Are there no skeptic in Texas, or isn't it allowed?

[mr blur]

The Christian right is making a fresh push to force religion onto the school curriculum in Texas with the state's education board about to consider recommendations that children be taught that there would be no United States if it had not been for God.

Members of a panel of experts appointed by the board to revise the state's history curriculum, who include a Christian fundamentalist preacher who says he is fighting a war for America's moral soul, want lessons to emphasise the part played by Christianity in the founding of the US and that religion is a civic virtue.

Opponents have decried the move as an attempt to insert religious teachings in to the classroom by stealth, similar to the Christian right's partially successful attempt to limit the teaching of evolution in biology lessons in Texas.

One of the panel, David Barton, founder of a Christian heritage group called WallBuilders, argues that the curriculum should reflect the fact that the US Constitution was written with God in mind including that "there is a fixed moral law derived from God and nature", that "there is a creator" and "government exists primarily to protect God-given rights to every individual".

Barton says children should be taught that Christianity is the key to "American exceptionalism" because the structure of its democratic system is a recognition that human beings are fallible, and that religion is at the heart of being a virtuous citizen.

<snip>

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jul/22/christianity-religion-texas-history-education

(This "American exceptionalism" - is this some kind of scientific principle?)

[moggie]

1. See, it's not just about evolution

Teaching of the theory of evolution is the obvious hot-button issue for these kooks, but it doesn't stop there. They won't rest until Christian teaching is pervasive in schools. Of course, their plans don't stop with education:

Barton, a former vice-chairman of the state's Republican party, said that Texas children should no longer be taught about democratic values but republican ones. "We don't pledge allegiance to the flag and the democracy for which it stands," he said.

The obvious reason to stop kids learning about democracy is that, in the long run, it makes it easier to dismantle democracy.

[onager]

3. Even for Barton, that's an incredibly stupid statement.

This one, I mean. Not like there's a shortage of stupid statements from Barton:

"Barton, a former vice-chairman of the state's Republican party, said that Texas children should no longer be taught about democratic values but republican ones. "We don't pledge allegiance to the flag and the democracy for which it stands," he said.

And the ancient Greeks invented republicocracy, then!

This goes along with that other ear-rattling usage they came up with, the "Democrat Party." I'm not sure about the reasoning behind that one and am too lazy to look it up. But I know it was championed by another Texas solon, Tom DeLay.

I often see this unattributed quote on DU: "If the English language was good enough for Jesus Christ, it's good enough for me."

That was uttered by Texas Governor Miriam "Ma" Ferguson, during a debate on bilingual education in the 1930s.

As that quote shows, Ferguson wasn't exactly the sharpest hoe in the rack. Once she was asked to grant a parole to an imprisoned criminal. Instead she granted him a full pardon. Maybe she just signed the wrong form. Anyway, that criminal wouldn't stay petty for long. His name was Ivan "Buck" Barrow, and he would soon join his kid brother Clyde on a crime spree that terrorized the Midwest for several years.

[LeftishBrit]

2. Well, that's where Bush was governor, after all!

[charlie]

4. We've got all kinds

But we still believe our PR about being bigger, louder, and more colorful than anyone else, so we don't do stupid in half measures, we go for the Big Stupid. Every time.

Here's a blast from the past, the town that banned "hello".

http://www.mndaily.com/1997/01/17/texas-town-says-goodbye-hello

[Anarcho-Socialist]

5. Hmmmm

...that there would be no United States if it had not been for God... the US Constitution was written with God in mind...

Given that the United States' "Founding Fathers" were predominantly secularists fighting against an empire with an established religion, how is one to interpret the above?

[drm604]

6. "an attempt to insert religious teachings in to the classroom by stealth"

By stealth? I fail to see the stealth here. This is in your face explicit. There's nothing stealthy about it. These people don't have the intelligence to use stealth.