Whose conscience is it anyway?

Whose conscience is it anyway?

by digby

My conscience is very offended by this (from Alternet and I feel believe it inhibits my religious freedom. And I would prefer that my tax dollars not even touch the tax dollars that fund it:

School vouchers have long been a pet cause of Christian school advocates who want to shore up profits and increase their ranks. In 2002, the United States Supreme Court ruled that public funds designated for private school tuition were not an infringement on church/state separation. That gave private Christian school advocates a green light to promote vouchers for themselves.

Though vouchers have become legal in some states, like Ohio, others, like North Carolina, are still holding out. Either way, Christian school advocates show no signs of slowing down their efforts. One reason vouchers remain so contested is that they sometimes fund activities in private Christian schools that many American taxpayers would not want to support. Here are 10 strange things that happen at Christian schools that may give you pause next time vouchers are debated in your state.

Click over for the full indictment. Hardcore anti-abortion lies and propaganda, fundamentalist sex-ed, racism, creationism, patriarchy etc. Here’s just one example:

Punishment by gender. Teachers in Christian schools sometimes stereotype boys as more rambunctious and rebellious than girls. In practice, this means that boys are often the targets of harsher corporal punishment. In 2007, a Chicago school was sued for injury and surgical costs after a forcing a 14-year-old boy to kneel in place for nine days, causing a hip injury. A few years later, in 2011, a Christian school teacher in Orlando was arrested on charges of beating a boy at her home with a rusted broom handle.

Many Christian schools punish girls more harshly because of perceived sexual acting out. In 2009, a California appeals court upheld a Christian school’s decision to expel two female students simply because administrators suspected they were involved in a same-sex relationship. Just last year, a 15-year-old girl was expelled from another California school for writing on Facebook that she was bisexual. Luke Jones tells AlterNet of an incident he remembers from high school, when a boy and girl were caught having sex in a school bathroom. The boy “got suspended for a little while but then came back,” but the girl was expelled for the remainder of the school year.

I’m very serious when I say that it offends my conscience to spend tax dollars for torture, child abuse and homophobia.

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