Religious fanaticism is definitely a part of what is wrong with our country right now. A great film I recommend that came out in 2006 is Jesus Camp. It’s about a Christian summer bible camp; I think it is a brilliant, and depressing as hell, movie. The film crew follows a woman who runs the camp and all the things she does with the kids to make them warriors for Jesus. The film culminates in the issue of abortion and the appointment of Justice Alito by Bush Jr. The kids in the film are emotionally abused, and it was hard for me to watch some parts of it because I work with kids and know how they they will trust adults and believe what they say. So if they are told, you are a sinner, you need to be ashamed of yourself and ask for forgiveness, they will do it for real because they believe you, and actually go around worrying about hell.
In any case, made in 2006 means that those kids, that went to this abusive camp, of which there are hundreds like it all over the country, are the MAGA leaders of today. The Charlie Kirks if you will. Christian nationalism is not a new thing, it’s been instilled in children along with the anti-abortion movement’s long term, corrupt plan to take over the Supreme Court for decades. Making warrior Christ worshipers like the Young Communist League or Hitler Youth. Now these people are the ones taking orders from Trump headquarters and loving it because Trump is letting them do whatever they want. So we see laws showing up now like requiring the 10 commandments in classrooms.
Let me tell you why this is a stupid thing to do from a Christian Nationalist point-of-view. If you don’t have a teacher that is also aligned with your theocratic politics (which I’m sure they are working on replacing us, but until then...) forcing religion into a classroom is a BAD idea because I can tell you teachers fucking hate to be told what to teach. They want to inspire, build skills and critical thinking… that last one there will screw the religious nuts. I was thinking of putting up the 10 commandments BECAUSE I believe in church and state separation and despise Christian Nationalism. You could post other religious quotes all around it. You could frame Marx’s “Religion is the opiate of the masses” next to it. You can have class discussions and suggest things like, “what do the 10 commandments say about killing?” Does the Bible include an exception for Venezuelan speed boats that may or may not be carrying drugs? How about starving children by taking away money being used to feed them? How about providing bombs to a government that uses them on refugees they themselves created, do you think God wanted exceptions in those cases?”
Trying to make kids follow a religion in public schools is a dumbass idea. If you don’t have the priest of your local church you support going into the classroom with the religious curriculum you want, your shit is just going to be torn apart by and students teachers who use it as fodder to help everyone think better. Kids rebel against stuff anyway, the more you put up your religion the more they will question and hate it. It has nothing to do with spiritual truth, that’s just how teenagers are as they encounter the “real world” and realize it’s full of lies. They struggle to create their identity within that context, seeking out what is true to them and what isn’t. Why would anyone who supports any religion want to trust a classroom of such people with their ideas? Every idea that comes into my classroom is examined, poked, prodded, torn apart and taped back together, usually with new shit hanging all over it. Fucking please try and give me a stupid ass religious curriculum I can have my kids chew up and spit back out with me. It would be fun.
BTW, I teach high school in Chicago, Illinois. Fuck TRUMP. And pray for my Latino students who are still coming to school and working hard every day getting their shit done AND learning English at the same time while avoiding ICE. We don’t take truth and faith for granted, we’re stronger than you fucking morons who think you can force other people to believe a corrupted message and not have them reject and use it to strengthen their own ideas. Trump is trying to racially divide our country, but everyday my students give me hope because of the way they show concern for each other and help each other out.
Let’s deliver them from evil right?
