Even worse material from the Texas sex education curriculum

[orichalcum]

So, I've posted before about my deep outrage at the farcical nature of abstinence-only sex education, which spreads lies like the idea that condoms have a 30% failure rate and that sperm and HIV can go through condoms anyway.

I had not realized, however, that at least for 9.5% of children in the  Texas public school system, this was being mixed with even more fun (and illegal) religious indoctrination, with questions in the curriculum like:

"Things to Look For In a Mate:

How They Relate to God
A. Is Jesus their first love?
B. Trying to impress people or serve God?

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...
F. Attitude
    1. Willing to obey God, or hesitate to obey
    2. Humility - willing to accept correction, put other first (Phil 2:3)
    3. Industrious - Proverbs 31:17

Question: What does the Bible say about sex before marriage?
Answer: Along with all other kinds of sexual immorality, sex before marriage/premarital sex is repeatedly condemned in Scripture (Acts 15:20, Romans 1:29, [and a bunch of other Biblical citations, all interestingly from the New Testament.)

Question: Are we supposed to be actively looking for a spouse, or waiting for God to bring a spouse to us?

Question: Is this person [potential mate] a Christian, meaning has she or he been born again? God tells us, as believers, not to become unequally yoked by marrying an unbeliever (2 Cor. 6:14-15), because those living in the light (of Christ) and those living in darkness cannot live in harmony.

From the "Wonderful Days" program, used in 3 school districts in the Fort Worth area:

"You will be amazed when the "sperm" of His Spirit connects with the "ovum/egg" of your spirit and you become a "new person" with His character. How? Read about it in your Bible: (NT passages cited.)

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Comments

[emilymorgan.livejournal.com]

How do they get away with that?

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Shrug. It's Texas? Non-fundamentalist Christians are a small minority?

[julianyap.livejournal.com]

To be fair Non Christians are a small minority, I'm given to understand that fundamentalist Christians are the minority Christian group, even in Texas. (As opposed to conservative christians, which is different)

[contrariety.livejournal.com]

""You will be amazed when the "sperm" of His Spirit connects with the "ovum/egg" of your spirit and you become a "new person" with His character. How? Read about it in your Bible: (NT passages cited.)"

Um.... EW EW EW EW BAD METAPHOR BAD BAD?

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that was kinda my reaction. It's practically medieval in its sexuality, as jab2 could tell you in much more detail and accuracy, except mixed with vague bits of biology.

[jab2.livejournal.com]

didn't see this comment before, but yes, yeah, "sex with God" gone wild!

[pantsie.livejournal.com]

This comment made me laugh out loud.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

I like my mystical sexual unions behind a discreet curtain of Fade-to-Black, personally. :)

[jab2.livejournal.com]

one of my friends works with the group that put out that report (and my friend is chair of our religious studies dept, so at least the non-fundies aren't always in positions of power.) he forwarded it to a couple of us to make us laugh and cry at the same time.
the one that really got me laughing, though, was the one where the district superintendent of a country school explained in print that they didn't teach about the details of how sexual intercourse works because all the farm kids knew it already from watching the farm animals. *FACEPALM*

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Fair enough - didn't mean to exaggerate. Sigh... - I guess that means that at least kids are learning more than the missionary position? :)

[jab2.livejournal.com]

oh, i didn't mean to say you exaggerate. you don't! he studies the problem, but doesn't actually work in public school or secondary school teaching. the fundies have it, pretty much. the amount of *unlearning* that has to go on once they hit college is frightening. the numbers that don't hit college because they got hit with consequences before getting to college is prob more frightening, just less visible to me.

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

the one that really got me laughing, though, was the one where the district superintendent of a country school explained in print that they didn't teach about the details of how sexual intercourse works because all the farm kids knew it already from watching the farm animals. *FACEPALM*

My school didn't explicitly teach to this standard, but honestly? The teachers were as embarrassed to talk about it as we were to hear about it, and I think it was as much because they presumed we'd already been sneaking our parents' porn as because we had farm animals, that never in my sex-ed did they ever _really_ explain the mechanics of heterosexual intercourse. I got most of the way through high school before I really understood how human penile erections worked-- I can remember making fluid dynamics jokes about it as a college frosh, but I'm pretty certain I'd only figured it out from other people's remarks in the preceeding year.

It wasn't that I got the information from observing animals as much as I got from hearing adults cracking jokes based on comparing farm animal copulation to human acts. I would prefer not to hear those jokes EVER AGAIN thanks.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

I'm happy to spare you. :)

[wildpaletz.livejournal.com]

AHHHHH

[hillarygayle.livejournal.com]

This is maddening. On the one hand, Texas has a pretty stellar educational system in the metropolitan areas as far as academic outcome (I'm thinking of the Plano ISD here). The graduation rate & the test scores are great. So much so that Bryan & I are considering moving to the city where his parents live, Frisco, so that Ganon can be involved in that educational system. I'd love to know they teach abstinence. I can counter that myself (no child of mine will ever be that ignorant about his or her own anatomy), but it irks me on a moral level.

On the other hand, we'd be coming out of Arkansas. I grew up here & Bryan teaches here, so we know what goes on here anyway. Bryan's school routinely has religious figures as motivational speakers.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Well, um, the Plano ISD was one of the districts they cited as being among the worst offenders from a religious perspective. So, there are definite tradeoffs.

[hillarygayle.livejournal.com]

That STUNS me. There are tons of children in the Plano ISD who are not fundamentalist Christians. GOBS OF THEM. I don't see how this flies in the light of the demographics!

I just joined TFN. If there's any chance we might be down there, I'm going to be involved in this. I wonder if my involvement might jeopardize Bryan's ability to move upward in secondary education in Texas...?

[sharpchick.livejournal.com]

Did you send this to the ACLU?

[retsuko.livejournal.com]

I was wondering the same thing. I was also wondering what these schools have done for children who are not Christian. Has no one already brought any kind of protest or lawsuit?

[hillarygayle.livejournal.com]

This is a really relevant point. Ori points out that Plano ISD is supposed to have been one of the worst offenders, but I personally have tons of experience in Plano, as my in-laws live in Frisco, and I bet dinner to a donut that fundamentalists are not the majority there! I just don't get this.

[jab2.livejournal.com]

hasn't anyone heard? there are no non-Christians in texas.

seriously, though, there is absolutely no sense here that anyone needs to make any public acknowledgment of other faiths or no faith. (i'm in dallas, and i teach in a seminary, so believe me, i know...) public prayer takes place all the time, inflicted on everybody from a patriarchal conservative christian perspective, without qualms.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

The relevant organization is trying to raise awareness, but there are no lawsuits with standing yet that I know of.

[cerebralpaladin.livejournal.com]

You may not be using standing in the technical sense, but establishing standing should not be very difficult. A suit by a custodial parent along with a child who attends the relevant school would fairly clearly meet the test for standing. A suit by a taxpayer within the relevant school district might also have standing, but why borrow trouble when you can get clear standing with a different set of plaintiffs?

It is kinda weird, though-- getting these struck down would be like shooting fish in a barrel, even in the Fifth Circuit, and attorneys' fees would be available. In light of that, it's surprising nobody has sued (although the social consequences of doing so might be severe.)

[meepodeekin.livejournal.com]

In a non-lawyerly way, this was my first thought as well. What it does more than anything else is make me worry about the authenticity of the source. I mean I'm sure that some school districts in Texas are pulling stunts, but 10% of the kids, in districts that hillarygayle says are not amongst the most conservative? It's just so easy to pick on Texas, and things like this have turned out to be hoaxes before.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

If you see above, jab2 vouches for the source - and it seems very well documented and done by reliable university professor researchers. It's not that easy to get someone who wants to face the social and logistical consequences of suing, I guess - and it may be percolating through the courts as well. Plus, since sex ed courses are usually optional, I suspect that the districts may have an out by simply saying that non-Christian kids can choose not to take the course.

[julianyap.livejournal.com]

First Amendment standing = easy.

[a-dodecahedron.livejournal.com]

I just want to point out that this crap is dishonest even as religious indoctrination--Acts 15:20 and Romans 1:29 have nothing to say about premarital sex, for example. (Is there a name for the practice of saying "Scripture clearly says X is a sin and it's bad" with a citation that says merely "Sinning is bad"? Other than "lying"?)

Question: Is this person [potential mate] a Christian, meaning has she or he been born again?
And non-Baptist Christians say, "Um, ex-squeeze me?"

I...just...AAAAAAAGH.

[marginaleye.livejournal.com]

"You will be amazed when the "sperm" of His Spirit connects with the "ovum/egg" of your spirit and you become a "new person" with His character. How? Read about it in your Bible: (NT passages cited.)

This sounds a bit like Aleister Crowley. Crowley, however, was never shy about dramatizing this sort of symbolism, in a very direct and tangible way, through ritual. I'd offer links, but I'm at work right now.