If you get prayer in school...

Its a matter of respect. Do you not stand up when they play o canada at hockey games?

No one is forced to say anything. No one is forced to put their hand on their heart.

People have died defending that flag, if you cant stand to show some respect, than you have far bigger problems than whether you hear the words "under god."

 

I just said you stand up. why are you ragging on me?
A, this is about school-sponsored prayer, in my highschool they had this chill thing where christians would rally round the flagpool during home room to pray. I have nothing against this, but some schools, particualry in the south have forced prayer still.
B, The flag is a symbol, that's it. By saying people died for it and now you have to pay respect to it, and you can never, never desecrate it makes it more of an idol. idols piss god off, especially if we include him in the mix. (member the ten commandment).
C. If we are a religiously tolerant and open society, which by god we should be, then there should be prayers to satan, or ginesha, or your dog for all i care in school too.
D, By having anything religious to do with the state means that the state is elevating one religion over another. This is a major civil rights no-no. Even the ten commandments is a political mine-field because several Christian sects and not to mention Jewish sects believe in different interpretations.
If we sponsor one religion over another, than we are no longer the land of the free. We cannot let this country fall into religious fundamentalism because that will inevitably lead to the decline of our society. Look at afghanistan, dark age europe, the present day middle east, africa or a host of other countrys for examples of where religious fundamentalism completely destroyed art, music, science and the human rights of its citizens.

but the 700 club and the religious right keep on insisting that we practice that blasphamy "the pledge", that we worship the idols of our flag and our ancestors, that we force people to believe in their idea of god, and to top it all off: Religious fundamentalism ain't a bad thing.

P.S. I'll give you Tibet as an example where a society thrived due to religious fundamentalism. Buddhisms different than western religions though, seeing as killing other people is generally frowned upon.

 

Supreme court says you can't be forced to stand for the pledge.

"
It is my understanding that a Supreme Court case now prohibits public schools from requiring students to pledge allegiance to the flag. This case was West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette (1943)
"
http://www.positiveatheism.org/mail/eml8896.htm

If you find it disrespectful, than I usually counter that they died for my right of free speech also.

 

I also think that everybody has the right to pray to their own deity, or not pray at all if a deity is momentarily or permanently unavailable. Honouring the sCar-spangled banner at school seems scary to me. Typically the American belief in superiority though.

 

Where? forced prayer is illegal.

As someone else said above, you dont have to stand. But yes, it is absolutely respectful to stand during the pledge/anthem

But no, it shouldnt be mandatory.

I dont think there should be any prayers in public school. If kids want to do it privately fine, but schools shouldnt be led with prayer over the loudspeaker.

Worship the flag? Pledging allegience is not worshipping. No one is forced to say "under god." No one is forced to believe in any god. Its a symbol of unity.

 

it has nothing to do with superiority. It has to do with unity. Where on earth does the absurd notion of superiority come in with the pledge?

 

If someone stood up and said they wouldn't take it, and their parents backed them and brought media attention onto it, then this wouldn't happen. Personally I've done a hell of a lot of things my school has said it has a zero tolerance policy on, and not only gotten away with it but not been punished whatsoever. People talk a lot but don't act. You're here talking, but not acting, so don't go around complaining unless you're gonna do something about it. You're part of the problem otherwise.

It's nothing to do with idolatry. The flag is a symbol. In america you should appreciate your flag far more than we do because apparently it represents the 'land of the free' whereas other flags represent the land and people, not the ideals they aspire to. People didn't die for the flag, of course not, but they died trying to uphold the ideals the flag represents, so of course you shouldn't desecrate it. Whether or not you believe in the flag or the anthem meaning anything you should respect the fact that for a lot of people it means a lot, and you wouldn't have the freedom you have today without the ideals the flag represents.

If we were a religiously tolerant and open society you would tolerate the prayers.

The USA was founded by puritans, the christian amish, of course you still have its after effects. Schools are not necessarily directly run by the state, there are no mandatory codes of practise for schools, it depends on the school board and the feelings of those attending the school. There is no law saying you must pray at school. The STATE is secular, the SCHOOL is not. Most private schools are founded for people of a particular religion, you gonna complain about that too? If the state passed a law saying you CAN'T pray at school then they would be intefering with religious matters, and are no longer a secular state. The state already has laws in place so people can choose whether they pray or not. They're your rights, use them. Get a spine and refuse to pray. I don't care how much you blab on about how horrible the school could make your life, because the moment you complain to (for example) a board of trustees, or even a few senior teachers, the school will realise what a huge problem they will have if they don't back down. We've done it here, all you had to do was write a letter to the school and you could go play in the library when anything religious was discussed/put in place.

 

What? Public schools are all SECULAR and they are all run by the state.

What are you talking about? "The Christian Amish?" The Amish ARE Christians, but they have NOTHING to do with Puritans, they didn't even come to the USA until the 19th century AND the Amish do not believe in government, so they have little to no impact on govermental policies.

 

In the old testament, in exodus i believe, Moses went up the mountain and the tribes got restless, it isn't like in the movies where he goes up for two hours and comes back with 2 stone tablets. Most scholars believe that he went up there for around a month and returned with the entire torah. When he got back down he discovered that the Jews had made an alter of a golden calf, unlike most people's initial reaction this wasn't an altar to a familiar egyptian god, but an altar to YHVH. YHVH cannot be depicted as an earthly being so this pissed him off. He was about to kill all the jews when moses interceded and got a reduced punishment. He ground the altar to dust and made the jews drink a mix of the gold dust and water. 1/3 of the people died.

What is an idol? An Idol is a 'graven image' it contains pictures of the heavens, earth or sea (technically an illustrated bible is a graven image). The flag has stars, a blue sky, blood and white people (that's what the colors represent y'know...)
An idol needs prayed to. you just call it a 'pledge' or an 'oath' but it is still a verbal way of paying omage to it. An Idol represents something that is not real, a god or some idea.
Our country is an idea, our values are an idea, so in effect the flag is an idol of our country.
God doesn't like idols, he really, really, really doesn't like them in the old testament.

I do tolerate christian prayers, but i think that there is no way in hell, pun intended, that a satanist could perform a proper black sabbath.
Also the 700 club is alway going on about how bad things have gotten since we stoped forcing children to pray before school, this is more of a retort to that idea than to the current situation.

 

"the flag is a symbol and i leave symbols to the symbol-minded" -Carlin.

 

jeez. so childish. the whole 'prayer in school' thing is so nonsensical to me. but then, so is mocking people who wanna have religion. i think anyone who wants to gather in a group to pray to the christian god should be allowed to. the ones who wanna pray to someone else should be allowed to. i don't think the administrators should be involved. i do recall that the buddhist club at my college was allowed to have a cultural day, but the christianity club was not. that seemed nonsensical to me.

 

It is nonsensical, but it happens all the time. For instance, New York City allows a menorah and islamic crescent to be displayed at schools, but not the manger... here was the BS reason which was given.

"The New York suit against the city's Department of Education is in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit after senior U.S. District Court Judge Charles Sifton ruled the city's discriminatory policy was permissible because it was an accommodation of "multiculturalism" and "an attempt to diversify the season and provide non-Christian holidays with parity.""

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=41855

such BS. This type of thing kills me.

 

Prayer should be allowed in school, but people who dont believe in what the others are praying about should be able to leave the room or whatever. I refused to stand for Oh Canada simply because it has "god keep our land" in it, and I am an athiest. That one line conflicts with my beliefs, so I didnt stand up.

 

you know, i really woulda preferred a single christian festival thing in one spot of the school. instead, the admins pretty much kicked up a hornets nets of fundies who then roved the school in evil pairs attacking EVERYONE who was brave enough to attend school the day of the buddhist festival. jeez, it was so freaking aggravating. allow public displays of faith, allow ALL faiths to display publicly. i mean, what the hell?

yeah, this shit embarasses me. my dad still sends me maudlin and probably completely untrue stories about christian high school students "standing up for their right to pray in school, as a group." WTF?!! everyone is allowed to pray, they just hav eto leave the admin out of it. jeez.

 

what if a student leads prayer in home room? can anything be done to stop that?

 

probably. i was never one for group prayer, but as long as i'm not forced to participate, i don't care what that group of kids does in their own time. on the school's time, though, they aughtta just go ahead and pray in their own head.