i can see this turning ugly

[Madeline]

Yes indeedy, Big Fitz I am an aging hippie. Exactly which of the world's evils would you lay at my feet?

Since you don't read my posts, only condemn them, or are incapable of understanding them, I doubt a list would help.

I'm not sure it's fair to derail this thread in order to discuss the matter, Big Fitz, but I'm open to a discussion. I'll admit I was not perfect, I made mistakes I regret now. So did most of my friends.

Still in all, I look back on how things were in the 1950's compared to how they are now...and feel some pride in having had a small hand in the changes.

 

[AllieBaba]

Yeah, it was horrible to live in a world where almost everyone was doing better than the previous generation, the economy was booming, and there was an excellent work ethic.

 

[Madeline]

It was if you were suspected of sympathizing with the Communists, or were black, or were gay, or simply found conformity life-killing. I know it is popular to romanticize the 1950's and it is true there was a terrific economy. But there were troubles as well, unfairly distributed.

Far fewer people had "Father Knows Best" lives than is now thought, and of those that did, fewer still enjoyed them.

 

[ConHog]

It was if you were suspected of sympathizing with the Communists, or were black, or were gay, or simply found conformity life-killing. I know it is popular to romanticize the 1950's and it is true there was a terrific economy. But there were troubles as well, unfairly distributed.

Far fewer people had "Father Knows Best" lives than is now thought, and of those that did, fewer still enjoyed them.

Pssst, I have something to tell you Madeline. Gays are treated worse today than they were in the 50s. No why? Because no gay person in the 50s dressed in pink and stood on the street corner yelling "I'm here and I'm queer, get used to me." So the average guy didn't even think about them.

As for race, yeah things are certainly better today if you're black, if you're white, racism has actually gotten worse. Who cares about the white guy though right?

Oh, and if you're a Christian, things are definitely not better today then they were in the 50s.

Another post Madeline will ignore I'm sure.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

So you'd support a Wahhibist having a top secret security clearance and access to state secrets?

I didn't think so.

Why should I have a problem with that? Why do you have a problem with it?

In today's climate I can see the thought behind such sentiment. BUT the reality is that if someone has underwent the necessary top secret clearance procedures than their religious standings have been vetted to the max, so there shouldn't be a problem.

I was vetted for a security clearance, which is why I have no problem with anyone who can get through that process having a clearance.

 

[Big Fitz]

Yes indeedy, Big Fitz I am an aging hippie. Exactly which of the world's evils would you lay at my feet?

Since you don't read my posts, only condemn them, or are incapable of understanding them, I doubt a list would help.

I'm not sure it's fair to derail this thread in order to discuss the matter, Big Fitz, but I'm open to a discussion. I'll admit I was not perfect, I made mistakes I regret now. So did most of my friends.

Still in all, I look back on how things were in the 1950's compared to how they are now...and feel some pride in having had a small hand in the changes.

You should have stopped after that in the 1960's and then we wouldn't have the societal mess we're in now. Somewhere after civil rights, and before the great society, "silent spring" but after the original clean air and water acts (freeze them there, thank you) and especially without affirmative action, Title 9 or other gender/racial special treatment or other codification of racism, special discrimination tolerance for Christians, free love and drug culture would have made a good stopping point.

Oh well, 20/20 hindsight that will soon be reversed. Let me be honest though... with all societal shifts... what scares me is that it goes too far. A political movement can go to uprising if not satisfied properly to revolution to guillotines at the courthouse surprisingly easy. And I would HATE to see that in this nation... but we are not above it on either side.

 

[Ravi]

Hello....it's not that she's a Christian that troubles the school. It is her belief that gay is a disease that needs/can be cured.

Why do you people, and this woman, keep pretending that the school is anti-Christian? I bet they have graduated plenty of Christians. Not all Christians believe this about gay and in fact some non-Christians believe it.

 

[AllieBaba]

Hello....it's not that she's a Christian that troubles the school. It is her belief that gay is a disease that needs/can be cured.

Why do you people, and this woman, keep pretending that the school is anti-Christian? I bet they have graduated plenty of Christians. Not all Christians believe this about gay and in fact some non-Christians believe it.

Why do you people insist it's not? A school funded with federal dollars cannot withhold degrees based on a student's religious beliefs, and they certainly can't award degrees on the condition that students are re-programmed.

I'm still waiting for evidence that it is a requirement of graduation that anyone BELIEVE anything. Because if it is, it's unconstitutional. If it isn't, it's discrimination.

 

[AllieBaba]

"...the student, Jennifer Keeton, argues that faculty members and administrators at the university have violated her First Amendment rights to free speech and the free exercise of religion by threatening her with expulsion if she does not fufill requirements contained in a remediation plan intended to get her to change her beliefs."

" The group has brought a similar lawsuit on behalf of an Eastern Michigan University graduate student who alleges she was dismissed from a counseling program for her beliefs about homosexuality. In 2006 the group extracted major concessions from Missouri State University in settling a lawsuit filed by a former social-work student who refused to respect a class project's requirement that she sign a letter to the state legislature in support of homosexual adoption."

"In a news release announcing the lawsuit against Augusta State, David French, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, said: "A public-university student shouldn't be threatened with expulsion for being Christian and refusing to publicly renounce her faith, but that's exactly what's happening here. Simply put, the university is imposing thought reform."

"It says faculty members at Augusta State confronted her about her beliefs based on such statements and on a student's claim that Ms. Keeton has advocated "conversion therapy" for homosexuals in conversations with her peers—an allegation that Ms. Keeton denies."

Augusta State U. Is Accused of Requiring a Counseling Student to Accept Homosexuality - Faculty - The Chronicle of Higher Education

 

[AllieBaba]

The comments are interesting as well:

This from a self-proclaimed gay person:

"Ms. Keeton claims to be able to provide professionally appropriate counseling to gay people. I suspect that she would find it difficult, but until she fails to do so, what exactly is the problem?

If she does fail to provide appropriate counseling, she must, of course, be dismissed on grounds of unprofessional behavior and failure to perform the duties of her position. But until that happens, I don't see a legitimate obstacle to her program completion."

 

[AllieBaba]

I thought this girl had actually balked at treating someone, but I had gotten her confused wtih the other student who was being discriminated against.

In the Augusta case, a class member "turned her in" for stating her beliefs outside of class. What a bunch of hogwash.

Here's another one:

"A popular professor has been barred from teaching by an American university because he explained Roman Catholic beliefs on homosexuality to students studying Roman Catholicism.
After the lecture to his “Introduction to Catholicism” class at the University of Illinois, Professor Kenneth Howell emailed his students and encouraged each of them to approach issues about homosexuality “as a thinking adult”.

His email prompted a complaint from a friend of an anonymous student, who denounced the email as hate speech and claimed to be “offended”.

An anonymous student's FRIEND. That's interesting.

And this is in a class that teaches about Roman Catholicism. So apparently we aren't to share our beliefs at all in class anymore. Schools are trying to bar Christians from the schools and prevent them from obtaining degrees. Lovely.

Meanwhile, terrorist sympathizers get free rein.

"Recent studies have demonstrated that Christian professors are consistently marginalised and passed over for promotion.

Yet decades of US Supreme Court precedent has settled that “The classroom is peculiarly the ‘market-place of ideas’”, and that universities “may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable”.

US University bars prof for teaching RC beliefs | News | The Christian Institute

"Howell, who has taught on the Champaign-Urbana campus since 2001, was barred last month after explaining during class why the church believes that homosexual behavior violates natural moral law. He elaborated later in an e-mail to students, which lawyers say circulated around campus and prompted complaints.

"All I ask as your teacher is that you approach these questions as a thinking adult," Howell wrote. "That implies questioning what you have heard around you. Unless you have done extensive research into homosexuality and are cognizant of the history of moral thought, you are not ready to make judgments about moral truth in this matter. All I encourage is to make informed decisions."

"Lorence said Howell's dismissal is one of an increasing number of cases where conservative professors have been penalized for ideological reasons.

"It's far too frequent that universities seem to be implying an ideological litmus test for their faculty members," Lorence said. "Rather than it be a true marketplace of ideas where diverse ideas are vigorously debated, there seems to be ... an orthodoxy that's imposed that one must espouse a certain view on marriage or they can't teach."

Howell's removal has inspired a Facebook page supporting him that has more than 2,600 fans, including backing from the president of the campus secularist group Atheists, Agnostics & Freethinkers."
http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2010/07/u-of-i-to-review-professors-removal-over-comments.html

 

[blu]

The comments are interesting as well:

This from a self-proclaimed gay person:

"Ms. Keeton claims to be able to provide professionally appropriate counseling to gay people. I suspect that she would find it difficult, but until she fails to do so, what exactly is the problem?

If she does fail to provide appropriate counseling, she must, of course, be dismissed on grounds of unprofessional behavior and failure to perform the duties of her position. But until that happens, I don't see a legitimate obstacle to her program completion."

Fallacy: Appeal to Authority

 

[Madeline]

Allie, the question of freedom of speech for university professors is not, not, not the same as a question of allowing a homophobe to graduate and become a public school counselor. In the case of professors of other disciplines, something might be wrong. It is a question worth examining. But in the case of this student, she has announced (made an issue of the fact) that she cannot deal with a segment of the student population in a manner that conforms to the requirements of her hoped-for profession.

 

[Immanuel]

nothing to do with religion, an atheist with her views on homosexuals would get the same treatment

That is your opinion, but I see no proof that you are correct.

All of this stems from her religious beliefs. Maybe if you can show that they prevented an atheist from getting a degree for such beliefs, but I highly doubt you can find such a case.

Immie

yes in her instance it stems from her religious beliefs, but one does not have to be chrstian or even religion to have the same views she does about gays

And the even bigger point...our government and schools NEVER get to deny anything to anyone based on religion.

Ever.

why are you so dense? its not based on her religion, but her beliefs about homosexuals

It seems to me that these two posts are contradictory.

In the first one you state it is about her religious beliefs and in the second you state that it is not about her religion.

I think this is very much about her religion and the bigoted point of view of some liberal professors who do not like to be contradicted.

Immie

 

[Immanuel]

You are correct, Allie. If a public university withheld degrees based upon a student's religious beliefs, they'd have a civil rights problem. But that is not what is happening. The school has asked this student to take diversity training, etc. because of her outspoken views on homosexuals and the manner in which her views will impact her performance as a counselor.

Diversity training = brainwashing and is absolutely un-American.

Immie

 

[Madeline]

O c'mon Immie. You seriously believe that her "liberal professors" found out about this student's religion and set out to have her expelled?

This student made an issue of her unwillingness to treat homosexuals in the manner dictated by the code and rules that govern all members of her profession. Seems to me, if anyone set out to create an issue, she did.

The religion thing is a smokescreen. This student wanted, and got, a backdoor way to challenge established protocols that have been in place for decades regarding homosexuals and therapy.

 

[Madeline]

You are correct, Allie. If a public university withheld degrees based upon a student's religious beliefs, they'd have a civil rights problem. But that is not what is happening. The school has asked this student to take diversity training, etc. because of her outspoken views on homosexuals and the manner in which her views will impact her performance as a counselor.

Diversity training = brainwashing and is absolutely un-American.

Immie

Why, Immie? Most diversity training occurs in the workplace, as employers attempt to create a more respectful atmosphere for all employees. This is supposed to happen in a school...so? Seems to me, this student very much needs to have contact with, learn about, and come to respect people who are homosexual.

I see nothing "un-American" about altering behavior that gives unwarranted offense and falls below a profession's standard of care. Would you prefer that the school simply expel her?

 

[Immanuel]

uh really? how do you figure that?

Just my opinion based off many of the threads I've read your opinions on. The only thing that really throws me for a loop is you almost go anarchist in your views on LEO.; but I know you don't truly want no law enforcement.

i want very few laws with cops not treated as Gods. I also want extremely, small constitutional only government. get rid of every social program, take down the empire, and get rid of the federal reserve and I will start to be happy

Did you type that correctly?

You want LEO's to be treated like gods?

I respect LEO's but I do find (because of the job they are paid to do) they can behave very arrogantly on the job. Do you really want them treated like gods?

Immie

 

[Immanuel]

logical4U, it is implied in seeking admission to a graduate degree program that mastering the material is a pre-requisite to graduation.

I'd like to see her grades before I determined that she had not mastered the material.

The school appears to be wrong in this case. If they proceed with this and it is later proven that they caused her to lose her degree over religious beliefs, I would think they should lose their accreditation permanently.

Immie

 

[Madeline]

Immie, part of mastering the material is learning how to properly counsel homosexual students. The student herself claims she cannot do so in conformity with the profession's standard of care.