Another SCOTUS decision on religious liberty.

[smac97]

43 minutes ago, Calm said:

What years were these?  

Hmm.  I think I went through the orientation week in 2010.

43 minutes ago, Calm said:

I will ask my husband, the UVU prof, if he was given more details than you were.  He has been working there since 2003, but has to attend those meetings as well, though I believe they take an afternoon rather than a week…though I assume that part of your orientation didn’t take that long.

Not long.  It was one of a series of presentations.

43 minutes ago, Calm said:

The instructions sound similar to how my Logic professor described professors getting instructed to include teaching the gospel in every course at BYU when I was there in the late 70’s and early 80’s.  Think that class was ‘81.

BYU is a different animal.

Thanks,

-Smac

[smac97]

57 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

Quote

Further, the deliberately vague/coy approach to "social justice" taken by the HR lady was mildly frustrating to me (I was a "new hire" but I had already been teaching at UVU for a few years as an adjunct).  Its meaning is not self-evident:

Irony died a few years ago but it is nice to see that it still does the zombie thing every so often.

In the immortal words of Roz Doyle: "Well, I'd ask you to explain that, but then... you would."

Thanks,

-Smac

[Teancum]

42 minutes ago, Obehave said:

Only down your ears, not your throat, and only to help others understand what those on the right side  believe.  Ramming isn't necessary and too much work. A little bit of repetitive preaching never hurt anybody.

It is not just freedom from religion but freedom from it as well.

[Calm]

53 minutes ago, Obehave said:

Yes total freedom of religion including worshipping in public. Who would want anything less?

Me.  Not all religion is kind.  For example, do you want a public ceremony for female genital mutilation?

Or self impalement?  Crucifixions?

https://www.dnaindia.com/lifestyle/report-7-brutal-religious-and-cultural-practices-that-exist-even-today-1998217

https://www.livescience.com/59514-cultures-that-practiced-human-sacrifice.html

Edited June 29, 2022 by Calm

[smac97]

52 minutes ago, Obehave said:

Quote

No, I was just interested in whether you really wanted total freedom for public worship.

Yes total freedom of religion including worshipping in public. Who would want anything less?

Some measure of precision helps here.  "Worshipping in public" sounds fine in broad terms, but a public employee "worshipping in public" while in uniform, or in some other context in which he is acting in a representative capacity on behalf of government, can become problematic.

Thanks,

-Smac

[smac97]

1 hour ago, smac97 said:

I spent several years (five total) teaching at a local univeristy (Utah Valley University).  I was teaching courses on the law (Business Law, Intro to American Law, Legal Research and Writing, etc.).  I was told when I first started there by a friend that I would have a better time if I just stuck to the subject matter and avoided digressions into off-topic matters.  That made sense to me, so I made a specific commitment to myself that I would do as you say here and keep most or all of my personal beliefs/opinions to myself, particularly as to controversial topics.  I figured I was being paid to teach undergraduates about how the law and the legal system work, not to pontificate about socially trendy topics. 

Having made that specific commitment, abiding by it was actually quite easy.  But a few weird things happened. 

First, my students often seemed to expect me to delve into social/political issues (which usually had little or nothing to do with the subject matter of the course I was teaching), and a few even became irritated when I declined to do so or re-directed class discussion back to the coursework.  To me it seemed like they had sort of been conditioned to expect their professors/instructors weigh in on these things. 

Second, I got the impression that some students even seemed to prefer talking about such issues instead of understanding concepts like "res judicata," "agency authority," and "interestate commerce."  Some of this was, I think, attributable to students wanting to do as little work as possible.  Another factor was that the topics I was assigned to teach were often, well, difficult to grasp by, and/or not particularly interesting to, kids in their teens and early twenties (it was hard to spice up a two-week introduction to . . . West's Topic and Key Number system!).  But yet another factor was, I think, that some students seemed genuinely annoyed that they were being called upon to study and focus and do homework relating to the coursework (such as drafting a legal memo about a hypothetical defamation claim), as opposed to chit-chatting about movies, current events, politics, etc.  I think these students viewed the coursework almost as a sideshow.

Third, the university itself also had some rather, shall we say, "unanticipated" expectations about how instructors are supposed to teach.  I spent two of my five years at UVU as a full-time instructor (no tenure, just two back-to-back one-year contracts).  Prior to starting to work there full-time I had to attend a week-long retreat for new hires at UVU's remote campus near Heber City.  During one of the training sessions, someone from the university (presumably from HR) gave a presentation about how the university had a goal and expectation that every course taught at UVU should include some reference to and incorporation of "social justice" (yes, she actually used this very phrase, many times over).  And she went to particular lengths to emphasize that not only should every course incorporate "social justice," but every single scheduled class meeting should include it.  For example, I was teaching a section of "Business Law" worth three credits, which met three times each week for an hour each.  The HR lady said that each and every one of those hour-long meetings, each and every "lesson," should incorporate some aspect of "social justice."  She provided a very broad and bland definition of what "social justice" was intended to mean (by the University), but there was zero explanation as to how to go about adding it into each and every lesson.

I was, candidly, pretty surprised that UVU would explicitly impose such an expectation/requirement.  It is a state school, paid for by tax dollars.  It seemed odd that it would specifically instruct new hires to incorporate what I think most people would consider to be a politically partisan ideology into each and every course taught.  But more to the point, it just seemed weird.  It is hard enough to formulate lesson plans, homework assignments, testing modules, etc. in a way that is both effective and interesting (particularly for my assigned classes like "Legal Research and Writing," which includes a lot of important-but-boring stuff), whicl also being required to tack on to each and every lesson some sort of "social justice" message or talking point seemed . . . forced.  Contrived.  

Further, the deliberately vague/coy approach to "social justice" taken by the HR lady was mildly frustrating to me (I was a "new hire" but I had already been teaching at UVU for a few years as an adjunct).  Its meaning is not self-evident:

I suspected that the Powers-that-Be at UVU wanted teachers to drench all courses in "social justice" ideology and talking points (essentially, leftist indoctrination/inculcation), but that they also recognized that doing so explicitly (such as by coherently defining what they meant by "social justice") would draw the ire of some portions of the legislature, which controls UVU's pursestrings.  So, I surmised, the vagueness about "social justice" was deliberate, and was there for "plausible deniability" purposes.

Alternatively, I could have been totally off in my suspicions.  Perhaps the emphasis on incorporating "social justice" was just a favorite talking point by some HR bureaucrat or one of UVU's innumerable "Vice President of ___________" functionaries.  I guess I'll never know.  I went on to teach for a few more years, during which I made some half-hearted attempts to raise discussions about current events, which is how I interpreted and applied the "social justice" mandate.  I found it to be a waste of time and a distraction, so I gave up on it pretty quickly.

Thanks,

-Smac

Thomas Sowell has some interesting things to say about the state of education today:

A transcript:

Quote

A woman with a petition went among the crowds attending a state fair, asking people to sign her petition demanding the banning of dihydroxymonoxide. She said it was in our lakes and streams, and now it was in our sweat and urine and tears.

She collected hundreds of signatures to ban dihydroxymonoxide — a fancy chemical name for water. A couple of comedians were behind this ploy. But there is nothing funny about its implications. It is one of the grim and dangerous signs of our times.

This little episode revealed how conditioned we have become, responding like Pavlov’s dog when we hear a certain sound — in this case, the sound of some politically correct crusade.

People are all born ignorant but they are not born stupid. Much of the stupidity we see today is induced by our educational system, from the elementary schools to the universities. In a high-tech age that has seen the creation of artificial intelligence by computers, we are also seeing the creation of artificial stupidity by people who call themselves educators.

Educational institutions created to pass on to the next generation the knowledge, experience, and culture of the generations that went before them have instead been turned into indoctrination centers to promote whatever notions, fashions, or ideologies happen to be in vogue among today’s intelligentsia.

Many conservatives have protested against the specific things with which students are being indoctrinated. But that is not where the most lasting harm is done. Many, if not most, of the leading conservatives of our times were on the left in their youth. These have included Milton Friedman, Ronald Reagan, and the whole neoconservative movement.

The experiences of life can help people outgrow whatever they were indoctrinated with. What may persist, however, is the lazy habit of hearing one side of an issue and being galvanized into action without hearing the other side — and, more fundamentally, not having developed any mental skills that would enable you to systematically test one set of beliefs against another.

It was once the proud declaration of many educators that “We are here to teach you how to think, not what to think.” But far too many of our teachers and professors today are teaching their students what to think — about everything from global warming to the new trinity of “race, class, and gender.”

Even if all the conclusions with which they indoctrinate their students were 100 percent correct, that would still not be equipping students with the mental skills to weigh opposing views for themselves, in order to be prepared for new and unforeseeable issues that will arise over their lifetimes, after they leave the schools and colleges.

Many of today’s “educators” not only supply students with conclusions, but promote the idea that students should spring into action because of these prepackaged conclusions — in other words, vent their feelings and go galloping off on crusades, with neither a knowledge of what is said by those on the other side nor the intellectual discipline to know how to analyze opposing arguments.

When we see children in elementary schools out carrying signs in demonstrations, we are seeing the kind of mindless groupthink that causes adults to sign petitions they don’t understand or, worse yet, follow leaders they don’t understand, whether to the White House, the Kremlin, or Jonestown.

A philosopher once said that the most important knowledge is knowledge of one’s own ignorance. That is the knowledge that too many of our schools and colleges are failing to teach our young people.

It takes a certain amount of knowledge just to understand the extent of one’s own ignorance. But our “educators” have given assignments to children who are not yet a decade old to write letters to members of Congress, or to Presidents, spouting off on issues ranging from nuclear weapons to medical care.

Will Rogers once said that it was not ignorance that was so bad but “all the things we know that ain’t so.” But our classroom indoctrinators are getting students to think that they know after hearing only one side of an issue. It is artificial stupidity.

Thanks,

-Smac

[The Nehor]

1 hour ago, smac97 said:

In the immortal words of Roz Doyle: "Well, I'd ask you to explain that, but then... you would."

Thanks,

-Smac

Actually in this case I probably wouldn’t so you are safe either way.

[Danzo]

1 hour ago, smac97 said:

Some measure of precision helps here.  "Worshipping in public" sounds fine in broad terms, but a public employee "worshipping in public" while in uniform, or in some other context in which he is acting in a representative capacity on behalf of government, can become problematic.

Thanks,

-Smac

Every once in a while, A police officer, on duty and in uniform will come to sacrament meeting to worship with us.

Would this present a problem?

[Danzo]

1 hour ago, Calm said:

Me.  Not all religion is kind.  For example, do you want a public ceremony for female genital mutilation?

 

Are you referring to gender reassignment surgery?

[Danzo]

1 minute ago, Obehave said:

Good example. I say no unless that officer expects others to believe as he does, or unless others think they should have the same beliefs as that officer for no reason other than because they believe they should conform to whatever beliefs that officer or any other officer has.

The problem involves not knowing who we should worship as our Exemplar.

I think it would be great if people followed the police officer to our meetings and wanted to join the church, but alas, it doesn't seem to have much effect on church growth in our area.

 

[smac97]

26 minutes ago, Danzo said:

Every once in a while, A police officer, on duty and in uniform will come to sacrament meeting to worship with us.

Would this present a problem?

No.  Attending a religious service while in uniform would not, I think, be characterized as implicating the Establishment Clause.

Thanks,

-Smac

[Calm]

5 hours ago, Obehave said:

I meant religion of some sort or another.  Nobody accepts all religious beliefs personally. It isn't even possible because of conflicting beliefs. 

Not sure what you mean by that.  You are now saying you believe there are some people’s religious beliefs that shouldn’t be given total freedom to perform in public?

[Calm]

5 hours ago, Danzo said:

Are you referring to gender reassignment surgery?

Are you making a joke or serious?  If the latter, definitely not.

[Hamba Tuhan]

7 hours ago, Calm said:

For example, do you want a public ceremony for female genital mutilation?

Having lived where genital mutilation is a semi-public affair involving extended family, friends, neighbours, etc., I suspect there would be far, far less of it still going on in America if people had actually witnessed it firsthand  ...

[ttribe]

42 minutes ago, Calm said:

Are you making a joke or serious?  If the latter, definitely not.

And if the former, it wasn't very funny.

[Calm]

On 6/29/2022 at 8:33 PM, Obehave said:

No. I meant I think we all need total freedom to express our chosen religion both in private and in public, whichever religion we have chosen, as long as we don't infringe on other's total freedom to express their chosen religion.

Can you think of any good reason to not have that much total freedom of religion?

Because I don’t want my grandkids to walk down a street and see someone practicing their own faith through a self crucifixion or flagellation without being able to prepare them for it first. 

https://discover.hubpages.com/religion-philosophy/Good-Friday-Self-Flagellation-and-Crucifixion-in-the-Philippines

Or a modern Druid society thinking they are reenacting a truly ancient practice, offering up an actual ‘wicker man’ (and since it would qualify as murder in our culture, we won’t be seeing it anytime soon).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicker_man

Edited July 1, 2022 by Calm

[Chum]

Just now, Calm said:

Because I don’t want my grandkids to walk down a street and see someone practicing their own faith through a self crucifixion or flagellation without being able to prepare them for it first. 

https://discover.hubpages.com/religion-philosophy/Good-Friday-Self-Flagellation-and-Crucifixion-in-the-Philippines

Or a modern Druid society thinking they are reenacting a truly ancient practice, offering up an actual ‘wicker man’ (and since it would qualify as murder in our culture, we won’t).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicker_man

Today's important question is whether local govs can deny public funding to the Church of Satan K-12 Magnet School of the Lobbying Arts.

[webbles]

9 hours ago, Teancum said:

It is not just freedom from religion but freedom from it as well.

The 1st amendment isn't "freedom from religion".

Quote

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof

It is generally called "freedom of religion" or the "establishment clause".

[Teancum]

8 hours ago, webbles said:

The 1st amendment isn't "freedom from religion".

It is generally called "freedom of religion" or the "establishment clause".

Yes and the fact that there is no establishment clause or religious litmus test for public office means you are free to worship how you want or not. And if not you are free from having religion rammed down your throat like we see happening today from the religious right in America.  

[carbon dioxide]

On 6/29/2022 at 12:13 PM, smac97 said:

Some measure of precision helps here.  "Worshipping in public" sounds fine in broad terms, but a public employee "worshipping in public" while in uniform, or in some other context in which he is acting in a representative capacity on behalf of government, can become problematic.

Thanks,

-Smac

Why should a public employee have to take off his uniform before they can worship.  I don't see it a problem unless it the worship occurs as some official or sanctioned action.  An LDS member who is a cop attending an LDS ward for sacrament while in uniform is not a problem.  An LDS sacrament meeting held at the police station would be a problem. 

Edited June 30, 2022 by carbon dioxide

[carbon dioxide]

10 hours ago, Teancum said:

Yes and the fact that there is no establishment clause or religious litmus test for public office means you are free to worship how you want or not. And if not you are free from having religion rammed down your throat like we see happening today from the religious right in America.  

Define ramming something down ones throat?

[smac97]

1 hour ago, carbon dioxide said:

Quote

Some measure of precision helps here.  "Worshipping in public" sounds fine in broad terms, but a public employee "worshipping in public" while in uniform, or in some other context in which he is acting in a representative capacity on behalf of government, can become problematic.

Why should a public employee have to take off his uniform before they can worship. 

When he is in uniform and funtioning in his official capacity, that may implicate "Establishment Clause" concerns.  Context matters.

1 hour ago, carbon dioxide said:

I don't see it a problem unless it the worship occurs as some official or sanctioned action. 

Yes.  That is the sort of problem that can arise.

1 hour ago, carbon dioxide said:

An LDS member who is a cop attending an LDS ward for sacrament while in uniform is not a problem.  An LDS sacrament meeting held at the police station would be a problem. 

When I was in the National Guard, we held a brief Sacrament Meeting during lunch in a side room for those who wanted to attend.  I saw nothing wrong with that.  

Thanks,

-Smac

[Bernard Gui]

On 6/29/2022 at 2:05 PM, Calm said:

Not quite the same when that is where I get the food and I don’t take it somewhere else to eat.  They have at least two options, in the locker room or on the field.
 

But I don’t have a problem with it, it just surprises me some given the scripture.  I would have thought that would lead them to holding the prayer in the locker room.  Less likely to get disruptive noises as well.

Could he be fired if the team had a pizza party and he prayed before eating his food?

[Calm]

6 minutes ago, Bernard Gui said:

Could he be fired if the team had a pizza party and he prayed before eating his food?

Why are you asking me?

[Bernard Gui]

4 minutes ago, Calm said:

Why are you asking me?

I don’t see the distinction between a coach praying alone on a field after a game and offering a prayer over food in a public situation if one assumes he is praying to be seen of men.