I've been ignoring my favorite blogot*, and I feel bad about that. So today, I give you a dissection of People of Faith Under Persecution by the Beetle Blogger.
According to Beetle, poor Olive Jones, an inhome teacher for disabled students, offered to pray- once!- for a 14-year-old girl with cancer and the girl's evil, secular parents had her fired.
Of course, the parents tell a slightly different story, which Beetle didn't bother to include in her post.
Paddy and Stephanie Lynch, whose daughter is seriously ill with leukaemia, said Olive Jones' constant 'preaching' left their child deeply distressed.
. . .
Mrs Lynch, 43, who quit her job with the Higher Education Funding Council in April to care full-time for her daughter, said: 'Mrs Jones was employed to teach maths but used every opportunity to discuss religion, despite the fact I made it clear we were a non-religious family and didn't want to talk about these issues in this way.
'On one occasion she asked my daughter to pray with her, my daughter was distressed by this behaviour.
'On another, after the death of my daughter's close friend, Miss Jones told my 14-year-old daughter that when young people die they go to heaven. These conversations upset my daughter deeply**.'
Well, this sounds a little more reasonable, doesn't it? Ms. Jones was told, repeatedly, to stop discussing religion during what should have been math sessions, Ms. Jones chose to ignore these requests, so the parents requested that Ms. Jones not be given access to their daughter any more.
What I find especially enlightening about Beetle's report on this incident is how often she has blogged about parental sovereignty- the right of parents to raise their children as they see fit. Beetle does not want her children exposed to things like sex education or neutral portrayals of homosexuals, and argues vociferously that it is her right as a parent to control what her children are exposed to.
So why is it not the Lynch's right to decide whether or not their daughter is exposed to religion? Beetle gets to raise her children to hate Teh Ghey and love Joseph Smith, but I do not have the right to decide how to raise my children? Parental sovereignty for thee, but not for me?
Let's also imagine if Beetle would defend the teacher if the situation were reversed and the teacher repeatedly told a minor child, over the parents' objections, that there is no god, no heaven and no hell and that when we die we go nowhere at all. I rather think Beetle would have no interest in defending Ms. Jones under those circumstances.
Thank you for attending today's lesson in monumental hypocrisy.
*blog + bigot = blogot. h/t to [redacted] for coming up with that one.
**My guess would be that (a) a 14-year-old undergoing grueling chemotherapy for leukemia probably doesn't want to discuss death, and (b) fundys are well known for telling people that their dead loved ones who did not accept Jesus are roasting in hell. the fact that saying such a thing to a 14-year-old undergoing grueling chemotherapy for leukemia is unbelievably cruel doesn't matter much when you're peddling fear.
Good old beetle blogger. Always a flaming hypocrite.
ReplyDeleteThanks for doing an update on beetle's lunacy. Good to see he/she is in form.
teachers still pull this shit?
ReplyDeleteTEACHERS?
my shock stems from the fact that i was really ill for pretty much the entirety of my 3rd grade year, and was in the hospital. a Children's Hospital. and we had classes. and my best friend at the hospital was a girl about my age with leukemia. and a teacher got fired for continually trying to "save" her - because her family were atheists, and she had never really heard about Jesus and etc.
this was over 20 years ago.
it's ILLEGAL for a teacher to do that crap. ya know? i think i'm gonna go read what BB said specifically.
Of course even once the truth is pointed out to the Beetle she still defends the behavior of the religious whacko. Apparently you're "persecuting" Christians if you don't allow them to proselytize to you incessantly.
ReplyDeleteNow imagine if the teacher had merely mentioned, even once in passing, the fact that she had a wife. Beetle and friends would be calling for her head, not just her job, claiming she was pushing Teh Gay Agenda on the child. Always with these people it's "do as I say, not as I do".
Thank you for being one of the few US bloggers to have picked up on this story and NOT used it to push some ridiculous "Christians get persecuted" rant. Well done for actually looking at the facts. It is soul destroying to see this minor issue, which i think the local council handled very well being blown out of all proportion by those with an unpleasant viewpoint. Sadly, I think you labour with an American Christian Right Wing that is far beyond anything like our tame British variety (Anglicanism and Methodism, anyone?), but the Olive Jones case, along with some more in recent times, show that even on this side of the Atlantic we occasionally get the nutjobs on their hobby horses. And, of course, it's really irritating and annoying to see such things repeated in US as if it is actually a true representation of what is going on in the UK. Have a look at these links.
ReplyDeletehttp://tabloid-watch.blogspot.com/2009/12/you-cant-upset-14yo-girl-with-leukaemia.html
http://tabloid-watch.blogspot.com/2010/01/who-are-zealots-cont.html