| richardhutnik said: It doesn't matter what you think here, or even how much close to what you see evolution is to reality. There is the issue of parential rights on what their kids are taught. So long as you force kids of religious parents to subject their kids to public schools, you are going to have to want them either not taught evolution, or be able to be taught something that is compatible with their religious beliefs. If you don't like this, then enable the parents to take their kids out of the school system. This is about parential rights. Their kids are not your kids, and you are to have no say in what they are to be taught. It is simple, enable them to get out of the system if they don't like evolution, then you don't need to worry about it. And that is why it is politics. Again, if you don't like it, you need to propose an alternative ethics system to one based on rights. Good luck getting that past the body politic here. Next up comes, "But but... test scores of America, yadda yadda yadda". |
As Bertrand Russell said, in education there's the clash of three different forces pulling in different directions: there's the family will, the child will and the state will.
Me, I can't see why if a family starves a kid of food then the state steps in with social services and assistance, and if a family mistreats a kid or damages him emotionally there are civil and penal consequences, but everything about the education should be covered by a sanctuarium.
Shouldn't in the same way the collectivity be allowed to intervene for a kid that is intellectually starved or mistreated? The child is not a property of his/her parents, but a person with basic rights to health, instruction and pursuit of happiness.
The family has a great role in the education of children, and I'm not saying that they shouldn't be allowed in principle to communicate their values and beliefs in a measure. But while an adult can responsably be a vegetarian, most times a vegetarian diet is unbalanced and hardly health safe for a growing kid, and there have been cases where the state stepped in for malnourished children subjected to it. In the same way one thing is to preach to a peer, another is to unproperly educate a child from the position of strength of the parental role.
(Of course it's politics, everything is :) )
