Are we supposed to stop the clock on scientific research based on what was known in the early 1800s? Darwin didn't publish his work until 1859 and it took time to be accepted after that.
I doubt they used calculators or computers in the early 1800s either. I guess that means any school that permits calculators or computers is acting wrong too.
What was done though in the 1700s is insist upon church and state being separated.
I take no satisfaction in noting lewk's strong and unequivocal condemnation of schools' attacks on students' 1st amendment rights
"One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."
Because what you are referring to as separation of church and state and what the founder's intent was is two entirely separate things. While you can make a good case NOT to teach creationism using several different arguments you should not say that it is a violation of the 1st amendment.
Lewk, your argument is that if theory x is considered legitimate in time period t, but becomes the preserve of religious fundamentalists in time period t+1, no one can object from a church/state perspective. Are you really going to stand by that logic?
Hope is the denial of reality
In short... yes. If an act wasn't unconstitutional during the time of the founders when the amendment was in effect the constitution cannot be re-interpreted to mean something different years later. I make the same case on the prohibition on 'cruel and usual punishment' when it comes to executions. If firing squad and hanging weren't cruel and unusual to the people who wrote the amendment, they aren't now. This isn't to say that I'm suggesting we HAVE to hang people or shoot them, or that we must teach creationism in schools, it is to say that these acts should be decided by the people via good old fashion Democracy. To go beyond what was intended by framers is to say fuck you to the will of the people.
Lewk, constitutional principles remain constant. The facts to which they apply change. This is how the Constitution survived for over two centuries. If we're going to be literal, the Constitution gives the government a right to form an army and navy. There's no mention of an air force. Or nuclear weapons. I take you think those are unconstitutional?
Hope is the denial of reality
The Air Force can easily exist under the Army paradigm. (In fact it originally did!) Nuclear weapons are basically just a big cannon. The principal is that cruel and unusual isn't allowed, who would define cruel and unusual? If one doesn't define it then it ceases to have meaning and can then be interpreted to be anything. I concede that nothing everything can be envisioned hundreds of years into the future which is why the logical thing to do would be to interpret cruel/usual to be *would the people who came up with this think it cruel and unusual*. IE futuristic executions would they have attached that label to it? If so, no dice, if not it should be legal. NOTE*** It is still the PEOPLE'S choice!
Except the air force is a separate branch. The Constitution does not allow for this new branch. The Constitution doesn't even allow for a standing army. Would the founding fathers be happy with that development? I'm guessing not.
Hope is the denial of reality
Sorry Lewk, but most of the founding fathers were specifically against standing armies. There's a reason we didn't have them until much later in American history. The government had the right to RAISE armies to fight wars. Then those armies were supposed to be disbanded. Which they were for much of America's history.
Hope is the denial of reality
Would you agree, though, the spirit of what Loki is saying holds true? I think those guys would have been universally opposed to the military the US maintains today, along with the US projection of power all over the world. But the other side of that coin is that the world is a very different place today, and the history that has passed between the time of the founders and today probably makes what they originally intended largely irrelevant. It's the same situation with the 2nd Amendment -- it was clearly intended as a check on the potential of the Federal Government turning tyrannical - preventing the passage of Federal laws that would disarm the various State Militias, making them vulnerable to a Federal army turned against them. Today it's largely irrelevant, and the way it's upheld is more than a little crazy. (And in the Slaver South, a lot of good it did them anyway... ) And while we're at it, it seems the founders wouldn't approve of the religion litmus test that federal candidates have to pass for election these days, Trump notwithstanding. Same goes with god on the money and in the pledge. Hell, they probably wouldn't like the pledge at all. So much is different today, the whole "what the Founders indented" discussion is kinda nonsensical in a lot more ways, maybe, than it makes sense.
The Rules
Copper- behave toward others to elicit treatment you would like (the manipulative rule)
Gold- treat others how you would like them to treat you (the self regard rule)
Platinum - treat others the way they would like to be treated (the PC rule)
Well, that kinda depends on how you're approaching things. We're talking about the Regular Army here alone rather than the Navy, yes? Because the founding fathers did not have a problem with the idea of a standing naval force. So 5,000 men in 1793 when the US population was just under 4 million (counting slaves). Now our population is 323 million, an eighty-fold increase. The current size of the regular army is 476,000 men. That's a bit more than eighty times the size of the force authorized in 1793 (strictly proportional to the respective population the total would be 403,000) but it's not wildly out or range. Is sheer number of bodies the only metric? No, nor would I say it's the best one. But Loki's claim is knowingly specious. The FF did envision that war-fighting would primarily be the task of a volunteer militias and now we expect it to be taken up by the permanent professional military. But there was no Constitutional proscription against having a permanent military and, in fact, the strongly felt lack of one under the Articles of Confederation was one of the major triggers behind the Constitutional Convention in the first place.
Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"
"One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."
Eeehhh...
This is a conflict. I'm for free speech, but I'm also for local control at schools.
Small town school teams are not puplic speaking engagements at colleges...so not an equivalence, and I expect that grown ups here can recognize that.
The school is being dickish, and need to promote free speech...but then again they should be producing thinkers as well...and may not be doing so well in that department either.
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Rath, you can be for local control of schools all you want. This isn't a school refusing to provide a platform for expression, it is a school which is COMPELLING students give expression to its own political platform. You can't compel them to salute the flag, you cannot compel them to pledge, and you cannot compel them to stand in support of the national anthem.
Let me present a hypothetical for you. I won't use Louisiana, I'll use an abstract high school in LA. Plenty of legal resident aliens there, with legal resident alien kids in the school system. Minors who aren't US citizens. You think it's ok for the school to compel them to express loyalty and support to a country they're not citizens of? Do you think they should have to be citizens to participate in the school's extracurricular programs? Since they are legal residents they are already paying the taxes which support the school and its programs.
They should promote free speech, and I'll agree as a public school that they ought to promote it as an important political value of the country, but what they NEED to do is not compel adverse speech.The school is being dickish, and need to promote free speech
Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"
While you have a strong point about compelling speech I think your example is very weak. Why should legal resident aliens have an issue with it?
I grew up in Australia, as a "legal resident alien kid". At school assembly we all sang Advance Australia Fair the Aussie national anthem. Despite being "a Pommie bastard" I sang their anthem every single week . . . even when the Ashes were on.
When we moved to Australia my dad said to me that we should respect the nation that is hosting us. Just as you take your shoes off if someone asks you to when you enter their home, we should show respect where due to the nation that we were living in. He was right. That didn't take away from the fact I'm English, it was just showing respect.
If you choose to do so, ok, that's your decision. Ain't nothing in this thread about there being a problem anyone, black or white, citizen or non-citizen, Jehovah's Witness or other, themselves choosing to stand for the national anthem or engage in any other act expressing their patriotism. But I am highlighting why compelling it is a bad thing. Bad enough to compel citizens into demonstrations of loyalty, but it's supposed to be acceptable "local decision-making" to compel citizens of other countries into demonstrations of loyalty and allegiance to the US and its national symbols? No.
Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"
I'll be grown up and say that how you phrase it is actually perfect. I abhor the way some schools still treat the pledge as the be all and end all of patriotism. No, kids should not be forced to in public schools either.
This will just be another paradigm shift for a lot of Americans.
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Hence why I said that your point about compelling speech was strong.
What I don't see is why it matters if the kid is an alien or native or anything else. The idea that aliens are less respectful or more prone to offence is one I don't agree with. It isn't aliens that are at the center of this controversy, it is Americans who for their own reasons don't want to do so. They should have as much of a right or a choice not to as aliens should.
I would make a distinction with saying the Pledge. I find the very notion of the Pledge creepy, standing for an anthem is just respectful, whereas a Pledge is weird (to me) and different. There is nothing about demonstrating either loyalty or allegiance while respectfully standing during an anthem - in fact quite the opposite. When I've been to international sporting events like football or cricket the tradition is to stand during both sets of anthems. Your own and your opponents. That doesn't mean that you're pledging for your opponents, standing in silence while their anthem is performed is just showing respect, just as their supporters should stand in silence for yours too. Standing is not speech.
Of course it is. There's this thing called "body language". To give you another example: If I give you the finger you'll feel insulted.
Also, you just beautifully demolished your own argument of "standing is not speech" by stating how "standing during an anthem" shows respect. I think you're focused on "speech being sound waves" while ignoring that "speech" has a lot of other ways to be expressed.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
If standing is a way to show respect then it's fair to characterize standing as a form of speech. At least as much so as giving money to campaigns
"One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."