cuddly_tomato said:
I tend to agree. I am all for religion being taught in schools, but it should be taught without the religion in it. That needs an explanation...
Religion has been a part of human history, all religion, and continues to be an important part of human culture. Religion taught in the context of "This is what Christians believe, this is what Muslims believe, this is what the Vikings believed, this is what the Inuit believe", without offering it as fact, could well be a positive thing. It will give people context when they approach religion on their own terms. Let them "shop around" as it were, and make an informed decision as to what particular spiritual direction suits them best.
i think wouldnt it be better to teach LESS about religion in schools rather than more.
see its like this for me. i was tought in school that the west fought the crusades because of our religious beliefs, but thats not the whole story , or even the MAIN part of the story. the crusades were fought because of 2 things really. greed, and as defence to an expanding Muslem threat both in eastern europe and in Spain. religion was just the PR reason to explane what was in reality a political war. i KNOW this now having done some educating of myself beyond the couple pages that an average high schooler gets in a text book to explane something as complicated as the crusades were. trying to condence all of the thoughts and actions and motivations of vast tracks of humanity down into a trite line like 'the crusades were a religious war' is bad education. better in my opinion not to teach anything at ALL on the subject than to teach it wrong.
i guess what im saying is that its importiant in specific cases of individual people to talk about how religion motivated them (Jesus for example), but to teach that religion is the ONLY cause of things, when in reality it wasnt a cause it was simply an excuse is just bad, and does a serious injustice to ALL religions we do it too. take an average American kid with no real upbringing in the Christian faith, run him through the American school system and ask him about Christianity and the answer you will get will be something like this.
"Christians lead the Crusades, and alot of Popes had people burned in their quest to control all of Europe" and if they actualy paid attention at all in 'history' class you might get an added line or two about how Christians discovered the new world and America was formed by quakers or some other nonsence.
i think it would be better to teach nothing than to teach a subject wrong in this reguard. i think that there isnt nearly enough information given in most talks about religions. and there isnt nearly enough effort made to underline that while most times religions are used as an excuse for a given event the TRUTH is that most historical events WERENT motivated by religion then any more than WE think OURS are now.
i used the American wars against islam now with this point in mind. most people alive NOW knowing a wide range of the details about our current world affairs would prolly NOT agree that this is a war of religions, but in 1500 years from now you can be sure that the text books will say that this was just another religious war in a long string of them.
and thats just bad education.
ill add this too, my 'beef' here isnt so much with religion being tought in a bad way as it is with our entire 'history' being tought in a bad way. i also take exceptions to how American history is tought about even recient things like WWII, the equasion that America = good/Germany = Bad sets my teeth on edge as much as the 'crusades were Christians killing poor muslem women".
when it comes to history, given too little information can be dangerious simply because it leaves wrong and LASTING impressions. better too not given ANY information and expect that a person when the time comes that they actualy NEED that information to go find it for themselves.
i happen to think that ALL History classes tought in the primary and high school levels here in America atleast are just propaganda classes that would do Goebbels proud.
(i hope you all cought the irony of that, what with my using another famious example of American history education that teaches that the Nazis and Goebbels himself were the ultimate masters of bad information)
