Last updated on June 13th, 2012 at 04:54 pm
Yesterday, the Supreme Court “declined to hear an appeal Tuesday from a former high school student who sued his history teacher, saying he disparaged Christianity in class in violation of the student’s First Amendment rights.” The case, C. F. v. Capistrano USD, involved a high school student who was insulted that his history teacher, James Corbett, didn’t think much of creationism and religion. Some of Corbett’s comments (which deserve some sort of hero’s award) are:
“Conservatives don’t want women to avoid pregnancies — that’s interfering with God’s work.”
“When you pray for divine intervention, you’re hoping that the spaghetti monster will help you get what you want.”
Referring to creationism as “religious, superstitious nonsense”, which lead to the lawsuit.
Unfortunately, the ruling does not clarify whether what Corbett said was constitutionally acceptable under the Establishment Clause (which works both ways, in that the government, or it’s institutions, cannot support a religion, but it also can be presumed to prevent same institutions from suppressing religion). The court almost said that because the law is not clear if his comments are constitutionally protected or not, he gets the benefit of the doubt. This case went up through the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, probably the most liberal one in the US, so we don’t know what might happen in a more conservative circuit, which may set precedent on what is allowed and not allowed.
Though I do not support religion, especially in public schools, I think that schools should be religiously neutral, except in science. Then it has to be scientifically neutral, which means creationism doesn’t exist at all.
via Corbett case ends with a “victory for teachers” | NCSE.
