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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!amdcad!linda
From: linda@amdcad.UUCP (Linda Seltzer)
Newsgroups: net.politics,net.religion
Subject: Re: "Secular Humanism" banned in the US Schools.
Message-ID: <3844@amdcad.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 12-Sep-85 01:16:47 EDT
Article-I.D.: amdcad.3844
Posted: Thu Sep 12 01:16:47 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 13-Sep-85 03:20:41 EDT
References: <1072@ulysses.UUCP> <607@hou2g.UUCP> <11384@rochester.UUCP> <11463@rochester.UUCP>
Organization: AMDCAD, Sunnyvale, CA
Lines: 55
Xref: watmath net.politics:10925 net.religion:7611
Summary: Trying to control kids' minds

In article <11463@rochester.UUCP>, ray@rochester.UUCP (Ray Frank) writes:
> > 
> > Besides, I don't belive in god. I don't want the schools teaching MY kids
> > about that at all. Too biased. If I want my kids to learn religion, I'll
> > send them to a special school for it. After all, they ARE my kids. We all
> > should have control over what they learn, espically in the area of religions.
> > 
> > -- 
> You should have control over what they learn, this is exactly why I'm against
> Planned Parenthood counseling.  I find it ironic that people are more against
> puplic institutions teaching religion than against private institutions secretlycounseling kids on sex and secretely giving out birth control pills, and secret-ly performing abortions.  As you said, "after all they ARE my kids."
> 
> 
Children are people and not robots.  Their individuality and their minds must
be respected, not programmed.  Parents can try to "shelter" children all they
want, but in the end the young adult will make ones own decisions.  I
personally would want my children exposed to all philosophies, since in life 
they will encounter all philophies.  I would like them to know something
about several religions - why hide the fact that some people are religious
and that the various religions have different practices?  You can't hide
reality from people forever.  Now actually, the child of an anti-abortion
activist will probably learn about abortion much earlier than a child of
a pro-choice family.  I have heard so much discussion at home and after
church in my friends' fundamentalist home that their children must
*certainly* have some curiosity....  now in a pro-choice home the
discussion may never come up at all in front of four year olds, even
though it's always on the radio and TV - or do you make sure that the news
never reaches the ear of your children?  So parents can act like little
dictators and oppose Pravda while using it's techniques on sons and
daughters...

If a parents' moral and religious values are very strong, then they
should be able to withstand the presence of conflicting values.
Trying to shelter and suppress a child will only lead the child to
rebel and seek out all the information later.

Now with Planned Parenthood, this organization has *never* to my
knowledge recommended or advocated sexuality, but it does allow
the teenager to come into contact with medical information.  If
the parent creates a climate of empathy and discussion, then the
child can confide in the parents and there will be no need for
"secret" counseling.  

Remember, unless you intend to raise your child under house arrest,
there is nothing you can do to physically stop your child from
having pre-marital sex.  So instead of being arbitrary and negative,
it is best to communicate with the teenager, and to voice, most
of all, that the son or daughter not get involved with someone
who doesn't treat him/her right.  The concern should be that
your son or daughter is not hurt or used.  

Again, parents can attempt to program their kids' minds, in which
the offspring may very well end up in the local mental institution
(or sleeping on Telegraph Avenue) or parents let the children learn
to cope with and deal with reality as it is.