Dragan

>>Right, but I cannot force you to listen, nor would I wish to. But, I have the right to respond. The problem here is that by forcing God out of schools (for example) the non-God crowd is forcing their POV on those kids who come from a family of faith.
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>Why does my daughter have to learn Christmas songs in the school then?

Why would my child be forced to abandon the songs she/he would like to sing? You see, your 'argument' cuts both ways. Your rights do not superceed mine, nor mine yours - so we need to find a balance. Having only one side represented is no balance.

Your rights to not sing those songs do not trump my rights to sing them. Remember, free speech doesn't require you to listen nor does it contain the right to not be offended. That is nowhere to be found in the Constitution.

Send your child outside during the singing. My wife (a 2nd grade teacher) has had children whose parents did not want them to say the Pledge of Allegiance. Rather than make all the other children not say it they allowed the child to go out into the hall, sit quietly at their desk or some other activity.

In your case I suppose if you felt strongly enough about it you could request that she be excluded. That of course leads right back to the "touchy-feely, emotion-driven, non-rational arguments though.

Simply put, neither you, your daughter, me or anyone else has a Constitutional right to force others to not offend us by what they say. Sorry, it does not exist. I may not like what you say or you may not like what I have to say but you have no right to make me stop - unless we are in a situation here where someone like Michel owns the venue and has the absolute right to so do.

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>>IOW, it would restrict the right of those in the religious community from speaking their minds. Bad law.
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>What's bad about it? They can still say whatever they want unofficially. Whenever you have someone in some sort of public office talking about any group of people as guilty before trial, that's not going to do anybody any good.

It's "bad" for the simple reason that it contained civil and criminal provisions -and- this is in an official capacity as a pastor. Those who disagree do not have to listen or agree but their rights IMO stop at their ears, not at my mouth, if that makes sense.

Remember Communism? Where you could think anything you wanted until the State found out but you could hardly say what you thought without jeopardy? Sorry, free speech - even offensive speech - has the right to be spoken no matter what.

Additionally, and you may be unaware of this, this leads to forcing religious schools to hire those of opposing viewpoints, like homosexuals. IOW, it is the forced imposition of a specific agenda upon others - all in the name of "fairness". In the name of fairness it deprives individuals of the right to associate with whom they choose and forces them to associate with those with whom they do not choose to associate with.

Think about this a minute. You may not like cabbage but that doesn't give you the right to stop me from eating it. <g> If you come to dinner at my house and we are serving cabbage you are entitled to decline. You are not entitled to force me to stop cooking or eating it, which is the equivilent of what we are discussing, only illustrating with foodstuffs..

BTW.. I like cabbage.. <g>

The beauty of this whole idea Dragan is that you and I can have vigorous debates freely. The result is then left up to the individual powers of persuasion and not the end of a rifle barrel, which strikes me as very healthy.

Sometimes it is good to find errors. In the software arena we always should test our products and free speech in debates such as this is the same with ideas. They are tested by the marketplace and thoroughly examined. That is always good, just as the marketplace, as brutal as it can be at times, it the best place to test one's work or product.

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>>While I'm not LDS (Mormon) and have some fairly strong disagreements with them in terms of doctrine, I do think they have a good way of dealing with this. They have 'release time' where the kids can go to a church-owned & sponsered building across the street for one period. I think it's one good approach.
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>And what do the other kids do at the time?

I don't really know actually. I suppose they get free time or perhaps study hall. I'll ask if I remember tonoght. Good question.

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>>I'd actually like to see the various religious belief systems taught. Of course, an honest treatment of any of them would lead to howls of anger I suppose as none have clean hands and most are fraught with internal inconsistencies. That would be a real food fight. <g>
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>:)

I take it you like food fights? <g>