On one hand, it’s nice knowing the US isn’t alone in its appalling understanding of evolution. On the under hand… WTF, Australia:
Fundamentalist Christians are hijacking Religious Instruction (RI) classes in Queensland despite education experts saying Creationism and attempts to convert children to Christianity have no place in state schools.
Students have been told Noah collected dinosaur eggs to bring on the Ark, and Adam and Eve were not eaten by dinosaurs because they were under a protective spell.
Critics are calling for the RI program to be scrapped after claims emerged Christian lay people are feeding children misinformation.
It’s bad enough children are being fed religious garbage that will only muddle their real scientific education. But when parents opt to have their children removed from this program (which they have the right to do), the children are often ostracized and discriminated against. Here’s just one unfortunate example:
A parent of a Year 5 student on the Sunshine Coast said his daughter was ostracised to the library after arguing with her scripture teacher about DNA.
“The scripture teacher told the class that all people were descended from Adam and Eve,” he said.
“My daughter rightly pointed out, as I had been teaching her about DNA and science, that ‘wouldn’t they all be inbred’?
“But the teacher replied that DNA wasn’t invented then.”
After the parent complained, the girl spent the rest of the year’s classes in the library.
I do like photo and caption the article uses, though:
“The only time man has walked with dinosaurs – in the Jurassic Park films.”
Journalism Win.
This is post 18 of 49 of Blogathon. Pledge a donation to the Secular Student Alliance here.
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Creationism is founded on lies and requires more lies to perpetuate itself. It is no less delusional than the schizophrenic in the asylum who believes that he’s a warlock and that banana’s hold the souls of of dead puppies, but at least the schizophrenic has the excuse of imbalanced neurochemistry.
Linking my boys in Australia so they can be outraged.
The most ridiculous thing is the ‘bible people’ as i call them, believe they are on the side of science. I really LMAO after reading this proof provided for dinosaurs in bible : http://www.clarifyingchristian…
I have to say that this doesn’t just highlight the problems within religion, but the problems that the teachers don’t understand the science – perhaps in areas of cross-curricular conflict just as this, the entangled CPD web in the education system should include lessons (for the teachers) in the other subject…so that at least the teachers know what the Science shows, whether or not they choose to acknowledge it within their own beliefs. The lack of cross-curricular knowledge among teachers is scary – no wonder some of our young people are growing up confused!
A ‘protective spell’? Don’t Creationists talk amongst themselves and get their story straight? Apparently not, here they say all creatures were vegetarian before the Fall. Maybe that just plays better here in the land of Political Correctness and Trendy Vegans.
Both of the colleges I attended had pretty big education programs. I would say that easily 10-15% of the people I’ve interacted with during my education have been working to become K-12 teachers.And the kind of people that major attracts? Not people I want teaching my future children. I’ve known some really awesome education majors, don’t get me wrong. I knew a woman with a masters in education for several years, and I would have loved to see her get a classroom (last I heard, she never did.)But most of the people I’ve met in Early Childhood Education are very narrow and dogmatic in their thinking. I heard more than one of the WOMEN in that program perpetuate the myth that girls aren’t very good at math.When teachers, who deal with children’s education every day, believe it, how are the rest of us supposed to disbelieve it? I didn’t actually learn that it was nonsense until a mathematician friend who had taken to being a professional tutor told me that it was absolutely not true, when I was twenty one!Twenty one years to find someone in education who didn’t believe that myth! And he wasn’t qualified to teach a children’s classroom.
But these aren’t teachers. They’re laypeople doing religious instruction.
this reminded me of this blog posting. This guy can be quite a dick, always takes things too far – but is such a riot.http://www.27bslash6.com/easte…
Yeah, 27b/6 is really funny, that is if you think a guy railing against emails he sends to himself is funny.
Oh sweet Jebus.I live on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland.This made me rage.I remember going to school religious classes and WISHING to be the kid that got to sit out. Unfortunately my parents wouldn’t let me.This is so embarrassing for Australia. I honestly thought we were at least maybe a few baby steps ahead of the ridiculousness that is the American schooling system. But obviously not.(Loving the Blog-a-thon Jen!)
“DNA wasn’t invented then.”*facepalm*
Oh,I hadn’t heard about this.Shall give it some blog attention soon.Bit surprised about the openness with which these RI instructors violate the state curriculum .Someone should sue the schools’ asses off .
“Scripture” in Australian schools is messed up.
And I thought “spells” = witchraft = evil. So Adam and Eve were protected by evil, not God? Hmmm.
See this related article from a few weeks ago: http://www.theaustralian.com.a…It’s not just here in Queensland it seems, but that doesn’t surprise me. Our MPs are pussies when it comes to standing up to the religious nutbags. They’ll do secret deals in churches and away from the media spotlight just to secure the nutbag vote. Fuck the rest of us, who want quality education and FACTS for the children, so long as they get reelected who gives a crap what lies are taught in public schools by nutbags?Grrrr. It makes me so angry how our politicians pander to the religious right (a.k.a nutbags). They won’t cancel RI classes, even if most parents want them to, because the minority of nutbags want to turn everybody into nutbags, and nutbags vote too.Don’t expect any action here. We’re in the middle of an election campaign, and sadly it’s a race to the bottom, appealing to the lowest common denominator.
You can’t sue them, because you can opt your kids out of the classes. Don’t want stupidity taught to your kids? Don’t send them to RI.What’s more interesting is that it was here in Australia where they recently proposed running a class on ethics as an alternative to RI (religious indoctrination). They’re running a trial at one school, and it has the religious nutbags up in arms. They want to have it all ways, claiming that you can’t teach ethics without religion and so want a voice in ethics classes (defeating the purpose of opting out of RI in the first place), and claiming that those children who did religious classes deserved to attend the ethics class AS WELL as doing RI.The result? A mass exodus (pun intended) from RI class to ethics class. Give parents the option and they’ll abandon RI in a heartbeat. That terrifies the nutbags, and they’ll do whatever is necessary to stop religion-free ethics being taught.
I don’t see how the ‘opt out’ option makes teaching nonsense in schools okay? This approach is so backwards! By default your children will be taught unsubstantiated nonsense that goes against the facts, but you can opt out so it’s okay…
The caption is wrong…People walk with Lucky the Dinosaur every day at DisneyWorld Resort LOL
But some of the hidden treasures can only be found in Australia. The country’s forests are full of surprise. caravan parks