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[Nadaka]

http://news.yahoo.com/fear-death-squads-hunt-iraqs-gays-emos-153725256.html

Don't read the comments. It is mostly people shouting "finally something to like about muslims" and "wish we could do that in the US".

[Dutchling]

As some US religious people apparently want their kids homeschooled, I assume you don't have religious public schools? This seems kinda strange to me as in the Netherlands there are plenty and I thought the US of all (Western) nations would have them as well.

I'm actually going to one right now, although my schools doesn't teach anything regarding creationism (creationism is trying to prove faith if I understood it correctly) and during Biology classes evolution is obviously seen as correct.

[Nadaka]

As some US religious people apparently want their kids homeschooled, I assume you don't have religious public schools? This seems kinda strange to me as in the Netherlands there are plenty and I thought the US of all (Western) nations would have them as well.

I'm actually going to one right now, although my schools doesn't teach anything regarding creationism (creationism is trying to prove faith if I understood it correctly) and during Biology classes evolution is obviously seen as correct.

There are many accredited religious private schools, and some of them receive partial state funding, but no fully funded religious public schools (yet).

Creationism isn't trying to prove faith, its about trying to find a way to justify a literal biblical interpretation of genesis as being equally as or more valid than the evidence based scientific inquiry that has led to our understanding of evolution and the formation of the cosmos.

[RedKing]

http://news.yahoo.com/fear-death-squads-hunt-iraqs-gays-emos-153725256.html

Don't read the comments. It is mostly people shouting "finally something to like about muslims" and "wish we could do that in the US".

Huh...I'm kinda seeing the opposite. "See, these bastard Muslims like to kill people" and "This is what we fought for?"

Of course, I'd like to see someone say "This is Rick Santorum's wet dream for America."

[GlyphGryph]

Why WOULD you have a religious public school? That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Especially with spread out populations like the US has, that's essentially forcing kids to go to schools of other religions and that would get a hell of a lot more anger directed at it than forcing kids to go to a strictly secular school.

I don't... I just can't see any possible way you'd want a public school to be religious. It just seems like a recipe for disaster unless you've got some sort of monoculture so intense that no one cares. And even then it just seems like a good way to isolate the outliers.


And as an expressly secular state, it should be pretty much impossible in the US.

[scriver]

I'm not sure Dutchling means what he says. I've never heard of religious public schools either. Private schools, sure, we have them here too, but never public.

[Reelya]

A lot of Christians here got angry when some Muslims wanted to build their own private school under the religious school laws which allow Catholics and Anglicans to run schools. Very angry.

http://www.cathnews.com/article.aspx?aeid=14173

After months of controversy, the NSW Land and Environment Court has rejected the Quranic Society's application to build a $19 million school for 900 students in a rural area near Camden south-west of Sydney.

The court found that the plans were inconsistent with the site's zoning restrictions, The Sydney Morning Herald reports.

Camden City Council cited planning arguments when it first blocked the proposal a year ago.

But fierce community opposition to the project often relied on racial and religious arguments.

At the hearing in April, the council's evidence included a letter signed by four Christian churches stating that Islam espoused views that were "incompatible with the Australian way of life".
The council's legal team also presented a DVD featuring the views of concerned residents, one of whom said the school would be a "breeding ground for terrorists".

However the council insisted its refusal was based on planning grounds, arguing it was incompatible with the rural zoning and would cause problems for traffic and neighbouring farms.

But then ...

http://cathnews.com/article.aspx?aeid=8931

Months after turning down a proposal for a Muslim school, residents of Camden in Sydney's west have welcomed plans for a Catholic school in the historic town.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports the Camden/Macarthur Residents' Group that fought a Muslim proposal for a school in rural Camden has welcomed Catholic plans to build a school nearby because "Catholics are part of our community."

Residents group president, Emil Sremchevich, said the Catholic school plan "ticked all the right boxes", even though he is yet to see its development application.

"Catholics are part of our community so we should be supporting it on this basis alone. We have to welcome them," Mr Sremchevich told the Herald.


"To become part of a community, you need to live in the community. You can't just turn up."

The Quranic Society said Mr Sremchevich's comments were racist but he rejected that tag.

"Why is that racist? Why is it discriminatory? It's very simple: people like some things but don't like other things. Some of us like blondes, some of us like brunettes. Some of us like Fords, some of us like Holdens. Why is it xenophobic just because I want to make a choice? If I want to like some people and not like other people, that's the nature of the beast."

Mr Sremchevich was among those who applauded a Camden Council decision in May to reject the Quranic Society's application to build a 1,200 student school at Burragorang Road, Cawdor.

Now the Catholic Education Office of Wollongong has bought the 150 student Mater Dei special needs school in Macquarie Grove Road.

It wants to retain Mater Dei and build a 1,000 student high school on the same plot, which is already zoned for a school.

The Quranic Society application would have required rezoning.

A spokesman for the Quranic Society, Issam Obeid, said: "Everyone can see there is a double standard ... No one knows anything about the Catholic school and they say, 'Yeah, give it a tick already.' I think racism is affecting this."

A spokesman for Wollongong's Catholic Education Office, Peter McPherson, said more schools were needed in south-west Sydney to cope with population growth.

"Our site is currently a school zoning so we don't believe we will have any problems with rural zoning issues," he said.

[GlyphGryph]

It's not like they could stop them, though, right? I mean we have a whole bunch of them in the US (along with various other religious private schools) and I've never seen much in the way of opposition to them.

[Reelya]

See my edit, i just found out they built a catholic school in the place where they had riots about an Islamic one.

There's quite a bit of racism amongst some Australians. Especially in rural areas.

The paranoia they hold is so great, that some people in a related news article said they feared revenge attacks for opposing the Islamic school in Camden. e.g. these people in a farming town outside the city, think they're going to be personally targeted by Islamic terrorists.

[Criptfeind]

To be fair "In the place" is a fairly inaccurate. The catholic school is going to be built (from what it looks like to me) in the same place as there already is a school.

There very well might be a valid point about the zoning. But by the comments from the people it is clear that zoning is a secondary concern.

[GlyphGryph]

Bluh. Suffice to say, I'm not surprised to see something like that happen in Australia, but I am disappointed.

Mind you, NZs one Islamic school is looking like it will get shut down, but at least that has a damn good reason (and its mostly muslim families making the complaints, I believe)

[Reelya]

It's the same city, and the state commisioner involved said "he rejected plans for the school on Burragorang Rd because the development would not be in keeping with Camden’s rural character and heritage".

So he claimed Camden, as a whole, was not "in keeping" with a large high-school. Then they dropped that logic because it was a Catholic school.

The council / state can still refuse the Catholic school, regardless of zoning. Hell, technically, you need council planning approval for a garden shed.

For the Islamic school, they said other factors, other than the site's zoning were relevant : specifically as i said above "Camden’s rural character and heritage" wasn't compatible with a high-school.

[RedKing]

I can't help but LOL that the guy who's talking about Muslims not being an integral part of the community is named Emil Sremchevich. I'm guessing the Sremcheviches didn't come over in chains from Old Mother England.

[Truean]

http://www.thenewamerican.com/culture/education/11167-bankruptcy-attorneys-predict-a-student-loan-qdebt-bombq

Yup. I've seen the hardship test to get out of student loans in bankruptcy. It's possible, but exceedingly unlikely. You've got... perhaps a 2% chance and that's being generous, quite frankly. Thus if you've got a 2% success rate, then you've got a 98% failure rate.... Yeah....
__________________________________________________________________

As for the middle school thing, yeah many US schools are horrible for that age. Not sure if it's the school, the age bracket or (probably) a combination of both). [shrugs]

[Bauglir]

I was on board with that article up until it explained how everything was the government's fault, and while I can't say federal policy is entirely free of blame, I think it's kind of dishonest to talk about how the result was inevitable and therefore it's the fault of government subsidies, as if the institutions exploiting them are some sort of inevitable force of nature, free of blame.