Texas intelligent design bill dies
Offline http://ncse.com/news/2011/05/texas-intelligent-design-bill-dies-006689
When the Texas legislature adjourned sine die on May 30, 2011, House Bill 2454 died in the House Committee on Higher Education without receiving a hearing. If enacted, HB 2454 would have provided, "An institution of higher education may not discriminate against or penalize in any manner, especially with regard to employment or academic support, a faculty member or student based on the faculty member's or student's conduct of research relating to the theory of intelligent design or other alternate theories of the origination and development of organisms." The sponsors of HB 2454 were Bill Zedler (R-District 96) and James White (R-District 12).
In a March 9, 2011, post on its blog, the Texas Freedom Network commented, "Disingenuous efforts by creationists to portray themselves as persecuted in mainstream academia for their anti-evolution beliefs are getting a boost from a Texas lawmaker" and described the bill as emulating "the strategy by creationist/'intelligent design' proponents to portray themselves as martyrs." TFN added, "Zedler's bill would ... require our colleges and universities to aid and protect academic fraud. But with the State Board of Education promoting anti-science propaganda in public schools, we shouldn't be surprised that higher education is increasingly a target as well.
Of the nine antievolution bills introduced in seven states in 2011 so far, seven — Florida's SB 1854, Kentucky's HB 169, New Mexico's HB 302, Oklahoma's SB 554 and HB 1551, and Texas's HB 2454 — are dead. Tennessee's HB 368 — nicknamed "the monkey bill" by House Speaker Emeritus Jimmy Naifeh — passed in the House of Representatives, but its Senate counterpart SB 893 is on hold until 2012. In the meantime, Louisiana's Senate Bill 70, which if enacted would repeal the state's antievolution bill enacted in 2008, was shelved in the Senate Education Committee on a 5-1 vote on May 26, 2011, and is not expected to be heard again by the committee.
Optimism is reality, pessimism is the fantasy that you know enough to be cynical
- Login to post comments
Time after time the courts have bitch slapped theocratic comic book pseudo science. Scopes should have been the end of it, but theists will do everything to try to put the cat back in the bag to cling to their myth.
Then Dover, and now this. It is nice to see that the courts didn't have to get involved again and that some wise people in Texas's legislature were willing to stop this bullshit.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Good riddance from a state education system that is already plagued by politics...
What is embarrassing is that other developed nations have public education with far better results. I hate right wingers who want to privatize everything as a solution. Our public education does not need more money(as a blanket solution) but it should not be scrapped because of politics. It needs effectiveness and results.
It is economy based. To blame it all on "bad teachers" all the time is stupid. Our economy wont allow parents to be actively involved in their kids lives as much as they want because of the cost of living. Address the pay gap and parents AND teachers will have more time and opportunity to correct these problems together and be more involved with their kids lives.
You cant blame teachers all the time when the kids go home to no parent. How do the teachers have any control over what happens off school grounds?
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
I agree - hey though, maybe the fact that even ultra-conservative Texas is wising up to this insanity is proof that the creationism movement is on it's last leg. I predict that by the end of the last generation, creationism will be all but dead. We live in the age of the internet now, so fundamentalist parents don't have the ability to cut their children off from reality and brainwash them into their cult - or at least with the internet and the free exchange of ideas, they will have a much harder time hiding the truth from their kids. I think that in this generation, even 90% of children who are raised in a fundie indoctrination environment know that it's all bullshit - they won't say it outright because they want to please their parents, but as soon as they get out on their own, they abandon the whole fundie charade.
Optimism is reality, pessimism is the fantasy that you know enough to be cynical
They have internet in Texas? ...oh wait
Parents still have the upper hand by far. I listened to my own father today as he explained how he is teaching my young sibling to be conservative and to follow his religious views. He said that right out loud knowing I am an atheist. I couldn't believe he came right out and said it because a statement like this should lead a person with even a small amount of critical thinking skill to understand it is what was done to them and on down the chain of indoctrination ... It's what they want.
Her mom doesn't "believe" in dinosaurs btw, yea I am in Texas.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Good news, but really...this shouldn't have gotten this far.
As backwoods as that state can be, it DOES have some oasis's and enough liberals and outspoken science advocates to raise a stink when the fundys try to bully the state.
Change always takes a long time, but we are living in a transitional stage and America seems to be having the start of it's second Age of Enlightenment. I think the age of the internet is making it much harder for myth lovers to protect their myths.
Huston has it's first lesbian Mayor. So even though I am not shocked that these morons tried to get Jesus through the back door of public schools, I am also not surprised that there are enough people who care to stand up for science and reason.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Way to make a tirade about minarchism (an ideology exemplified by Beyond Saving) and the public education system in response to a post and thread that has absolutely nothing to directly do with either. My "politics" remark was directed at the Texas Board of Education mandating a rewrite of its schools history books to favor a conservative political view.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
Optimism is reality, pessimism is the fantasy that you know enough to be cynical
For the eyes of a fundy
Are upon you
Any reason you attempt
Their gonna see
When you're in Texas look behind you
Cause that's where the fundy's gonna be
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
My young sibling went to a church camp "retreat" yesterday here in TX, she will be gone for a week. I was informed today that she was not allowed to take her cellphone nor is she allowed to call anyone from there except in an "emergency".
Intelligent design bill or not, evolution taught in schools or not, parents still have the upper hand.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin