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Quoting from Marnie's comment:
A local authority shall not
I'd forgotten about part b... well, part a makes sense, 'cos they oughtn't be promoting any lifestyle choices, but part b really needs serious rewording.
Of course, many Christians would probably disagree with me here, but I think a secular government is a Good Thing (as opposed to a Christian religious government). The problem with religious governments of *any* sort is that they obviously restrict freedom of religion. And although I'd like to see everyone in this country as a Christian, it doesn't *work* if it's forced on them. The difficulty is, it's hard to argue that people ought to have the freedom to be wrong - after all, they don't have the freedom to go around killing people, or even to take some kinds of drugs. But not giving people the freedom to be wrong, especially on such an a) important and b) contentious issue as religion, comes with the danger of it being so easy from that state to turn this not-having-the-freedom-to-be wrong into not-having-the-freedom-to-be-right... if people accept restrictions of a certain level, it's easy to change what those restrictions actually are, without changing the level of them, so that good things are suddenly restricted. In this particular case, what would everyone feel about Section 28 if it was worded the other way around - if it was talking about *heterosexual* relationships? If people have accepted this kind of restriction on religious grounds, it wouldn't be that big a leap to accept it the other way around on environmental grounds (and environmental activists sometimes can make this into almost a religion), due to overpopulation...
Yes, a religious government would be perfect if it actually *was* governed by God, and therefore actually did have perfect judgement on issues. But if it's run by people, there is so much scope for the twisting of God's word... it's better that the government is secular in this case, so that it seeks to restrict as little as possible on moral grounds, and works on the pragmatic 'people can do what they like as long as it doesn't harm others more than others would otherwise harm them' grounds, which are twistable but not quite so easily and devastatingly, because they're not seen as the product of some divine authority that cannot be contradicted.
This would be a nice speech to give at a church sometime... I suspect it'll meet a mostly positive audience among LJ'ers, and it'd be interesting to argue it against detractors to it...
A local authority shall not
- intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality; and
- promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship.
I'd forgotten about part b... well, part a makes sense, 'cos they oughtn't be promoting any lifestyle choices, but part b really needs serious rewording.
Of course, many Christians would probably disagree with me here, but I think a secular government is a Good Thing (as opposed to a Christian religious government). The problem with religious governments of *any* sort is that they obviously restrict freedom of religion. And although I'd like to see everyone in this country as a Christian, it doesn't *work* if it's forced on them. The difficulty is, it's hard to argue that people ought to have the freedom to be wrong - after all, they don't have the freedom to go around killing people, or even to take some kinds of drugs. But not giving people the freedom to be wrong, especially on such an a) important and b) contentious issue as religion, comes with the danger of it being so easy from that state to turn this not-having-the-freedom-to-be wrong into not-having-the-freedom-to-be-right... if people accept restrictions of a certain level, it's easy to change what those restrictions actually are, without changing the level of them, so that good things are suddenly restricted. In this particular case, what would everyone feel about Section 28 if it was worded the other way around - if it was talking about *heterosexual* relationships? If people have accepted this kind of restriction on religious grounds, it wouldn't be that big a leap to accept it the other way around on environmental grounds (and environmental activists sometimes can make this into almost a religion), due to overpopulation...
Yes, a religious government would be perfect if it actually *was* governed by God, and therefore actually did have perfect judgement on issues. But if it's run by people, there is so much scope for the twisting of God's word... it's better that the government is secular in this case, so that it seeks to restrict as little as possible on moral grounds, and works on the pragmatic 'people can do what they like as long as it doesn't harm others more than others would otherwise harm them' grounds, which are twistable but not quite so easily and devastatingly, because they're not seen as the product of some divine authority that cannot be contradicted.
This would be a nice speech to give at a church sometime... I suspect it'll meet a mostly positive audience among LJ'ers, and it'd be interesting to argue it against detractors to it...
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no subject
Date: 2001-08-26 08:50 am (UTC)From:The problem is, that by note talking about it, and in fact, not being able to talk about it means that young people with serious questions are being ignored by teachers for fear of losing their jobs (and - potentially - going to jail). This is a real issue because young people often see teachers as neutral authorities. They know stuff, are trusted, and they aren't biased like parents are. So who else does the kid talk to that they can trust?
Maybe the kid isn't gay at all; I know a lot of people who've spent years of their life trying to figure out their sexuality, but their grades will suffer, they can become depressed, or worse.
Now I'm not saying that teachers should give advice on sexuality. Most people are biased one way or the other, and most have no idea what to say to a kid who's got doubts about which side (s)he's batting for. I sure as hell don't. But teachers should be encouraged to give a worried/confused child support contacts, LEA-approved leaflets, or whatever.
There's no reason why schools should have classes on sexuality. Promotion of alternative lifestyles isn't the issue; the issue is that teachers are being stopped from helping children to grow up and make their own decisions, which is surely what education is all about. And teachers are being stopped from preventing the persecution of confused youths. Surely that's wrong in any book?