From the Toronto Star: There is no reason creationism could not be taught in addition to evolution and "other theories" if private religious schools are brought into Ontario public school boards, Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory said Wednesday......"It's still called the theory of evolution," Tory said. "They teach evolution in the Ontario curriculum, but they also could teach the fact to the children that there are other theories that people have out there that are part of some Christian beliefs."
Sorry Mr. Tory, but Canada, and specifically Ontario, isn't Turkey or the USA. The masses are much more appreciative that science isn't one gigantic conspiracy theory against God and creation.
I don't have any kids but I do care about the future of Western civilization and the world. There is no way more of my tax dollars are going towards God in the classroom. No chance. And I know most Ontarians feel the same way.
It is bad enough that we support Catholic schools with public funds, but to my knowledge, they have kept creation out of the science class. They somehow got grandfathered in. The Pope has been very progressive towards science and especially evolution. I still would like to stop funding Catholic schools, but in the meantime, there is absolutely no way we are going to take a step back into the Stone Ages (which creationists believe happened sometimes between Adam and Noah, less than 6500 years ago).
I have to blame my people, the Jews, on this one. A Jewish group has launched a campaign to get public funding because the Catholics get it.
Not that it is going to happen, but if successful, that means our tax dollars will be used to fund Muslim schools as well. And don't think they won't start springing up everywhere. I expect Jehovah Witness schools and Scientology schools as well.
What this amounts to is a formula for segregation and worse: reality denying idiots will come out of the school system intolerant of everyone with different beliefs, all paid for with our tax dollars.
Do we want our tax dollars to help teach the alternative theory that Canada is Muslim land?
Tory used the old idiotic line that evolution is only a theory. Well so is gravity. Maybe we should teach children that perhaps God keeps everyone from flying off the earth with magical invisible fingers.
I became a staunch Progressive Conservative supporter because of their stance against Islamic terrorism and their ability to keep church and state separated (even though they seem reluctant to do so on their part many times).
I can live with McGuinty's lie about dropping funding to Catholic schools for now, though I'm still having a hard time with the fact that Liberals have attracted Hamas supporting MPs. There is no way I'm voting Communist (NDP) either.
I guess I'll support the PC's federally, but the Liberals provincially. Tory must go for me to change my vote.
Canadians, including many PC bloggers are pissed as well.
Read The Atheist Conservative, The Kitchener Conservative, CTV.ca readers have blasted Tory (yes I know that the CTV attracts many Liberal and Communist supporters), but even the Globe and Mail readers (where the money and thinkers are), have gone ape on Tory.
How about teaching evolution and the Koran in church as alternative theories? Sarcasm off.
I am amazed that science is trying so hard to prove that God doesn't exist when God himself is doing such a good job at convincing us that he doesn't exist.
ReplyDeleteAny suggestion that John Tory "favors" or "supports the teaching of creationism" is either Liberal spin, sloppy reporting, or some combination of both.
ReplyDeleteI think John has been very clear all along that any independent schools that wish to receive public funding would be required to implement the Ontario curriculum (as well as hiring only certified teachers and testing their students using the province's standardized tests).
The Ontario curriculum does not allow the teaching of creationism or any other religious belief or theory in science classes, Those subjects can, however, be part of a religious studies class - as they are right now in many of Ontario's public and Catholic schools.
So Tory's policy would mean that the theory of creation would be handled no differently in independent schools than it is in schools which currently receive public education funding.
Further, his policy would ensure that those faith based schools would have to start following the Ontario curriculum, using only certified teachers, and implementing standardized testing if they wanted to receive any funding from the government.
Mark, then why did Tory have to say that "evolution is still a theory" and other theories could/should be taught as well?
ReplyDeleteAlso, I'm against any other motivation for new faith based schools to spring up.
I'd rather have Muslim students in secular schools that follow Ontario's rules, then in a Muslim school where they can also teach that Israel is the devil and that Canada, being part of the planet is really Muslim land as "alternative theories"
I'm with the previous commenter on this one. You simply can't stop them from teaching creationism in RE, anymore that you can stop them from teaching that G-d exists (in RE). Teaching creationism in science classes (Dover-style) as an "alternative theory" to evolutionary biology would be a very different thing. As it states further below in the CTV.ca article:
ReplyDelete"Tory later clarified his remarks to say that he meant creationism could be taught in such a class, and that he did not mean to suggest the two theories would be given equal weight in a science lab."
So yes, this smacks a bit of a liberal kneejerk reaction.
As regards faith schools, assuming these are private, you simply can't stop a stupid parent from wanting to pay through the nose for an education that is "faith based", as long as that education complies with the national curriculum.
"I'd rather have Muslim students in secular schools that follow Ontario's rules, then in a Muslim school where they can also teach that Israel is the devil and that Canada, being part of the planet is really Muslim land as "alternative theories""
Nonsense: Muslim schools would have to comply to the curriculum too.
Gert, I don't know if you get it or not. I'm not saying that parents won't pay through the nose to get their child in a private religious school in many instances, but what Tory wants to do is give $400 million to other faith based schools. I say no money, and look into the ceasing of funding of Catholic schools.
ReplyDeleteAnd public schools in Canada do not do the God thingy in classroom. Nobody stops the parents from taking kids to church or brainwashing them at home...that is a given.
And what Tory stated was that he doesn't mind that alternative "theories" are taught to children inside the religious schools he is proposing to fund which would fall outside the Ontario curriculum. If you encourage Muslim schools with tax dollars, they can teach lots of stuff outside the curriculum too.
I have no problem with Muslim schools as long as all students are required to take a "Jewish Studies" course. Taught by a Jewish teacher.
ReplyDeleteOf course, I think that the Jewish school kids should have to take a "Muslim Studies" course, taught by a Muslim.
Scientology can't have a school because Scientology is not a religion, whatever Tom Cruise may tell you.
And they ALL SHOULD TEACH EVOLUTION. Duh. At least Canada doesn't seem as bad as this "Teach the Controversy" USA.
The problem with creationism is that it relies too much on evolution. They speak of "adaptation" and "variation"; that's just semantics to get around saying "evolution." I don't see where there's much of a controversy when there's so much of an overlap. The main differences seem to be "God did it!" and "things can't adapt into different species." Oh yeah, and of course the obligatory, "the Earth is 6000 years old" (YECs only).
ReplyDeleteBEAJ:
ReplyDeleteWell, I don't know the Canadian situation all that well but I'll assume it's similar to the British/European situation.
I'm all for looking into cutting funding for Catholic schools (or Anglican as is the case here) but the truth is that such schools have considerable support from large swathes of the population (i.e. electorate!) And in a multicultural society that means other faiths will want their national curriculum based faith schools too. It's with dismay that I see faith schools (of all faiths) on the rise in Britain but I fear there isn't much we can do about it, as with many people the perception that "faith based is better" really does exist. Combine this with another case of perception with regards to "private is better" and the result is that some not that religious parents will actually send their kids to a private faith based school if it's not too far away, just because it's private.
So, good luck with cutting funding to faith based schools, but going by the UK and many other European countries you can more or less forget about that. Schools are part of the "culture wars" and the traditionalists will always defend themselves well: they're a large voting bloc, whether we like it or not.
Zoop, you are talking theistic evolution. It couples fact with God as a guiding factor or cause. I really don't mind that.
ReplyDeleteBut 45% of Americans are YECs. They completely deny reality.
Gert, by not voting in Tory at least we can just keep the status quo here instead of opening up the gates to hell.
I went to a Jewish private school until grade 8. We had 2 science classes a week, but way more bible classes. This was a 'secular' style Hebrew school no less. We also never learned about evolution. Not only that, but the rabbi who taught our torah classes insisted that the earth was 6000 years old, and that dinosaur fossils are tests from god.
ReplyDeleteCatholics were not funded until a number of years back (except that their local education taxes were diverted that way). When they got funding they put up tons of new high schools with the money.
ReplyDeleteI do not think religion should be taught in public school. I do not think Catholics or alternative religions should be funded even though I'm Christian. Instead, have all public school and invite the parents to pay extra if they wish their children to learn one faith or another. Open it up. Why shouldn't every child have access to Atheism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam or whatever?
I hate paying for both the public and Catholic systems. I really do.
Jeannie, I of course agree. Catholic school funding should be abolished.
ReplyDeleteYou raise a good point that once the government started funding them, more and more Catholic schools sprang up. The same will happen if Tory has his way. Baptist schools, Mormon schools, Muslim schools and Jewish schools will attract more and more children causing more intolerance and more segregation in the future.
I just wrote a comment about this here.
"Maybe we should teach children that perhaps God keeps everyone from flying off the earth with magical invisible fingers."
ReplyDeleteDoesn't he? Oops... ;-)
Hi BEAJ, came across the below story thought you and some of your readers might find it amusing if you/they haven't already seen it.
ReplyDeleteGoat Story
Also I would like to ask you and anyone else that might be interested to reply to a somewhat off topic question or two.
Background: Recently I've been having a serious change of heart to one of mind with respect to religion. I've always found within science the wiggle room to allow for religion/God belief.
Recently my "faith" has pretty much diminished to the point of being non existent. When looking at the arguments for why to believe in a god compared to the lack of evidence and the powerful evidence for natural selection the whole God theory seems pretty weak to me these days.
Okay so my first question is; Without God belief what reason(s) are there to justify good behavior?
Sure a lot of time people are nice to one another out of common courtesy and natural response, or for monetary reasons, or because you are helping out a family member which could be explained as gene-pool investment.
I guess what I'm getting at is that in the past I often thought well I'll be rewarded for good deeds and that might have been part of the good feeling I got from the act of kindness to others when it was a thought out premeditated act of kindness. Some of that good feeling was right then I would think to myself something like I feel good for having helped someone and that is my payment in the here and now and even if it didn't do anything for me in there here and now I'll be rewarded in the afterlife. Now with the less to no belief I'm just wondering what if any gratification is there out of doing kind things for people without knowing/thinking there is something in it for you? What is the atheistic reason for premeditated acts of kindness that have little or no hope of return?
Also in the world of God belief there is the belief that I can justify horrible things (war, famine etc) as a part of some test of faith or part of the grand plan. Then rest assured there is something going on that is beyond my puny minds comprehension abilities and feel comfort in knowing there is a greater purpose to life than my own existence and my life is eternal. Is there a meaning to life in the atheist belief system beyond gene-pool protection and procreation?
I hope some of you will take the time to comment and that this doesn't sound too stupid but I'm new to this whole line of thinking.
Without repeating myself read the following posts I've made:
ReplyDeleteHere
and here for starters.
There is no standard meaning of life answer that you can collectively attribute to atheists, though many of us have an answer. Theists don't have an answer either....they just hope God does. My answer is that we subjectively give our lives meaning or not.
And I covered the scientific reasons for why we do good things in the above linked posts.
Zionists are delusional. They do not practice the proper means of anal sex. They are unkosher goyim that need to know there place in this world.
ReplyDeleteNow.. pray to Lord Keithula that you learn the proper way to have sex.