Florida school allows bible; censors atheist literature

Timshel

New member
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friend...hool-district-over-literature-discrimination/

You may recall that, back in January, World Changers of Florida, Inc. held Bible distributions at a number of public high schools in Orange County. No student would be forced to take one, but there would be a table set up where interested students could take a copy if they wanted one:


This alone could have been illegal, but the Orange County School Board agreed that non-Christian groups could also have a distribution if they wanted. The Central Florida Freethought Community called their bluff and planned their own giveaway.


The only problem was that the atheist giveaways were heavily censored:



Orange County Public Schools insisted on vetting the freethought literature from FFRF and other secular groups. It censored many of the materials, including “Letter to a Christian Nation,” Sam Harris’ book; “The Truth,” an essay by Robert G. Ingersoll; “Jesus Is Dead” a book by Robert Price, professor of philosophy and religion; “What on Earth Is an Atheist,” a book by Madalyn Murray O’Hair; “Why I am Not a Muslim,” a book by Ibn Warraq, and several FFRF “nontracts,” including “Dear Believer,” “Why Jesus?” “What Does the Bible Say About Abortion?” and “An X-Rated Book.”http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friend...hool-district-over-literature-discrimination/
 
Based solely on the titles, it looks like those books aren't worth reading anyway.

How are they selling relative to The Bible?
 
Florida. Figures. But can they be sued now? Since negotiating a compromise didn't work....

They filed a lawsuit.

http://ffrf.org/uploads/legal/OCSchools-Distribution-Complaint.pdf

The school district prohibited one book because its message that Jesus was not crucified or resurrected “is age inappropriate for the maturity levels of many of the students in high school.” However, the bible that the school approved for distribution claims that [Jesus was] crucified and resurrected. “Permitting one viewpoint (the crucifixion and resurrection occurred) and censoring the opposing viewpoint (the crucifixion and resurrection did not occur) is unconstitutional,” FFRF’s complaint states.



The complaint lists dozens of factual examples of how secular materials and secular volunteers were treated differently from the World Changers and the biblical material:
The district objected to the Harris book for describing “the sacrifice of virgins, killing and eating of children in order to ensure the future fertility of mothers, feeding infants to sharks, and the burning of widows so they can follow their husbands into the next world.” FFRF’s complaint notes that the concepts flagged as age inappropriate all appear in the bible.


WCF put up interactive whiteboards, had volunteers staffing tables to talk with students and passed out invitations to worship at the Orlando Wesleyan Church. Plaintiffs attempted to pass out a pizza party invitation but were censored at several schools. Freethought volunteers had to wait up to an hour at some schools to set up.http://ffrf.org/uploads/legal/OCSchools-Distribution-Complaint.pdf
 
"Freedom of Religion" and not "Forced Religion" is still a battle today. So many never learned after reading, "Those who are without sin cast the first stone" and are still casting stones today at gays and others today.

We all sin, we all just sin differently. What makes my sins worse than a gays?

We shouldn't be able to force Christianity in schools, but we should fight to keep it available. Just like we can't force Muslim in schools, but we can't take away it's availability..

And even deeper, is "god" a generalized term? Or is it Christ? Should we stop the Pledge of Allegence or is "god" a generalized term?

The bible and the Constitution go hand in hand while stating "free-will" and Never force religion. Lead by example, don't force. Yet we have seen many laws out that are directly Bible based.
 
I wonder if all the ex-Christian juvenile nitwits know how damned bitchy and whiny they seem to reasonable and rational atheists.
 
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