Saturday, September 4, 2010

The American Theocracy - School Choice

This is one of those issues that in the new American theocracy will be turned on its head. In current society, the major proponents of school choice are fundamentalist Christians. They believe that education should be Christ-led and that the public school system instead chooses to advance the e-v-i-l "gay agenda" and disparages their narrow beliefs.

Consequently, they advocate for public education dollars to go to families, so the parents can choose the appropriate educational setting for their children. Such settings include charter schools (specific public schools that often govern themselves), private schools and homeschooling. If such a scheme became fully vested, most fundamentalist parents would pull their progeny from the public schools and, since the dollars would follow their children, this would necessarily dilute public education even more than it is now.

However, in the new American theocracy, the battle lines would be completely redrawn. My guess is that the main proponents of school choice would now be non-Christians parents.

You see, in nation that has "returned to God" -- one in which school prayer is mandatory -- the public school system would come to resemble Church School! The conservative Christian worldview would become part of the everyday curriculum. Therefore, it would be non-Christian parents who wanted to get their kids away from this narrow perspective.

But, like so many other issues in the new American theocracy, school choice would be a non-starter. Our religious/political leaders would turn a deaf ear to such positions. Why? Because they specifically want to brainwash all of America's children into becoming the next generation of Christian soldiers.

If some non-theist parents continued to persist in calls for school choice, I can hear the rebuttal. "Don't like our Christ-centered educational system? Then you can leave the country. Go enroll your kids in schools in Russia or Iran!"

If you're interested in reading more from this tongue-in-cheek series, go to the The American Theocracy Index page.

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