While the headlines in the MSM are fixated on SCOTUS, and describing in exquisite detail avalanches of things that are not yet even happening at Federal level, the work of solidifying the economic and social coup among US institutions at more local levels continues apace, and with precious little coverage at all.
Well, not quite. It did make the news in Scotland, of all places, as here in Herald Scotland;
It sounds like a plot dreamed up by the creators of Southpark, but it’s all true: schoolchildren in Louisiana are to be taught that the Loch Ness monster is real in a bid by religious educators to disprove Darwin’s theory of evolution.
Thousands of children in the southern state will receive publicly-funded vouchers for the next school year to attend private schools where Scotland’s most famous mythological beast will be taught as a real living creature.
These private schools follow a fundamentalist curriculum including the Accelerated Christian Education (ACE) programme to teach controversial religious beliefs aimed at disproving evolution and proving creationism.
One tenet has it that if it can be proved that dinosaurs walked the earth at the same time as man then Darwinism is fatally flawed.
Sigh.
This of course is merely the tip of the iceberg. The “voucher” system, as an alternate funding mechanism for education, is wildly popular in GOP circles, and is usually advocated as an effective means to combat the decline of the mainstream school system. The nub of the scheme, for those of you outside the US and unfamiliar with it, is that the government will give “vouchers” to parents that they may then redeem for tuition at private schools. The option to send your kids to regular public school (that means the opposite here of what it means in the UK, btw) remains, but the parent would also have the option to bypass public education entirely and send the kid to schools outside of the state funded institutions, but still using state funds to pay for at least part of that. They could also, in many cases, redeem the vouchers for cash to defray the cost of home-schooling.
This scheme is of course a particular favorite among religious fundamentalists, since it allows for curricula that are not approved by the Department of Education, an agency that many on the right nowadays would eliminate anyway if they could. Nor do such people believe that the Constitutional separation of Church and State says what it does, or means what it has been upheld to mean, and they’d get rid of that sucker as well.
Many articles here on this blog have illustrated the ways in which School District Boards have been colonized by the religious hard right, and not just in the “Bible Belt” states. For them, this voucher system is simply a means to send their children to schools using overtly religious curricula, but still have their education funded on the public dime.
In Louisiana, the vouchers would be available to about 5,000 students for the 2012-2013 school year, but private school choice options are to be dramatically expanded to cover approximately 380,000 students in the state in 2013-2014.
Rachel Tabachnick, a reporter who has followed the trajectory of the religious right’s influence in education and politics generally for years, has the skinny over at Talk2Action;
Some Louisiana students receiving publicly funded vouchers and attending private schools in 2012-2013 will be taught from educational media promoting young earth creationism, global warming denial, history that is not factual, and bigotry toward Catholicism, Mormonism, other Protestants, and non-Christian religions. This is predictable because some of the schools that are on the approved list to receive voucher students use curriculum from A Beka Books, Bob Jones University Press, and Accelerated Christian Education (ACE). Public funding of the teaching of creationism is already happening in Pennsylvania, Florida, and other states with “private school choice” programs. The following 8-minute video provides a window into what these students are being taught.
This video below is an 8-minute excerpt on the content of A Beka and Bob Jones University Press textbooks. The excerpt is from a 35-minute video about the corporate tax credit program funding students to attend private schools in Pennsylvania (preview and full length video embedded in this article).
Do please watch at least the 8 minute version to get full flavor of just how far out in the weeds this stuff is from any scholarly scientific/historical point of view.
It’s not just Louisiana either, naturally. This stuff is really widespread, nor is it limited just to School Boards. Here below, for your pleasure, is the entire Texas GOP Platform for this, the year of Our Lord 2012, wherein you will find unequivocal support for exactly this kind of shift in educational focus, including gems like these;
Having an educated population, with parents having the freedom of choice for the education of their children.
Knowledge-Based Education – We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.
Controversial Theories – We support objective teaching and equal treatment of all sides of scientific theories. We believe theories such as life origins and environmental change should be taught as challengeable scientific theories subject to change as new data is produced. Teachers and students should be able to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of these theories openly and without fear of retribution or discrimination of any kind.
Naturally enough it doesn’t stop with education. Cheaper to dump that benzene in a river? Fixed;
Protection from Extreme Environmentalists – We strongly oppose all efforts of the extreme environmental groups that stymie legitimate business interests. We strongly oppose those efforts that attempt to use the environmental causes to purposefully disrupt and stop those interests within the oil and gas industry. We strongly support the immediate repeal of the Endangered Species Act. We strongly oppose the listing of the dune sage brush lizard either as a threatened or an endangered species. We believe the Environmental Protection Agency should be abolished.
Separation of Church and State? Political advocacy on the part of Clergy? We can fix that too, no problem;
Free Speech for the Clergy – We urge amendment of the Internal Revenue Code to allow a religious organization to address issues without fear of losing its tax-exempt status. We call for repeal of requirements that religious organizations send the government any personal information about their contributors.
Onerous Federal rules preventing racial discrimination at the voting booth getting you down? (Texas is one of nine states with a history of racial discrimination that must get Federal approval before changing their voting laws)—Hey presto! Done deal;
Voter Rights Act – We urge that the Voter Rights Act of 1965 codified and updated in 1973 be repealed and not reauthorized.
Here’s the whole enchilada, and check out the “Protecting Our Children” section on P-10, if you have the fortitude for it. There’s a lot of wider Dominionist influence easily recognizable throughout this document, not least this on P-22;
Our policy is based on God’s biblical promise to bless those who bless Israel and curse those who curse Israel and we further invite other nations and organizations to enjoy the benefits of that promise.
And finally, for, um, journalistic balance, and from the “even a stopped clock” department, let me be the first to congratulate the Texas GOP for getting on the right side of the GM food labeling issue—they support it.
In my dictionary there is a much shorter way to say that: indoctrination.
Couldn’t watch the vid. It kept crashing my browser. Probably too many cookies from Nature embedded in the walls for Beka’s liking.
Some friends from back home sent me a link to a similar article in The Scotsman a few days ago.
First though was – perhaps Gunny isn’t always tilting at windmills – second that there was still a lot of local sectarianism in the comments – and third that we are heading into the silly season in the UK.
I really have to stop reading this sort of thing. My daughter is taking on board the whole nine yards. She’s started passing around their gung ho ideas and I can’t stop myself biting.
I offended her the other day by saying she’d been gone too long. She has!
Where does your daughter live Di?
I give up. You want to be a nation of drooling morons, knock yourselves right the fuck out. I just hope the earth bites back, hard.
(PS – i do believe in Nessie though. No scientific proof is going to change that.)
Ah but the important question, Porn, is- does Nessie believe in you?
(she may have had all her higher order thinking skills beaten out of her by her elders and betters thousands of years ago, making her unable to modify her fixed belief that featherless bipeds are merely a figment of the imaginations of the socialistc/fascist snobosaurs who just want to tax her hard-earned stocks of fish in order to feed the lazy good-for-nothing welfaropods in the next loch over.)
Bluth -
We’ll find out if she bites me back. Maybe if the Scots get their independence, Nessie will emerge from the lake, Excalibur in hand.
Expat:
Florida. But she’s married to a Southener…
We’re not all bad, Di, us Southerners….
“Having an educated population,with parents having the freedom of choice for the education of their children”
From the Principles -
bit of an oxymoron, no?
On the subject of watery tarts handing out swords….
Actually, why bother with school at all for the children of these people? Why not just waterboard them until they spout the catechism correctly and be done with it?
I object to the implication that Nessie is a tart or a bint.
Take your point, Porn, she’s always behaved like a perfect lady in my eyes, but it’s the excalibur bit – did you watch the clip?
I did. That’s where i got the bint bit from. It was a bint wot gave it to Arthur and started the whole shebang. But what if Excalibur’s real home was in Scotland? And it’s really Nessie’s? Look at the Stone of Scone. Not entirely farfetched, you must admit. And she is a true lady.
But isn’t the Stone of Scone originally from Egypt? I’m sure I read that on the interweb (where everything is always true).
Hmmm, didn’t know that. Well, maybe the Lady of the Lake was really Grendel’s mommy.
In other news, looks like Stockton, Calif is filing for bankruptcy.
Oh my, we can’t have that.
That’s a relief. Sectarianism only emerges around windmills, we all know that.
Ah, that explains it then. It’s being reported in order to conform to the “silly season” tradition, and not because it’s, you know, actually happening.
Whew, that was a close call, eh EP?
Porn: Grendel’s Mommy! You mean her?
Bluthner:
Apologies. I make an exception for you. You come across as a thoroughly nice person.
At times I feel so alienated from my daughter, it physically hurts.
Gunny – There you go again responding to my agreement based on your entrenched prejudices and preconceptions.
Now would it have made the news in Scotland if not for the Nessie link the slow news summer season?
Have I phrased that wrong? No offence to other members of this blog. I’m just in the middle of making bacon bread and about to dish up roast beef and Yorkshire Pudding. I don’t multi-task so well these days…
No, I don’t think so, but you have made us all hungry.
Bluth -
No wonder Artie fell for it. Sucker born every minute, and he does have form.
Bill, our son and two friends are having their annual day boys day out at an air show on Saturday. I always do the food for them.
The bacon bread is an experiment. I’ve made a regular loaf and added finely diced dry cured bacon to the mix. I thought it might give extra dimension to bacon sannies.
They’re also having home made Scotch eggs, fried chicken, egg and bacon quiche and a chocolate sponge filled with strawberries and clotted cream made with my own fair hands.
I have sourdough bread in the freezer so that’ll be filled with their five a day vegetables and ham — or I might fill the bacon bread with the veggies, and put the bacon in the sourdough…Decisions, decisions.
Which airshow Di? I always enjoy them. Lots of noise and gratuitous carbon emission
Gunny – and the latest on silly season Myth-Conceptions from Edinburgh’s daily, The Scotsman.
Home-made Scotch eggs! Your Bill is lucky Bill indeed!
And my heart hurts for you, to have to see your daughter slipping away into a cult -which is essentially what it sounds like- in that way. Mine are still at home. Hard enough that one of them has decided to become vegetarian (but her meat-loving dad is still cooking her meals kind of thing).
Home made Scotch Eggs! (I just had to shout it again.) What a treat.
Expat, wouldn’t you know it they have a photo of a deep-fried mars bar in the G. today. (Though I’m not convinced at all that it really is a mars bar….)
Could just as easily be a battered and fried turd , I’d say.
ExPat:
They’re going to Duxford this year. They’ve been doing it for years now, and the two workmates are good fun, so they thoroughly enjoy themselves.
Farnborough Air show is on this year I think and that’s just down the road from us. When it’s on we usually take a picnic and sit in the park which is just behind the airfield. We saw the Vulcan on her maiden flight after a re-fit a couple of years ago at Farnborough. I think she’s my favourite.
We used to go to Greenham Common Airshow years ago when Mike was young. It was quite a buzz.
Bluthner:
I used to make scotch eggs all the time when we did a lot of seaside day trips with the kids.
I don’t make them so much these days because of the calories!
I’ve never had the nerve to try fried Mars Bar.
One of my teenage granddaughters has gone Vegetarian. I always worry they aren’t getting enough protein, but when he was six my nephew decided no more meat, and now he’s a hulking great rugby player, so I guess it’s not too bad as long as they eat sensibly.
I’ve just had a look at the link for the fried Mars Bar. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen one…Oh yuk!
The entree was deep fried pizza
Pizza? Really? Yuk again. What does that do to your arteries…
Fried pizza does a number on them Di.
I was last at Farnborough in 2008 and saw the restored Vulcan fly for the first time too. A cold war relic but wonderful for an aeroplane buff to see.
Perhaps apocryphal but I was once told that B52s had fast acting automatic blinds on the windows to protect the eyes of the flight crews from the flash of the nulear bombs that they would drop. Vulcan crews had an eye patch. Before dropping the bomb they planned to put on the eye patch and fly with one eye. After the flash they would remove the eye patch and fly with the remaining good eye.
For Gunny from an old school friend of Expat.
Bad Egg
Expat.
So near and yet so far apart
We spent most of the day in the park watching the flights.
Don’t you [sometimes] just love the English way of doing things…
Yup – Drinking expensive Pimms from a tent on the flight line while internal organs being shaken by re-heat.