Universities are supposed to discriminate against the uninformed

August 29, 2005

I think it’s essential that universities have diverse student populations, but suing a college for “discriminating” against the ignorant doesn’t make any sense.

Amid the growing national debate over the mixing of religion and science in America’s classrooms, University of California admissions officials have been accused in a federal civil rights lawsuit of discriminating against high schools that teach creationism and other conservative Christian viewpoints.

The suit was filed in Los Angeles federal court Thursday by the Assn. of Christian Schools International, which represents more than 800 religious schools in the state, and by the Calvary Chapel Christian School in Murrieta, which has an enrollment of more than 1,000.

Under a policy implemented with little fanfare a year ago, UC admissions authorities have refused to certify high school science courses that use textbooks challenging Darwin’s theory of evolution, the suit says.

Other courses rejected by UC officials include “Christianity’s Influence in American History,” “Christianity and Morality in American Literature” and “Special Providence: American Government.”

The University of California wants incoming students to have a certain base of education. Students who received an inadequate education are therefore unprepared for the rigors of the university curriculum and aren’t welcome. For this, the Assn. of Christian Schools International is filing a lawsuit, claiming “discrimination.”

Even by the already-low standards of the religious right, this is pretty silly.

As Mark Kleiman noted, UC doesn’t care about incoming students’ religious background; it simply wants students equipped with the basics.

No one is telling these schools they can’t fill the heads of their students with whatever preposterous mumbo-jumbo they like. And no one is telling the students they need to believe that evolution is the correct account of the origin of species.

But a biology course that teaches Genesis instead of biology isn’t a biology course. Presumably an “astronomy course” using Ptolemy’s Almagest as its primary text would also be rejected.

It isn’t “religious discrimination” when an academic institution refuses to treat mythology as science.

I think the phrase to keep in mind here is “academic standards.” UC, like nearly every other state university system in the nation, welcomes students who learned a lot in high school, did well on entrance exams, have demonstrated an understanding of a broad series of subjects, shown a willingness to take on intellectual challenges, etc. Calvary Chapel not only wants to teach young people poorly, it also wants UC not to mind.

“It appears that the UC system is attempting to secularize Christian schools and prevent them from teaching from a world Christian view,” said Patrick H. Tyler, a lawyer with Advocates for Faith and Freedom, which is assisting the plaintiffs.

No, it appears the UC system wants students who have a basic understanding of modern science.

The real crime isn’t the UC’s standards; it’s what these schools are doing to these kids.

AAAAAAARGH! These people…. the mind boggles, you know? They really think they’ve got a case? Talk about being divorced from reality…

  • These people are crazy. They want to teach their mumbo-jumbo and then they want everyone else to appreciate the good job they are doing.

  • I’m pretty sure that the ACS knows it doesn’t have a legal basis. It’s perfectly okay to eliminate applicants who are not prepared to succeed, as Carpetbagger said. Ignorance is a justifiable criterion for exclusion.

    I suspect that their real purpose is simply to further foster the “victim” complex that American religion has. Here we have an evil UC system picking on poor Christians who have been taught the “truth.” If the ACS wins, great! If they lose, even better–they have further evidence that the judiciary is the enemy.

    All this is just part of the continuing effort to program the fundie base.

  • Shouldn’t they be sueing Calvary Chapel Christian School for providing them with an education that does not prepare them for the real world instead?

  • It’s a money thing for these schools. If parents see that by sending their children to Christian schools, the children won’t be able to get into a good college, the parents will send the kids elsewhere – so they have to make sure that they put themselves on an equal footing, results-wise, with other schools or they’ll miss out on all those voucher funds.

  • I think Andy has hit the target right smack in the middle. Even otherwise rabid evangelicals are smart enough to realize that money spent on a discredited private school is not a good way to invest in your child’s future.

    But reading about UC’s position on these alternate-reality academies makes me wonder about the home schooling that so many of these folks have eagerly adopted. What are those children learning at mommy’s knee, and how will it transfer to the university level? Is there any mechanism to test those folks?
    . . . jim strain in san diego.

  • Let me see if I have you liberals correctly:

    It is okay for us to discriminate against thse Christian kids for something they have no control over, such as whether their parents send them to a school with inferior science.

    But we will positively discriminate in favor of blacks and Latinos who come from schools with inferior science programs because their inner city public schools don’t have the requisite resources as other schools.

    One form of discriminating against uninformed children is okay, the other isn’t. Why? Because one is harccore Christian, which the left, despite their lipservice to tolerance and diversity, absolutely despises, and the other is people of color, who the left treats like children in need of a stepping stool and lots of extra encouragement to get anywhere in life.

    Admit- you guys hate very religious people, and your tolerance mantra is a sham.

  • Nate,

    You should re-read anything you ever write that start with “you liberals” and ends with “you guys.” I assume you have a little more complexity, even in your political views, than any simple ideology. So do we. This is a pretty diverse and thoughtful site. Perhaps you are too used to freeperville.

    As to your direct comment, the poor urban schools you mention are teaching accredited science, albeit, perhaps, poorly. So although you raise an interesting point, it’s not that simple. The idea of calling something “biology” that is, in fact, not based on biology as accredited universities define it, means that it shouldn’t be treated as biology for entrance purposes. The issue of religion is irrelevant, it is one of standards for students.

    For example, if I start a non-Christian school where I teach biology as “any old thing I made up”, or perhaps Aristotelian “biology”, or ancient Egyptian ideas of “biology,” it would not meet the entrance requirements for an accredited school. These kids can learn and believe anything they want, but they have to take and pass certian basic classes to be ready for college.

    As to affirmative action, I have serious doubts that it is accomplishing its goals. There is recent evidence from law schools to the contrary, where median income for minorities in affirmative action scenarios (i.e., admitted to schools wherein they would be denied if they were white) is lower than their non-affirmative action counterparts. I’ll try to find a link to the study, but it was a progressive law scholar who was doing the study.

  • Nate, I rest my case (see post #4).

    Everyone, feel free to applaud for my correctly predicting what the trolls would say before they even bothered.

  • Eadie,

    Excellent response. Especially the “you liberals” part. It’s not only that we here at TCR are a complex and diverse group. Many of us, as individuals, would regard the label “liberal” as far too simple a way to describe our political philosophies, strategies and tactics over a wide range of issues. Nate, like most Bushites I’ve ecountered, doesn’t see this because his own world is adequately described by such simple terms.

    Mr. Fribble,

    applaud, applaud, applaud

    Nate,

    I know I’m addressing a cinder block wall, but I’ll at least address one aspect of your contention. Christians who fear science and insist on sharing their fear and ignorance with their offspring ARE MAKING A CHOICE and, unfortunately (imho) their offspring are stuck with that choice. “Sins of the father…” and similar religious nonsense. Blacks and Latinos (I think you mean people from poor school districts) are not making a choice. It’s possible, if they’re open to it, to take affirmative action to help such people prepare for a university education.

    FWIW, in my own university experience I have opposed programs which sought to create “something like a university experience” for those ill-equipped to follow traditional paths and standards. Back in the early ’70s my university established a College of Ethnic Studies. While it did have some noble, and competent, inspiration, in practice it amounted to rounding up racial minorities from Seattle and Tacoma who would not otherwise have applied, then offering them degrees in fields no one ever heard of. Again, there were noteworthy exceptions, but the program was overwhelmingly a waste of time (a precious time in young lives) spent learning no more than how to rant and feel sorry for oneself. When I suggested that the College, instead of making up weird BA programs, provide special support for those who might want traditional majors (Accounting, Chemistry, Literature), I was hooted down as a racist. It gave me great pleasure, three years later, to chair the committee which dissolved that College and redistributed its resources toward helping those students who did want to stay on in other university programs.

    So, Nate, am I still one of “you liberals”? Not that I care, one way or another.

  • Why do any of these parents even want their kids even want to go to non-Christian, secular schools? What about Bob Jones U? Pat Robertson’s Regents University? Or the Christian homeschooler paradise, Patrick Henry University?

    I love how fundamentalists interpret anything that is neutral to religion as “hostile” or anti-Christian. (That’s because they believe they are entitled to dominate, the very act of questioning their place is offensive.) Sorry, but if you choose to have your children taught totally outside of mainstream schools using totally non-mainstream, non-academic curricula in areas like science, then it should go without saying that they’re not going to have an easy time getting into mainstream schools. Actually, the schools are helping these parents because if they go to big university schools and get exposed to non-Christians, gays, atheists they might not come home the way they left.

    By the way, comparing privileged kids who attend private, Christian schools to kids who were born into poverty and “bad” school districts is really freaking low. Do you have any idea how totally racist you sound/are? Or is your solution for all of those kids to get state-paid vouchers to attend the anti-science, religious schools so they can’t get into state schools either?

  • Some disparate points:

    a) I really like this site. I think your views are rather extreme, and I think the content of the posts and comments have the effect of reinforcing the existing views of the participants rather than challenging them, but I love the passion you guys (and gals) have.

    b) I’m not a Bushite. I know you can’t possibly verify this, and will therefore have to take my word for it, but I voted for Gore in 2000, Kerry in 2004, and against the Governator in 2003. I do lean right, but am and never was a fan of Bush. But I’m a big opponent of poorly constructed, emotionally driven criticism of Bush, largely because it taints substantive criticism of his administration.

    c) Sorry Zoe, not a racist. I’ve spent the last three years teaching in an inner city public school, volunteering to teach the remedial classes with large minority populations, classes that many of my more liberal colleagues find beneath them. I may frame racial issues in a different way than you, but that doesn’t mean I’m not committed to helping minorities in America. The fact that the “racist” charge came so quickly from you should be of some concern. It’s on par with idiot Republicans who shout treason at an any anti-war criticism.

    d) To the extent that I’ve offended posters by referring to them as “you liberals”, I apologize. I never thought that was a putdown, more a challenge, and provocation if you will. I think it’s good you take pride in being a liberal, those of you who embrace the title. And I did generalize from the comments I’ve read that most people here are liberals.

    e) I can’t bore everyone by answering all your critiques of my initial post. I’ll just say that in response to the title of the post “Universities are supposed to discriminate against the uninformed”, if that is what you believe, you should be logically consistent and do away with affirmative action. If you believe that universities should allow for some populations to be uninformed to due environmental circumstances beyond their control- a perfectly legitimate view- then it should extend to everyone: the kid born into poverty in South Central LA and the kid born into a “cultish” Christian family.

    This doesn’t mean accepting a passing grade in a Creationism class anymore than it means accepting a passing grade in a poorly taught South Central math class. If you believe in affirmative action, it does mean not punishing the kids in both situations.

  • I would just like to point one thing out Nate. Despite the title of the post, the gist is simply that you cannot have people entering an institution of higher learning when they have been taught that the basic precepts of that institution are wrong. To send a child with no science or social science background into post secondary education is not only a waste of that students time, but also prevents others for attending. While you may disagree with affirmative action, the fact is that these prospective students must still meet certain minimum academic standards, which includes passing these courses. Therefore, the simple solution for these “Christian” educated children is to ensure that they take the required courses either in their own schools or elsewhere.

  • Well, maybe we should have affirmative action for Christians who are handicapped by a Christian education. This would take the wind right out of the argument that teaching from a world Christian view is legitimate.

    Please, let’s not take this lightly. The lawsuit is another battle in the right wing Christian war on America.

    Next up, a lawsuit to establish a Christian studies curriculum in the U of C?

  • The bottom line for me is that creationism is not science. If the UC system wishes to count such classes towards a humanities requirement, then fine. However, such curricula should not be credited as science coursework.

    Secondary schools – whether public or private, secular or religious – should be held accountable to teach what is necessary to qualify their students for the pursuit of higher education. To do otherwise is irresponsible.

  • It’s difficult to deny that schools like the Calvary Chapel Christian School are doing one thing extremely well. They are preparing their students in the most effective way possible for exciting lifelong careers as entry level greeters at Walmart. If they can pass the physical, anyway.

    What good would it do if they did manage to get into the UC system? The only way they could pass would be to demand a free ride because of their alleged ‘Christian’ beliefs, just like they’re trying to do to gain admission in the first place. They haven’t been given the background and fundamentals to deal with university-level subject matter, so how could they possibly do the course work?

    But let’s say for the sake of discussion that they did get in, and were given a degree in the subject of their choice purely because of their ‘Christian’ affiliation. They’d still be no more knowledgeable than when they went in. What would they do next, go to a company waving their Bibles and demanding to get paid because they believe in Jesus?

    Toyota recently built a new manufacturing plant in Canada rather than the southern U.S. in spite of millions of dollars in cash incentives because the workers down there were literally too rock-stupid to operate the machinery. That’s the reality that kids with an inadequate education have to face, and I’m sincerely sorry for them.

    Here’s the link to the article that tells all about it. Read it for yourself.

    http://www.cbc.ca/cp/business/050630/b0630102.html

  • Nate–

    You may not fancy yourself a right-winger, but you sure do play one on tv. Here’s what you said:

    But we will positively discriminate in favor of blacks and Latinos who come from schools with inferior science programs because their inner city public schools don’t have the requisite resources as other schools.

    I have a few questions for you. Do you know what the original intent of affirmative action (AA) programs was? Do you believe that AA uses quotas and discriminates against white people, especially white men? Do you believe that the people who are helped by AA don’t really deserve it? That academic standards are lowered in by the use of AA?

    You might not believe any of these things but you sure did talk like someone who does. Phrasing things the way you did in addition to attacking all liberals so angrily makes you sound like a right-winger, like the people who refer to “blacks and Latinos” as shorthand for “poor,” the very people who often have unchecked racist views. You might not have meant to and you might not fit the association, but it sure is how you came off.

    INMO, imperfect as AA is, it is an attempt to correct historical, racist wrongs. Personally I’d like to see it directed more towards class than race, but I totally understand why it has developed the way that it has. I’d do something more than AA if there were an actual alternative. But I also don’t blame AA for causing racism, I think it reveals racism that already exists.

    I think we should be truly equalizing the education system, as AA only addresses a symptom. But it would never work, it would be too radical and too FAIR. Here it is– I think that all schools in a state should get the exact same amount of money and resources, it shouldn’t be based on their local tax base; schools in rich and poor areas get the same amount, dollar for dollar. Why won’t this ever work? All of the local politicians who made it happen would get voted out of office. So until that happens, until schools are on equal footing no matter where a person is born or grows up, AA is the best we’ve got.

    So, yeah, if you want to have a conversation about AA, please reconsider your approach and tone a little more. We’re all up for debate, but if you come out swinging we’ll swing right back.

    (For the record, I said you either sound/are racist and I meant it as an either/or. Sorry for not being clear about that. I don’t use the term very often. But it struck me as racist when you used “blacks and Latinos” as shorthand for poor, inner-city kids.)

  • Liam- I see your point, but I don’t think a student from a fringe Christian school should be prevented from attending a state university just becuase her school teaches Creationism instead of science. Students coming from those schools could be required to take introductory biology, chemistry, etc in their first year. If the student is unwilling to do so, they don’t have to enroll. You seem to be implying that because the students attended these Creationist classes and come from Christian families that they are indoctinated and can’t be changed. I don’t think that is the case.

    Zoe- I don’t know what you mean by a right-winger. I oppose affirmative action, a large welfare state, excessive income redistribution along the likes of which you describe. But I favor gay marriage, legalization of pot, a more humane and rehabilitative prison system. Out of curiosity, are there any issues on which you might consider yourself a conservative?

    I agree with you that educating all children and giving them a equal shot at success in life should the goal of the American education system. I just really don’t think the funding scheme you describe would ever work, not even with enlightened leaders. People don’t behave selflessly like that. If they did, they wouldn’t be human, they would some form of selfless robot. You deal with the humans you have, not the ones you wish you had.

    I’m totally in favor of giving the poorest kids the best schools and teachers. That doesn’t contradict my conservatism at all. However, I disagree with the dumbed down, spineless multicultural ideology of education espoused by the unions that have a stranglehold on the teaching profession in inner city public schools, and am therefore reluclant to advocate spending more money in such a system. Ideally charter schools and vouchers wouldn’t be necessary, but the corrupt ideology and lack of high standards in our public schools make them a necessy alternative.

    That’s my two cents. And as for my sounding racist, well, since white flight most poor, inner-city kids are black and Latino. And these groups do tend to come out of high school woefully unprepared for college work. (Read Bob Herbert today) That doesn’t mean I think aren’t capable kids, or I don’t wish the very best for them.

  • But reading about UC’s position on these alternate-reality academies makes me wonder about the home schooling that so many of these folks have eagerly adopted. What are those children learning at mommy’s knee, and how will it transfer to the university level? Is there any mechanism to test those folks?

    My wife and I homeschooled both our kids (now 18 and 21) so I’ve got a bit of experience on this. I can tell you that in California it was easy to homeschool under the radar and we didn’t have to submit to any testing at all. When our school district started offering a couple grand per kid annually for supplies and materials in exchange for a monthly sitdown with a coordinator, we signed up gladly and ended up with some very nice educational material that we wouldn’t have bought otherwise (for the most part). But soon the money started getting smaller and the accountability started getting tighter, so we just opted out.

    The first time my daughter (the eldest child) had to face testing was when she was 12 or 13 and wanted to take math classes at the community college. She tested well enough to start out with basic math, which isn’t hard in the least. She continued to take CC classes until she was 17, including some of the toughest ones, and was consistently tops in her classes. Then she decided she wanted to go to high school! She did one year of high school, loaded with honors and AP classes at a very highly regarded public school (in Davis, where we moved specifically for that reason), then got into a quite selective liberal arts college with a good physics program. She’s pulling a 3.8 GPA as she heads into her junior year.

    My son just went off to college for the first time, having been accepted into an honors program at a different private liberal arts college. He too started taking community college classes at age 12, but decided on his own initiative to do three years in high school. In retrospect he kind of wishes he’d continued home schooling, but that’s all in the past.

    Both kids are quite gregarious, especially my son. We (and most home schoolers) often joke about the “socialization problem” with homeschoolers. Last year my son was up on stage with a big group and obviously hamming it up, and I made a joking remark about socialization to my daughter. To my surprise, she said that the vast majority of homeschooled kids she’s met are screwed up to one degree or another. She said that when she tells people she was homeschooled all her life they usually are shocked and remark that they couldn’t tell because she’s not weird.

    I’ve seen it work out both ways with home schoolers. I’ve got two fundie younger siblings who homeschool their kids, and they’re brainwashing them something fierce. It looks like they’ll end up quite accomplished in some fields, probably most, but mixed in with that they’ll have these primitive ideas about creationism and all that entails (the young earth, humans and dinosaurs coexisting, etc.). So how will they do in university, if they can get in? Probably very well, as long as they don’t have to take any science classes.

    By way of illustration I offer an amusing anecdote. My daughter, majoring in Physics in college, recently spent Thanksgiving with my holy rollin’ extended family, due to geographical proximity and social responsibility more than choice. After pointedly refusing to join in a toast to our fearless leader Bush (sometimes your kids make you so proud!), my sister engaged her in a “discussion,” suggesting a book on “intelligent design” or something “that’s got some physics in it.” Yeah, I know, you can imagine.

    So despite one’s incredulity that conversations like this can even be happening in 21st century America, my sister then gets onto a creationism riff, and asks my daughter, “How do you think they date these things?” meaning the age of the earth, etc. Kid replies matter-of-factly, “Beta decay.” My sister condescendingly responds, “You don’t really believe in that, do you?” as if my poor kid is just the most naive little thing.

    Well, it just so happens that only the week before my daughter did a big lab project wherein she turned silver into cadmium, a bit of reverse alchemy the whole point of which was to illustrate the mechanism of beta decay. She even had her lab report with her, and could have whipped it out and tried to explain it, though of course it would have sailed right over her aunt’s head. But she knows when she’s talking to a wall, and didn’t bother. She understands the impossibility of discussing science and rationalism with someone who long since abandoned both in favor of blind faith. So instead, being a diplomat of sorts, she just told her aunt that when she sees “scientists” who aren’t Christians espousing creationism, then she could at least begin to consider looking at it (like when hell freezes over), but until then it’s clearly a religious belief and has nothing at all to do with real science. That’s my girl!

    I can’t tell you how often both my kids have thanked us for not raising them religious. Or Republican! Though I guess that’s all the same these days, isn’t it? Sheesh, it’s like the Stalinist cult of personality. Who’d have thought we’d see such regression—political personality cults and religious wars—in 21st century America?

    It’s been embarrassing sometimes to have been a homeschooling parent, because when we mention it so many people automatically assume we’re fundie Luddites. The weird thing is that, as my sister’s comment above (“You don’t really believe that, do you?”) was quite telling. For many fundies, everything is about belief, not fact. If your facts contradict their beliefs, then your facts aren’t facts, they’re just alternative beliefs. It’s the whole creationism/ID thing in a nutshell—an appropriate receptacle.

    I fear I’ve rambled on long enough, but before I check out let me just say that one should beware of assumptions about homeschoolers, even though in general they will likely end up being fundies, probably with generally good educations (often better than school kids) with some glaring misconceptions in whole swaths of knowledge, and enough brainwashing to keep suds pouring out of their ears for the rest of their lives. But like with everything, there are exceptions.

    Look at it this way: they won’t be competing with your kids for jobs in scientific fields. The bad news? Plenty of them are on a fast track to become your political leaders. Perish the thought! Okay, I’ll shut up now.

  • ‘I don’t think a student from a fringe Christian school should be prevented
    from attending a state university just becuase her school teaches Creationism
    instead of science.’

    Then how are we to determine what is supposed to be taught? Science is the basis of the rapid change that have occured in the past century. It is just as important as english, mathematics, history or any of the core areas of education. Would you say a student who couldn’t write an essay is qualified for to attend college? I view the ability to write and the ability to understand science and scientific thought as of equal importance in education.

    As to your original assertion thatthere is no difference between an poorly educated inner-city youth and a poorly educated youth attending a private Christian school I would disagree. The Christian is remaining ignorant willfully, or at least his parents are keeping him ignorant willfully. He or She has every oppurtunity to attend an accredited school, but chooses not to, while an inner-city youth is stuck in his or her situation. He or she is unable to relocate to another city or to a private school for financial reasons.

    I am surprised that nobody commented on the old ‘Liberals hate Christians’ line. Thats obnoxious and wrong, and probably why half of us didn’t take you seriously on your first post. I am a Liberal and a Christian, I attend services twice a week. Many of those I go to church with are liberal if not Liberals, and look to the Bible to support and defend many of their views. There very well may be Liberals who hate Christians, but they are by far the exception and not the rule.

    Nate, Please stick around, it is good to have competing points of view.

  • Thanks, Mr. Flibble, but watch what you encourage.

    “Don’t get me stahted…”

  • Chip-

    Thanks for your comments. I do not think my initial post implied that liberals hate Christians, but that liberals hate the extreme elements of the Christian right. It’s a generalization, yes, but I find the mocking nature of many posts and comments on this site to back up this assertion.

    Regarding the Christian vs. the inner city kid: The key is that neither kid has a choice in their schooling. Their parents do, so if you are content, as another poster asserted, to punish the son for the sins of the father, I guess your view holds up. But if I wanted to be truly inclusive and tolerant, I wouldn’t punish a 4.0 student with a brilliant mind just because she didn’t get the chance to have some science.

    If you really want my opinion, I wouldn’t take the Christian or the inner city kid. Universities are not built to remedy social ills, but to reward achievement. I guess that’s the conservative in me coming out. But if we keep affirmative action, then I say apply it to everyone who has been deprived.

  • Regarding the Christian vs. the inner city kid: The key is that neither kid has a choice in their schooling. Their parents do…

    Nate, don’t you get it? Haven’t the previous posters who’ve responded to your pieces made the point crystal clear? The parents of the poor inner city kid don’t, in most cases, have the same choice that the fundie parents do. And that being the case, your comparison is utterly useless. Give it up, you’re building on sand. Saying it over and over doesn’t make it so. That’s something that’ll work with the Bush cult, but it doesn’t work here.

    “Repetition does not transform a lie into a truth.”
    Franklin Roosevelt

  • Lindsay-

    Not true. The inner city kid’s parents made choices in their life, and if those choices put them in a situation with little funds, so be it. I really don’t buy into the infantization of poor minorities perpetuated by social progressives. They are free men and women like the rest of us, and the sooner we rid them of the crippling entitlement culture, the sooner we will see them prosper.

    To add a wrinkle into the discussion: what if we were talking about a black Christian kid? With an 800 SAT Verbal, masses of community service, but no science- just Creationism. C’mon, you know you would want this kid at your college.

  • Ahh, it all comes down to that, does it? The cycle of poverty, rooted in hundreds of years of institutionalized racism/Jim Crowe/slavery, has nothing to do with why so many people are poor– they just don’t work hard enough, they made bad choices. Got it, they’re poor because they’re lazy and have bad judgement. On top of that multiculturalism is to blame, so is the “entitlement culture” and the “infantalization of poor minorities perpetuated by social progresives.”

    Very neat little picture you have there with liberals held accountable for almost everything– funny that. According to you, we’re not helping, we’re holding them back. Next are you going to say we want actually them to stay down? I’m quite familiar with the particular phrases and rhetoric you’re using, they’re common in very anti-liberal “right-wing” circles, unless you somehow came up with them all on your own. Mostly you strike me as someone with a pretty irrational hatred of liberals based on our efforts to help others.

    What I find most troubling is your lack of insight. You say you work with kids in inner-city schools? You really think that racism has nothing to do with why they are there? or why their schools are in such bad shape?

  • Chip wrote: Nate, Please stick around, it is good to have competing points of view.

    I don’t mind competing points of view, as long as there’s any validity to the arguments. But Nate’s tired rehashing of rightwing cliches is anything but refreshing. Zoe pretty much has Nate nailed there. Frankly, Nate, I doubt that your self-description is for real. I’ve read enough of your stuff to seriously doubt your progressive leanings. Your ideas of evolution, I’d bet, are restricted to social Darwinism. (Poor Charles would be appalled to see his name associated with such sentiments, I’ll bet.)

    I didn’t mind this place before Nate showed up, suddenly commandeering what was heretofore thoughtful commentary and making it about refuting rightie nonsense. I disagree, Chip, I would rather that Nate not stick around. He’d feel much more at home with the freepers. If I want his brand of stubborn argumentation I know where to go to find it. I know this thread is old enough now to probably be seen by only a few, but that’s intentional because I don’t like to be negative. I’m just hoping Nate will come to check up on the reaction to his posts and maybe take a hint.

  • Only seen by a few, eh? I understand what you are saying. Nate made me pause and reflect. He didn’t change my point of view but he made me understand it a bit better. And of course some one can out stay their welcome.

  • I don’t mind competing points of view, as long as there’s any validity to the arguments. But Nate’s tired rehashing of rightwing cliches is anything but refreshing.

    Really? While I found his original post trite and lacking in substance, some of the other things he’s posted since show a view divergent from any freeperville zombie I know.

    Examples:

    “The fact that the “racist” charge came so quickly from you should be of some concern. It’s on par with idiot Republicans who shout treason at an any anti-war criticism.”

    “[I] oppose affirmative action, a large welfare state, excessive income redistribution along the likes of which you describe. But I favor gay marriage, legalization of pot, a more humane and rehabilitative prison system. Out of curiosity, are there any issues on which you might consider yourself a conservative?”

    Thoughtful stuff. He is still wrong in the original argument (that an accredited university cannot set admissions criteria–mistakenly framed as a discriminatory practice by belief). One note on the actual topic: no-one is saying those kids can’t go and take the required courses somewhere else. The fact is, those are classes you need to be prepared for college, so go take them. The lawsuit is misguided for trying to replace required entrance criteria with their own views of what is “true.”

    But anyway; I concur, please stay. I am too often missing a conservative voice on some issues (particularly gun control, which I abhor).

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