Wow Timmy,

                Your “red herring” definition is basically accurate, except the use of red (cured) herring to throw bloodhounds off a scent was practiced as long ago as the 1650s – in the 1800s is when the term was first used metaphorically, and as I said; the practice was intended to obscure the truth. You can’t make my statement wrong by claiming it was wrong.

                Your understanding of scientific theory is not impressive. A Scientific Law is a description of a consistent phenomenon; what goes up, must come down – bodies in motion tend to stay in motion, etc. Scientific Theory is an attempt to explain the mechanics, or the “why” behind the consistent phenomenon; why must it come down, what is causing it to come down, and so forth. Once a theory is proven, it does not become a law – it remains a theory which has not yet been disproved. Once a theory is disproved, it ceases to be considered a valid theory by the majority of scientists – but some scientists may continue to attempt to prove a previously disproven theory – it’s up to them.

                Your initial concern seemed to be that someone had “stopped freedom of speech by stopping the right to speak of religion in public school” (which, by the way; was off topic…a red herring?) and you later mentioned that “A child reading a bible in school was stopped” – how concerned would you be if a child reading a Koran had been stopped? Be honest now, you’re cool with it as long as it’s YOUR god’s brand of indoctrination. But that’s scarcely of any real importance here either; with the socialist/statist indoctrination that is occurring in the public school system, you’re worried about children learning the good and bad things that were done in the name of our primitive culture’s imaginary friends? All too often, the “why” of a thing is stressed only for indoctrinative purposes when the “what” is all that really matters; people do this to offer validity to their own belief structures – for example, most religions insist that morality comes from their own religious teachings – a great recruiting tool, but no foundation in reality. Teaching ANY religion in school, unless ALL religions are taught; is religious indoctrination. If you want religious indoctrination in school, send your children to a private school, where you have some choice of what religious indoctrination your children will endure; the public school system is a socialist system with a virtually captive audience and it can only cater to the lowest common denominator – do you really want to show your denomination to be the lowest of them all? You really can’t get any lower than forcing your own ideas on innocent children.

                Just for the fun of it; look up the words “ripe” and “rife” – then come back with another snarky definition remark. Better yet, why don’t we see if we can find some problems with my punctuation?

                The articles you linked to overwhelmingly describe the use of force in an inherently violent system, the public school system, to discourage religious practice, written from a very pro-religion, victim-esque perspective.  These articles repeatedly reference freedom of religion and freedom of speech and, with some irony, suggest these freedoms should exist in a socialist, state-run school system. How is it you support the violence inherent in the system only when it backs your point of view; my contention is that the violence inherent in the system invalidates the system entirely - you apparently, are only concerned with making that violence work on your behalf.

                I never identified myself as an atheist because I’m not an atheist. I never identified you as a religious person per se; I suggested that “you might understand why religious indoctrination cannot be allowed in public schools if you did not belong to the prevailing religion” – so, yes, I did suggest you’re likely a Christian, but I stopped short of labeling you as such because I don’t have a problem with Christians; I have a problem with people who suggest they are pro-freedom while simultaneously supporting the use of violence and coercion against free people to have their own beliefs and points of view validated. I am a disinterested agnostic – I don’t really care if there is a god or not – the idea does not appeal to me; you are not likely an agnostic, that claim is probably intended to color your entire argument as secular, but a Christian agnostic is still a Christian – how often do you find yourself lying awake at night wondering if everything you’d heard about Buddah is true…or allah? You’re likely an uncommitted Christian, non-denominational, or an Easter & Christmas catholic. I believe you to be a Christian because you refer to Darwin’s theory of evolution as “Darwinism” and Al Gore’s Global Warming religion as “Environmentalism” – this has been the Christian method of suggesting both are false religions, but both are just Scientific Theories – Darwin’s theory is yet to be disproven and Al Gore’s garbage has been repeatedly disproven.

                I’m very happy if you do not consciously wish to “oppress” anyone, and I both wish that were true and hold out some hope that one day, you may actually understand what that statement would really mean about you if it were true. Blind conservatism is a good baby step in the direction of true liberty, but you still support the use of violence and coercion against those with whom you do not agree while whining and complaining when you feel like it has been used against you.

                Your Hitler quote supports your Christian agnostic status - that quote works well to insist that Christianity would have saved us from the likes of Hitler had it not been abandoned; do you think Hitler found Thomas Moore or Tomás de Torquemada to be meek? In fact, I submit that these two Christian heroes of the past might have found Hitler’s methods to be tame in comparison to their own. Whether or not your source casts Hitler as a theist, he was a spiritualist – whatever that really means, he had a belief in magic and the occult, his statements about the Mohammedan and Japanese religions only show that he admired the violence those religions inspired – violence not completely unlike that which you are supportive of when yielded on your behalf.

                Do you really think Hitler was primarily concerned with suppressing religion? Hitler wanted power and was willing to use any methods available to him to gain that power. If singling out a particular religious group worked towards that end, he would use it to his advantage, and the people who focused all their anger on the loss of their own religious freedoms failed to comprehend the system of government which either supported coercion and violence or was incapable of preventing it. I am sure the religious people he oppressed fought valiantly against their specific oppression, but because they were only concerned with the symptom which affected them directly, and were less interested with the cause, it didn’t work out too well for them.

                It’s cute that you call me hero – I haven’t been called hero since I was in the Army, fighting for our country. How do you like that appeal to emotion? Look, you either support the use of violence against others or you do not. The state has no business supporting or suppressing any religion because there is no way possible that the state can do either without alienating a percentage of the population. Any time a government supports or suppresses anything, it must use force to do so, and I do not support to use of force against anyone except as a response to the use of force. If you want religion taught in schools, get rid of the government involvement in our school systems so that the free market can provide the kind of schools the people freely support. Your argument is that you don’t have a problem with the use of force and violence to suppress, as long as you are not among the oppressed. You have not yet discovered liberty, and I think it is because you’ve not yet had the chance to experience it.

                I feel bad about being mean here and there in my posts because it detracts from the points I’ve attempted to make, but I don’t know if you’ll just shrug everything off or if you’ll actually read what I’ve written. My darker side has decided it’s worth it to get in a few jabs here and there. I didn’t understand how NewsBuster’s inbox thing worked – I accidentally clicked on it today and found your reply, so I was more than happy to respond. It feels like there is potential for a good back-and-fourth argument here, so I await your reply, hero.

                Wow, that WAS easy! Thanks!