General apology and explanation.

[velvetpage]

I realize I've raised a lot of hackles with that last post. I'm not taking it down or changing it in any way; it is what it is and it's staying. That said, I feel I need to explain it just a little.

I do not agree with the worldview I explained in one quote. If this type of school were available to me, I would not teach in it or send my kids to it. It's not what I want for my family or myself.

I proposed an idea. I didn't feel all that strongly about it myself; if something similar were proposed in my region, where it would affect me, I would consider it and judge it at that time. I don't want to dismiss it, however, because I'm a bit of an idealist. I want people to get along. I want people to make democracy work in such a way as to maximize the number of people who feel represented in it. I don't like "us and them" polarizations, and I feel that most of the time, they're not necessary unless and until one side makes them necessary. That has happened with the Christian Right in the States. It has not happened to anywhere near the same extent in Canada, which makes this suggestion potentially viable for where I live. I don't see the point of spending billions on an education system, only to have a huge segment of the population feel it is not meeting their needs; as a teacher, my job is to do my utmost to meet the needs to my students, and I feel the need to attempt that politically, as well.

I'm sorry if I upset anyone. I do hope, though, that if I upset you, you'll be able to separate the ideas from the person. This was a debate. It was about ideas. It was not, ever, about any individual, not even myself.

Comments

[dagoski.livejournal.com]

There's no need to apologize in my opinion. I think you're seeing just how wide the religous and cultural gap is in the US.

The US vs Them polarization is exactly why I think religion needs to be kept out of the schools in anything other than academic study sense. School needs to be a place we're all us and when school provides religous indoctrination, in anyone's religion, it creates divides. I think the type of system you speak of would work in Canada because, nationally, you have a much stronger consensus about national identity. The US is really split by regional culture and by regional inequities in wealth. I've had people poo-poo my comments on the differences between the coasts and the interior of the country, but I've lived many regions of the US and have spent a lot of time in most of the other parts of the country. There are stark differences in cultural and economic opportunity in the regions. The term Fly Over Country really does describe the chasm. What I've noticed is that this religous mania has arisen in culturally isolated parts of the country(including the suburbs and exurbs of the coasts). While California does have some truly awful mega-churches in places Orange County, you tend not see Christians forcing students to pray like you do in places like Oklahoma. On both the East Coast and the West Coast, the mix of cultures and attitudes forces us to find ways to be civil and get along. Plus the economic opportunities seem to much better and makes people feel less threatened. When I lived in Michigan, the state seemed to be slowly dying except for Ann Arbor and a couple of other areas that had relatively diversified economies. Everywhere else, plants were in the final phases of shutting down and a lot of people were displaced. At the same time I saw more and more born again Christians and they became ever more militant and intolerant. I think in a lot of places, working class people feel like they're under attack and they embrace anything that seems traditional, or maybe, in some places, the only institutions that offer any help are dominionist churches. Add that to the cultural homegenity that you had in the first place, and these places have become very hostile to people who are different.

I don't know. All I know is that I'm actually afraid to live in much of the US because I am not Christian. It wasn't like this until the very late 1990s either. Something happened and I wish I knew what it was exactly.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

I think you're right about the connection between fewer economic prospects and rising fundamentalism. It makes sense - people tend to seek SOMETHING in their lives to be certain about when the basics are proving elusive.

That said, I'm gald "separation of church and state" is not quite as solidly enshrined in our constitution as it is in yours. It gives us more options to seek creative solutions in a few areas. Whether we will or not is still an open question. (Our laws do enshrine freedom of religion, but the courts tend to interpret that as meaning, "As long as there's an equal, non-religious option, some support for a religious one is not discrimination."