U.S. Newswire: Group Pushes Extinction of 'School-by-Government'

[truthpusher]

Press Release:

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=39593

Group Pushes Extinction of 'School-by-Government'; SepCon2004 - 'World's Boldest Education Conference' Nov. 20-22 in D.C.

11/10/2004 7:31:00 AM


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To: Assignment Desk, Daybook, Education and Religion Editors

Contact: Marshall Fritz, 559-499-1776 or 559-960-5264 (cell)

News Advisory:

Celebrating the 10-year growth of a controversial movement to end state, federal, and local government involvement in K-12 schooling, SepCon2004 will be held at the Omni Shoreham Hotel, November 20-22, in Washington, D.C.

<snip>

Fritz claims, "When textbook and teacher contradict what mom and dad are teaching at home about human origins, purpose, and destiny, it gives children the anti-education of today's typical 'public school.' Confusion stops children from even wanting to understand reality. Most fall into the postmodernist trap of believing there are no moral absolutes and that decisions should be governed by feelings rather than moral principles."

<snip>

Also at the Sunday gala Tenth Anniversary Banquet, Fritz will announce a new affiliate organization, GetTheKidsOut.org, and introduce its Executive Director, Rev. Grady Arnold, a Southern Baptist minister. The mission of "GTKO" is to help evangelical Christian pastors and parents see why they should rescue their children from "officially Godless public schools."

<snip>

Underlying the goal of the Alliance to help rebuild solid families, Fritz revealed on www.SepCon.org -- http://www.SepCon.org -- why he chose the Omni Shoreham: "It's the only convention hotel around Washington that doesn't rent adult movies. We're taking a stand against hotels that are just porn shops built to look like a hotel."

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=39593

[demnan]

1. Yeah with the Bush win

all the crackpots now have free reign to fuck up every aspect of American life they can.

[Emboldened Chimp]

2. It's things like this that make me not want to have children

Excuse me, but if our schools become theocratic, then they'll be contradicting what I teach them at home.

[neverforget]

3. Faith based teaching will lead us to a Taliban style government.

Oh wait, we're already on our way.

[jdj]

33. it's all about money, the don't want gov't money going to

educate the children of heathens when they can line their own pockets with it. They want uneducated people for cheap labor. and soldiers.

in fact, there are very few policies that they support that can't be traced back to these two motives

anti-abortion and birth control? cheap labor, desperate parents willing to work anywhere for anything and plenty of cannon fodder.

end to public education? same thing, uneducated masses desperate for any kind of work, to the point of joining the armed forces.

end of social safety net? same.

end of social security? same.

etc, etc

[leftchick]

4. these fundie freaks are certainly emboldened

by the fake mandate of the unelected one*.

[tk2kewl]

5. Now will the news also report...

Bush's education policies with flowery names as the Orwellian public education sabotage that they are?

... uh, i guess not.

[denverbill]

6. Well, this will certainly advance the liberal secessionist cause.

I seriously don't think I can live in the same country with these nut-fucks anymore.

[dethl]

7. These guys are f*ckin nuts...

They want to seperate school from government so they can use school to brainwash children with religion.

[lovedems]

8. For those who pay attention to my posts, I have fundie in-laws

My mother, father and 3 sister in-laws are fundie to the max. One of my sister in-laws has taken her kids out of public school and the one who is kindergarden age told me that he can't go to school, "because Jesus isn't allowed there".

Have I ever mentioned how ignorant those kids are? Not just in their studies but socially as well. They aren't well rounded and if you talk to them for 3 minutes their strangeness/lack of diversity/lack of appropriate education leaps out at you.

[trogdor]

11. And yet...

...one of them usually wins the National Spelling Bee, and they all start crowing and cackling about what a superior education homeschooled children receive.

Balderdash.

Anyway, they already have the right to pull their kids out of school. What more do they want? Oh yeah, the right not to pay school taxes. Well, screw 'em. If they don't want to be part of society, they can take over South Carolina like this other group wants to do and secede, leaving the rest of us alone.

[Bill McBlueState]

35. it's funny about the nat'l spelling bee

I see no evidence that being able to spell a lot of obscure words is a sign of a good education, yet this always gets trumpeted as proof that homeschooling works better. The reason homeschoolers do well in the spelling bee is that they have much more leeway than traditionally educated students to focus heavily on one particular skill.

That's not to say that all homeschooled kids are good at spelling and bad at everything else, but the environment is conducive to this if the parents decide they want to raise a spelling champion.

[Bill McBlueState]

9. pervs

Underlying the goal of the Alliance to help rebuild solid families, Fritz revealed on www.SepCon.org -- http://www.SepCon.org -- why he chose the Omni Shoreham: "It's the only convention hotel around Washington that doesn't rent adult movies. We're taking a stand against hotels that are just porn shops built to look like a hotel."

Who are these people who can't stay in a hotel that rents adult movies? If you don't want to watch them, don't rent them.

Only someone who's really into porn would describe hotels that rent adult movies as "porn shops built to look like a hotel."

[belle]

32. Really. Shows what *they're* thinking about. Who even pays attention to

shit like that if they aren't already obsessed? It's not like you can watch those movies unless you specifically *ask* for them, yeah?

[Bill McBlueState]

10. re-write!

The guy says,

"When textbook and teacher contradict what mom and dad are teaching at home about human origins, purpose, and destiny, it gives children the anti-education of today's typical 'public school.'"

More like,

When the textbook and the teacher contradict what mom and dad are teaching at home about human origins, purpose, and destiny, it means mom and dad don't know what they're talking about. Maybe when mom and dad get the right credentials to teach science, they can take over the teacher's job.

[AmandaRuth]

12. not more than a week to get SS and public schools

right on the bullseye.

[Xipe Totec]

13. My rights are being trampled!"

Calvin: "I'm being educated against my will! My rights are being trampled!"

Hobbes: "Is it a right to remain ignorant?"

Calvin: "I don't know, but I refuse to find out!"

- Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat p41

[daleo]

14. To his kind I say "GTFO"

That shouldn't be hard to decipher.

[callous taoboy]

15. This'll go over like a lead zeppelin:

I live and teach in a very fundie town, and one fundie I spoke with about our state mandated "moment of silence" each morning said that she did not like it. She said that real Christians don't foist religion on others, that religion is a private, not state, matter.

If the Falwells of the U.S. try to implement this it will be slayed from every quarter.

[truthpusher]

16. The Key is: 'real Christians' are we dealing w/ real Christians here?

[Straight Shooter]

17. Ha ha. Good one, truthpusher.

With Falwell at the helm?

Ha ha.

[callous taoboy]

20. Zealots. It's all the rage these days.

[Dogmudgeon]

18. It's just a Lifestyle Christian power-grab

These same people fought hammer-and-tong against the Free Schools of the late 1960s and early 1970s. They have shut down hundreds of Summerhill-style schools over the years, as well as Montessori schools before WWII.

It's a power grab. As soon as non-"Christians" start having success with their own schools, you can bet that they will all be in favor of Big Gummint establishing "standards" that must be "rigorously enforced."

Beware of Lifestyle Christians when they talk about "liberation"!

--bkl

[belle]

34. Also, it's about power *over their own kids.* which tends to get overlooke

What really freaks these people out about the whole idea of public school is that it means that the little darlings might learn that Mommy and Daddy aren't supposed to beat the shit out of them every time they disagree with them, or even if Mommy and Daddy just feel like it. If they keep them at home, they'll *really* never have a chance to escape, even for part of the day...

[blackspade]

19. these guys suck

"Most fall into the postmodernist trap of believing there are no moral absolutes and that decisions should be governed by feelings rather than moral principles."

And moral principles are not feelings?
Where are my kids supposed to go to school?
these guys are idiots.

[reprobate]

21. Remember, in the land of the blind the one eyed man is king.

I haven't been a Rand fan since teen agehood, but this seems a perfect example of Atlas Shrugged.

As they get more power the religous right will make their offspring less and less able to cope with life, turning everything over to the few educated that are left.

[AG78]

22. I enjoy this line the most

"Confusion stops children from even wanting to understand reality"

I thought it was the opposite of that, but I'm in that "reality-based community", so...

But I do have some problems with government run schools. Maybe it's changed, but when I was in school(only 26 now), they taught us that America was great, Columbus was great, and we didn't learn a damn thing about what we've actually done around the world. Outside of winning WW2, and ending that evil thing called communism.

But that doesn't mean I'd turn teaching over to religion.

[truthpusher]

24. amazingly fucked up isn't it?

[one_true_leroy]

25. so, by this arguement,...

if Mom and Dad are dead wrong and ignorant to boot, we shouldn't confuse Jr with the truth. WOW!!!!

[blm]

23. GOOD! This kind of stuff is Bush's just desserts. Let's help promote the

event and get the media to cover it.

Let the country know the inmates are running the asylum.

Watch David Brooks, Tucker, et al, trip over themselves saying these nuts represent one small part of the party.

[Redleg]

26. Yeah, parents always know better than trained teachers how to educate

their kids. Even parents with minimal education and who are ignorant Fox News watching "Moran Americans." We will produce a whole new crop of ignorant Americans if we allow parents to control every aspect of education.

Say goodbye to the social sciences, say goodbye to the decadent arts and liberal studies. Say goodbye to science texts discussing global warming and evolution and any other topic the right-wingers don't want or that corporations think you don't need. Welcome to schools with mandatory religion classes and prayer.

I feel that parents do have a role in public education I think many have gone too far in doing what they are doing.

[thinkingwoman]

27. Done. Done. And done.

"Say goodbye to the social sciences, say goodbye to the decadent arts and liberal studies. Say goodbye to science texts discussing global warming and evolution and any other topic the right-wingers don't want or that corporations think you don't need."

Public schools in rural areas already have.

[Redleg]

28. See, it's happening already!

As a college professor in a southern Red State, I am really looking forward to the students I will be getting in the future. I may as well give up on expecting critical thinking.

[thinkingwoman]

29. I would if I were you...

The situation in public schools in my area is unbelievable.

[acmavm]

36. I think you'd better give up on any kind of 'thinking' whatsoever. Except

the maybe something resembling the good ol' boys in Deliverance.

[Fleshdancer]

30. Let's give our children less education and a ton of debt!

Great moral values. :grr:

[iconoclastic cat]

31. Fine. Let them go.

They should take their kids out ASAP. Let the fundie freaks breed in private, create walled compounds, and wallow in their own ignorance.

[truthpusher]

37. agreed