MarkMC

Not sure about the intelligence levels, but they are all well lacking in Common Sense though

MTPockets

Yeah I know - it turned far too sensible.

How about discussing other annoying things like withheld numbers, jeremy kyle, being stuck between very fat fidgety people on long haul flights, noisy eating, vocal anti smoking ex-smokers, oz media and adverts and the word fallacious...

Burbage

Book learning is not intelligence.

Are you arguing that an absence of brainwashing is brainwashing? That certainly seems fallacious.

hereshoping

I'd say most racists are brainwashed as children, by their parents, society etc...

Anyway that's not the discussion. I'm an atheist who (for the next week or so) teaches in a catholic school and I firmly believe that religion has no place in education. You may well ask why I've been teaching in a religious school then (and my atheist husband also is), well basically because such a large proportion of the schools in Melbourne have a religious affiliation and we needed work- We don't like it but there you go.

I'd agree with the earlier poster who said that about 5% of the time in a religious school is spent on that religion- but I find this far too much. They could be using that time much more productively. Imagine if we spent 1/20 of the school time on Cinderella or some other fairly tale. I also find it insulting that despite my excellent qualifications and experience teachers in catholic schools have to get 'accredited' to teach there by studying the religion. And there is of course a glass ceiling on promotions of non-catholics.

What does this teach students? That religion is more important than competence. That the only moral code to subscribe to is one set out in an old book that contradicts itself and has no bearing on the moral code.

It doesn't surprise me that people object to Islamic schools, it surprises me that people DON'T object to all the catholic schools.

22B

What about the other two examples I gave? Or did you not understand?

No, I argued that Pa taught us that religion is for weak people who need a crutch to get through life. That is just as much religious instruction as another 5yr old who can recite "Jesus died on the cross", or whatever. Point is, no uninfluenced free thought.

Anyway, I shouldn't be posting as I have had a few too many putting up my Christmas tree

rabsody

Yeah I do agree with that and find it hard sometimes to bite my tongue in front of my kids when it comes to religion but I know that I am indoctrinating them in the same way as the religious types.

Best time to post. I had a whale of a time about two weeks ago reading back my posts the day after a christmas party

So, 22B, while you have a few under your belt it would be rude not to ask what else gets on your nerves?!!!

Burbage

Brainwashing children isn't the problem. Brainwashing children is actually required. Children are required to learn things that they cannot test for themselves.

Brainwashing them with NONSENSE is the problem.

Other two examples? 15-1: memory. The vast majority of academic qualifications: memory. Neither of these is a sign of intelligence. Considerable capacity for retention of information, yes. Ability to accurately recall said information yes. But not intelligence. Intelligence is the capacity for manipulating information, not for regurgitating it.

Anyway this discussion has nothing to do with racism. Islam is not a race, it's a religion.

The O'Neills

Okey dokey.

I am the practising CATHOLIC with two children at a CATHOLIC school where I work.

One thing the Catholic faith teaches the children of our school is tolerance and understanding and forgiveness. Some of you might be surprised to hear that our class is actually visiting a Mosque soon!!!!! I'm hoping that we won't burn or be converted or have a fatwa placed on us, but I guess I will just have to cross my fingers on that one.

I honestly can't believe what I have read here today, I thought I had heard it all when it came to objections towards religious education, but obviously I was completely wrong. By some peoples standards we shouldn't teach creative writing, or art because it is non factual and encourages the kids to use their imaginations! Non of our children are stupid, they are already questioning the existence of God at 8 years old. What we do as parents is give them the freedom to believe, NOT ram it down their throats that religion is nonsense. As I have explained already, My siblings and my husbands siblings have all given up the church, but that makes absolutely no difference to us. Neither will it when our children stop attending church as teenagers (more than likely this will happen).

How many of you tell your kids that Santa brings them presents, or the tooth fairy left them a penny?

You talk about prejudice?

The definition of the word Prejudice is . . . "an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason."

When was the last time any of you was at a regular sunday church service? You won't hear any mention of hellfire and damnation. What you hear is 'Help your neighbors, forgive each other and love each other'

If that doesn't promote a sense of community then i'm stumped as to what does - certainly not an attack on an institution that you neither know nor understand.

It is no wonder to me that the world is in dire straights. Maybe if a little MORE religion was taught in schools, we wouldn't have the intolerance which is tearing countries, cities, towns, villages and families apart.

I understand that a lot of people feel threatened by religion, otherwise why the overwhelming reaction to the mention of religious schools? I am sorry for them!

NOTE: Our school is only 20% state funded.

I used the phrase morals of the church, not Church. i.e. universally accepted morals based on God's commandments. The same morals that atheists and agnostics use to bring up their children - I hope.

This argument was apparently based on prejudice, but for some reason it has developed into an attack on faith. A whole different subject surely? - or is it? Isn't our prejudice based largely on faith? After all, how many of you have friends from Pakistan or Indonesia who don't practice their faith, so they're ok?

What a croc.

22B

Well, I'm not drunkard anymore, but I am grumpy from being woken at 4:30 by DS, so at this moment in time......... EVERYTHING is getting on my nerves!!

Btw - can anyone advise on how to get a 2yr old to take himself to the loo at 4am?

bcworld

My issue with the 'morals of the church', with a capital c or otherwise is the implication that the church or believers have a monopoly on such values. When in fact the actions you mention are those which most decent human beings would aspire to, with or without the church's influence.

Universally accepted - I agree with that as I said above. However I would say, '.....God's commandments based on universally accepted morals.' Or at least they were universally accepted when the commandments were penned by their authors.

rabsody

Just let him wet the bed maybe?

rabsody

I would so agree with this. I am studying at the mo and generally get high distinctions for my assignments. However when it comes to exams and having to retain and recall large amounts of detailed information I fall down badly (despite plenty of revision). It's affecting my results.

Burbage

Tolerance, understanding and forgiveness: three well known attributes of the Spanish Inquisition.

As for visiting a mosque, this is of course all about visting people who are equally brainwashed. If you school wants I'll come and give the kids a talk on reality. I await the invitation with relish.
That is because your capacity to question your own religion was brainwashed out of you as a child. You were told to accept things and not question them. This is a dangerous thing to teach children in a world containing so much disinformation. It also makes you easy victims of politicians and advertisers, and others who wish to propagate lies for their own self-interest.

If catholic schools taught critical thinking, which is urgently required for children's education in our modern world, then those children might question such things as:

If Matthew and Luke traced Jesus' lineage through Joseph, then did they believe in the virgin birth?

Is a god who condemns a man and his wife and all their descendents to suffering for ever and in perpetuity for eating an apple really a forgiving god? Are these not, in fact, the actions of a vindictive bastard?

God kills millions of people in the bible and the devil kills seven. Who should I take my chances with?

Etc etc. The bible is so full of holes that in order for people to accept it they MUST be brainwashed.



There is no problem teaching children nonsense as long as they are clearly told that it is nonsense. You don't believe in Santa any more, but there was a time that you did.

Luckily your children live in a society that doesn't kill people who turn their back on religion. Let's all be thankful for that.

Quite a few, I imagine, but they don't expect them to believe it for ever.

Believe me, I know more about christianity than you could shake a stick at.

It's perfectly possible to help your neighbours without having to believe that a woman talked to a snake and got her husband to eat an apple (or a fig, in fact, in the original text) as a result.

Your assumption that I don't know or understand christianity, or the catholic sect, is a little prejudiced. In fact you probably understand less of it than I do, since you have been told not to question what you have been told. Your veiled assumption that, because I don't go to church, I don't have a sense of community is, frankly, insulting. Umans are social animals by instinct, not because of some religious organisation.

"straits"

Maybe if a little less was taught then there wouldn't be quite so many of those neighbour-loving suicide bombers around. The only reason the catholic church isn't still burning heretics and witches is because of the reformation, the enlightenment and the industrial revolution. Without them we would still be at its mercy. Let us be grateful that human intellect won over ignorance. Obviously the church has had to change. But it would love to go back.

I don't feel threatened by religious schools any more than I feel threatened by paedophiles. But I think that children would be better off without them.

Well, apart from the first four. Basic rules that I'm sure society required for its function even before Moses wrote the ten commandments. You do know, by the way, that the ten comandments have been edited by the catholic church?

I have no problem with religion. It's nonsense, and can often be harmless nonsense, and if it makes people happy then why should they not follow it. Certainly there are worse things in the world. But children should not be brainwashed with it. If you want to brainwash them leave it until they are adult. The reason religion won't do this is because children are so easy to brainwash. Why do you think that Hitler came up with the Hitler youth? Children can be made to believe anything and they will often believe it for the rest of their lives.

That's what your parents should have said to the man in the white collar when you were five, then you might have had chance.

Cheetah7

I went to a strict Catholic school - I wasnt baptised but got in because my sister was.

The priest would come round my house a couple of times a week and tell me that 'there was not enough room in the Kingdom of God for children that were not baptised and I would go to Childrens limbo'

That made me cry, I was only eleven and couldnt understand how the guy in the year above me who raped his sister and got her pregnant, went to confession and was forgiven yet I was going to Childrens Limbo as I wasnt baptised.

What a crock of shit, you DO NOT tell kids they are going to limbo because they are not baptised.

I was bullied by the nuns and the priest, and the brainwashing about abortion and a womans right (or lack of) to choose as to whether or not she wants to continue with a pregancay - was not appropriate for 11 year olds.

I HATE the catholic religion now, brainwashing and scaring children by telling them what will happen if they are not baptised is out of order.

IMO it was a case of teaching by fear and inventing threats of what would happen if you didnt believe.

The comedian Peter Kay said he was shown graphic abortion videos by the nuns at his school when he was a kid to force him to adopt their beliefs.

Young minds are fragile and inventing such crap when there is no evidence is dangerous.

I still feel sick when I remember Father John coming round my house to bully my Mum into getting my baptised.

I believe in God but not religion and I certainly do not believe in Childrens limbo.

hereshoping

You seem to be mixing up morality and religion. The church does not have a monopoly on morality (in fact exactly the oposite i would say, looking at it from a historical perspective)

However I do not hate religion, or religious people. I just believe that it has no place in education. If parents want to have their children brought up in a faith (any faith) or not that is their choice. But why should schools play a part in this. School is for preparing them for life, religion is not.

It doesn't actually surprise me that your school is visiting a mosque, most religious schools now make a big deal out of their tolerance of other faiths- though stragely always neglect to mention the huge portion of society with no faith. Nor do I feel even remotely threatened by religion - I do however feel sorry for children who are exposed to such myths every single day, are not exposed to alternate viewpoints or moral codes and are not taught to question the information they are given. In short I feel sorry for the poor education children at religious schools get.