Mass. 2nd-grader sent home for crucifix drawing

[louis-t]

Source: AP

AP - An 8-year-old boy was sent home from school and ordered to undergo a psychological evaluation after he was asked to make a Christmas drawing and came up with what appeared to be a stick figure of Jesus on a cross, the child's father said Tuesday.



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091215/ap_on_re_us/us_jesus_drawing

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I don't know what to make of this.

[Posteritatis]

1. I do - it was an idiotic overreaction by the teachers and school, full stop. (nt)

[No Elephants]

50. Nope. Papa misrepresented.

[midnight]

2. What about a Christmas tree? The crucifix is for Easter. Maybe the eight year

old mixed up the holiday traditions? Schools are loosing their perspective...

[sasquatch]

3. I'm coming to the conclusion that in America we put the stupidest people in the position of

authority.

[Dont_Bogart_the_Pretzel]

6. I think your right

ofcourse their are still a lot smart teachers out their, but the bad ones always get all the news.

[Gman2]

30. HERE is the problem. Many idiots went to college. Not knowing what they would do.

Many Many women, using their strengths, went into social science careers. The positions were not elected. With limited education, they have authority. And a doo gooder soul. Dangerous combo. They are the business end of why the wingers think us batty.

[proud2BlibKansan]

45. Oh good grief

:crazy:

[sasquatch]

46. Oh please, ed. colleges only want sycophantic, spineless weenies for that job

[sofa king]

44. Maybe only stupid people want the job.

[No Elephants]

51. Only if you assume the father's version was totally accurate and all the

school personnel involved in this were off their rockers.

It amazes me that no one recognizes this story for the fundie bs that it is.

[jberryhill]

4. "sketch something that reminded them of the holiday"

...and the kid drew Jesus.

Ummm... so?

Pretty freaking weird. The kids are asked to make a sketch, and the kid produces a fairly decent rendering of one of the most basic visual icons of Western art - and gets in trouble for this?

[dencol]

23. He didn't draw Jesus...

He drew himself on the cross according to the teacher, who may have asked him who it was. Also, it looks like the kid's name in on the script on the top. If it is actually the kid drawing his own death on a cross, I can understand the concern.

[rasputin1952]

24. At 8 years old?

If what you say has a ring to truth to it...this is one seriously disturbed 8 year old.

Welcome to DU...:hi:

[jberryhill]

38. Meh....

I'd want to know more about his religious background.

If the kid is told "Jesus died on a cross for all of us" and "we should be like Jesus", then self-identification with the crucified Jesus is within the realm of how an 8 year old might put all that together.

But you raise a good point.

[debbierlus]

49. I can't believe he was ordered psychological testing for it

Forgive the pun, but Christ Almighty

[No Elephants]

52. Go with your instinct and common sense, Debbie, and don't believe it.

The father misreprsented.

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. Details, details

"Johnson said the teacher became upset when his son said he drew himself on the cross."

Now I can definitely understand why that would alarm a teacher. Can't agree that it was justified to send him home but I do understand why the parents were notified.

[WriteDown]

7. Sounds like the kid has a messiah complex....

Where is that rimshot when I need it?

[louis-t]

13. Wow, only took 5 posts for someone to

actually read the article. That was why I didn't know what to make of it. Father cries 'racism'? Article doesn't mention the 'kid drew himself as Jesus" tidbit until later in the article.

[jberryhill]

39. Read the article?

What would be the point of that?

Just tell us what it says. This is not the Psychic Friends Network, yanno.

[louis-t]

47. Heh heh.

:silly:

[xultar]

8. What is wrong with the school districts? Teachers cutting hair, sending kids home for long hair

and now this.

:crazy:

[Goldstein1984]

9. Agreed: Overreaction

My son was required to see a counselor after he drew an anatomically correct picture of our male dog.

It seems to me that, as a nation, we are becoming oversensitive, paranoid, and driven by fear of what we can't control. We see potential homicidal maniacs behind the eyes of children.

[superconnected]

12. My sister had to go to my nieces elementary school once because she drew a syringe

in her don't do drugs picture. The class was drawing don't do drugs themed signs. My nieces sign said don't ever do drugs so she wasn't promoting them.

[Goldstein1984]

21. And my other son was sent to in-school off-site suspension for

stepping into a fight to stop it. The school has a zero tolerance policy on fighting, regardless of circumstances.

Zero tolerance is the preferred method of handling problems in schools because it requires zero judgment.

The list could go on and on.

Schools have a tough job to do, but they don't make it easier with simple-minded policies. A lot of very creative students with active senses of justice just decide school is a joke.

[WriteDown]

22. Zero judgement = zero lawsuits to them...

Trust me, I've been through the same nightmare.

[superconnected]

10. Okay, the article is funny. The teacher thought the kid was a threat since he drew a stick figure of

himself (the kid) on the cross.

The dad thinks the school is racists since the kid is black and got in trouble for drawing a Christ figure. He wants a transfer for his kid. And he assures us that the kid has never been violent or in trouble before.

The school determined the picture was not a threat and is letting the kid come back even though the dad doesn't trust that school now.

That teacher is paranoid imo.

[theoldman]

11. Too bad we don't know the full story.

Of course that does not stop us from commenting on it.

[superconnected]

15. 2813 posts and you're considering commenting on stories you don't know every detail on could

be faulty now?

[Orrex]

16. I concur.

Source: AP

AP - An 8-year-old boy was sent home from school and ordered to undergo a psychological evaluation after he was asked to make a Christmas drawing and came up with what appeared to be a stick figure of Jesus on a cross, the child's father said Tuesday.

The key word in this excerpt may be "after," which doesn't necessarily mean "because."

More details are needed.


I, however, am looking forward to the predictable outrage from The Right as they trot this boy out as the latest martyred victim of persecuted Christianity.

[louis-t]

17. First thing that came to my mind.

He'll be on Billo's show soon. Maybe Hannity. Won't be Beck because he scares children.

[Ozymanithrax]

14. Kids confused. Everyone knows Christmas is the great free market capitalist holiday...

Oh, sure, it had its beginning as the last day of the Roman pagan Holiday of Saturnalia and that Christian's ripped the date off to steal that potent spiritual thunder, but Capitalism has owned the Holiday since the 20's when Macey's converted it to a day of conspicuous consumption in the name of profits.

[superconnected]

20. Yes, but Saturnalia was on 17 December.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturnalia

Sol Invictus, was on December 25.

[Ozymanithrax]

27. Saturnalia was a week long festivatl celebrated from 17-25 December.

http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/Christmas_TheRealStory.htm

. How Did Christmas Come to Be Celebrated on December 25?

A. Roman pagans first introduced the holiday of Saturnalia, a week long period of lawlessness celebrated between December 17-25. During this period, Roman courts were closed, and Roman law dictated that no one could be punished for damaging property or injuring people during the weeklong celebration. The festival began when Roman authorities chose “an enemy of the Roman people” to represent the “Lord of Misrule.” Each Roman community selected a victim whom they forced to indulge in food and other physical pleasures throughout the week. At the festival’s conclusion, December 25th, Roman authorities believed they were destroying the forces of darkness by brutally murdering this innocent man or woman.

B. The ancient Greek writer poet and historian Lucian (in his dialogue entitled Saturnalia) describes the festival’s observance in his time. In addition to human sacrifice, he mentions these customs: widespread intoxication; going from house to house while singing naked; rape and other sexual license; and consuming human-shaped biscuits (still produced in some English and most German bakeries during the Christmas season).

C. In the 4th century CE, Christianity imported the Saturnalia festival hoping to take the pagan masses in with it. Christian leaders succeeded in converting to Christianity large numbers of pagans by promising them that they could continue to celebrate the Saturnalia as Christians.<2>

D. The problem was that there was nothing intrinsically Christian about Saturnalia. To remedy this, these Christian leaders named Saturnalia’s concluding day, December 25th, to be Jesus’ birthday.

E. Christians had little success, however, refining the practices of Saturnalia. As Stephen Nissenbaum, professor history at the University of Massachussetts, Amherst, writes, “In return for ensuring massive observance of the anniversary of the Savior’s birth by assigning it to this resonant date, the Church for its part tacitly agreed to allow the holiday to be celebrated more or less the way it had always been.” The earliest Christmas holidays were celebrated by drinking, sexual indulgence, singing naked in the streets (a precursor of modern caroling), etc.

F. The Reverend Increase Mather of Boston observed in 1687 that “the early Christians who first observed the Nativity on December 25 did not do so thinking that Christ was born in that Month, but because the Heathens’ Saturnalia was at that time kept in Rome, and they were willing to have those Pagan Holidays metamorphosed into Christian ones.”<3> Because of its known pagan origin, Christmas was banned by the Puritans and its observance was illegal in Massachusetts between 1659 and 1681.<4> However, Christmas was and still is celebrated by most Christians.

G. Some of the most depraved customs of the Saturnalia carnival were intentionally revived by the Catholic Church in 1466 when Pope Paul II, for the amusement of his Roman citizens, forced Jews to race naked through the streets of the city. An eyewitness account reports, “Before they were to run, the Jews were richly fed, so as to make the race more difficult for them and at the same time more amusing for spectators. They ran… amid Rome’s taunting shrieks and peals of laughter, while the Holy Father stood upon a richly ornamented balcony and laughed heartily.”<5>

H. As part of the Saturnalia carnival throughout the 18th and 19th centuries CE, rabbis of the ghetto in Rome were forced to wear clownish outfits and march through the city streets to the jeers of the crowd, pelted by a variety of missiles. When the Jewish community of Rome sent a petition in1836 to Pope Gregory XVI begging him to stop the annual Saturnalia abuse of the Jewish community, he responded, “It is not opportune to make any innovation.”<6> On December 25, 1881, Christian leaders whipped the Polish masses into Antisemitic frenzies that led to riots across the country. In Warsaw 12 Jews were brutally murdered, huge numbers maimed, and many Jewish women were raped. Two million rubles worth of property was destroyed.

The kid is right, a cross is right at home.

[superconnected]

33. From the wikki

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturnalia

Saturnalia's relation to Christmas
Main article: Christmas

There is no evidence scripturally or secularly that early Christians in the first century commemorated the birth of Jesus Christ. In fact, in keeping with early Jewish law and tradition, it is likely that birthdays were not commemorated at all. According to The World Book Encyclopedia: "early Christians considered the celebration of anyone's birth to be a pagan custom." (Vol. 3, page 416) Rather than commemorate his birth, the only command Jesus gave concerned a commemoration of his life of any sort actually had to do only with his death (Luke 22:19). It was not until several hundred years after the death of Jesus Christ that the first instances of the celebration of Christmas begin to appear in the historical record. According to the new Encyclopedia Britannica, some who later claimed to be Christian likely "wished the date to coincide with the pagan Roman festival marking the 'birthday of the unconquered sun." The festival was celebrated with similar customs (gift giving, feasting) that are done to celebrate Christmas today. Another argument is that Christmas was set on the feast of Sol Invictus, which was also on December 25.

-------------

It appears there is no known correct answer here. Chose to believe what you want. My belief is that Christmas first started around the 600's and that the Catholic Church sanctioned it. It's supposed to be a metaphor and not actual truth.

[RedCloud]

18. Maybe they should have sent him to art class.

[Ms. Toad]

19. So a kid drawing a symbol of his faith

when asked to draw a sketch representing a holy day in his faith is equivalent to a kid drawing a stick figure apparently representing him shooting a teacher and classmates?

>>In June 2008, a Taunton fifth-grade student was suspended for a day for a stick figure drawing that appeared to depict him shooting his teacher and a classmate.<< (Same school)

Really sad.

[louis-t]

26. Wait, his "faith" involves drawing himself on a cross?

[Ms. Toad]

36. Could be - or it could be his description was misquoted

What is obvious is that he drew a crucifix (the picture was shown adjacent to the article), an image he likely sees at least weekly and associates with his faith - and perhaps daily if his home is like my in-laws.

Nothing to get all worked up about (regardless of who was on the cross)- but I couldn't necessarily say the same about a kid who drew himself (or someone else) shooting his teacher and classmates.

[jberryhill]

40. Yes...

Depending on the flavor of Christianity in which he's been immersed, then viewing the crucifixion as a substitutionary transaction is not abnormal.

[Wizard777]

25. The required Psych Eval was a human rights violation.

[rasputin1952]

28. I believe the school over reacted...

kids often see cartoons where the character has "x"'s for eyes...and the "placard" at the top is no big deal, the child wold have seen that as a place to write a name...like his because he drew the sketch...It doesn't take someone with a degree in psychiatry to see this was nothing.

When i was a kid in school, we would draw planes bombing Japanese held islands and shoot Hitler in the head...:shrug:

For what it's worth...crucifixion in itself can't be seen as anything but a violent death at the hands of others...in Europe, the churches have incredibly graphic examples of crucifixion...far worse than anything this kid drew...and they were done by "adults".

[truthisfreedom]

29. The teacher should be sent in for psychological evaluation for asking the kids to draw

anything associated with a religious holiday.

[WriteDown]

31. Its a secular holiday recognized by the fed govt...

so that is not unusual.

[hughee99]

37. I was on another thread about this subject and was very surprised

to see it went a couple of hours and a few dozen posts without anyone mentioning this.

[edc]

32. The kid just got confused

about the difference between Christmas and Good Friday.

[TrogL]

34. The kid is theologically correct

The celebration of Christmas has often been considered Heresy. We are currently in Advent, a forewarning of the apocalypse, predicated by Easter. Hence, inclusion of a crucifix is theologically correct.

[Enrique]

35. war on Christmas!

teachers hate Jesus!

[RamboLiberal]

41. One of our local RW Rush wannabes is spinning it that way

tonight on his show. Wonder if he'll read my message to him on why the school was concerned and that schools these days are damned if they do and damned it they don't ignore a sign of psychological or possible signs of abuse with kids.

[Nikki Stone1]

42. Nothing wrong with the kid. The pic is Jesus on a cross. (And the school was a public school)

?x=241&y=345&q=85&sig=JkRqau0F7RSdXhSb.vXaug--




If you look at the pic, Jesus is on it.

It may not be a Nativity scene, but is does show who Jesus is and what his purpose was. Even the wise men brought myrrh, an ointment for embalming the dead, to his birth. This second grader probably thought Christmas-->Jesus--->the guy on the cross.

I have no problem with this and a psychological evaluation is insane.

Interestingly, the article does not give the name of the school but Superintendent Julie Hackett (mentioned in the article) is superintendent of the public school system in Taunton.

http://www.tauntonschools.org/district.cfm?subpage=180420

Are the public schools supposed to be asking the kids to draw a picture of Christmas?

[MannyGoldstein]

43. Not Typical For Mass.

In case anyone is wondering.

Unless there's more to the story that we're not hearing.

[chelsea0011]

48. This is what happens in the "let's throw the story out there" without

even spending an hour to find out the real story. the teacher says there never was a "do a picture about xmas" in class. The picture may not have even been done in class. When the teacher saw the picture and asked about it, the boy said it was him on the cross. His father is a effin lunatic.

[No Elephants]

53. Yep. I always thought Democrats were the smarter group. And,

in general, I still do. Which means, "Small wonder Americans have let their nation go to hell in a handbasket."

The knee jerking, failure to question, etc. is much scarier to me than dying in a terrorist attack.