Bann Christmas at Schools in the United States? What's next?

Sounds interesting to me... when? where? what time?

Understood..I have not labeled Christmas as Christianity..I simply see it through the eyes of a child and goodness of heart. The heart only cares about the goodness of the giving and sharing of gifts from the heart as it will see the goodness that is offered in all Nationalities of Celebrations. Too many get caught up in the Politically correct agenda.

I'm not anti-Christmas. I have wonderful memories of it as a child. My parents went all out and we woke up xmas morning to a house transformed into a fantasy land. It was pretty magical. Having Christmas acknowledged at school did nothing to add to that, and not having it mentioned would have done nothing to detract from it. Certain places need to be neutral in regards to religion and religious ritual. Public schools are one of them.

Well, it'd make for some amusing plastic light-up onraments on the courthouse lawn.

Sorry Blake - but this is absolutely NOT how you initially presented the topic:



Your first post trivialized the separation of Church and State and your second post trivialized Freedom of Religion in America. Therein lie the justification for the arguments.

Also note: The opinion that church and state should be separate is hardly a "politically correct" opinion in the current government administration.

I also understand your point..the giving and sharing of Gifts in school tied to a specific religion is easily miscontrued..as forcible belief..however; I do not believe that because of this perception that by Law Prohibition from giving or exchanging a gift should be percicuted. It is sometimes harder to see the intent of goodness than the perceptions of the negatives that easily blanket it.

Because that is how some percieve it...not necessarily how all do.

I'm not arguing the religous aspect of these types of things in school but what does bother me about banning christmas or any other holiday or praying before a football game, etc is the Tradition associated with them.

Some of my fondest memories of school are drawing names from a hat and getting like a 10 dollar item for someone at xmas and I just couldn't wait to see what I got. Also, the plays we had and participated in were fun and a great way to bond with people you might haven't bonded with before.

Easter, the same... there was always an occassion associated with our holidays at school. These things are tradition and have been in the schools WAY before I was even born.

When people start threatening someones traditions / beliefs, things get hairy and they fight back. (Thus, this thread starting) I can understand with the way America is today that this starts to infringe on a lot more people than ever before. When I went to school we might have had 1 person that didn't participate. Yes people viewed them as "different" and yes that person probably felt "left out". But, do I need to name the other "countless" things that people fell "left out" of in school that has NOTHING to do with religion or anything else? Nowadays, the classrooms are ALOT more diverse.

Usually what happens is that since EVERYONE cannot be satisfied, something will be done away with... so I completely understand why these things get banned from schools.

Same with SL, i'm sure you all have witnessed things that have been complained about by some that end up getting PULLED from the application.

The best way to solve these things are to remove them altogether. Then people can't bitch / complain about having it when in fact we have lost 1 more thing that was known / comfortable to a vast majority to others.

my .02 cents

Anyway, as I said in a previous thread, I was born and raised Buddhist.
Did I feel uncomfortable as a child saying the pledge of allegiance? Yes, but it didn't break me down. Just made me feel different.
Did I feel uncomfortable singing Christmas tunes in assembly? Yes, but the melody of Silent Night is nice so I didn't mind singing that.
Did I feel uncomfortable going on field trips to missions? Yes, but I think everyone did since there were graves all over the place.

I don't think it was right for me to be forced to say stuff that included words like god, holy, prayer, etc. I didn't mind at all Christmas lights, Santa Claus, elves, Rudolph, cookies, and presents though.

I was raised by athiests, although as kids my family did the secular Christmas stuff- tree, decorations, and gift giving (no santa), so to this day I (personally) don't find that kind of thing religious, although I can see how they can be interpreted that way by association.



Same here.

Ok first off this is pretty comical but to play your game, if or when the religious right starts taking over the government all you will see of me is asshole and elbow.

Now on to your other point Christmas is not being banned from all schools. Private schools across the US have the right to teach the religion of choice and celebrate any of the holidays they see fit. Publicly sponsored "free" schools, on the other hand, are not responsible for the religious education of children. What the school systems do instead is give students time off so that they can celebrate with their families and religious organizations. Celebrating religious holidays in school is not only unnecessary but also alienates students and families who do not practice christianity.

The school system has enough on it's plate already. It is a parents responsibilty not the governments to foster the religious growth of their children. When teachers are having a hard enough time keeping order in the classroom, when they are often teaching from outdated text books filled with misinformation, when they are dealing with more cultural diversity then ever before; why in the hell would you want to further take away from the academic studies to have a Christmas party. The classroom is not the place for frivolity and cupcake parties, it is a place for learning fundamental skills and gaining the ability to survive in this world.

Ask your gov-co for tuition tax credits and send your kids to private school if you want religion in education. If you want to use the secular public educational facilities, then take your kids to church, pray with them at home and decorate your own damned christmas tree. Stop trying to put everything on the teachers and take on a bit of your childs education yourself.

In the United States, among elsewhere, Christmas is a secular holiday as well. Government offices, businesses, schools, et al are closed, similarly to Thanksgiving and New Years. While there is an associated religious holiday, it has nothing to do with trees, lights, and gift giving. Two different holidays are being argued here, in the same way that people against gay marriage make the argument on religious grounds. There is a separation of secular and religious marriage. If you remove Christmas celebrations from schools, you need to remove other holidays as well.

I agree that all religious holidays should be removed from schools.

Frankly, I'd rather the little buggers didnt have any time off ever. And boarded there. Seven days a week.

Oh wait. TMI for this particular topic.

uh. Christmas is evol. Yeah.

And furthermore, if you are going to ban Christmas celebrations, at least do so because it has become a crass orgy of commercial greed with no ties to anything to do with its origins.

I agree with that too. I must stop this. Agreeing with Crist(i)o? whatever next?

Agreeing with Blake.

*Hands Cris an unofficial invitation to the punk rock club*

I really dont think theres much danger of that

Gracias, my man-purse wearing friend. My new store in Mexican Town is near the store that carries them, maybe I will buy you a pretty one for Christmas

OMFG I go away for like 5 hours and flakey has followers?!

*Dies*

Ok.. that was what he wanted me to put in his HEAD..

*confuses oneself and leaves the thread*

These are the two most insightful things I've read in this whole thread.

I'm kind of on the fence on this issue. Let me think out loud:
1. Not all Christians are the right-wing bigots self-proclaimed (laughably) the moral majority.
2. These right-wingers are, I believe, forcing this on everyone by making everything about morals instead of law or ethics or (god-forbid) science.
3. Every single US President has been Christian. All but one (JFK) has been Protestant.
4. People deserve days off during the year to celebrate their religious holidays.
5. Christmas is a national US holiday. Until it is removed as such, no such banning of the celebration of it anywhere is warrented.
6. Christmas seems to be a national holiday of convenience - most people in the US claim to be Christian, so laws were passed so that miser bosses couldn't Scrooge employees into working on their religious holiday. Perhaps we should revisit the Christmas as a national holiday, and revise it to be more open to other religions.
7. Having Christmas as a national holiday has cheapened the holiday into a commercial quagmire.
8. In fact, having Christmas as a public holiday does more to hurt Christmas than help it.
9. Holiday parties in school never mention Christ anyway, so what's the big deal if you call it a Holiday party?
10. As long as it's optional, let the kids pray at school, dammit. Not teachers, no, but if kids want to pray it's their right, anytime, anywhere.

True. However, they're the ones that get the press. They're also the ones that explicitly need to be guarded against.



Also true. To this end they will distort, obfuscate and even openly lie. They've been doing exactly that for over 1600 years.



Washington was a Deist, both Adams' were Unitarians, Jefferson was essentially a Deist (with strong leanings toward atheism,) Lincoln was an 'other,' someone that's hard to classify. (Not a christian, by his own admission. Closer to deism.)

We tend to remember the more modern presidents, who have pretty much all been at least nominal christians. (Including some more vocal ones who have claimed christianity, but haven't acted very 'christian.')



I agree.... however state agencies don't need to throw them a party for it.



Nobody's banning the celebration of it. What IS being banned is a school sponsored endorsement of it.



An easier solution has already been suggested: That we just give people a set number of days off per year to celebrate holidays.... religious or otherwise.



I agree that the whole thing is amazingly crass.... (does anybody else remember when 'mere commerce' was something one was apologetic for or is it just me?) but christmas as you people know it has ALWAYS been purely commercial. Before the victorians, christmas was seen as a relatively minor holiday.... the huge christmas bit is a result of increasing commercialism in the western world. (Santa Claus was an ad campaign for Woolworths starting around 1910-12, Rudolph, Frosty, etc also all began as ad campaigns.)

The religious symbolism has always been secondary.



Don't know that I entirely disagree here.



Except in the school districts that are trying to put up nativity scenes on public land, of course.



Yes, it is. It's also entirely legal.

What ISN'T legal is teacher led, officially sanctioned prayer or religious messages. This doesn't completely stop it.... and there are always religious types trying to get around the restrictions on their actions. ('Meet at the flagpole' being one example.) However, a kid praying at his desk (as long as he isn't ignoring the lesson.... such as the classic example of 'just before a test....) is perfectly legal.

Why thank you, Hiro. It is not often that Chip and I are both quoted together, since we are usually fairly far apart in opinion.

Thank you panda! I almost fell off my chair laughing when I read that, and was quite disappointed it took so long for someone to notice it.

Obviously you agree with many of my notions.
Some corrections, though:


Unitarianism is still a Christ-worshipping religion. Deism is monotheism, and, honestly let me fine-tune my original statement.
Publicly, all American Presidents have claimed to be Christian. There is debate whether some deliberately misled, and if others are just plain heretics. *coughsbushistheantichristcoughs*


No, actually, this would include kids having parties in schools without school support, arguably not even in private rooms. This would be denying children the right to use public land to express religious beliefs.