Student gets F grade for mentioning God

Originally posted by slank
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Apes and Chimpanzees don't change or exercise their intellectual capacity from generation to generation, maybe that is why they are still Apes and Chimpanzees.

The Human brain is, as far as we can see, the most flexible and adaptive thinking machine in the known Universe. It is, i am certain the thing that differentiates us from other species.

The point of going to school is to exercise your brain.
America is becoming both physically and intellectually unworked.
If something is true a stronger, better exercised brain would be able to defend it better.

Once again the Religious right is in favor of lazy intellects.
You go to school for an expansive experience. [or shallowly for a certificate]

If you want a religious shoebox experience of the world stay at home and only communicate with other religiously limited intellects.

If on the other hand you want to embrace the mystic future in all its unknowns, go out and seek a diverse range of experiences, and it may [or may not] re-shape your views of the world.
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Pleeeeeeease Slank,

Spare us the limited liberal mind capacity of your thinking and stop reading those tabloid magazines and do some real research for yourself !

See it works both ways doesn't it ?

Have you actually been brainwashed as a little pup to believe that anything Godly is weak and narrow minded ?

Get a clue my friend, did you you actually say that lazziness means avoiding Secular Humanstic Ideologies, Occultic and Cultic Views that only seperate one from God

I pray for this world filled with individuals as yourself !

Yeah, I've about had it with attacks on religions.

Some people in this world are working hard to reduce man to a soulless creature, nothing more than a bunch of chemicals and meat. An animal in other words. And it's much easier to controll a man who thinks he is just some animal, isn't it? You just give him a sack of pills to keep him "sedated and under controll," sit him down in front of "American Idol," and slowly take away all of his freedoms.

This is a dark road we are headed down.

Troy

If taht's true i think that many peoples are disappouinted in the system... Well, at least they are checking it up now...

Originally posted by slank
.
Apes and Chimpanzees don't change or exercise their intellectual capacity from generation to generation, maybe that is why they are still Apes and Chimpanzees.

The Human brain is, as far as we can see, the most flexible and adaptive thinking machine in the known Universe. It is, i am certain the thing that differentiates us from other species.

The point of going to school is to exercise your brain.
America is becoming both physically and intellectually unworked.
If something is true a stronger, better exercised brain would be able to defend it better.

Once again the Religious right is in favor of lazy intellects.
You go to school for an expansive experience. [or shallowly for a certificate]

If you want a religious shoebox experience of the world stay at home and only communicate with other religiously limited intellects.

If on the other hand you want to embrace the mystic future in all its unknowns, go out and seek a diverse range of experiences, and it may [or may not] re-shape your views of the world.
.

Go man go! You have a very clear and intelligent view of things.
Those that can't handle the truth rebuke you with their carbon copy speech patterns right out of their "how to be a sheep" handbook. No original thinking at all.

I just love it when the weak admit that they are getting "sick and tired' of the truth, it means they are being beaten down, and they admit it so often. Its like truth is a microwave gun pointed right at their thick skulls...pzzzzzzzt pzzzzzzt!

Some of you are just not getting what this situation is about. It's not a simple case of the the student failing to follow the professors instructions. It's about the fact that the professor does not have the right to arbitrarily infringe on the students rights by restricting their speech and certainly not due to their own bias. There are already precedents for this.

www.claremont.org...

As the Supreme Court held in Lamb's
Chapel, “[t]he principle that has emerged from our cases is that the First
Amendment forbids the government to regulate speech in ways that favor
some viewpoints or ideas at the expense of others.” 508 U.S. at 394
(emphasis added).
The First Amendment precludes any governmental effort to single out and
censor – or otherwise burden – the speech of private parties solely because that
speech is religious. A unanimous United States Supreme Court in Church of
Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah, 508 U.S. 520 (1993), explained this principle
in light of free exercise concerns:
The principle that government, in pursuit of legitimate interest,
cannot, in a selective manner, impose burdens only on conduct
motivated by religious belief is essential to the protection of the rights
guaranteed by the Free Exercise Clause. The principle underlying the
general applicability requirement has parallels in our First
Amendment jurisprudence.

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For those of you who seem to take the attitude that the professor told her to do something and she must comply, whether he is within his bounds or not, I ask this. Has a college education now become your first exercise in learning to become good sheeple? I just can't believe higher education has become so pathetic, but what is more worrisome is how many of you getting a higher education today are falling into line over this.

Freedom of speech doesn't protect people from failing when they did opposite from the Professors instructions. There was a project, with set guidelines, she was warned (because the project was contray to those guidelines) and she went all self-righteous and didn't get on board the assignment. If you writing a paper about American in the 60s, you can't write about France in 1450!

Wolf - Her topic was approved, it was about the influence of Religion in Government. She didn't go off topic, the professor made a ridiculous requirement after approving the topic.

If I won the lottery tomorrow, I would give her a scholarship to attend a school with professors who are worth getting an education from. Of course, your scholarship will now be limited to attending the school where the idiot is teaching.



Hee hee - j/k of course.

Think of it this way, Say I am your childs science teacher and I approve her topic...let's say it's How did humans come about or something like that. I tell her she is allowed to do that topic but she cannont mention the word Evolution or associate humans with primates, monkeys, apes, etc..etc...

That's just wrong on the teachers part.

Or...Im a history teacher and I approve someone to do a paper on Early American culture/history....only I tell the class they cannot have any Black culture in the paper.....however, they can do it on the Irish, Italians, Jews, Brits..hell even the Indians..but no Blacks.

Is that wrong...I think it is.

This is great!!! "I was suppose to do a report about the history of the ZImbabwe Tribe of Africa, but I didn't feel like it, so I did one on how funny dogs are when they chase their tails. What? I failed? SUE!!!!!"

And people are defending her? SHe was told to do something, she didn't do it, she failed!

In the real world, boss tells you to do something and you don't do it, you get fired. Can you sue? NO!
"I told you to sort it by alphebetical order, you did it by drawing bunnies and bears and sorting it that way, you are fired!"

Is anyone actually reading the links for this case? Where are your heads? This is not about writing off topic.

Geez.

"I have one limiting Factor, no mention of the big “G” gods, i.e., one, true god argumentation.."

If you read the teachers quote, I think many people are getting confused about what he was saying. He wasn't saying "don't put the word god in it", he ment, to single one out, he believed it would be offense to other students. So, what she could have down, was write about how Christianity had a place with the foundation of America and its believes, and wrote about how the religion influenced it. But no, instead, she wrote singularly, writing about God and his influence within the foundation of the country. Not only that, but the majority of her essay, was simply lecturing and preachy quotes from several political individuals. There was no real solid research on the topic, just quotes from some old farts about how they love God and how he blesses and rules the country." Even after that, she ends with a closure that has nothing to do with her subject, and commenting about how the founding fathers would not have wanted to have America live in "ignorance of the divine scripture."

She not only failed to follow VERY simple guidelines, but her report was trash, it didn't even meet the regular requirements status, besides the added on requirement.

She deserved the F.

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Her basic premise:

no known society in the history of mankind has existed without practicing or believing in some form of religion

Poor child has never heard of Soviet and modern Russia, China, or non-deified monarchies like Monaco, or Fascism.
Maybe she should read some history to improve her intellect and not limit herself to the bible.

Her basic premise is pretty obviously false.

She claims all then inspiration of the founding fathers comes from religion and the bible

we can see how the Christian religion inspired our founding fathers and government leaders

Lets see, . . . Christianity, religion and the bible has been around and dominant for centuries prior to this time and had no effect on freeing individuals from Deified Bible clutching monarchs.
She must be unaware of the cultural revolution taking place in Western Europe at the time talking about personal liberty and freedom [Voltaire, DesCartes].

It has not occured to her that the reason for the inspiration of the founding fathers was being freed from any government at all, and being able to create what they thought was the very best. The fact that they attempted to give it legitimacy by shoe horning it with Biblical fragments from time to time seems pretty spurious. The bible is a text much better suited to a capricious tyrrant than a book of personal liberty and freedom. "You will do this, You will do that, You won't do this" [and much of it is incredibly barbaric]

Her report is a kind of effusive, happy talk claiming all credit goes to [the Christian] religion. Like the constitutional congress was happy camp all singing "kumbiya my lord, kumbiya" Instead of the contentious frustrating competition of various ideas, beliefs and interests.

Her whole thesis is sort of a melted marshmellow melange, all lumped together. It reminds me of someone who is mentally ill and regardless of what they look at they see a fish. Looks up, "Fish", looks down, "Fish", looks left, "Fish", . . .

The satrine Universal nexus according to her is Christianity, Religion, the bible and God.

Its kinda vacuuous.

If you are happy in a religious vacuum, fine, but don't use it as a cop out.

Its like wallpapering over everything in a room including people and furniture,
It just makes a big mess. But its such pretty wallpaper . . .
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I'm sorry, couldn't let this one slip through.

Some people in this world are working hard to reduce man to a soulless creature, nothing more than a bunch of chemicals and meat. An animal in other words. And it's much easier to controll a man who thinks he is just some animal, isn't it? You just give him a sack of pills to keep him "sedated and under controll," sit him down in front of "American Idol," and slowly take away all of his freedoms.

I think it would be much easier to control a population by telling people that if they don't do what you want them to, some mystical grandfather-figure will smite them down, or they will not be allowed into the afterlife.

It is such a perfect form of control it gives the illusion of freedom.

I agree with the whole F thing. God should be kept out of school's. They are a place to learn about real things. Save the god for church

Originally posted by xxblackoctoberxx
I agree with the whole F thing. God should be kept out of school's. They are a place to learn about real things. Save the god for church

Why should we take God out of anything because a small minority of people that have decided in their own heads that God doesn't exist ? Despit all the evidence !

Truth

Evidence.... HA!

Opinions, opinions, that was my opinion. A school is a place to learn and IMO should not be littered with other distracting things. Don't get me wrong, I'm not some crazy god hater. There are a million things I think are wrong with the school system and the way things go down in schools, religious things just happen to be one of them.

[edit on 7/7/2005 by xxblackoctoberxx]

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Its not that the subject of God has to be absolutely excluded from the academic setting, its just that any presented thesis has to measure up to critical thinking.

If you want to present virtually any thesis, I really don't think i personally have a problem with it, but you have to present good solid evidence that will support it. And the art of writting allows for some flexibility using semantics, ordering of ideas and intonations to favor your thesis perhaps more than absolute clinical analysis would allow. Rational persuasion is part of the art of writting, if not a part of scientific scrutiny.

But you can't just have happy talk about things such as 'all living things are peaceful, and only mankind is violent' or 'Modern Liberty is the result of religion or God' without some substantive facts that back it up. You have to show/demonstrate the/a logical structure behind your idea.

Otherwise it is just so much glop.

Academics glop

The logical extrapolations of ideas 'what if there is a God', or 'what are the ramifications of the idea/belief in a God' are ideas that in our social context have a great deal of importance and should be discussed, hopefully in a non-offensive way, but discussed in any event.

How would society be affected on moral vectors with or without a belief in God? What effect would different visions of God have? Is it possible to have the broad mass of people generally act in a law-abiding, civilized manner without a belief in God? Does the belief in God cause or prevent more lawlessness and incivility? Is law abiding more important than civility? Does civility itself allow for papering over of many dispicable things?

A lot of questions worthy of asking and thinking about include God.

God [or anything else] taken as some kind of narcotic panacea is idiotic.

Looking at the paper itself, the reason for the F, seems to have very little to do with God per sey, but with this students inability to support her thesis and include defenses against expected/logical counter arguments that her awestruck religious blindness will allow her.
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I completely agree that this discussion that this should have never come up as a seperation between church and state in the context of the paper that received an F. But in all honesty I think the teacher started the whole conflict by challenging a girl that he new was a God fearing believer.

Was her paper good - C
Did she have good intent- A+

I believe she did the best she could considering the parameters she was forsed to keep with keeping on the subject. If she went any deeper in any of her paragraphs from her sources, she would have definetly been failed by going outside of the parameters. I think this tied her hands a little too much and she didn't get to expound as needed for supporting evidence. Thus resulting in an average paper.

As far as religion in school is concerned I am a Christian myself and I am not saying that religion should be taught in a puiblic school. Religion can and should be decided on at the home.

However that doesn't mean that the principles of Gods given laws shouldn't be taught. What I mean by that is God has imparted natural laws on man and on this earth resulting in ramifications for bad behavior. Thus having the Ten Commandments. I think that most people are not that ignorant and would accept that the ten commandments are a positive thing and only support a healthy environment for us all without infinging on ones own morals, views, philosophies etc....... The basis of our laws were created from the ten commandments. The Ten commandmenst of this day are so paraphrased anyway so not to offend.

The results of their negative actions upon society will result in punishment. Is this principal so wrong to teach ? They don't have to discuss theology.
Evereyone will be held accountable for their actions whether they want to believe it or not. If they don't want to believe in a God that I bleieve in thats fine. But can't the few respect the teachings of the laws enough to create a place of learning for all of our children ?

It's not a matter of forcing Christian values and principles down anyones kids throats ? This was not ever the intention. And franly haven't heard of a single case of this in a public school forum. Doesn't mean it hasn't happened. There are whackos in ever group !


Peace,

When I was in 2nd grade I had to write a paper on the meaning of easter. So, what did i write about? You guessed it Jesus dying on the cross and being ressurected from the grave after 3 days. Everybody else wrote about the easter bunny and finding eggs. I was a little more intelligent. Anyways..... The students all got good grades except for me. I got an F:mad I probably should have done something about it but i was in 2nd grade and my mom already had her own troubles.