Sikh students can wear dagger in Plymouth-Canton schools, but with modifications

Guy Incognito said:

Interesting how you bolded the "Free Exercise" Clause, which is not relevant to your point. You should have bolded the "Establishment" Clause, which precludes the government from endorsing religion. The Establishment Clause, not the Free Exercise Clause is the reason prayer is not allow at public schools, because that constitutes a government endorsement of a particular religion.

There is a difference between allowing a student to wear a religious symbol, as is the case here, and school endorsed prayer is as stark as the difference between night and day. The latter is an endorsement of religion by the school, the former is not.

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Does the constitution say establish or endorse?

spud_meister said:

Does the constitution say establish or endorse?

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Good question. The text itself says the government shall not establish a religion, but it has been held by the Supreme Court that the standard for a violation of the establishment clause is a government endorsement of religion.

Guy Incognito said:

That is false.

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so are all your points. :shrug:

Goshin said:

Okay... so are you saying that because our religion is a bit less demanding than theirs, means that theirs should get priority efforts at accomodation while ours is relegated to a side-issue at best, when not being actually stifled outright?

Not saying you meant it that way, just pointing something out...

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To a point...yeah. You pretty much nailed it on the head. And I don't really have an issue with that. No one forces anyone to follow a particular religion. A Christian may LIKE to play multiple times per day...their belief system doesn't consider it some kind of sin against their god if they don't. So while I absolutely don't think a Christian should be "banned" from praying during their free time if they want at school, I also don't think the school should have to allow them to skip out in the middle of class "X" amounts of times per day to do it.

Similarly, while I don't think Crosses or the Bible should be banned from schools, if a school bans all Jewelry for a legitimate reason I don't think its wrong for them to not allow the cross. On the flip side, if a school bans all hats I don't have a problem with them allowing a Hassidic Jew from wearing his yamaka because their religious beliefs require him to wear it all the time.

In one case you're essentially creating an inconvienence, which I don't have an issue with. In the other case you're asking them to violate the tennets of their religious faith, that I have a problem with.

If a school didn't allow kids to bring in packed lunches, if the issue was raised to the school by a devout catholic Parent, I'd have no issue with the school making sure it didn't serve Hamburgers as the only main course on Friday's during Lent.

You could see this as "unfair", but I don't really. The other kids have the benefit of being part of a religion that doesn't have these strict requiremesn. Who aren't feeling as if they're commiting some sin against god if they don't do x, y, z. The kids who don't have that hanging over their heads have that responsability lifted from their shoulders. However, going along with that, they don't have the ability to suggest that such action is a NECESSITY for their spiritual beliefs as well.

Do I think that schools in this country do a LOT of stupid things when it comes to Christianity? Absolutely. But I think its ignorantly stubborn, short sided, and selfish to get behind and support wrong-headed actions...or to oppose intelligent, reasonable, and correct actions...not because you think the ACTION is wrong but because of pure pettiness of "well somewhere someone is being ****ty to MY religion so how DARE these people have a school district act reasonable towards them!"