You are making this much more complicated than I intended it to be.
Sorry. I didn't even feel in an argumentative mood today. :-(
Actually, I don't feel that the pledge issue itself is complicated at all. A lot has to do with what we are envisioning in our mind happening in classrooms, and making points past each other because the visions are different. If I am thinking of a 2nd grade class, and you an 8th grade class, and we don't say so, then we each frustrate the other and prolong it. The import of a religious allusion may be different at at every grade level, as children mature so rapidly.
We can let it go, as we have discussed it often enough.
I had a point in mind today not just for you, but for the thread, about the coercive aspects of religious indoctrination of children by parents. I think this is an overlooked aspect of the pledge debate, where the focus is exclusively on the schools. I believe such indoctrination raises it own questions about "freedom of religion." If parents hold a religious view contrary to the mainstream, such as Atheism, Christian Science, or Quakerism, the practice of which may be life-altering in important respects, do we just assume that it is a parental right to impress that belief upon the malleable minds of children? And where does that right come from? If parents believe it is God's will not to intervene by treating illness, do they have the right to so instruct their children? I am not saying that one thing is the same as another, not by any means, but rather just throwing out examples to test what the limits are, if any, as to what parents can -- or should -- teach their children. |
