Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!decvax!microsof!uw-beaver!cornell!ddw From: ddw@cornell.UUCP Newsgroups: net.religion Subject: Re: Is the jury biased? Message-ID: <4522@cornell.UUCP> Date: Sun, 29-May-83 09:12:34 EDT Article-I.D.: cornell.4522 Posted: Sun May 29 09:12:34 1983 Date-Received: Fri, 3-Jun-83 06:12:13 EDT Lines: 43 Ah, good ol' Larry Bickford. What would we do without him and his ilk to remind us of what we're opposing? To Dave Wright: "I'd like to see an end to a small but vocal Christian minority out there trying to ram their religions down the throats of American school-children." Reply: I'd like to see an end to the use of humanism (it IS a religion) as the basis of educational, judicial, and other decisions. Yeah, I'm sure you would. And just what would you like to see used as a basis for these decisions? Why, I'll bet it's the Bible! So much for the separation of church and state. One of the biggest problems one runs into in dealing with people of Bickford's stripe is that they don't \think/ they're right, they \know/ they're right. This makes it easy to disregard any reasons why we should maybe not have Christianity ensconsed as a \de facto/ state religion. Raising this non-existent issue of "humanism" is a favorite tactic of people like Larry. It's a real pain, too, since they can immediately start claiming that anyone who doesn't subscribe to their particular brand of religion is really a humanist and is thus introducing his own religion into the schools. Even claiming that you don't know anything about humanism and don't subscribe to its creed doesn't slow them down, since they can just claim that you picked it up by osmosis in our godless schools. Sigh. To Don Ellis and Dave: "Public" schools should be an extension of the home, not the state. Too many parents have abdicated their responsibilities and treated the school essentially as a baby-sitter. They are reaping what they have sown. This sounds good, but what exactly does it mean? An extension of the home? Whose home? Mine? Yours? The mythical "average American?" If parents are dropping responsibilities (which ones?) then should the schools stand idly by, or try to do something to remedy the situation? And "reaping what they have sown?" What does this mean? Come on, Larry, you can do better than this. Or can you? (Sorry for the delay on this note, but I've been out of town.) David Wright {vax135|decvax|purdue}!cornell!ddw ddw.cornell@Udel-relay ddw@cornell