Then there’s the part where only this one person is given the assignment, which is hard to imagine if multiple students performed the same action, refusing to sign, that prompted the assignment.
At any rate, the OP also contains a link to the film trailer and plot summary, both of which make the scenario very clear.
Can God give me back the three minutes I spent watching that stupid trailer?
In the decision by the U. S. Supreme Court *West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnett, *I found this passasge in the prevailing opinion:
“…forcing one to state what is not on his mind…”
The Justices deplored such a concept, as out of harmony with the freedoms of the Bill of Rights.
Heck, then why is reciting the pledge of allegiance a common practice for schoolkids too young to really grasp the concepts of “republic”, “liberty” or “justice” (or “God”, I guess).
Can you post the link for the decision? (I assume you must have it to hand.)
Because I really do not see how education could be accomplished without violating that phrase. I’d like to see it in context.
No, it is not hard to imagine one student being given an assignment. It is not hard to imagine several students refusing to do something, but only one arguing strongly against it. You keep adding assumptions that support your position.
And I never pretended to be discussion the film or the trailer, only the original post and the requirement to write a phrase on a piece of paper. I think it would be an interesting way to start a class in many disciplines.
And I am beginning to think that failing someone for refusing to construct a cogent argument in defense of a position, especially an argument that does not assume facts not in evidence, is a perfectly reasonable act.
FWIW, in North Carolina the law specifically says that the law cannot be used to compel a child to say the pledge. I always begin the school year by letting kids know that one of the freedoms protected in our country is the freedom NOT to say the pledge, and give them guidelines for what to do if they decline to say the pledge, and guidelines for other students if someone opts out. I generally have one or two kids who opt out for at least some of the time.
Yes, requiring one student to argue for God’s existence or else fail the class, while not requiring the other students to argue that “God is dead,” is an excellent pedagogical technique, especially in a philosophy class. :rolleyes
If you ask a person to write down a statement, absent any other commentary, the natural assumption is you are asking the person to endorse the statement.
As to the court case you can probably find more info here: West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette - Wikipedia
Requiring someone to support an argument without relying on assumptions that have not been stipulated in advance most certainly is reasonable.
Rolling one’s eyes is not an argument.
Well, you added the assumption that other students also refused, which is nowhere in the OP, and you’re now adding the assumption that the student who got the assignment “argued strongly against” writing “God is dead”, as opposed to merely refusing like these other students allegedly did, which is actually contradicted by the OP:
Bolding mine. It’s not me that’s adding assumptions to support his position.
The film is part of the original post, as is the other aspects you’re refusing to address. You’re discussing some third thing, not the film and not the OP.
Maybe, but that’s not what happened in the scenario under discussion. Again, you’re discussing some scenario of your own creation. Which is fine, but you need to state your scenario, since it’s not the one in the OP.
Literally demanding that a student renounce his or her religion would definitely get a professor in trouble, particularly in a state school. But only a professor who is crazy who do such a thing.
I can envision a professor asking students to write “God is dead” on a piece of paper for other reasons—such as to kick off some kind of philosophical, moral, or ethical exploration—but not in the manner apparently depicted in this movie.
Thank you. I was beginning to wonder how some posters could ignore so much of the OP(and the link provided in the OP) to twist the situation from an obvious singling out of one student for his religious beliefs to some sort of high-minded exercise to facilitate a philosophical discussion.
Well, a high-minded exercise is a possible scenario under which actions vaguely similar to those in the trailer might occur. It’s fairly obvious that this isn’t the intent of the film.
I haven’t seen the movie (and don’t want to), and I haven’t seen the trailer. But I’m willing to bet this movie is a fictionalized version of an incident that happened last Spring and got a fair amount of publicity in fundamentalist Christian circles.
It involved an African-American instructor named DeAndre Poole, at Florida Atlantic University. By most accounts, he started off a class by asking his students to write the word “JESUS” on a piece of paper and then step/stomp on that piece of paper.
Most students willingly did it. Some adamantly refused, and one or two made a big stink about the incident.
I haven’t researched the incident enough to know exactly what the class was about or what lesson Mr. Poole wished to impart. But Mr. Poole says (and I believe him) that he himself is a faithful Christian.
Meaning… what? Perhaps he meant this exercise as an experiment of sorts? To see how many students would willingly do something offensive just because a teacher told them to? To see how many people refused to follow orders, and why? To kick off a debate over what people consider blasphemous? To start a discussion about if or where lines should be drawn regarding free expression?
It could have been any of thsoe thigns or something else. Regardless, the exercise didn’t go over well. Perhaps Mr. Poole handled it badly, or perhaps some of the Christian students were too sensitive.
Regardless, the professor who (probably) inspired this movie was NOT an atheist, and he says his purpose was NOT to mock or insult God.
Now, if I’d been a 19 year old in his class, and he told me to do that, I would have refused… but instead of walking out immediately and complaining, I’d have assumed the professor ahd some kind of point to make, and would have waited to see what that point was before storming out.
This is reaching Brazil84 levels of uselessness.
Not to be accused of quibbling again* but rolling one’s eyes most definitely is an argument. It is one way to express a premise of an argument. Is it a good argument? Possibly not. But it is not clear that good arguments are the order of the day in this conversation.
But that is not what I said is unreasonable, and it is not what is being discussed in this thread. What I said is unreasonable is making that requirement of just one student, while not requiring it of other students. No student who wrote the line was required to argue for the claim “God is dead” (even though the claim relied, btw, as you put it, on assumptions not stipulated in advance). But this student was required to argue for such a claim. That is not reasonable in almost any imagineable context. It is even harder to imagine it reasonable in the context of a philosophy course. It is certainly not reasonable as presented in the OP.
It’s not good discussion, and it’s not good pedagogy. In fact it borders on unethical. Speaking as a teacher of philosophy, I would insist that it is never pedagogically sound, and very often ethically questionable, to “go for the jugular” against a student’s dearly held beliefs in the way that is presented here.
It’s not, the movie started filming in November 2012, the FAU stomp-on-Jesus affair was in March of 2013.
An interesting educational exercise would be to point out that the professor is shifting the burden of proof. He apparently wants to allege that God is dead. It is up to him to provide the evidence of this.
IOW “Here is an assertion - prove it’s wrong or flunk” is not how it works. “Here is an assertion - here is the evidence - prove that you understand it or flunk” is how it works, at least as long as it is not directed just at one student.
We saw the trailer before seeing the Son of God movie on Saturday. I think I can wait for it to come out on DVD.
Regards,
Shodan
Okay, my theory was plausible and logical but wrong.
Since I lost the bet, let me know what chairty you want me to send a buck to.
According to this Forbes article, it was the opener to a discussion on why students would refuse to do it, to be then widened into a lecture on symbols and their role in society. And nobody was *forced *to do it.
The professor was immediately suspended after a Mormon kid raised a fuss*, then reinstated. As should be.
Precisely. But evidently religious outrage trumps thought.
If I may offer what I think is a needed clarification:
The student named Ryan Rotela was suspended, not the professor, though there seems to have been some dispute over whether or not it was an actual suspension. I gather one could hair-split an argument either way, but Rotela was allowed back in the class in any event.
The pledge of allegiance goes back to 1892; it was wrtitten by a man named Francis Bellamy for a magazine named Youth’s Companion, and was part of a celebration of Columbus Day. By the late 1930s it had become hide-bound tradition and–strangely enough–used a salute with the right arm extended forward and upward–what we now call the fascist salute. Because of the similarity, the hand-over-the-heart posture was substituted at that time.
Mr. Bellamy may not have meant for schoolkids to recite it, but that’s how it was received. The high court removed its unofficial sanction.