Why were so many of the people that reject the facts of science to accept the dumbass beliefs of ID and other form of creationism raised as religious believers? Do you really think the constant attacks on critical thinking that a child experiences have no effect on them as adults? Why do think so many religious people want ID taught in school?
Why do so many adults follow the religious beliefs that they were raised with?
I guess non-physical abuse doesn’t matter to you?
See, as long as William Strunk, Jr. gets to head up the thought police, everything’s hunky dory. Put tdn in charge, though, and I predict that WSJ will suddenly have a change of heart about the whole idea.
Funny how people disagree about what constitutes an “unproveable falsehood.”
It I ever say that I could prove that God does not exist? I can’t.
I don’t think that atheist should be able to teach their children that it is a fact that God does not exist as a fact anymore than a theist should be teach their child that God does exist as a fact.
Should say:
Did I ever say that I could prove that God does not exist?
:rolleyes:
Testing kids beliefs and making them narc on their parents sounds about as big brother as it can get, assuming that’s what “fascist” is meant to mean here. Given that something like 90% (last I saw) of the U.S. population have some sort of religious beliefs I doubt such measures could be implemented by any government short of a dictatorship.
Because if they had the evidence to support their belief about an objective fact about about the world they would be able to present it.
You’ve changed your position: if your point was that ALL of such teachings should be outlawed (still an indefensible position IMO) then you would have phrased your OP in a totally different manner. The topic YOU started specifically addressed preventing religious teachings and totally omitted your own position. The only reason you’re agreeing to this now is because you were called out on it and it’s the only way to save half your argument
Omitted my own position? Which is?
(By the way I am a not an atheist)
The reason I addressed my post to religious (non-atheist) beliefs is because they seem to be the bigger problem. If you want to expand the discussion, we can.
No. But there is an established legal test, a method, to sort of such competing imperatives.
If a government regulation (“Don’t beat your kids”) imposes a restriction on the exercise of religion (“I must beat these demons out of my kid!”) then we must first examine the law to determine if the impact on religion is incidental or targeted. If the law is neutral towards religion, merely a law of general applicability which happens to impact some instance of a particular religious practice, then religious belief generally does not permit a person to disobey such a generally applicable law. As the Supreme Court says, “We have never held that an individual’s religious beliefs excuse him from compliance with an otherwise valid law prohibiting conduct that the State is free to regulate.” This has been shown in Supreme Court decisions relating to the practice of polygamy (Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S. 145 (1879)); child-labor laws (Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158 (1944)); the military draft (Gillette v. United States, 401 U.S. 437, 461 (1971)); and participation in the Social Security system (United States v. Lee, 455 U.S. 252 (1982) ).
The scheme you propose is NOT a “neutral law of general applicability.” It is a law that would specifically target religious teaching and practice. It would be forbidden by the First Amendment, even though a law forbidding beating children would not be.
Get it?
By the way title is “Is teaching faith-based beliefs as fact child abuse?” which would include hard atheist beliefs.
I guess should have included an atheist belief in the examples, but again I just don’t see them as much of a problem in this country. (They were probably a bigger deal in the USSR and perhaps some other countries in the world right now.)
all of which gets back to my original post on provable harm being done to the child irrespective of the basis for the teachings.
and
sorry assumed that was the case; still, my point stands that the post was not originally a balanced message.
So just write a law that prevents parents from teaching in a systematic matter (excludes one time comments) to their children as fact things for which there is not evidence to support. This would include theist beliefs, atheist bleiefs, and any other unsupported beliefs.
And of course parents could still teach about these things. They just cannot pretend they are supported facts.
They would also be prevented from lying to their children about facts that are supported. They couldn’t claim that evolution is all a lie no matter what their reason is.
Atheism is not faith-based anymore than are not believing in telepathy, the Loch Ness Monster, or ghosts.
So you believe it takes faith to be a strong athiest?
How’s about you take a crack at it first? I’m sure some of the legal eagles here on the SDMB would be more than happy to proofread it for you.
Yes, but only a tiny amount faith. It takes the same amount of faith to believe that Yahweh absolutely does not exist as it does to believe that Zeus absolutely does not exist.
When an atheist tells there children that that God (in whatever form) does not exist, they should give the caveat it possible, if extremely unlikely.
Do I also need to include a caveat about monsters under the bed?
After all, I can’t be absolutely sure that there’s not an invisible imp under there.
Would I be breaking the law if I said “Don’t worry, honey, there’s no such thing as monsters.”?
Would that be sufficient grounds for having my children taken away from me and put in foster care?
Yes.
The parents could also teach about the latest concepts in theoretical physics, too. But since the math will probably be beyond the understanding of the average parent (as well as the child), they just have to “take it on faith” that the scientists who came up with the formulas and conclusions are correct.
Eventually, if a child is allowed to go out of the house (school, play with friends), they inevitably will be exposed to other theories. And, eventually, they will come to make up their own minds on these topics.
Now, in a David Keresh (which I think was in Waco, TX.) type scenario, you might have a point that the kids are being raised in an isolated enviorment that inhibits their ability to function in the larger society as productive adults. Then I might see some form of governmental intervention required.
But despite all the drama, it appears that the Waco style of extremists are not the norm among our religious adherents in the US.
Well, despite nearly 5 and a half years of “The War on Terror”, here in the US, there has been discovered only a handful individuals willing to go this far in the name of religion.
Therefore, in my humble opinion, this is not a problem that cries out for a solution, speaking solely within the confines of the US.
Feel free to spread the “atheistic word” in other parts of the world where this issue may be more widespread.
So, you think that you are better qualified to raise their kid than the birth parents, solely because you’re smarter or better looking?
The default assumption must absolutely be that, until proven otherwise, that the bio-parent is fit to be that parent, with all the rights and privileges that you would expect to come with that role.
If you mean physical abuse type of beating (as opposed to spanking), that is because that is much easier to prove as abuse to an outside observer. (A juror, for example.)
I also disagree that teaching your child that god gave moses some tablets with god’s laws written on them is the equivalant of hitting them with a baseball bat.
You have not convinced me that religion, as a concept, is an intolerable danger to society.
You can convince me that there are individuals jusifying their bad actions with religion. And some of those are even sincere about those reasons (as opposed to using religion as an rationalisation).
But in the US, the vast majority of religious folks are about as law abiding as can be expected from a population sample based on any other subset.
If you have evidence that absolutely proves that god does not exist, I suspect that you could become rich and famous.
Otherwise, we what we really have here is just two different opinions, and since they are the bio-parents, they trump you when it comes to raising their kids.
“Stay out of my bedroom! Oh, wait. Go into his, I think he is teaching his kid that Jesus walked on water…” You really see no irony here?
And yet abortion remains legal, even though most people of faith consider it to be murder. Interesting claim.