Dispatches from the Culture Wars: Stunning Church/State Case

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Ed Brayton is a freelance writer and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of Michigan Citizens for Science and co-founder of The Panda's Thumb. He has written for such publications as The Bard, Skeptic and Reports of the National Center for Science Education, spoken in front of many organizations and conferences, and appeared on nationally syndicated radio shows and on C-SPAN. Ed is also a Fellow with the Center for Independent Media.(static)

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Stunning Church/State Case

Category: Church and State
Posted on: July 1, 2006 12:16 PM, by Ed Brayton

If even 10% of the allegations in this case are correct, it's one of the most outrageous cases I've ever seen. The Indian River School District in Delaware is accused by a Jewish family of pushing Christianity so agressively and viciously that the family has moved to Wilmington because they feared reprisals from the town after filing the suit. It's the story of a Jewish family, the only one in an enormous school district, essentially being tormented. Read it for yourself. I want to follow this case in court, because if the facts support those allegations that's absolutely stunning.

Comments

Ed: You should set up a betting line on how long it will take for this law suit to turn up on Christianist websites as more evidence that a "war on Christianity" is under way in this country. I want low field.

Posted by: flatlander100 | July 1, 2006 12:57 PM

Oh, wow. That last section, the one about the school board rejecting a settlement, looks _so_bad_ for them. They're about to get boned without legal insurance.

Good.

Posted by: NBarnes | July 1, 2006 4:43 PM

Going along with your recent church/state graduation post, here's another lawsuit: an Everett high school student ensemble couldn't play "Ave Maria" because of its religious origin. Absolutely pathetic.

Posted by: Jim Anderson | July 2, 2006 1:26 AM

I'll be posting links to the original article in any discussion someone from America bashes my country (Poland) for being "so anti-semitic".

Posted by: Roman Werpachowski | July 2, 2006 9:06 AM

I looked into the Indian River SD case some on the 'net. The Jews on First site seems to have a pretty fair summary of the situation there. It's been dragging on since early '04, and the local community is sharply divided over the board's decisions. Aside from the religious/anti-semitic issues, some taxpayers there are upset that the board refused to settle out of court, leading to a lawsuit by the district's own insurance company. Taxpayers will have to foot the bill for two simultaneous court cases. I bet the dominionists never considered how expensive their war would be -- no mention of lawyers in the NT.

Frankly, I would have expected the kind of bigotry alleged by the plaintiffs to be more likely in places like, well, Kentucky, where I live, and that in the smaller towns. Delaware never struck me as a hotbed of anti-semitism, but what do I know? I've only been there once. The people of Indian River SD should be ashamed of their boards' actions. Some are, but there is a significant number who support the board all the way, judging from my cursory research.

It's just sad, and I hope the plaintiffs and the insurance company lawsuits hit the board hard. Decisions favoring plaintiffs would probably lead to the voters throwing the bums out of office, a la Dover, Pa.

Posted by: wheatdogg | July 2, 2006 12:18 PM

I live in Delaware and it's an interesting state. The northern part of the state is more or less a suburb of Philadelphia, and is pretty cosmopolitan. As soon as you get south of the C&D canal things get very rural and backward. The beach towns like Dewey and Rehoboth are islands of sophistication known for having a significant gay population. But the rural areas can get a little scary. The south of the state is not-so-affectionately known as "slower Delaware"

Posted by: Cliff | July 2, 2006 1:01 PM

The lawsuit was actually filed almost a year and a half ago, flatlander. Among the things I Googled up about it was a STACLU page which gave out the Dobrich's home address and telephone number.

In a STACLU writeup of the board's rejection of the settlement offer, there's this marvelously garbled sentence:

The Indian River School District deserves a standing ovation from us for boldly and unanimously rejecting the ACLU's claims of monetary extortion and intimidation in trying to persuade them from public prayer before their meetings.

Posted by: Pieter B | July 2, 2006 3:02 PM

Why is it that wingnuts have no English composition skills? My high school students can write better sentences.

Posted by: wheatdogg | July 2, 2006 4:08 PM

I've dug into this a bit over on my blog, for anyone who's interested. The Indian River School District also extolls the value of "a couple of swats on a student's buttocks, done in the privacy of an administrator's office".

Posted by: Bartholomew | July 3, 2006 8:51 AM

Pieter B. wrote:

Among the things I Googled up about it was a STACLU page which gave out the Dobrich's home address and telephone number.

That is just nasty. Those sick bastards actually think that picking on a Jewish family is something to be applauded.

Reading that article made me incredibly angry. The way that some of the people in that district are acting and their total lack of empathy is almost sociopathic. What kind of a person yells at a Jewish kid to take off his yarmulke? How stupid and low and cruel would you have to be to publicly humiliate and taunt a freaking 6th grade kid? Unbelievable.

And by now they've probably racked up dozens of death threats. The fact that these same people are no doubt spouting off about love, forgiveness and compassion in church just makes me want to vomit.

Posted by: Leni | July 4, 2006 5:20 PM

I managed to bring Pieter B's discovery about the Dobrich home address to the attention of Jesus' General; the General has now written to Nedd Kareiva at Stop the ACLU about his role in "the Indian River Pogrom". Kareiva's response: