Nicely articulated, Dio. I’m also perplexed by the OP’s concern about Ben Stein’s statement per se. Evolution has always divorced itself from abiogenesis because its theories do not address the emergence of life from non-life. That’s what Stein seemed to be talking about to me.
Section 29 of the Charter:
I’m not sufficiently versed in prior constitutional legislation to track down what exactly they lay out. Certainly there’s nothing mandating separate school systems as several provinces don’t have them.
You say that as if the kids get any choice at all as to what school their parents pay for, and send them too. They can’t help it if their parents enroll them in a Catholic school.
I went to a Catholic school and we definitely learned about evolution. However, to be 100% honest to this day I don’t view evolution as being the basic foundation of a sound education in biology. Do I think that someone can be educated in the field of biology without being educated in the theory of evolution? No, I do not.
But I have said many times on these forums in response to claims by people that evolution is the fundamental concept in biology that it is my belief that the cell (and the molecule) is the fundamental concept in biology and understanding how millions upon millions of cells work together as an organism is the fundamental underpinning of biology. Evolution is essential in understanding how these organisms (grouped into species) change over generations, how natural selection works.
In my high school there was a relatively brief section on Darwin, his discoveries, and evolution. But the bulk of the biology education I receive focused on anatomy and cellular-level biology. I don’t doubt that you need to learn more about the theory of evolution if you become a bio major at college, but I think at the High School level anatomy and cell biology are rightfully taught as the bulk of biology courses.
To be honest, that is most of my problem.
I think education should be secular for that very reason.
Some Googling seems to indicate that Section 93 of the Constitution Act, 1867 is still in force in Ontario, which mandates a separate Catholic school system(in Ontario – Quebec was previously mandated to provide both Protestant and Catholic schools, for instance).
I’m not a practicing, or even caring, Christian, no, but I do see regular occurances of Christian high school students teased and excluded because of their beliefs. I don’t think by any means that there’s some sort of organized conspiracy or anything, like I imagine Ben Stein sees, but I do see regular name-calling and snobbery towards Christians. Hell, I see it on this board. Guess it depends on the definition of persecuted.
No biggie, just curious.
I’m going to put this in as a nitpick - because the way things are schools will err on the side of overreaction and fail to adequately teach their students.
Students need to be taught about religion, and that education should go so far as to introduce them to the Bible, the Koran, other religious texts, the structure of religious groups, and the history of religious movements. Covering this in the course of cultures, history and civics classes is appropriate.
So long as there is no indoctrination into a particular faith, there is no constitutional issue here.
That was definitely the case at one time, but not so much anymore. Where I live (Montgomery AL) any family that can afford it and many who can’t, white and black and otherwise, send their kids to private school strictly because the quality of education is better and the schools are less violent and with nicer facilities, and even the most expensive and elite private schools are integrated well above the “token minority” level.
Of course the “segregation academies” have a place in the direct ancestry of “public schools that suck” as they made middle class parents generally stop caring about or getting involved with public schools.
From what I’ve noticed, in “good ol’ Philadelphia,” Catholic schools are chosen as a convenient way for parents to avoid having their children exposed to “undesirable elements” (read: minorities).
Now that’s not true for everyone who makes that decision, any more than it is true for every southern family that sends their child to “Christian” school.
I too wonder what the hell happened to Ben Stein, and agree he is too smart to belive that shit- or believing it shows he’s not as smart as he thinks.
Apologies for the hijack, but… according to Wiki, Stein was born to Jewish parents. [No surprise there.] It doesn’t say anything about his own religious convictions, or if he has any.
Usually, the people associated with opposing the teaching of evolution are fundamentalist or evangelical Christians. I’ve always assumed that secular and Reform Jews are generally pro-Darwin, but what of the Orthodox and Conservative branches? If they aren’t creationist, why not, given that the story of creation kicks off the Old Testament?
I suppose that even if creationism is part of the Orthodox creed of core beliefs, Orthodox Jews aren’t visibly a part of the public policy debate because their children mostly attend parochial schools [schuls?] anyway.
Does anybody know if Ben Stein arrived at a creationist postion through his general conservatism and ties to Christian right-wingers, or if he was always creationist, from Jewish education or teachings from his youth, or if he independently arrived at this from study and reflection?
I suspect that most of the kids you see picking on Christians are Christians themselves. I also suspect that the teasing has more to do with the behavior and attitudes of a certain kind of Christian than with “beliefs,” per se.
There were similar stunts when the Trinity Broadcasting Network produced and released The Omega Code (starring master thespian Casper Van Dien). Churches were asked to buy blocks of tickets whether the people attended or not and were offered rebates. Consequently it opened huge and then petered out, grossing about $12 million+ domestic and less than $70,000 internationally and turning a considerable profit.
Even Fundies have their limits though. Its sequel cost $22 million and grossed less than 1/3 of that, and the Clan Crouch and TBN that produced both were sued several times for plagiarism, unshared profits, violating SAG regulations (they used SAG actors and agreed to honor certain guidelines but then broke them- at one point anyone who wanted to be an extra only had to show up in military gear [“Wood productions- the mark of quality!”]) and other matters that probably reduced its take even further.
No idea how long the ID thing’s been going on, but he’s been a major anti-abortion activist and lecturer for many years (long before his game show notoriety). I stopped liking him in 2000 when he responded to questions about why he supported Bush by saying “because he’s a very good person”. (All that legal education and political insight and that’s the best you can come up with?)
From wiki (but with cites for its claims):
Blaming Darwin for genocide is about like blaming Eli Whitney for the Civil War, but c’est la vie.
I know Stein is a 12-stepper and a big “higher power” buff. I think that plays into his emotional investment in believing in a Bible God but I don’t know when or why the creationist bent popped up.
Hey! The man has a wonderful and joy-inspiring talent, or at least what I’m going to call talent in this thread.
You can see his beautifully shaped and muscled talent in the shower scene of Starship Troopers, if you’re curious…
Even if it did inspire the Holocaust, that doens’t mean its not true- Ben thinks belieiving its not true is going to rewrite history? Has he offered any reasons why he thinks the science of it is incorrect?
Oh, oh my no. It’s entirely about beliefs, on not participating in certain activities or sports because of timing conflicts (lots of kids go to church classes before or after school), of not participating in drug use or sex…it’s not Christian on Christian abuse, it’s non-believers on believers abuse. Like I said, it’s not an organized thing, it’s kids being kids more than anything else, but do not try to blow it off as if it doesn’t exist or fit a certain world-view.
Maybe he figures the ideas are dangerous enough that it doesn’t matter if it’s true or not?