Discussion about hot topics trending today

[Annoyed]

That TV ad really annoys me. It's dog whistling and creating fear. But of course everyone with half a brain should know that. Along with the new borderforce TV ad urging people to dob in people in boats that they think might be suspicious........

CREATING FEAR.

If you ask me the ad goes beyond annoying into downright stupid. Why in the name of all that's holy would the govt. want to provide the names of materials that could be used to make a bomb?

[Gatefan1976]

That TV ad really annoys me. It's dog whistling and creating fear. But of course everyone with half a brain should know that. Along with the new borderforce TV ad urging people to dob in people in boats that they think might be suspicious........

CREATING FEAR.

Actually, no it's not.
Dog whistles and such are for when there is a bias against a particular race, or religion or group and this ad AVOIDS showing the owners of ANY of this stuff and concentrates on elements of known risk of something that does happen, terrorism.

[Gatefan1976]

If you ask me the ad goes beyond annoying into downright stupid. Why in the name of all that's holy would the govt. want to provide the names of materials that could be used to make a bomb?

Cause we know what you can use to make a bomb already?
Any year 8 student in a public school knows these things, and anyone who watches any form of news knows the most common forms of chemicals to make a bomb before even then?
Does it tell you how to handle them?
No.
How to mix them?
No
The risk to yourself?
No.

Buying a crap ton of bullets and using the gunpowder would be an easier and safer way to make a bomb, so why in the name of all that's holy would the government allow free access to this more stable and damaging explosive?

[Gatefan1976]

So, maybe the forced purge of anything of a religious (read: Christian) nature from the schools wasn't such a good idea?

In a subject of facts such as the hard sciences, yes it is good.
In a subject of interpretation perhaps not.

When I went through the grade schools back in the 60's, they did cover religion, and it wasn't focused upon any one denomination. They even had guest speakers come in representing various churches. Aside from mainstream Christian, we had Jewish and I think we had one Mormon speaker. We also had Christmas pageants, Hanukkah observations as well.

So. it didn't focus on Christian, just Christian, proto-Christian, and Christian off-shoots.
Yeah, digging that real variety man................

I don't see this as violation of the separation of church and state, as the state was not advocating any particular religion, they were just providing information about several of them, and celebrations were observed for the holidays of those that had a significant percentage of the school population represented, again, not favoring one over the other.

Yeah, as long as you were a smegging Christian offshoot.
Where is the teaching of Sikhism, or Buddism??
"Hey, I have 4 flavours of ice cream, vanilla with chocolate, vanilla with caramel, vanilla with strawberry and vanilla with lime"

I think you are advocating vanilla a bit.

But over the years anything resembling education about the dominant religion of this country has been purged from the public schools. This leaves any religious education to the churches themselves, which are understandably going to be very biased in favor of their particular faith.

True, but they are ALLOWED to be because attendance is by choice.
School is not.

[Falcon Horus]

The second one fits more in a history class. I think someone was slacking off.

We never watched any films in history class -- documentaries, on the other hand, plenty of those. Many times my classmates and I arrived at the lunch table pushing our lunches aside for we were no longer hungry after seeing the holocaust documentaries. Yes, our history class was right before lunch.

[Annoyed]

So. it didn't focus on Christian, just Christian, proto-Christian, and Christian off-shoots.
Yeah, digging that real variety man................

Yeah, as long as you were a smegging Christian offshoot.
Where is the teaching of Sikhism, or Buddism??
"Hey, I have 4 flavours of ice cream, vanilla with chocolate, vanilla with caramel, vanilla with strawberry and vanilla with lime"

I think you are advocating vanilla a bit.

Well, maybe because 90% of the population identified as Christian back then? Even today, if you count all offshoots, among those who identify as being of any religion, it's over 90% today. Since the educational system is intended to serve the needs of the population, that kinda makes sense.

http://news.gallup.com/poll/187955/p...down-high.aspx

The downtick in the percentage of the U.S. population identifying as Christian over the past eight years is a continuation of a trend that has been evident for decades. In Gallup surveys in the 1950s, over 90% of the adult population identified as Christian, with only a small percentage claiming no religious identification at all or identifying with a non-Christian religion.

Despite these changes, America remains a predominantly Christian nation, and with 94% of those who identify with a religion saying they are Christian.

The broad Christian category includes Catholics, Protestants, Mormons and non-denominational Christians. In 2015, 24% of Americans identify as Catholic, 50% as Protestant or as members of another non-Catholic Christian religion, and 2% as Mormon.

[aretood2]

If you ask me the ad goes beyond annoying into downright stupid. Why in the name of all that's holy would the govt. want to provide the names of materials that could be used to make a bomb?

I think you are being way too concerned about it. As long as proportions (and other details) aren't shared, such info is really useless. Now if GF or the ad did give that info....

Well, maybe because 90% of the population identified as Christian back then? Even today, if you count all offshoots, among those who identify as being of any religion, it's over 90% today. Since the educational system is intended to serve the needs of the population, that kinda makes sense.

http://news.gallup.com/poll/187955/p...down-high.aspx

If the point is to learn about other religions then...why not have other religions? If it is about your own religion, schools can't functionally do it. What if you are Christian but Non-Trinitarian?
Or heck, even pentecostals are widely misunderstood that is if people in my area even know anything about them to begin with. Or that time I had to correct my professor when he said that the Catholic Church was the only one for centuries (In his defense, he was trying simplify things but in doing so was ignoring a very important fact, Christianity has never been just one thing that can be generalized). Now extend this to religions not common in the US...oh boy, the inaccuracies.

That said, I do support comparative religious studies. But only if done with the aim to teach diversity within each religion. And I think that is the most important aspect of it. To learn to not rely on generalized labels.

[photoglyph]

One cannot equate one party with the other in this regard.

[SGalisa]

Just stopped by here for a refreshing time break from *that* other topic...
Thought I'd find something enlightening and lighter to read about, but came across the below, instead...

...2 years later, we did a schooltrip to Poland and visited Auschwitz. If ever there was a busload of 13-14 year olds more quiet and subdued in a bus, then you hadn't seen us that day -- a very lasting impression on a bus full of teenagers.

We've never been to Auschwitz, not even Mauthausen. But I remember when I first saw Schindler's List (on TV), I cried so much afterwards. I think I was also about 12-13 yo there.

Never been to that side of the world -- ever.. don't ever want to see Auschwitz in person. I saw enough of its depressing sadness from seeing many documentaries in school about the war and extermination camps, etc..

Not that anyone here might watch this --- but "The Winds of War" (1983 Tv series) and "War and Remembrance" (continued TV Mini-Series 1988) were among the saddest memories of the whole WWII history saga in fictionalized Tv format. Even tho it was just a Tv series about what really happened to other people -- who really died in all of that stuff, I cried every time I saw the trains come in and collect the people like cattle and then drop them off to die. Those people had everything stolen from them -- the moment they got off the trains -- EVERYTHING, even their own clothes were stolen and piled up in heaps for either someone else to steal or to be burned. The winter (trains, camps, and war) scenes were the most powerful (with intense music adding to the greater atmospheric effects) and my eyes are watering up now as I write this... :*(

Reading real life survivor stories of what actually happened within the camps was even more heart-breaking than just watching the films.

...Something is rotten in God's own country.

God's country?

Yeah, which country is that? The only 2 countries I've ever heard as "God's country" is Israel --as an actual country-- and the term used as an *affectionate* phrase for the rural countryside that my dad used to call "God's country".

We never watched any films in history class -- documentaries, on the other hand, plenty of those. Many times my classmates and I arrived at the lunch table pushing our lunches aside for we were no longer hungry after seeing the holocaust documentaries. Yes, our history class was right before lunch.

I had a special film class (I think it was during 8th grade) that was during AND after Lunch hour. It was our history teacher who had this class for anyone interested in watching short films. I took it to get out of some other class-work... Lucky us, some of those *short* films ended up as documentaries (short film clips) which ended up in "The World At War" series. Very, very sad. I remember seeing some of the battle scenes, many deaths and injuries and scars, but most of the stuff focused on interviews. Got to see Japan and the big boom (bomb) several times over, enough that it seemed to end up drilled into my head... thus, that might explain why I *dislike* watching war stories, war scenes, and having that constant dreaded *end of the world* bomb threat. Tho, I don't remember losing my lunch over any of it... just had that dreaded FEAR of the ultimate end drilled in over and over.

It also didn't help that my film class was in an old school with the only bomb shelter I knew about in that town -- which wouldn't fit more than 70 to 100 people at the most, even at packed capacity. Time era was shortly after or still during when the infamous "Cold War" was in action, with discussions on hiding under our desks if the nuclear bomb sirens ever went off.
Like how much good would that do hiding under a desk in a room full of huge windows?

[Coco Pops]

Actually, no it's not.
Dog whistles and such are for when there is a bias against a particular race, or religion or group and this ad AVOIDS showing the owners of ANY of this stuff and concentrates on elements of known risk of something that does happen, terrorism.

Yeah sorry for the mistake but no I disagree strongly. Both ads are creating fear.

[Gatefan1976]

Yeah sorry for the mistake but no I disagree strongly. Both ads are creating fear.

Ok, do you remember the old Grim reaper AIDS ads we had here in the 80's?
That too created fear, it also virtually halted the aids epidemic spreading further out here as well.
It -also- did not point out groups, and stuck to AIDS as the issue.
Sometimes fear is not a bad thing, when the subject of the ad is pretty bloody scary.
IF however, these ads were showing people doing the act, I would totally agree with you CoCo, the lesson would get lost in the blame and you end up fearing the person or the group, rather that the threat.

[Coco Pops]

Ok, do you remember the old Grim reaper AIDS ads we had here in the 80's?
That too created fear, it also virtually halted the aids epidemic spreading further out here as well.
It -also- did not point out groups, and stuck to AIDS as the issue.
Sometimes fear is not a bad thing, when the subject of the ad is pretty bloody scary.
IF however, these ads were showing people doing the act, I would totally agree with you CoCo, the lesson would get lost in the blame and you end up fearing the person or the group, rather that the threat.

Yes I remember the Grim Reaper TV ads......Put me off sex

[Falcon Horus]

Hey Ozzies, I hear there's a Belgian immigrant leading Australia this week... ...is he turning your country into chocolate yet?

[Coco Pops]

Hey Ozzies, I hear there's a Belgian immigrant leading Australia this week... ...is he turning your country into chocolate yet?

No......... But I love chocolate....... If only we had chocolate rivers and lakes.... I'd drown

[Annoyed]

Yes I remember the Grim Reaper TV ads......Put me off sex

Although I obviously didn't see Aussie TV ads, we had our own variations on them.

Ummm wasn't that the idea? To discourage people from having random sex with random partners to slow the spread of an incurable fatal disease? I'd say the ads worked, at least in your case.