Adam and Eve's Kids Not Inbred - DNA Not Invented Yet

[karadan]

Those RI pricks know what they are doing. That's the really fucked up part of all this. Thay actually know they are feeding lies to these poor kids.

That is why they all deserve lengthy jail sentences.

[NothingSacred]

There is a sick part of me that is made to feel better when other countries have just as stupid and insane educational standards as some of the schools in the US.

PRIMARY school students are being taught that man and dinosaurs walked the Earth together and that there is fossil evidence to prove it.
Fundamentalist Christians are hijacking Religious Instruction (RI) classes in Queensland despite education experts saying Creationism and attempts to convert children to Christianity have no place in state schools.
Students have been told Noah collected dinosaur eggs to bring on the Ark, and Adam and Eve were not eaten by dinosaurs because they were under a protective spell.
Critics are calling for the RI program to be scrapped after claims emerged Christian lay people are feeding children misinformation.
About 80 per cent of children at state primary schools attend one half-hour instruction a week, open to any interested lay person to conduct.
Many of the instructors are from Pentecostal churches.
Education Queensland is aware that Creationism is being taught by some religious instructors, but said parents could opt out.
Australian Secular Lobby president Hugh Wilson said children were ostracised and discriminated against if they were pulled out of the class.
In many cases, the RI lay people were not supervised by teachers.
Kings Christian Church youth worker Dustin Bell said he taught "about creation" in Sunshine Coast schools.
Set Free Christian Church's Tim McKenzie said when students questioned him why dinosaur fossils carbon dated as earlier than man, he replied that the great flood must have skewed the data.
Queensland Teachers Union president Steve Ryan said teachers were sometimes compelled to supervise the instructors "because of all the fire and brimstone stuff".
Mr Ryan said Education Queensland had deemed RI a must-have, though teachers would prefer to spend the time on curriculum.
Buddhist Council of Queensland president Jim Ferguson said he was so disturbed that Creationism was being aired in state school classrooms that he would bring it up at the next meeting of the Religious Education Advisory Committee, part of Education Queensland.
He said RI was supposed to be a forum for multi-faith discussion.
Education Queensland assistant director-general Patrea Walton said Creationism was part of some faiths, and therefore was part of some teaching.
New research shows three in 10 Australians believe dinosaurs and man did exist at the same time. The survey, by the Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies, shows a "worrying" lack of basic scientific principles.
"The results underscore the need for students to be exposed to science and mathematics through a well resourced education system, rather than learning about science through Jurassic Park," FASTS president Dr Cathy Foley said.
PhD researcher Cathy Byrne found in a NSW-based survey that scripture teachers tended to discourage questioning, emphasised submission to authority and excluded different beliefs. She said 70 per cent of scripture teachers thought children should be taught the Bible as historical fact.
A parent of a Year 5 student on the Sunshine Coast said his daughter was ostracised to the library after arguing with her scripture teacher about DNA.
"The scripture teacher told the class that all people were descended from Adam and Eve," he said.
"My daughter rightly pointed out, as I had been teaching her about DNA and science, that 'wouldn't they all be inbred'?
"But the teacher replied that DNA wasn't invented then."
After the parent complained, the girl spent the rest of the year's classes in the library.

All I can really say is yikes.  Also, I posted this on my facebook and found out that a close friend of mine evidently doesn't believe in dinosaurs because he has never done any carbon dating and has never put a fossil together himself.  But - he says - that's just his nature given that he's a Capricorn.  

My head nearly exploded.

Why in australia? I left America and thought i was free of the creationists . Why are they following me?

[Guittars]

Of particular interest (to me) in the article (http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/cr ... 5899497234) was this quote

"PhD researcher Cathy Byrne found in a NSW-based survey that scripture teachers tended to discourage questioning, emphasised submission to authority and excluded different beliefs. She said 70 per cent of scripture teachers thought children should be taught the Bible as historical fact."

Religions have to discourage questioning because as soon as it starts, massive holes with no answers start to appear. That's where faith comes in. Faith doesn't answer questions, it just encourages you to stop asking them.

And it is probably worth pointing out that while it is often Christians (fundamentalist or otherwise) that get this sort of coverage in the mainstream Western media, all religions are guilty of exactly the same idea: teaching that their 'holy' book is the truth despite the huge number of alternative religions all saying the same thing.

G

[Reasonable]

It would be difficult for these creationists to continue with the bs.  A few questions from kids and they lie through their teeth and spew nonsense.

I'm aghast at what these people are doing.  Don't they see that they look, sound and appear stupid, even to themselves?

[pinkocommie]

It would be difficult for these creationists to continue with the bs.  A few questions from kids and they lie through their teeth and spew nonsense.

I'm aghast at what these people are doing.  Don't they see that they look, sound and appear stupid, even to themselves?

Well they would, but they're actually protected against self criticism by a magic spell.  Gooooooo Jesus!

[The Magic Pudding]

It only gets worse.
http://www.theage.com.au/federal-electi ... 11pih.html

JULIA Gillard will intensify her pitch to Christian voters with a major expansion of the school chaplaincy program.

Despite identifying herself as an atheist, Ms Gillard has been working hard to court the powerful Christian lobby.

It comes amid concern that Labor's standing among religious voters has slumped following the overthrow of church-going prime minister Kevin Rudd.

Ms Gillard will today announce an allocation of $222 million to boost the number of chaplains in schools by more than one-third, which would mean about 3700 schools will be covered under the voluntary scheme introduced by the Howard government.

That bothersome PZ Myers has also been pointing out Australian stupidity for all to see.
Thanks a lot PZ.  http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010 ... rities.php

[Reasonable]

Hi MagicPudding:

Unfortunately, religious education are being paid for the state.  And it puts religion on the minds and hearts of children at such a crucial stage.

And the thing is, this brainwashing is even state-sponsored.  Gareth Wilson writes in The Plain Truths of Religion an example:

The 1944 Education Act, which provides a platform for religious faith in state schools, stipulates that children should participate in a daily act of worship...This means that instead of being taught useful word association and key phrases, using the silky language of our closest cross-channel neighbours, the wonderful sponge like brains of Britain’s primary school children are soaking up a useless fantasy world of creation myths and miracles.

It would seem that we would be powerless to stop it, especially if these superstitions have already crystallized in such young minds.

[Asmodean]

Actually, what I meant to say was

[GAYtheist]

So...yea...I had to fight denting the desk I'm occupying in school....

"The stupid...it hurts...so much....MY EYES!"  :brick:

[Thumpalumpacus]

It's nice to know I'm not the dumbest sonofabitch on two legs.

[Sophus]

That doesn't seem like a question Who Wants Be A Millionaire would ask. Were they running out of ideas?

[Asmodean]

Sorry, I'm having great difficulty not imploding and then exploding reading the garbage these morons are posting/spouting  

[necrobitsch]

Students have been told Noah collected dinosaur eggs to bring on the Ark, and Adam and Eve were not eaten by dinosaurs because they were under a protective spell.

Bloody hell. I know that's how they think. But it never fails to make my brain bleed. And there I was thinking that magic and spells were verboten according to Yahweh. Or at least Leviticus makes it explicitly clear that magic-doers are to be rejected and killed. Then again, this is the same supposed deity who's guilty of Pride and Wrath in terms of the deadly sins.

(Also - Pinko- GO TEAM VENTURE!! )

[Asmodean]

That doesn't seem like a question Who Wants Be A Millionaire would ask. Were they running out of ideas?

It's a trick question. The Moon does not appear larger than an elephant and to someone distracted and possibly slightly nervous what with the cameras and all, the fact that the moon is a effing planet is... Elusive  

[Sophus]

That doesn't seem like a question Who Wants Be A Millionaire would ask. Were they running out of ideas?

It's a trick question. The Moon does not appear larger than an elephant and to someone distracted and possibly slightly nervous what with the cameras and all, the fact that the moon is a effing planet is... Elusive  

That's okay, I can make another one.