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Court upholds dismissal of David Parker lawsuit over schools' same-sex teaching
Boston Globe ^ | January 31, 2008 | Associated Press

Posted on 02/02/2008 5:13:54 AM PST by lexfreedom

Court upholds dismissal of suit over schools' same-sex teaching

January 31, 2008

BOSTON—A federal appeals court on Thursday upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit filed by Lexington parents who objected to same-sex families being discussed in their children's elementary school classrooms.

Tonia and David Parker of Lexington sued school officials in April 2006 after their son brought home a book from kindergarten that depicted a gay family. Joseph and Robin Wirthlin joined the suit after a second-grade teacher read the class a story about two princes falling in love.

In a ruling Thursday, the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with a judge who ruled in February 2007 that parents' rights to exercise their religious beliefs are not violated when their children are exposed to contrary ideas in school.

"Public schools are not obliged to shield individual students from ideas which potentially are religiously offensive, particularly when the school imposes no requirement that the student agree with or affirm those ideas, or even participate in discussions about them," the court said in its ruling.

Jeffrey Denner, an attorney for the parents, said they were disappointed with the ruling and are considering appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court.

"Normally, when kids are taught certain things, they believe it to come from on high," Denner said. "I think this influences the way they think in very, very direct ways and becomes functionally indoctrinating to them."

(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; US: Massachusetts
KEYWORDS: davidparker; homosexualagenda; homosexuality; parentalrights; romney
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Support David Parker ! Visit:

www.davidparkerfacts.org

1 posted on 02/02/2008 5:13:58 AM PST by lexfreedom
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To: lexfreedom

Demand vouchers NOW!


2 posted on 02/02/2008 5:18:27 AM PST by Archon of the East (Universal Executive Power of the Law of Nature)
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To: DirtyHarryY2K; little jeremiah; DBeers; scripter
David Parker ping.

Here's a link to the text of the Circuit court opinion: http://www.ca1.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/getopn.pl?OPINION=07-1528.01A

Note these statements:

"Given that Massachusetts has recognized gay marriage under its state constitution, it is entirely rational for its schools to educate their students regarding that recognition."

and

"There is no allegation here of a formalized curriculum requiring students to read many books affirming gay marriage."

But there IS a formalized "tolerance" curriculum that starts in KINDERGARTEN and goes all the way through high school.

3 posted on 02/02/2008 5:20:59 AM PST by lexfreedom
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To: lexfreedom
"Public schools are not obliged to shield individual students from ideas which potentially are religiously offensive, particularly when the school imposes no requirement that the student agree with or affirm those ideas, or even participate in discussions about them," the court said in its ruling.

Unless of course those children are Muslim.

4 posted on 02/02/2008 5:23:30 AM PST by Pontiac (Your message here.)
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To: lexfreedom; Congressman Billybob; wagglebee; Calpernia
This is one of the INFERIOR Courts as defined in the Constitution that Congress can make vanish by defunding. And whether Congress does is up to the Citizenry.

...and, to paraphrase Orwell's "Animal Farm," while all Federal Appeals Courts are inferior (to SCOTUS) some are more inferior than others.
5 posted on 02/02/2008 5:25:35 AM PST by The Spirit Of Allegiance (Public Employees: Honor Your Oaths! Defend the Constitution from Enemies--Foreign and Domestic!)
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To: Pontiac
And unless, of course, those ideas are Judeo-Christian in nature.
6 posted on 02/02/2008 5:35:25 AM PST by Ghost of Philip Marlowe (If Hillary is elected, her legacy will be telling the American people: Better put some ice on that.)
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To: lexfreedom

That this is occurring at the elementary-school level indicates that this is not merely indoctrination, it is recruitment.

If Camel can be forced to stop using the cartoon character Joe Camel because it is such a powerful influence to children and leads them to become smokers, then this sort of recruiting at such an early age and using fairy tales would have the same effect and should be banned for the same reason.

I WANT EDUCATION CHOICE NOW!!


7 posted on 02/02/2008 5:37:34 AM PST by Ghost of Philip Marlowe (If Hillary is elected, her legacy will be telling the American people: Better put some ice on that.)
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To: Archon of the East

The quickest and most efficient way to make a dent in Leftist endoctrination is for every family that can homeschool to do so.


8 posted on 02/02/2008 5:44:20 AM PST by fightinJAG ("Tell the truth. The Pajama People are watching you.")
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To: lexfreedom
Image hosted by Photobucket.com and the filthy disease ridden queers win again...
9 posted on 02/02/2008 5:46:17 AM PST by Chode (American Hedonist ©®)
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To: lexfreedom
Public schools are not obliged to shield individual students from ideas which potentially are religiously offensive

Tomorrow, children, we will read a story about a young girl who was stoned to death by her daddy and brothers. Let's all bring a good hefty rock tomorrow, ok!

10 posted on 02/02/2008 5:46:26 AM PST by mtbopfuyn (I think the border is kind of an artificial barrier - San Antonio councilwoman Patti Radle)
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To: fightinJAG
The quickest and most efficient way to make a dent in Leftist endoctrination is for every family that can homeschool to do so.

No, that's merely running away from the problem. A more appropriate and long lasting solution is to stand and fight with other like-minded parents against the school. Of course anyone living in Teddy Country is just asking for this sort of thing. There are public schools that have morals and conservative values. It's all in where you choose for your family to live.

11 posted on 02/02/2008 5:51:00 AM PST by mtbopfuyn (I think the border is kind of an artificial barrier - San Antonio councilwoman Patti Radle)
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To: fightinJAG

I agree. I have often wondered about taking the home school to the community level. Create community outreach programs that kids can home school together if they choose. Maybe this already exists, but I think it could add an element of choice in the truest sense of the word to our failing illiberal school systems.


12 posted on 02/02/2008 5:51:52 AM PST by Archon of the East (Universal Executive Power of the Law of Nature)
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To: lexfreedom
"We shall sodomize your sons, emblems of your feeble masculinity, of your shallow dreams and vulgar lies. We shall seduce them in your schools...in your youth groups, in your movie theatre bathrooms...wherever men are men together. Your sons will become our minions and do our bidding. They will be recast in our image. They will come to crave and adore us." - homosexual activist Michael Swift
Some of our pro-homo cheerleaders always try to insert the "how could someone make you homosexual" question into these discussions.

Well, this is how you do it! Get in there early and teach the children a false set of morals that run contrary to biology. They will never stop trying to make Michael Swift's dream come true.

13 posted on 02/02/2008 5:52:49 AM PST by FormerLib (Sacrificing our land and our blood cannot buy protection from jihad.-Bishop Artemije of Kosovo)
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To: lexfreedom
"Given that Massachusetts has recognized gay marriage under its state constitution...

A Massachusetts *court* may have recognized it but the people most assuredly have not.That's why the forces of "tolerance" in this state fought so desperately to keep the issue off the ballot,lest numerous polls prove correct that such a measure would lose decisively.

14 posted on 02/02/2008 5:57:50 AM PST by Gay State Conservative (Wanna see how bad it can get? Elect Hillary and find out.)
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To: Pontiac

...or Atheist or anything but Christian. SO- by that statement, then all kids should have to say the pledge of allegiance.


15 posted on 02/02/2008 6:02:09 AM PST by mombyprofession
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To: lexfreedom

Romney


16 posted on 02/02/2008 6:42:52 AM PST by the gillman@blacklagoon.com (And close the damned borders!)
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To: mtbopfuyn
A more appropriate and long lasting solution is to stand and fight with other like-minded parents against the school.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

The best place to wack a liberal/Marxist is in his pocketbook. Closing down the government schools would mean a lot of unemployed liberal/Marxists.

While I agree with you that standing and fighting the liberal/Marxist agenda is important. The best way to fight the agenda in the education arena is to close down their madrases ( mis-named public “schools”)

Just think if the Liberal/Marxist indoctrinators in the government madrasses had to work in the private sector, a good number of them just might come to see the wisdom of conservatism.

17 posted on 02/02/2008 6:51:11 AM PST by wintertime (Good ideas win! Why? Because people are not stupid.)
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Comment #18 Removed by Moderator

To: Archon of the East
Archon of the East,

I have a solution. I posted it on another thread on this same topic:
Wintertime

Solution: Private scholarship foundations providing private vouchers to PRIVATE schools!

IT IS COMPLETELY POSSIBLE TO DO THIS!!!! ( I am shouting. I hope someone will hear!)

Harvard has a $35 BILLION dollar endowment, and many, many of the colleges and universities have billion and multi-multi-million dollar endowments as well. Hey! Exeter, the elite prep school is close to a billion.

If conservatives WANTED, they COULD give every child in this nation an education that respected the Constitution, the free market, and the Judeo Christian philosophy that makes all freedom possible. Not only could conservatives do this for the children of this nation, they could likely do it for every child in the WORLD. We ARE that rich as a nation!

Imagine! Please imagine.

Imagine armies of young people entering college fully prepared with arguments needed to thoroughly defeat their Marxist professors. Soon they would be taking their place in the hall of academia as well.

Conservatives, (Christian and non-Christian) could turn this country completely around.

Imagine schools that were inspected and certified by these conservative scholarship foundations. Conservative children could have the most excellent education ever provided to any child since the dawn of humankind.

If the Marxists can gain control of the educational establishment, so can conservatives!

Once those children are OUT of the government schools, their parents, friends, and neighbors can organize a MASSIVE school tax revolt. It is time to SHUT DOWN the Marxist madrassses that mis-named “public” schools!

19 posted on 02/02/2008 7:13:28 AM PST by wintertime (Good ideas win! Why? Because people are not stupid.)
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To: mtbopfuyn

They had the parents arrested for protesting in Romneyland.


20 posted on 02/02/2008 7:13:37 AM PST by the gillman@blacklagoon.com (And close the damned borders!)
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