

[kodi]

I'm so ashamed. I saw this for the first time, yesterday, and my considered reaction was, "Gee, that's a bit of hyperbole, innit?"

Apparently, I just have no idea.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

That cartoon is so true it hurts.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Here (http://idrewthis.org/d/20050418.html) now.

[schwa242.livejournal.com]

Gee... better not serve bacon in schools, as it would give Kibology preference over Judaism and Islam.

[vatine]

"Warning! This book contains discussion of Intelligent Design. Intelligent design is only a theory, not proven fact. Readers of this book should approach the subject rationally and critically and form their own opinion."

religions tolerant of homosexuality

[vardissakheli.livejournal.com]

While most of them still have some barriers to homosexuals in the ministry, the nine large member churches of Churches Uniting in Christ (http://www.cuicinfo.org/members/members.html) acknowledge as one of the marks of their union:

6. Intentional commitment to promote unity with wholeness and to oppose all marginalization and exclusion in church and society based on such things as race, age, gender, forms of disability, sexual orientation and class.

Even despite the constitutional bans, I have friends who are openly gay who are ministers in the PCUSA, UMC, and ELCA. It's simply not true--and hasn't been for at least the 30 years or so that I've taken any note of the question--that all Christian churches are intolerant of homosexuality.

Re: religions tolerant of homosexuality

[khrister.livejournal.com]

He did say "fundamentalist Christian", though. Are any of those churches (I've never heard of most of them before, being from Sweden) fundamentalist?

He asked, "like, what, Buddhism?"

[vardissakheli.livejournal.com]

Actually, though, the Disciples of Christ and the A.M.E. churches are pretty heavily fundy. I'm not familiar with CMEC or ICCC but I have to guess they are, too. The rest have generally mainstream liberal theology.

Now, I have friends who left A.M.E. Zion over this issue, so just how tolerant each of these churches really is is still a valid question, but I think it's significant that such a broad group joined in this statement.

Re: religions tolerant of homosexuality

[cheesetruck.livejournal.com]

My dad was a Lutheran minister in the LCA, which was part of the ELCA.

You can go back 50 for that pretty safely.

60 pushes it, my grandfather had issues. (LCA Chaplin, US Navy.)

[merde.livejournal.com]

what scares me is that my ex-husband, while in a polyamorous relationship with my evil twin's wife, is becoming increasingly freaky-xtian and claiming that xtians are a persecuted minority.

he's so fucking weird.

[lara7.livejournal.com]

>>Religions that are tolerant of homosexuality... like, what, Buddhism?

Like the First Church of Ass-fucking, I guess.


Other than evolution and relativity, what are some other scientific "theories" that must stay "theories" because they can't be proven or disproven? I'm serious- I'd like to start a counter-protest over something like Magnetism (is there scientific Proof that it exists, or have we just not found anything to disprove it?) to educate these people what "theory" means.

>This insane trend that you may teach something only if you also include any and all opposing viewpoints must be stamped out.

The Comfort Women in Japan liked it! Native Americans were happy to have those blankets, even if some of them got smallpox! The Reign of Terror in France was just misunderstood!

[palecur.livejournal.com]

Well, the thing with evolution is, the word 'theory' doesn't apply to evolution itself. Evolution is observed fact -- it happens. There's documentation of speciation on both micro time scales and macro time scales. The theory is about how the evolution happens, not about whether it happens.

Same thing with magnetism. Magnetism is an observed fact. We have a theory that accounts for the facts, but it's just the current best fit. It could be replaced with something better next week -- granted, after years of refinement, the burden of proof on the something better is immense, but it could happen.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

You scientists and your dogma! You can't prove that all the effects of magnetism aren't being simulated by invisible flying elves that push things around. Promoting the magnetism theory involves promoting a methodologically naturalistic anti-flying-elf metaphysics that implies bigoted intolerance toward Flying Magnetism Simulator Elf Belief.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

You can't prove that all the effects of magnetism aren't being simulated by invisible flying elves that push things around.

I AM THE SHOVER ELF.
I PUSH THINGS AROUND.
WE ARE HERE TO PROTECT YOU
WE ARE HERE TO PROTECT YOU
WE ARE HERE TO PROTECT YOU
FROM THE TERRIBLE SECRET OF SCIENCE.

[frosch.livejournal.com]

This thread would be funny if I had not recently had a lunchtime conversation with a 6'6" unix admin who insisted that the Big Bang theory was inconsistent with the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

I feebly attempted to explain to him what the Second Law actually says, then STFU when I realized that one can never, ever, win an argument with root.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Just play him this sound clip (http://www.moviewavs.com/0056218974/MP3S/TV_Shows/Simpsons/laws.mp3) next time.

theory and fact

[vardissakheli.livejournal.com]

The pertinent question, though, is not whether evolution happens, but whether it happened to us. We have a bunch of observable facts in the fossil record and a theory that successfully explains them, and it's that theory that leads to the conclusion that we evolved from the primordial soup along with everything else.

The problem, of course, is not in labeling this theory a theory, but in the general public's misunderstanding of how the word "theory" is used in science. As long as people can continue to get away with saying "just a theory" about this or any other scientific theory, actual science will have to keep competing with folklore and superstition in public science education.

[cheesetruck.livejournal.com]

and thus, I've escaped.

(Tho I'm not gay, I just believe in freedom as something which all humans deserve - wrong word, just got up after 14 hour escape flight post-sleep - require isn't it. Anyway... liberty and freedom for all. And liberty and freedom aren't weapons to be used to smother or incinerate.)

[peglegpete.livejournal.com]

U.S. District Judge Alexander Williams agreed with two groups that sued contending such discussions gave preference of religions that are tolerant of homosexuality over those that reject it.

And this decision doesn't give preference of relgions that are intolerant of homoexuality? What the fucking fuckity fuck?

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

No, see, you have to give equal time to good Christians as well as the sodomite lovers! It's only fair! Isn't that what you pansy liberals want, fairness??