Native Ceremony takes place at a public school

[msj]

23 minutes ago, Bob Macadoo said:

Just like the kids who scrawled in the bathroom something about Trump making America something again.......involving going back to Africa I think.....I bet they were smelling BS too.  Parents telling them what it smells like.  Probably smells like smoldering sweetgrass.

Yeah, becuase wanting to learn something new because of too much exposure to one part of a program is the same thing as kids in America scrawling pro-Trump graffiti...

[Michael Hardner]

12 hours ago, drummindiver said:

Which as you know has been banned since 1996 ...

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/prayer-becomes-mindful-moment-1.3763229

Not banned everywhere in Canada.  It was just removed from this school months ago.

[drummindiver]

 

Odd. I didnt think the Canadian Charter of Rights was something you used arbitrarily. 

16 minutes ago, Michael Hardner said:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/prayer-becomes-mindful-moment-1.3763229

Not banned everywhere in Canada.  It was just removed from this school months ago.

 

 

Edited November 20, 2016 by drummindiver

[Bob Macadoo]

21 hours ago, msj said:

Yeah, becuase wanting to learn something new because of too much exposure to one part of a program is the same thing as kids in America scrawling pro-Trump graffiti...

I thought the same about every freakin year hearin' about explorers an pioneers......guess that smells like BS too.  How about all that Medieval Times nonsense.....smells like feudal BS.

 is most appropriate.

[msj]

38 minutes ago, Bob Macadoo said:

I thought the same about every freakin year hearin' about explorers an pioneers......guess that smells like BS too.  How about all that Medieval Times nonsense.....smells like feudal BS.

 is most appropriate.

Agreed. 

I have a BA degree with one of my majors' in history so I know all about overexposure to Canadian history (FN, French, English - it's all boring). 

Edited November 21, 2016 by msj

[drummindiver]

14 hours ago, drummindiver said:

 

Odd. I didnt think the Canadian Charter of Rights was something you used arbitrarily. 

 

 

Sorry, I added the wrong link

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/lord-s-prayer-banned-25-years-ago-after-sudbury-protest-1.1359913

This direct from the charter.

      1. Freedom of Conscience and Religion (Section 2(a))

Before the Charter came into force, there was no express protection for freedom of religion under the Constitution Act, 1867. Some limited protection was, however, given to denominational schools in section 93 of that Act. Specific legislative jurisdiction with respect to religion is not dealt with in the Constitution Act, 1867 and the courts have had to characterize laws touching religion as coming either within section 92 or section 91 of that Act. The pre-Charter cases in this area mainly dealt with challenges by merchants to various Sunday closing laws. 

The fact that "conscience" has been separated out from "religion" led to comments that the Charter might constitutionalize the right of civil disobedience when the route of opposition to law is sufficiently the product of an individual's deeply held system of moral beliefs, whether or not these are grounded in considerations normally regarded as religious. In R. v. Big M Drug Mart, the Supreme Court of Canada indicated that the freedom of conscience safeguarded by this provision relates to freedom of conscience in matters of religion. The paragraph protects against all state-imposed burdens on the exercise of religious beliefs, whether direct or indirect, intentional or unintentional, foreseeable or unforeseeable, provided they cannot be regarded as merely trivial or insubstantial.

 

I The court concluded that since the enactment of the Charter it has become the right of every Canadian to work out his or her own religious obligations, if any, and it is not for the state to dictate otherwise.  

 

And finally! First Nations are not first among equals despite the hyperbole otherwise. There is no way in hell you are going to give a muslim kid a bar mitzvah for the sake of education. 

 

http://www.thecharterrules.ca/index.php?main=concepts&concept=9

[Boges]

On 19 November, 2016 at 2:51 PM, BC_chick said:

Kids are exposed to a little bit of everything because not every kid grows up to be a scientist or mathematician. 

Some do go into humanities and social sciences and no matter what your opinion is of those programs, there will be kids who will show a desire to learn about them the same way some will go into vocational or business or the arts.

Kids get exposed to public works sector, history and other various events for the same reason. 

So participating in smudging gives you life skills in what exactly. I'm not saying that you can't learn things in school that have little real world benefit. But don't pretend that it actually has some real world benefit. I took History and Philosophy in High School, I learned a lot, doesn't make me a single solitary cent today though.

[WestCoastRunner]

On 11/17/2016 at 7:36 AM, drummindiver said:

No religious ceremony has ever been innocent when it comes to sharing culture. It's all about indoctrination.

Do you understand the meaning of indoctrination?

Indoctrination, or thought reform, is the process of forcibly inculcating ideas, attitudes, cognitive strategies or a professional methodology (see doctrine) by coercion.^[1] Conspiring institutions such as police and mental health institutions have been widely used as a modus operandi of indoctrinators.

[Guest]

I don't think it's about indoctrination so much as it is about policy.  If we're happy with allowing Menorahs, and Nativities, and whatever it is Muslims, and Sikhs, and Hindus do, then Native fairy tales should be welcome too.  If not, then not.  Easy.

[drummindiver]

Just now, drummindiver said:

D

 

5 hours ago, WestCoastRunner said:

Do you understand the meaning of indoctrination?

Indoctrination, or thought reform, is the process of forcibly inculcating ideas, attitudes, cognitive strategies or a professional methodology (see doctrine) by coercion.^[1] Conspiring institutions such as police and mental health institutions have been widely used as a modus operandi of indoctrinators.

As have  schools.

Edited November 23, 2016 by drummindiver

[drummindiver]

5 hours ago, WestCoastRunner said:

Do you understand the meaning of indoctrination?

Indoctrination, or thought reform, is the process of forcibly inculcating ideas, attitudes, cognitive strategies or a professional methodology (see doctrine) by coercion.^[1] Conspiring institutions such as police and mental health institutions have been widely used as a modus operandi of indoctrinators.

And clearly, religion and their practices is what this word was made for.

[Melanie_]

Nope, this is not an ok thing for schools to be doing. I have no problem with them teaching about the practice, but kids should not be expected to participate. And I have a real problem with the classroom furniture and environment being “cleansed” – it removes the option of individuals opting out.

 

What I really object to is that it is being presented to children as fact – that this cleansing ritual “ensures that the room is safe for all and that no bad things will happen.” This isn’t simply teaching about a cultural practice or religion, it is stating that it is real, which makes the teacher a hypocrite, as I’m sure she doesn’t actually believe it. It’s deceptive, and I think actually undermines Indigenous spirituality – she is subtly letting children know that they don’t need to take it seriously, it is just a silly ritual.

 

[msj]

47 minutes ago, Melanie_ said:

 

What I really object to is that it is being presented to children as fact – that this cleansing ritual “ensures that the room is safe for all and that no bad things will happen.” This isn’t simply teaching about a cultural practice or religion, it is stating that it is real, which makes the teacher a hypocrite, as I’m sure she doesn’t actually believe it. It’s deceptive, and I think actually undermines Indigenous spirituality – she is subtly letting children know that they don’t need to take it seriously, it is just a silly ritual.

 

Well stated. 

Earlier in this thread I related a personal story about going through the motions with a tour group in Thailand for a Buddhist ceremony.  

I didn't participate partially because I'm not a Buddhist and partially because I do think it is insulting to go through the motions when you genuinely do not believe something. 

To be surrounded by people who sincerely believe in the ritual, while I think it is crap, is an insult to those people even if I am supposedly trying to "learn" about their culture or religion. 

I can learn about their culture/religion by watching them do it. No need to participate, no need to insult. 

It is a religious ceremony so it will contain metaphor and prayers and silences and burning of this and holy water that etc...  if it was rocket science then, yes, I can understand the need to participate in doing calculations and doing some experiments in firing off some rockets etc... 

The other funny thing from earlier in this thread is that I linked to a wiki page about rituals and purification: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ritual_purification

Prior to this case, I think any reasonable person looking at that page would agree, yes, those are religious rituals including a description of indigenous smudge sticks etc.... 

No one would have said anything about the use of the term "religious" on that page at all - we would all take for granted that ritual purification ceremonies are, inherently, religious. 

But no, as soon as the story in the OP crops up the story changes and it is not religious but cultural, yeah, that's the ticket, it's cultural. 

It is all so disappointing and disingenuous.

[eyeball]

 

17 hours ago, Melanie_ said:

What I really object to is that it is being presented to children as fact – that this cleansing ritual “ensures that the room is safe for all and that no bad things will happen.” This isn’t simply teaching about a cultural practice or religion, it is stating that it is real, which makes the teacher a hypocrite, as I’m sure she doesn’t actually believe it. It’s deceptive, and I think actually undermines Indigenous spirituality – she is subtly letting children know that they don’t need to take it seriously, it is just a silly ritual.

 

What we need to cultivate is an attitude of universal secular political correctness.

Consider how saturated we are in micro-delusions, how many hundreds or thousands of time are people told to break a leg, are blessed for sneezing, or advised to throw a pinch of salt over their shoulder.  I've seen grown men come unhinged because someone whistled in the wheelhouse or opened a can pf milk upside down. And never EVER go fishing on a Friday, especially with a banana.

Yes we should definitely stop reinforcing delusional magical thinking of all types by refusing to encourage it almost everyday in people starting at an early age.  Tooth fairies, Santa Clause, step on a crack break a ladies back....omigod where do we even start?

[Guest]

School?

[OftenWrong]

Start by locking up anyone who dares to dream of something greater than the ordinary. Imagination is illegal.

[Guest]

49 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

Start by locking up anyone who dares to dream of something greater than the ordinary. Imagination is illegal.

No more Science Fiction...?  Dammit.

[OftenWrong]

7 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

No more Science Fiction...?  Dammit.

Probably no more science, either.

[Guest]

3 hours ago, OftenWrong said:

Probably no more science, either.

Science is generally concerned with facts, and reality, and stuff like that.   Not so much the fairy tales. Unless they are called "fairy tales". Then that would be okay. 

[eyeball]

The number of fairy tales composed of scientifical elements is fast catching up with the one's made from magical stuff...chem-trails...alien-abduction...anti-vaxxing...the list goes on and on and there's no end in sight.

I guess thousands of years of old habits die hard.

[Bonam]

I think probably the most important life skill for people going forward will be the ability to somewhat reliably sift through all the bullshit to understand what information is trustworthy and what is nothing more than idiocy/lies/hoaxes. 

[cybercoma]

9 hours ago, Bonam said:

I think probably the most important life skill for people going forward will be the ability to somewhat reliably sift through all the bullshit to understand what information is trustworthy and what is nothing more than idiocy/lies/hoaxes.

Yes, absolutely. You might be surprised to know that elementary and high school students are far better at this than past generations according to recent studies though. Why wouldn't they be? They've spent their entire lives on the internet. And contrary to the anti-discovery-learning crowd's whinging, students' critical-thinking skills are actually much improved, even if their math scores are dipping behind a few other OECD countries. Even then, we're still far above the mean for the OECD.

[Bonam]

8 hours ago, cybercoma said:

Yes, absolutely. You might be surprised to know that elementary and high school students are far better at this than past generations according to recent studies though. Why wouldn't they be? They've spent their entire lives on the internet. And contrary to the anti-discovery-learning crowd's whinging, students' critical-thinking skills are actually much improved, even if their math scores are dipping behind a few other OECD countries. Even then, we're still far above the mean for the OECD.

Yes, I think there's some promise for my generation and those coming after it, having grown up with the internet. The people I see struggle most with this are those in my grandparents generation, who no matter how many times they have it explained to them don't seem to understand that they need to filter incoming information. So many fall for all kinds of hoaxes and scams, truly sad. 

[TimG]

6 minutes ago, Bonam said:

Yes, I think there's some promise for my generation and those coming after it, having grown up with the internet. The people I see struggle most with this are those in my grandparents generation, who no matter how many times they have it explained to them don't seem to understand that they need to filter incoming information. So many fall for all kinds of hoaxes and scams, truly sad. 

I see no evidence that the young are more able to filter bad information. The proliferation of 'safe spaces' and other such attempts to simply suppress speech they don't agree with makes the young more susceptible to manipulation. Not less.

[Michael Hardner]

The 'safe space' phenomenon and conversation around it is a cultural fad more than evidence of anything.