And again...*FACEPLANT*

[xaq_the_aereon]

"I hope schools will realize it's less an exercise in tolerance than a platform for liberal groups to promote their pan-sexual agenda," said Robert Knight, director of Concerned Women for America's Culture and Family Institute

...I can't even think of anything demeaning to say about this. It pretty well speaks for itself. But that quote makes me want to go up to this guy with the following quote:

"Yes, the left-wing liberal radicals DID have a hidden agenda here, Mr. Knight...their agenda was to lure out all the idiots in the world so that we could make fun of them. AND YOU FELL FOR IT!"

I swear, if I ever hear -anyone- use the words "agenda" or "conspiracy" again from her to the day I die, I'm going to stop whatever it is I'm doing and vomit on them. X_X ..Unless they're a close friend, in which case they'll simply get the Abenobashi War Fan. >:D

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

S'okay . . . let's drop (for now) anything about sex and sexuality. Is this a good program? It LOOKS all kinds of good. As I have said for years, "Die Mittelschule ist das tiefste Loch in der Hoelle" (Junior High is the deepest pit in Hell), and the cruelty of some kids to other kids is one of the biggest reasons. Yet, this kind of thought control bugs me.

I'm a clergyperson: orthodox, theologically; an idealist, philosophically; a child of the Enlightenment, politically; a bleeding heart conservative. I can't tell you how many times I've gone to gatherings of clergy or other overly religious types and had a liturgy stuffed in my throat that reminds me of this program. Many and many are the times that I have been asked, not merely to listen to things I am skeptical of, but to RECITE prayers and confessions and whatnot that would require me to say things to God that I don't agree with.

F'rinstance -- I support our govt's policy in Iraq. I'm not a fire-eater, but I'm backing the effort. If you don't support the policy, that doesn't mean you're an expletive to be deleted; we should be able to get along. But to lure me into a meeting where I am asked to confess our "national arrogance," or to ask God to bless things I think are evil, or to pray for wisdom in election time where the prayer is a thinly-veiled campaign ad for the opposition is fundamentally dishonest, manipulative, and just plain wrong -- even if you agree with the sentiments expressed. (It would be, of course, just as wrong to write a jingoistic prayer that did this in reverse.)

Now, this kind of talking to the pray-ers under the guise of talking to God has been going on for ever -- I've put up with it my whole career. But I'm a big boy. I know when I'm being had, and I can resist going along to get along. But kids are different. Offering manipulative, ideological fare to kids who have less ability to critique or resist it is nothing less than dastardly. And the fact that we don't mention God doesn't mean it isn't laden with all kinds of ideological subtexts.

Me, I put the blame for the bullying in school squarely on teachers and administrators. They have elected to create schools where the inmates run the asylum. Civility (which includes not calling each other names) is best taught in face-to-face relationships which include the presence of proper authority and adult role models. The answer is insanely simple. Just reduce the size of schools. If every teacher knew every student (at least by name), then nowhere in the entire school can a kid be anonymous. Nowhere is that kid out of sight of those who can bring restraint to bear. The omnipresence of adults also means that restraint can be less heavy-handed. Correction of bad behavior can be more prompt, more direct, have more influence, and be handled with fewer layers of bureaucracy. (Quite a change from the factory farm model upon which most American schools are based, huh?)

In a more intimate environment, name-calling -- including the use of pejorative sexual terms -- can be suppressed without getting into whether homosexuality is good or bad. A simple, "we don't talk like that around here," accompanied by situation-appropriate discipline, ENDS the issue (at least in that situation). But those who view the school as a giant values-farm where all the little piggies are to be inoculated according to the values of the farmer means we keep trying to make them oink the way we think they ought to. So we get "no name-calling" programs that involve teaching kids that homosexuality is good, AND we get sex education programs that drone on and on about abstinence while avoiding cold, hard facts about contraception.

The point of this is that, yes, the conservatives are hyper-sensitive to gay rights propaganda. But that doesn't mean that gay rights aren't being propagated by folks who are determined to shoehorn them in by any means possible. The schools are an ideological battleground because all the power-players in the education establishment WANT them to be (read Plato's Republic: nothings' changed). This will go on ad infinitum, ad nauseam et ad absurdum, until we fix the way we do school.

-- AWC

[kjorteo]

"Concerned Women for America's Culture and Family Institute." That has to be the absolute most pretentious group name I've ever heard, and that's saying something because heavens know there are plenty of pretentious group names out there.

Why is it that we not only let the secular right-wing nutballs hijack concepts like patriotism and the American flag, but now the religious right-wing nutballs have family values?

Actually, you know what? Let's take every group like this (Focus on the Family, Concerned Women for Group Names that are Entirely Too Long, etc.) and force them to stick the word "Nuclear" in front of every occurence of the word "Family." Then the names will make significantly more sense! :D

...Hey, wait a minute. Why is the Concerned Women for etc. etc. led by a guy named Robert?

[arturus-magi.livejournal.com]

I swear, if I ever hear -anyone- use the words "agenda" or "conspiracy" again from her to the day I die,

I dunno. They may not be all-consuming conspiracies, but this and NARTH {North American institute for Research and Treatment of Homosexuality}, among others, do give off the stench of (not-so-)hidden agendas.