Shrimp and Grits

Here’s something South Carolina’s legislature recently passed: S484.

AN ACT TO AMEND SECTION 59-113-50, CODE OF LAWS OF SOUTH CAROLINA, 1976, RELATING TO THE DEFINITION OF INDEPENDENT INSTITUTION OF HIGHER LEARNING FOR PURPOSES OF PROVIDING TUITION GRANTS, SO AS TO INCLUDE IN THE DEFINITION AN INDEPENDENT BACHELOR’S LEVEL INSTITUTION CHARTERED BEFORE 1962 WHOSE MAJOR CAMPUS AND HEADQUARTERS ARE LOCATED WITHIN SOUTH CAROLINA.

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of South Carolina:

Definition revised

SECTION 1. Section 59-113-50 of the 1976 Code is amended to read:

“Section 59-113-50. For the purposes of this chapter, an independent institution of higher learning means an:

(1) independent eleemosynary junior or senior college in South Carolina whose major campus and headquarters are located within South Carolina and which is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools; or

(2) independent bachelor’s level institution chartered before 1962 whose major campus and headquarters are located within South Carolina.”

Nothing much to see here, right? But this legislation was sponsored by Mike Fair, who is not known to be much of a friend to quality education. With that in mind, what does this legislation actually do? It …

approved $2.5 million to help low-income students attend Bob Jones University, a private school in Greenville.

… according to the Charleston Post and Courier. (It does this by adding the unaccredited-by-any-reputable-accreditation-board Bob Jones to the list of private schools eligible to receive grant money for students with financial need. Bob Jones is the only new school to qualify under this legislation!)

Rev. BigDumbChimp has more details on why you should be irritated at this legislation, especially if you prefer your tax dollars to be kept away from anti-science nutjobs.

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Disclaimer: I teach science at a public college. Just so y’all know my bias.

In a recent editorial, Peter Berkowitz proclaims that what he calls the “new new atheism” - popularized by books by Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, and Christopher Hitchens - is basically the same as “old” atheism.

In some sense, he may have a point. After all, how many ways can one possibly talk about not accepting ideas that either are provided with no supporting evidence or are contradictory to the evidence? But in keeping with Berkowitz’s “there’s nothing new under the sun” theme, I’d like to point out that his criticisms of the “new new atheism” are … nothing new, themselves. More below the fold.

(more…)

A little bit of history was made today. For the first time, a Hindu gave the daily prayer that started a day of work for the US Senate.

Unfortunately, it did not sit well with some representatives of our majority religion.

two women and one man were arrested and charged with causing a disruption in the public gallery of the Senate. The three started shouting when guest Chaplain Rajan Zed, a Hindu from Nevada, began his prayer [...] They shouted “No Lord but Jesus Christ” and “There’s only one true God,” and used the term “abomination.”

The next time you hear a fundamentalist Christian complain that he’s being oppressed and persecuted because of his faith, remind him of this incident and let him know who the oppressors really are - people like him.

Moderate Christians would do well to denounce these hecklers - loudly and publicly. After all, if America allow Hindus to be persecuted today, who’s to say that it won’t persecute Christians in the future?

On the subject of Republican Ted Pitts’ attempt to get rid of South Carolina’s antiquated “blue laws”, Eric (in the comments on my earlier post) had this to say

just add it to the list of sanford vetoes … and general assembly overides.

Have I got a surprise for you! Sanford vetoed the measure, but the legislature upheld the veto. So, we’re stuck with the blue laws.

Presumably, this veto and the support of it allows both the governor and members of the legislature to pick up some cheap fundie support at the expense of only the smaller counties in the state - since the richest counties can already ignore the blue laws. FromThe State:

“I don’t think it had to do with religion, but my mom raised me to go to church on Sunday,” said Rep. Nathan Ballentine, R-Richland. He said he voted against the Pitt’s proviso because, “There’s certain things we don’t need to be messing with.”

That’s an interesting statement from a legislator from a county whose stores can ignore the blue laws thanks to the accommodations tax exception. But I’m inclined to agree with what Bellentine is saying here. His vote probably had very little to do with his religion. It likely had more to do with his benefactors not wanting competition in neighboring counties opening up on Sunday morning!

The State had an article today about a proposal to exempt all counties from South Carolina’s ridiculous “blue laws”.

The House and Senate this week voted to exempt each of the state’s counties from the century-old law. Under the blue laws, apparel sales, for instance, cannot begin until 1:30 p.m. on Sundays.

For those of you who don’t live in South Carolina, we have laws that state that certain stores can’t be opened until an couple of hours after church services end on Sunday. Some stores open, but they’re restricted to what items they can sell until after church is over. The local Wal-Mart, for instance, opens at a normal time on Sunday, but ropes off the vast majority of the store - which contains the items you’re not allowed to buy until Sunday afternoon.

Some counties - the ones who collect enough taxes from tourism - are exempt from the blue laws.

Six counties now earn enough motel tax revenue to skip the blue law restrictions — Horry [the Myrtle Beach area], Charleston, Georgetown, Beaufort, Greenville and Richland.

The tourism exemption is comical. It’s as if South Carolina is trying to hide its bass-ackwardsness from the rest of the country.

the bad news about this new proposal to exempt all counties from the blue laws? It’s only for one year, because nobody in the Legislature appears to have the guts to get rid of these idiotic laws permanently. Heck, some of them don’t even want to scrap them for a year:

“My personal belief is I think we should respect Christianity more and during the hours when the church is open, let’s keep the shops closed,” said Rep. Bob Leach, R-Greer. “I didn’t know it was in there.”

Are the churches really frightened that people, if given the choice to attend church or go buy a new Wii game from the local Gamestop, will stop going to church? No, don’t answer that.

I haven’t had much time for posting recently, but there was at least one news item that caught my eye today. A little while ago, I posted about Georgia wanting to offer Bible classes in their public schools, saying that

Even if all the students are Christians, teachers run the risk of running afoul of the ways different sects of Christianity interpret parts of the Bible. (one example: Biblical literalists vs. old-Earth creationists). Add in complaints from the sprinkling of kids who have non-Christian parents, and you’ve got a recipe for nothing but trouble.

Some districts in Texas do offer Bible courses. How’s that working out for them?

Two advocacy groups filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday against a West Texas school district on behalf of eight parents who say a Bible course violates their religious liberty.

[...]

“Religion is very important in my family and we are very involved in our religious community. But the public schools are no place for religious indoctrination that promotes certain beliefs that not all the kids in the school share,” Doug Hildebrand, a Presbyterian deacon who is among the plaintiffs, [...]

Georgia, meet your future.

CNN has reported that Georgia has approved state sponsorship of Bible classes in schools. Why? Here are a few opinions from supporters of the idea.

“I don’t think you can understand Shakespeare, that you can understand a great deal of literary allusions or that you can understand a great deal of Western civilization without understanding the role of the Bible,”

[...]

“It’s going to challenge the faith of some students and it may foster the faith of others,”

Georgia hopes to skirt the obvious Constitutional problems with these classes by saying that

The classes must be taught “in an objective and nondevotional manner with no attempt made to indoctrinate students.”

My take? This will end badly. Teaching a Bible class to a set of students with diverse religious backgrounds without some of them (or their parents) seeing the class as a form of indoctrination will be impossible. Even if all the students are Christians, teachers run the risk of running afoul of the ways different sects of Christianity interpret parts of the Bible. (one example: Biblical literalists vs. old-Earth creationists). Add in complaints from the sprinkling of kids who have non-Christian parents, and you’ve got a recipe for nothing but trouble.

The schools will bail once they get slapped with enough complaints and lawsuits over the classes. This will occur only after a lot of taxpayer money is wasted on the whole process.

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Having said all that, I actually do believe that knowledge of the Bible is helpful. (A great way to lead someone away from the path of fundamentalism is to have them actually read that book they’re being so fundamental about - all of it - and to learn about the history of that book.) But, I just don’t think that it’s possible in our current social environment to have Bible classes in public schools that don’t “indoctrinate” in some way. We have enough of a time keeping religious indoctrination out of biology classes. How the heck would we keep it out of a Bible class?

Ed Leap has an editorial on the Greenville News site called Homeschooling is about far more than education.

So, what does Ed think homeschooling is about? What are the advantages? Many things:

People educate their children at home for many reasons. For some, it is a way to cloister their families from the world. That seems, to our modern, connected, socially conscious society, like a backwards idea. And indeed, in rare instances, the children do not benefit, but develop an unfortunate paranoia, transmitted from worried parents. On the other hand, a few minutes with the news, a few hours looking at the statistics on drugs, crime and sex in our culture, and a little “cloistering” doesn’t seem so bad.

I’m getting suspicious here. This sort of reasoning usually leads to crazy fundie talk. Ed seems to be saying that because people have sex, it might not be a bad thing to lock your kids away from the outside world.

Ed then outlines some more advantages of homeschooling.

Scripture doesn’t conflict with learning; in fact, reading it can be a learning experience in itself, and a series of lessons in culture and history. There can’t be a concern over separation of church and state when the state isn’t involved.

That’d depend on how literally you read said Scripture. Read it too literally, and it can conflict with learning.

Furthermore, the homeschool family can ask pointed questions about controversies without being accused of being Cro-Magnons: “What are the weaknesses of arguments for and against evolution?” Or the more heinous, “Could it be that global warming isn’t a problem?” The scandal! It’s getting harder and harder to have divergent ideas about anything in our modern world of alleged diversity; except at home.

Usually, when someone uses the phrase arguments for and against evolution, he’s a creationist who wants to teach creationism. That’s simply because these “arguments against” are bunk. They are merely smoke used to cast doubt upon settled science that conflicts with a narrow interpretation of Scripture. Homeschooling, of course, gives the homeschooler the freedom to teach these bad arguments as if they were actually true. But I don’t really consider this an advantage.

Finally, Ed coughs up the crazy.

We like the fact that our children can start to learn the critical skills of rhetoric and argument, so that they aren’t one day ambushed by college professors who would happily bully away their deepest held beliefs.

Another advantage: the homeschooler is free to drill apologetics into their child’s head just in case she ever meets one of those evil, atheistic college professors. Did you know that those evil professors line up in front of the dorms to bully away the deeply held religious beliefs of new students as they arrive? it’s brutal, I tell you! Brutal!

Why is it that almost every time I see an opinion piece about homeschooling, it drifts off into fundie Bizarro world?

This might have something to do with it. 30% of homeschoolers cite religion as their primary motivation for homeschooling, and more than 70% cite religion as at least one of the reasons they homeschool.

I wonder if Ed’s merely one of the 70%, or one of the 30%…

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For the record, I’m not actually opposed to homeschooling. I may not do it myself, or think that for most people it’s a very wise thing to do. I certainly do not think that anyone deserves a tax break for homeschooling. However, I think a parent has a right to educate their child as they see fit.

Well, it looks like the ACLU is at it again.CNN has an article about a New Jersey school district that’s being sued over having their graduation ceremony in a Baptist church.

“Schools should not sponsor activities that exclude some students from participation on the basis of religious belief,” said ACLU-NJ’s legal director, Ed Barocas, [...]

It must be those pesky atheists again! After all, isn’t that all the ACLU is supposed to do - provide cover for militant atheists who want to remove all traces of religion from public view? After all, who but a godless heathen couldn’t allow themselves to go into a Baptist church to get their high school diploma?

The New Jersey ACLU said Wednesday that it was suing the school district because its decision to hold graduation in the church prevented West Side High School senior Bilal Shareef, a Muslim, from attending. Shareef’s religious beliefs forbid him from entering a building with religious images, the civil liberties group said.

Surprise, surprise! It looks like the wronged party in this case isn’t godless after all.

I can’t wait to see what the fundamentalist spin on this story’s going to be …

I’ve recently been reading The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. One criticism of Dawkins is that he doesn’t recognize enough of the good that religion does for society.

For example, here is an example of the good religion does that, as far as I know, is completely omitted from The God Delusion:

“Cleaning the toilet to attract luck” published this month is the latest in a series of books advising readers on how to attract good fortune using a brush and an array of cleaning fluids.

[...]

The books are inspired by Buddhist teachings and feng shui, a traditional Chinese belief that people’s fortunes are determined by their surroundings.

How can Richard Dawkins simply ignore the vast benefit to society that clean toilets provide? Isn’t a holy war now and then a small price to pay for a sparkling, sanitary crapper?

Dawkins fans might retort that this particular article was published well after The God Delusion went to press. Well, that’s no excuse.

The idea that a clean toilet can bring good fortune, or even make you more beautiful, has existed in Japan for many years, according to Yuka Soma of Makino Publishing in Tokyo, editor of one of the toilet books.

Such clear, unmistakable benefit from religion. It amazes me that Dawkins is unable to see it!***

***For the humor impaired, take a close look at the category where this post is filed. Got it? Good.

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Thanks to quork, a commenter over at Pharyngula for the link.