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Over at Townhall, Nathan “the young Jesse Helms” tells us What’s really scary this Halloween: teaching kids about sex when we could be using the money to put them in work camps instead,

A survey cited by National Public Radio in 2004 showed that 47 percent of schools teach something dubbed “abstinence-plus.” The theory behind this sexual school of thought is that, while abstinence is best, some students will simply refuse to abstain, so schools should teach kids about condoms and contraception as well. But, at a time when technology is advancing faster than our hands can fly across a computer keyboard, should we really be spending part of the school day teaching kids how to put on condoms? If parents are responsible for ensuring that their children are potty-trained by kindergarten, shouldn’t it be up to parents to make sure their offspring learn about the birds and the bees?

Apparently Nathan thinks it’s the parents’ job to teach their kids about potties and condoms (possibly in one lecture to be delivered on the day before the children start kindergarten), but it’s the public schools’ obligation to teach kids that they’ll go to hell if they have sex before they’re married.  Yes, Nathan is a true conservative.

Or consider this: A national poll reported by CBS News two years ago indicated that Americans don’t believe in human evolution. Fifty-five percent said God created humans in their present form, i.e., no apes were involved in the creation of man and woman. And yet, school districts throughout the U.S. continue to waste their precious resources teaching children that man evolved from monkeys. It seems to me that, if a child believes that he or she has an ancestor who’s an ape, he or she is more likely to behave like one.

Yes, this is how we should decide our science curriculum: we should ignore that sciency stuff, and get our facts from public opinion polls (“Where do babies come from? Our survey says: from the cabbage patch”), along with whatever teachings might cause children to behave better (“Class, thunder is God yelling at you for picking your nose”).

Why not spend some of our tax dollars teaching schoolchildren that life really means something—that every child in the womb deserves a chance at life? Let’s face it—if you teach a student that killing an unborn child is acceptable, what’s to prevent that child from growing into a teenager who thinks it’s O.K. to pick up a gun and shoot someone?

Certainly not Nathan’s science classes, which will fail to teach kids that there is any difference between a week-old embryo and their teen-age classmates.

But anyway, I think we can all agree that high school students should neither be gunning down people nor performing abortions.

In the kind of school budget that I’m proposing, we’ve cut out money for condom education, evolution propaganda, liberal indoctrination, and abortion promotion. That leaves quite a bit of money left. And we should be using that money to make schools safer and teenagers more disciplined.

[…]

And finally, let’s devote some money for boot camps for teens. It’s the only way to get some teenagers in shape—and out of prison.

Why not just replace public schools with workhouses, and make the brats earn their keep for a change? This will not only reduce our property taxes and help us compete with third-world nations when it comes to making crap for Wal-Mart, but it will also protect the little dears from having to learn anything which might not accord with Nathan’s world view.

26 Responses to “Another Wingnut Halloween Horror”

Let’s face it—if you teach a student that killing an unborn child is acceptable, what’s to prevent that child from growing into a teenager who thinks it’s O.K. to pick up a gun and shoot someone?

Good point, Nate. By the same token, if you teach a person that killing an unborn child is *un*acceptable, he’ll never grow up to be someone who thinks it’s OK to pick up a gun and shoot someone.

“…no apes were involved in the creation of man and woman…”

OK. Who let Doctor Zaius’s human counterpart out?

Unfortunately, there wouldn’t really be any savings, since we’d then have to go on to teach the kiddies that aliens want to rummage in their underwear, you can’t get knocked up on the first date but you can get knocked up if you’re a virgin, plants grow faster if you sing to them, dogs know when an earthquake is coming, ghosts exist, dinosaurs were big lizards, pencil lead is actually lead, sharks eat people all the time, aliens built the pyramids, the government is ruled by a secret cabal, women are too moody and unpredictable to be president, gay people are just going through a phase, snakes are slimy, Coke makes an excellent spermicide, wrestling is real, you can too beat the House, and a host of other bullshit that our fellow citizens routinely tell complete strangers with clipboards that they believe. Does Nathan want to volunteer to do the “The DaVinci Code Is Real” class, the “Bigfoot Lives In Texas” class, or the “Hey, I Drive Better When I’m Drunk” class? I’ll do “Horoscopes Are Real–And Evil”, but we definitely need someone to take up the slack on the whole “Jesus Was An American” issue.

We’ll also, based on comments my fellow white suburbanites routinely make, need some classes that teach that Asian men have tiny penises and Asian women are all masochists and subs at heart, Black people just aren’t that bright, and are kind of violent, too, and also sort of promiscuous, and Jews control everything and are going to hell. Also, all dark skinned men are probably Muslims and therefore terrorists, which I’m willing to bet even more people believe than know where Canada is. (Which reminds me, geography classes will have to be *seriously* reworked. Fixing all those books sounds expensive to me, Nathan.) Yahoo, sounds like exactly the sort of world *I* want to live in.

That whole “teaching kids to use/put on rubbers” bit drives me nuts. It’s not that hard difficult to figure out. Honestly. I remember well the first condoms I stole from my dad, back in those misty B.A.* days of yore. I, uh, used ‘em in a somewhat non-standard way (solo!!1!), had a good ol’ time with them (novelty factor), and could easily have utilized them in nearly any appropriate sex situation from that day forward–not that there were any essential uses for ‘em at that point for gay boiz, but still. Anybody who is too st00pid to figure out condoms on their own without the “put the Tr0jan™ on the banana” class deserves the hordes of squalling brats they’ll be stuck with (or stuck paying for) by the time they’re 16 or so… and the many more to follow. No abortions for you, asshole.

.

*Before AIDS, of course!

Why do we need to clear out money in the school budget for boot camps for teens? If we videotape the camps and air the best parts on Maury Povich and Montel Williams, they should be able to pay for themselves. There would even be money left over for all the paternity tests necessary after teenage sex-ed is outlawed.

Shiva H. Vishnu, I didn’t bother reading him. Did he ask why, if men evolved from monkeys, there are still monkeys?

Oh, and I loves me some D. Sidhe. Just in case I haven’t said it recently.

This guy’s such a cliched dolt I think he’s really a liberal pretending to be a Republican for a halloween joke, sort of the inverse of this Mallard Fillmore cartoon.

Bah, “the Young Jesse Helms” needs to be more creative. All this column is is a conglomeration of winger talking points, rehashed from other sources. If he’d remembered to mention gays he’d have all the parts he needed for his “Ultimate Moralizing Wingnut” costume.

Don’t knock it. That “voting on the right answer” thing is pretty cool.”Fifty-five percent said God created humans in their present form.” In fact, I might actually have passed Biology – and math -if we could have just voted on the answers. And then I could have become a brain surgeon or rocket scientist. Please, sir, may I have more gruel.

Y’know, tomg, you’ve given me a whole ‘nother perspective on this thing. But why should it be limited to public school science courses? “Jews lose plebiscite, must accept Jesus”. “Soap opera actors now officially the characters they play.” “Cheney to face firing squad.” Sure would liven things up while we wait on the Rapture–oops, minority opinion.

Yes, I too insist we stop indoctrinating children regarding politically hot issues like evolution and instead merely teach them scientific fact, such as that ensoulment occurs at conception.

“Quite a bit of money left over”…

Has this jackass ever even *attended* school?

“…faster than our hands can fly across a computer keyboard…” Fly across what?? If smart kids are doing it online, then it must be the dumb kids that do it in the backseat of the car, and evolutionary theory dictates that we will thus devolve (Q: Are we not men?)into jingoistic dittoheads who are too dumb to put on a condom.

But seriously, folks — guys usually find that, once the opportunity avails itself, putting on a condom is a pretty easy task compared to the previous one they’ve just mastered, namely unhooking a bra.

D. Sidhe, I find your lack of faith disturbing. First of all, you can beat the House (of Representatives). And while Horoscopes are indeed Real, they are not in the least bit Evil, at least when applied to White House scheduling.
And, dammit, Hey-Zeus was an American!

Nathan flushed his credibility down the toilet the moment he made the assumption that kids are all showing up to schools potty trained these days. I mean Max Boot and Sean Hannity aren’t, why should we expect it of the little ones?

Why not just replace public schools with workhouses, and make the brats earn their keep for a change?

No, not workhouses–boot camps. As in, military. See, we’re going to need a whole boatload of cannon fodder if we want to bring the Apoca…I mean, neutralize the threat of Iranian nukes.

“. . . is a pretty easy task compared to the previous one they’ve just mastered, namely unhooking a bra.”

Thanks for making me flashback to my first clumsy attempt at doing that.

“Jews lose plebiscite, must accept Jesus”.

Man, I wish like hell I’d said that. That’s hilarious on at least four levels.

And Marq, I’d cheerfully go along with your policy except I know a couple like that, and I feel incredibly bad for the resultant children, who are virtually guaranteed to end up schizophrenic or worse. (People too dumb to understand condoms are absolutely too dumb to comprehend the hazards of similar family histories of disease.)

I don’t even like kids and I think it’s a nasty thing to do to them.

Why not just replace public schools with workhouses, and make the brats earn their keep for a change?

Three words: mandatory chastity belts.

Actually, I think he’s got a point. If 55% of people don’t believe in evolution, maybe we should stop teaching it. It’s clear most people aren’t actually learning anything.

Why not just replace public schools with workhouses, and make the brats earn their keep for a change?
I can see the bumper stickers now: “Home Erect-us, not homo erectus.”

Oh, christ. He can’t possibly be PRO teenage boot camps. Most of those things are under investigation for pretty horrific abuse of children. Jesus fuck.

I may be misreading or over-reacting, but I have a friend who was sent to one of those things in high school by parents who didn’t want to deal with her depression, and she’s STILL recovering from the experience. And I can no longer tell what sort of fucked up shit rightwingers will support these days.

When I’m President, all children, no matter how young, will know how to use condoms to make balloon animals.

fiver, I am so voting for you. Though may I suggest an exemption for those with latex allergies?

And arghous, in the context of workhouses for children (and casting back to Newt’s Dickensian bid to recreate state orphanages) the notion of beating the House of Representatives is both disturbing and somewhat appealing…

Fifty-five percent said God created humans in their present form, i.e., no apes were involved in the creation of man and woman. And yet, school districts throughout the U.S. continue to waste their precious resources teaching children that man evolved from monkeys.

This idea of “opinion trumps fact” is like the Wingnut Rosetta Stone, isn’t it?

Not always, Chad: they still think W is the awesomest president ever.

I’d love to know the methodology of a survey that shows 55 percent of Americans are complete idiots.
On second thought, I may not want to know. It might be sound, and I’ll be even more depressed.