religion in school
In Romania kids study religion even in highschool. Now they have an option not to, if their parents express their will in this direction. Mind you, they don't study the history of religions or any other similar thing that would expand their cultural horizon. No. Religion. Catechism. The majority being Orthodox Christians, they study that. Kids from the first grade learn that God will punish them if they don't do God's will and they don't listen to their parents. More precisely, God will arrange for them to get into a car crash or give them high fever. Any other religious beliefs other people might have are demonic and must be fought against. Yoga is devil's work. (Not that I care much for yoga, but, seriously...)
I feel the need to quote from one of the manuals:
"Vasilica is a bad boy. He climbed the ladder to destroy a birds nest. But he was punished! God saw him and pulled the ladder from him." There's a picture of the boy fallen off the tree, with a head fracture.
All this horrifying intolerance tought by state schools has many supporters. They imagine that the youth today has a moral problem that can only be fixed by forcing the kids learn religion and filling the schools with religious icons. (Like before they were filled with the portrait of Ceausescu). Anybody who dares to oppose these ideas is going directly to hell. How dare they oppose the right to study religion in school, a right won with blood in the Revolution?
Where's the free will? Where's the tolerance and mutual respect for people with different faiths? If you want your kid to learn catechism, you send him/her to church for Sunday school! School is school. Church is church. When you stop seeing the difference where do you go? Have we become fundamentalists? WTF? It's 2008 and we're in Europe. And a member of the EU.
No wonder we're so intolerant. I've watched the Midsumma carnival in Australia on the news. There it's a huge festive occasion that brings tourists and everybody enjoys it. In Bucharest a small gay pride parade is received with hatred and counter-demonstrations by extremist groups. And occasionally stones and other projectiles. And the TV channels invite some pathetic prostitute trannies (like they're representative!) and some extremists to talk, (like the extremists should have a word!), and act like they're all impartial.
I feel the need to quote from one of the manuals:
"Vasilica is a bad boy. He climbed the ladder to destroy a birds nest. But he was punished! God saw him and pulled the ladder from him." There's a picture of the boy fallen off the tree, with a head fracture.
All this horrifying intolerance tought by state schools has many supporters. They imagine that the youth today has a moral problem that can only be fixed by forcing the kids learn religion and filling the schools with religious icons. (Like before they were filled with the portrait of Ceausescu). Anybody who dares to oppose these ideas is going directly to hell. How dare they oppose the right to study religion in school, a right won with blood in the Revolution?
Where's the free will? Where's the tolerance and mutual respect for people with different faiths? If you want your kid to learn catechism, you send him/her to church for Sunday school! School is school. Church is church. When you stop seeing the difference where do you go? Have we become fundamentalists? WTF? It's 2008 and we're in Europe. And a member of the EU.
No wonder we're so intolerant. I've watched the Midsumma carnival in Australia on the news. There it's a huge festive occasion that brings tourists and everybody enjoys it. In Bucharest a small gay pride parade is received with hatred and counter-demonstrations by extremist groups. And occasionally stones and other projectiles. And the TV channels invite some pathetic prostitute trannies (like they're representative!) and some extremists to talk, (like the extremists should have a word!), and act like they're all impartial.