Nigerian police rescue 32 pregnant teens locked up and forced to produce babies for witchcraft rituals

BBC News  -  June 1, 2011

Nigeria 'baby farm' girls rescued by Abia state police

Nigerian police have raided a hospital in the south-eastern city of Aba, rescuing 32 pregnant girls allegedly held by a human-trafficking ring.

Aged between 15 and 17 years, the girls were locked up and used to produce babies, said Abia state's police chief.

These were then allegedly sold for ritual witchcraft purposes or adoption.

But the hospital's owner denied running a "baby farm", saying it was a foundation to help teenagers with unwanted pregnancies.

The UN organisation for the welfare of children, Unicef, estimates that at least 10 children are sold daily across Nigeria, where human-trafficking is ranked the third most common crime after economic fraud and drug-trafficking.

But the BBC's Fidelis Mbah in the southern city of Port Harcourt says it is very rare for traffickers to be caught and prosecuted.Male babies prized

Abia state Police Commissioner Bala Hassan said four babies, already sold in an alleged human-trafficking deal but not yet collected, were also recovered in the raid on The Cross Foundation hospital.

The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (Naptip), the organisation charged with fighting human-trafficking in Nigeria, says their investigations show that babies are sold for up to $6,400 (£3,900) each, depending on the sex of the baby.

Male babies are more prized, our correspondent says.

In some parts of the country, babies killed as part of witchcraft rituals are believed to make the charms more powerful, he says.

Human traffickers also put the children up for illegal adoption.

Poor, unmarried women face tough choices if they get pregnant in Nigeria, often facing exclusion from society, correspondents say.

Natip says desperate teenagers with unplanned pregnancies are sometimes lured to clinics and then forced to turn over their babies.

Some of the girls rescued in Aba told the police that after their new-born babies were sold, they were given $170 by the hospital owner.

The police said the proprietor of The Cross Foundation, Dr Hyacinth Orikara, is likely to face charges of child abuse and human trafficking.

Our correspondent says the buying or selling of babies is illegal in Nigeria and can carry a 14-year jail term.

The police carried out similar raids on such clinics in neighbouring Enugu state in 2008.

Three years ago, a Nigerian woman was jailed in the UK for trying to smuggle a baby into the country in order to get on the list for a council flat.

This article was found at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13622679

***************************************************************************

AlterNet - June 10, 2011

Teens Locked Up and Forced to Give Birth to Kids Sold into Slavery -- How Can This Happen, and What Can We Do About It?

By Jessica Mack, AlterNet


Last week, BBC broke the story of what has been dubbed a “baby farm” in southern Nigeria. Nigerian police raided the grounds, “rescuing” more than 30 poor teenagers who had reportedly been locked up and forced to bring their unwanted pregnancies to term, only to relinquish their babies to human traffickers or purveyors of body parts for witchcraft. It’s the stuff of a horror film, and, oddly enough, it is.

Except this is really happening, to real women, in real time. BBC first reported a “baby farm”raid in a nearby Nigerian city back in 2008. Clearly, there is something very wrong here – both in what’s happening to these women in Nigeria, but also in the way that these issues are being conveyed in the global media.

Human trafficking remains an outstanding problem in Nigeria, despite earning the US State Department’s “stamp of approval” on its anti-trafficking efforts. Since 2009, the annualTrafficking in Persons Report has ranked Nigeria as a Tier 1 country, signifying the government’s full compliance with the US’s Trafficking Victims Protection Act. Though “compliance” doesn’t necessarily mean effective prevention of or protection from trafficking. With this “baby farm” situation, we see the tenuous value that such rankings have for reality on the ground. While the Nigerian government has stepped up its anti-trafficking efforts in recent years, increasing prison sentences and fines still won’t address precipitating factors.

To start, women in Nigeria, and especially young women, are undervalued. There is a dearth of ready access to affordable and high quality reproductive health care services, and moreover social and cultural taboos about accessing such services. Early marriage and early pregnancy remain common, and you can guess that maternal mortality is also quite high. Abortion is restricted almost entirely, and highly stigmatized beyond that.

BBC writes, “Desperate teenagers with unplanned pregnancies are sometimes lured to clinics and then forced to turn over their babies.” Horrible, and it gets worse. Desperate teenagers with unwanted pregnancies also seek fatal care from quack abortion providers. Women regularly play Russian roulette with concoctions (bleach and ground glass) and gruesome instruments (knitting needles) just to preserve some semblance of reproductive choice.

The operative issue here is “desperate teenagers with unwanted pregnancies.” Nigeria is Africa’s most populous nation, no small claim, and almost 45% of the population is under the age of 15. This is not some measly minority; young people comprise the mitochondria of the nation and are the future of this emerging country. Yet their health and rights needs are so often cast aside.

In a 2009 report, the Guttmacher Institute maintained that national policies to protect the reproductive health and rights of young people have not been sufficiently implemented or enacted. Why hasn’t there been more done to address the unique health and rights needs of this set?

Perhaps it’s a little like national anti-trafficking efforts: there on paper, mysteriously absent or positively ineffective on the ground. This vast divide between vision and reality is what local and global advocates should push the government to reconcile. The recent presidential election, for example, might have been an opportune time to raise these neglected issues. Sure there’s a lot else going on, but there always is. The sexual and reproductive health and rights of young people are chronically marginalized, so perhaps it’s time to force the issue.

There are amazing national and international reproductive health advocates and providers doing work to counteract the heaps of risks and vulnerabilities which too often complicate women’s lives in Nigeria, but the battle is uphill. It is past due that the government put some muscle behind this. The US should hold more accountability, too, than simply superficial compliance on trafficking. They should urge the Nigerian government to examine the intersection of healthcare system failures and trafficking vulnerabilities.

These might have been salient points for the BBC to touch upon in its coverage of this issue, especially since four years after they first reported on baby farms, here we are with no discernible change. Alas.

Given rightful sensitivities about how Africa and Africans are portrayed by almost everyone else in the world and/or especially the global media, the BBC needs to check the caliber of their coverage. For starters, the 2011 article on “baby farms,” includes at least one typo, and a sentence cribbed verbatim from the 2008 piece. It’s not clear where or when the awful phrase “baby farm” was coined, but I must say that’s macabre marketing genius right there. BBC’s use of the term in its title is sensationalistic – link baiting even – and distracts from the complexity and gravity of the issue.

Human trafficking, human rights abuses, false imprisonment, reproductive choice, I mean there’s a lot to take in here. This is a highly disturbing scenario, but only further perverted by the use of this phrase. While there are human rights and human lives at stake here, the term caricatures a complex set of issues, and objectifies those involved – the babies, the young women, and even Nigeria itself.

For some readers perusing this eye-catching article (also covered in the New York Daily News, natch), this may be their first introduction to social justice or health issues in Nigeria. Let’s see what they’ll get: baby farm, witchcraft, desperate, poverty, corruption, crime, and savagery. The article “otherizes” these issues, painting Nigeria as a horrid place where such a ghastly things occur.

Yet, this notion of using pregnancy as a fulcrum for manipulating women is not so “other,” not so savage and foreign after all. It happens all over the world, and it happens right here in the US. For instance, increased discussion and examination of crisis pregnancy centers is revealing just how manipulative and coercive their tactics can be. Who do they often target? Poor, desperate young women with unwanted pregnancies. In addition, one could argue that, in fact, no one is more immersed in finding ways to manipulate women via reproductive rights than the US Congress.

BBC states the obvious: “poor, unmarried women face tough choices if they get pregnant in Nigeria.” Um, yes. I think we can safely substitute any country in the world in that sentence and it would read just as true. In fact, we can say that young women face tremendous reproductive health challenges all over the world. Now that we know this, what are we going to do about it?

This article was found at:

http://www.alternet.org/story/151222/teens_locked_up_and_forced_to_give_birth_to_kids_sold_into_slavery_--_how_can_this_happen%2C_and_what_can_we_do_about_it

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Louisiana student fighting legislation allowing creationism in science classes challenges deluded congresswoman to debate

AlterNet - May 28, 2011

17-Year-Old Challenges Michele Bachmann on Law Allowing Creationism To Be Taught In Public School Science Classes

By Allison Kilkenny, AlterNet



Most high school students are concerned about their grades or getting into a good college, but 17-year-old Zack Kopplin is focusing on conducting a national campaign to challenge a congresswoman on her basic understanding of the separation of church and state.

Kopplin, a student from Baton Rouge Magnet High School, is working tirelessly to repeal the Louisiana Science Education Act (LSEA), a piece of legislation that Kopplin said is a way to sneak the teaching of creationism into Louisiana public school science classrooms.

Initially presented under the guise of "academic freedom," LSEA singles out evolution for specific criticism. The bill allows local school boards to approve supplemental classroom materials specifically for the critique of scientific theories.

The text of the bill suggests that this is all designed to aid critical thinking, and calls on the Board of Education to "assist teachers, principals, and other school administrators to create and foster an environment within public elementary and secondary schools that promotes critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussion of scientific theories."

And what are the areas in need of "critical thinking," you ask? Coincidentally, the hot button issues the Religious Right have turned into legislative crusades: evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning.

Kopplin is horrified his state has adopted the pro-creationism law. "It is embarrassing," he said, "TheNew York Times covered this law, and I have friends and family around the country who called me up and asked me about it. No one should be embarrassed by their state."

Beyond the personal humiliation of living in a state that teaches a fairytale about a sky daddy alongside real things like carbon dating, genome-mapping and gravity, Kopplin fears for the future of Louisiana's educational system.

"This hurts Louisiana students' chances of getting the good science-based jobs we want. Research centers, like Baton Rouge's Pennington Center, are not going to hire Louisiana kids because they won't know whether we were taught the science we need to work there," he said, adding that in a world constantly making rapid advancements in scientific understanding, Louisiana can't afford to backslide into the dark ages.

"Louisiana students can't compete with kids across the country and around the world if we're not being taught evolution," Kopplln said.

Such anti-science behavior is even bad for tourism, according to Kopplin. "The Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology pulled a prescheduled convention from New Orleans after the law passed, and other groups have made it clear that they don't plan to come back while the law is in place."

Kopplin supported a bill designed to repeal LSEA, which also shared the backing of more than 40 Nobel science laureates, national science organizations, university professors, high school biology teachers, the Louisiana Association of Educators, and a petition with more than 60,000 signatures.

Despite the overwhelming pressure from the scientific community (not a single state or national science organization lobbied on behalf of LSEA), Sen. Karen Carter Peterson's Senate Bill 70 died in committee Thursday. Kopplin blames the repeal's demise on the oppositional pressure coming from the Louisiana Family Forum, an affiliate of Focus on the Family and a powerful lobbying group.

LFF enjoyed another victory this month when it successfully urged the Louisiana legislature to kill House Bill 112, also known as the Safe Schools Bill, which sought to better protect school children from bullying. LFF's executive director, Gene Mills, referred to the piece of legislation as the "Homosexual Bullying Bill."

"We're selective in when we want to listen to experts. When we're talking about the economy we bring in economists. When we're talking about roads and bridges we bring in engineers. Why don't we afford the same to science? How do you ignore 42 Nobel laureates?" Peterson asked the committee. "It is fundamentally embarrassing to have this law on the books."

"Creationism is not science," said Kopplin. "It does not belong in a public school science classroom. Put it in a religion class, a philosophy class, but not in a science class."

Kopplin is not impressed by the "critical thinking" claims made in LSEA. "They don't need a law to teach critical thinking in a science class," Kopplin said. "Science is critical thinking."

Furthermore, he doesn't plan to limit the scope of this fight to Louisiana. Earlier this week, the high schooler called out Minnesota's Michele Bachmann for trying to pass SF 1714, a bill similar to LSEA, that would require public schools to permit the teaching of intelligent design creationism in the school science curriculum.

Perhaps such ignorance should be expected from the woman who stood on the House floor and declared that the threat of manmade global warming doesn't make sense because "carbon dioxide is a natural byproduct of nature."

"Bachmann's ongoing misrepresentation of science and scientists at a national level adds fuel and false authority to the lobbyists and politicians in my state who have an agenda to undermine evidence-based science," he said.

No doubt, Zack Kopplin's resolute stance will not be shaken by this recent defeat. "Even if we don't get it this year, we've laid a remarkable foundation for next year. We can get 100 Nobel Laureates for next year and thousands more signatures and phone calls and kids involved," he said before the vote.

This article was found at:

http://www.alternet.org/story/151120/17-year-old_challenges_michele_bachmann_on_law_allowing_creationism_to_be_taught_in_public_school_science_classes

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New Scientist  -   May 27, 2011

American Muslim clerics sign up for evolution

by Andy Coghlan



Almost 13,000 Christian clergy have done it. Nearly 500 Jewish rabbis have too. Now, Islamic teachers, or imams, have begun signing an open letter declaring that there is no clash between their religious faith and evolution.

The Imam Letter, launched this week in the US, is the latest challenge to fundamentalists of the three Abrahamic religions who reject evolution in favour of creationism. The Clergy Letter was launched in 2006 and now has 12,725 signatures, followed three years ago by the Rabbi Letter, which has 476 signatures.

Like its predecessors, the Imam Letter explains why it's OK for believers to accept the truth of evolution. It also calls for a ban on creationist teaching in science classes. "As imams, we urge public school boards to affirm their commitment to the teaching of the science of evolution," says the letter, written by T. O. Shanavas, a doctor in Michigan and member of the Islamic Center of Greater Toledo in Perrysburg, Ohio.

"It shows that evolution and science can transcend what some people see as quite deep religious divisions, providing a unifying factor representing common ground between them," says Michael Zimmerman of Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana, the architect of the Clergy Letter Project. "Christians are really excited about the Muslim letter," he says. "They realise that Islam is just as fractured as Christianity, with just as many people who take their scriptures out of context to deny the truth of evolution."

Recently, for example, an imam in London was hounded out of his mosque and has suffered death threats for openly declaring support for Darwinism. Likewise, in Christian communities, especially in the US, fringe fundamentalists continue to push for teaching of creationism in science classes.

This article was found at:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20522-american-muslim-clerics-sign-up-for-evolution.html

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The Bible is not historical it is hysterical

Chain The Dogma      May 26, 2011

The Bible is not historical it is hysterical

It causes hysteria in those who believe it is a literal account of history

by Perry Bulwer



Hysteria:

1. Behavior exhibiting excessive or uncontrollable emotion, such as fear or panic

2. A mental disorder characterized by emotional excitability, etc., without an organic cause.

U.S. television network, History, announced on May 24, 2011 that a 10-hour series covering the entire Bible has been in the works for two years and is expected to air in 2013. News reports covering the announcement all refer to the series as a docudrama, which is commonly understood to be the dramatization of factual events. Such dramatizations, however, almost always use dramatic and historical license to manipulate, distort or ignore certain facts for entertainment purposes without making their audience aware of what those distortions are. The recent movie, The King's Speech, is a good example of that, as explained by Christopher Hitchens.

History president and general manager, Nancy Dubuc, referring to the series as bringing “the historical stories of the Bible to life for a new generation”, seems to suggest that 'docu' in docudrama indicates documentary, in other words a factual representation of real historical events. I suppose she had no choice but to maintain the pretence of history when announcing this project, but remember, she is not in the business of teaching history but in delivering eyeballs to advertisers. The History channel exists to make money, not to educate viewers with actual history, and what better way to make money than to promote the Bible to the gullible. It's what god frauds have been doing for centuries.

It is simply not true that Bible stories are historical, especially the most dramatic ones likely to be portrayed in the series. At best they are historical fiction -- metaphors and myths mixed in with bits of real history -- at worst they are lies. And they do create hysteria in people who believe the Bible is a factual, true account of reality. Just look at the recent hysteria created by Harold Camping, or browse through the more than 3,000 news articles in the Religion and Child Abuse News archive that document the hundreds of ways in which hysterical Bible believers abuse children. I've linked to some of those articles below. The headlines alone are enough to prove the point.

This article was found at:

http://chainthedogma.blogspot.com/2011/05/bible-is-not-historical-it-is.html

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Australian church affiliated with US fundamentalists opens school to teach how to raise the dead and cure cancer

The Queensland Times   -   Australia May 21, 2011

Westlife 'Cancer cure' course

by Chris Garry



A SCHOOL of the Supernatural has opened in Springfield, claiming to teach Ipswich residents how to cure cancer through prayer.

Westlife Church, which counts Hillsong Church [see related article links below] amongst its evangelical family, is running the six-month course for the first time this year.

Seventy people have enrolled in the School of the Supernatural.

Participants who complete the course are told they will be able to perform miracles through prayer, such as helping couples who can't conceive fall pregnant, healing broken bones and even curing cancer.

The course is based on the controversial teachings of fundamentalist pastor Bill Johnson who runs the enormous Bethel Church in California.

The pastor speaks to Ipswich students through a series of DVDs.

Bethel's members purport to have the ability to bring the dead back to life.

Westlife Church's website states: “Supernatural schools are designed to equip students to ‘live and do' in the supernatural through biblical teaching and practical application.

“This is an environment where people can take risks in learning to operate in the supernatural without fear of rejection or failure.”

School of the Supernatural director, Cherylyn Collett, said Ipswich students had shown great promise in their ability to physically heal.

“Our course is based on Bible scripture. The course teaches students to live outside the box and listen to what God really has to say,” Mrs Collett said.

“God fills the minds of our students with pictures and that helps them heal others physically.

“We are not out to convert anyone or preach.

“Our students are taught to transform the atmosphere around them but to do so in an accepting way.

“Some Churches in the past have had agendas and have not been real with their congregation. This is real.”

Mrs Collett said the course did not teach students how to “speak in tongues”, but she would discuss the technique with pupils if asked.

Westlife Church has contributed immensely to Ipswich's recovery since January's flood disaster.

Westlife Church manager Yvonne Baker said several miracles had been performed at their church this year and it was hoped those who completed the School of Supernatural course would increase the number physical healings.

Mrs Collett attended Bill Johnson's Bethel Church several years ago to have her chronically ill son healed at their School of Supernatural Ministry.

When it worked within two days, she said she felt obliged to bring the Bethel teachings back to Australia.

But Bethel Church has come under severe criticism.

Pastor Johnson has claimed angel feathers have fallen in his church.

The church even claims to heal physical ailments over the internet through the use of Skype.

This article was found at:

http://www.qt.com.au/story/2011/05/21/cancer-cure-course-supernatural-springfield/

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AlterNet    -    May 23, 2011

The 'Christian' Dogma Pushed by Religious Schools That Are Supported by Your Tax Dollars

By Rachel Tabachnick, AlterNet



Are your state’s tax dollars funding the teaching of religious supremacism and bigotry? What about creationism? The answer is undoubtedly yes, if you live in a state with a voucher or corporate tax credit program funding “school choice."

Religious schools across the nation are receiving public funds through voucher and corporate tax credit programs. Many hundreds, if not thousands, of these schools use Protestant fundamentalist textbooks that teach not only creationism, but also a religious supremacist worldview. They offer a shocking spin on politics, history and human rights.

In 12 states and the District of Columbia, almost 200,000 students attend private schools with at least part of their tuition paid with public funds. The money is taken from public school budgets to fund vouchers or by diverting state tax revenues to tuition grants through corporate tax credit programs. An interconnected group of non-profits and political action committees, led by the wealthy right-wing school privatization advocate Betsy DeVos and heavily funded by a few mega-donors, is working to expand these programs across the nation. The DeVos-led American Federation for Children hosted Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, and Michelle Rhee at a national policy summit earlier in May.

Take a look at what growing numbers of students are being taught with taxpayer funding. The textbook quotes are followed by a description of the Florida tax credit program, the largest of its kind in the country.

The Textbooks

In 2003, Dr. Frances Paterson, a specialist in education law, published Democracy and Intolerance: Christian School Curricula, School Choice, and Public Policy, summarizing her extensive study of the curricula of the three most widely used Protestant fundamentalist textbook publishers in the nation: A Beka Book, Pensacola, Florida; Bob Jones University Publishing, Greenville South Carolina; and Accelerated Christian Education, Lewisville, Texas.

Her research included surveys in Florida, including one of private schools receiving public funding in the Orlando area. Of those that responded, 52 percent used A Beka textbooks, 24 percent used Bob Jones and 15 percent used ACE. A Beka publishers reported that about 9,000 schools nationwide purchase its textbooks.

In 2003, the Palm Beach Post conducted its own survey of Florida’s voucher schools, and of the religious schools that responded, 43 percent used either A Beka or Bob Jones curriculum. The percentages may be higher in Florida than some other states; however, these three curricula series are used by thousands of private schools across the country.

Unsurprisingly, the textbooks are fiercely anti-abortion and virulently anti-gay, similar to the ideology of Religious Right organizations (heavily funded by Betsy DeVos and family) that have been labeled hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center. A Bob Jones current events text argues against legal protection for gays, stating, “These people have no more claims to special rights than child molesters or rapists.” The text uses an often-repeated phrase that homosexuals and abortion-rights supporters are “simply calling evil good.”

They also teach a radical laissez-faire capitalism. Government safety nets, regulation, minimum wage and progressive taxes are described as contrary to the Bible. Many of these textbooks were first published in the 1980s, evidence that the merging of Religious Right ideology with extreme free-market economics predates the Tea Party movement by many years.

The textbooks exhibit hostility toward other religions, including Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Shintoism, and traditional African and Native American religions, and other Christians are also targeted, including non-evangelical Protestants and Roman Catholics.

All three series include biblical creationism in their science curriculum.

The following textbook quotes about social issues, science, history, government, economics, and religion, are taken from Dr. Paterson’s documentation or directly from my own collection of textbooks from the three publishers.

Social Issues

The term liberal is associated throughout all three series with moral decline. For example, under the subtitle “A Liberal Supreme Court,” an A Beka eighth-grade text reads, “The Supreme Court made several liberal decisions in the 1970s, indicating the moral decline of the nation as a whole.” Another A Beka text states, “Modern liberalism has had many tragic consequences -- war, tyranny, and despair -- for mankind.”

An A Beka government text describes Roe v. Wade, “Ignoring 3,500 years of Judeo-Christian civilization, religion, morality, and law, the Burger Court held that an unborn child was not a living person but rather the 'property' of the mother (much like slaves were considered property in the 1857 case of Dred Scott v. Sandford).”

Both Roe v. Wade and Brown v. Board of Education are described as social activism by the Supreme Court. The Bob Jones high school civic texts states, “While the end was a noble one -- ending discrimination in schools -- the means were troublesome.” The text continues, “liberals were not willing to wait for a political solution.”

History and Government

These texts are less militantly Christian nationalists than some other homeschooling and private school textbooks, such as the popular America’s Providential History. Nevertheless they present a view of the nation’s history and government that closely hews to that of the Religious Right.

The A Beka civics text states, “God’s original purpose for government was to punish the evil and reward the good.” The same text describes the ideal form of government. “All governments are ordained by God, but none compare to government by God, theocracy.”

Predating today’s “tenther” movement, the texts consistently accuse the federal government of exceeding its constitutional authority as described in the 10th Amendment and taking powers that belong to the states. The 14th Amendment, passed during Reconstruction to give citizenship to African Americans, is criticized as taking away state’s rights.

Concerning slavery in America, a Bob Jones high school text states, “To help them endure the difficulties of slavery, God gave Christian slaves the ability to combine the African heritage of song with the dignity of Christian praise. Through the Negro spiritual, the slaves developed the patience to wait on the Lord and discovered that the truest freedom is from the bondage of sin.”

In an A Beka high school history text, American education is described in glowing terms until the 1920s, when damaging influences of liberalism began to sweep the nation. Under the heading “Liberalism in American Life” these influences are described as the social gospel, socialism, secular psychology, progressive education, and secular humanism. The “most destructive idea to sweep the nation in the 20th century was Charles Darwin’s doctrine of evolution,” according to the text.

Under the subtitle “Socialist Propaganda” the Great Depression is described as having been exaggerated so that Franklin Delano Roosevelt could pass New Deal legislation. The text states, “Perhaps the best known work of propaganda to come from the Depression was John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. [...] Other forms of propaganda included rumors of mortgage foreclosures, mass evictions, and hunger riots and exaggerated statistics representing the number of unemployed and homeless people in America.”

Ironically, the same A Beka text claims the New Deal prolonged the Depression. The purpose of the Taft-Hartley Act, which began to unravel New Deal legislation, is described as “to remove certain labor abuses and to curb the growing power of labor unions over individuals and employers.”

Commentary on the Vietnam War states that it divided the country into the “hawks who supported the fight against Communism, and doves, who were soft on Communism.”

Throughout these texts the tone of despair changes as President Ronald Reagan’s presidency is celebrated. A fourth-grade A Beka text announces the administration of Ronald Reagan under the heading “A Return to Patriotism and Family Values.”

Even after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the textbooks continue to promote fears of communism invading American life. An A Beka text states, “It is no wonder that Satan hates the family and has hurled his venom against it in the form of Communism.” The same text claims “history shows socialism gradually opens the door to Communism.” The terms socialist and socialism are used repeatedly in references to Democratic presidents.

The A Beka high school text describes President Bill Clinton’s administration. “The First Lady announced that she would personally lead the effort to implement a plan for socialized medicine in the United States. Bill Clinton’s running mate, Al Gore, a senator from Tennessee known for his radical environmentalism, became the new Vice President.”

Economics

These textbooks provide a window into a worldview that has recently impacted the political scene -- the merger of social conservatism with radical free market ideology.

Global warming is presented as a theory that is “simply not supported by scientific evidence,” and is supposedly promoted by environmentalists for destructive reasons, according to the A Beka economics text. ““Global environmentalists have said and written enough to leave no doubt that their goal is to destroy the prosperous economies of the world’s richest nations.”

In the same text a graphic of Bruegel’s famous painting of the biblical Tower of Babel is followed by a presentation of globalism in conspiratorial “one-world government” terms. This chapter on globalism describes the forces behind a one-world government as the United Nations, European Union, trade agreements (because they take away sovereignty), peace organizations and environmentalists.

A sidebar in the chapter on globalism explains that many Christians believe that that this “drive toward a one-world government fits in with prophecies” about the Antichrist and the end times. “But instead of this world unification ushering in an age of prosperity and peace, as most globalists believe it will, it will be a time of unimaginable human suffering as recorded in God’s Word. The Anti-christ will tightly regulate who may buy and sell.”

The authorship of this text is credited to the late Russell Kirk, an economist awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal by President Ronald Reagan. The edition from which I took the above quotes was published after Kirk’s death, but still lists him as author.

The text includes lessons in the form of fictional accounts of companies. For example, the fictitious Gray Iron Fabricating is described as failing due to the National Labor Relations Board, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, and lawsuits: one brought by the widow of a man electrocuted on the job (he failed to follow safety instructions), and a second by a female junior executive who was passed over for a promotion in favor of a man. This section of the text is followed by a cartoon and the story of “The Goose That Laid the Golden Eggs” -- implying that government and greedy workers are destroying businesses.

Sweden and Canada are portrayed as “unwittingly snared in the command policies of socialism.” Based on the text, a reader might conclude that these nations are failed states.

Creationism

The A Beka Web site advertises its fifth-grade text, Observing God’s World, as, “This teachable, readable, and memorable book presents the universe as the direct creation of God and refutes the idea of man-made evolution.” A section on the origin of the universe retells the Genesis story of creation and states, “Throughout history there have been people, even scientists, who have thought up their own stories of how things came to be.”

A quiz in the teacher’s guide for the A Beka eighth-grade text Matter and Motion asks, “Why did superstition take the place of science during the Middle Ages?” The answer key tells us, “People did not have the Bible to guide them in their beliefs. Many looked back to the false ideas of Aristotle.” The next question is, “Why did modern science begin so suddenly in the 1500s?” The answer given is, “As people returned to the authority of the Scriptures during the Protestant Reformation (1517), they started learning the truth about God and His creation.”

A three-page section in this A Beka text leads with a headline “Two Faiths: Creation and Evolution” and states, “Creation, not evolution, is based on a reasonable faith.” A Bob Jones science text includes a chapter titled “Biblical Creationism,” claiming that evolution cannot be a part of science, since it can not be observed and must be accepted by faith.

The same Bob Jones text explains, “From a Christian standpoint, there are only two worldviews from which to choose -- a Christian worldview or a non-Christian worldview. The most important beliefs in a Christian worldview are the beliefs that the Bible is the Word of God and the only completely reliable thing in this world.”

The text suggests that sedimentary fossils were formed in Noah’s flood. One and a half pages are dedicated to the possibility that the Bible refers to dinosaurs and closes with the warning, “Bible-believing Christians cannot accept any evolutionary interpretation. Dinosaurs and humans were definitely on the earth at the same time and may have even lived side by side within the past few thousand years.”

Religion and Ethnicity

Paterson described the texts as “having an arrogance and hostility toward non-Western religions that is truly breathtaking.”

An A Beka grammar school text states that traditional African religions are “false religious beliefs” from the Egyptian descendants of the biblical figure Ham. A fifth-grade text tells a narrative of a great chief who was a Christian convert, although his subjects were “ruled by witchcraft,” and drank corn beer that made them “lazy and wicked.” The claims of witchcraft are ironic given the fact that many of the schools using these textbooks are associated with churches that have joined the current wave of obsession with witchcraft and expelling demons.

All three publishers stress the need for missionary work and reject religious pluralism. Non-Christians are described as living in “spiritual darkness,” which is credited as the source of poverty and societal ills.

The teacher’s edition of a A Beka geography text describes “Modern Africa’s Needs” as follows. “Africa is a continent with many needs. It is still in need of the gospel. Many people have gone there as missionaries but the continent is so vast, and spirit worship and the Muslim religion so strong, that only a small percentage of Africans claim to be Christians. [...] Only about ten percent of Africans can read and write. In some areas the mission schools have been shut down by Communists who have taken over the government....”

These statements are not factual and were not in 2004, when this text was published.

One of the more shameful episodes in American history, the Cherokee Trail of Tears, is apparently mitigated by the fact that “God used the Trail of Tears to bring many Indians to Christ,” according to an A Beka text.

Paterson points out that several textbooks claim that Chinese ideographs indicate that the Chinese people once had access to “biblical truth” but later embraced false religions including Confucianism. I’ve seen this curious and factually flawed argument in a number of other sources that claim, for example, that the Chinese character for boat indicates that ancient Chinese knew of the Noah story.

Islam is also portrayed as a false religion and Hinduism is described as “devastating to India’s history.” Followers of Shintoism are described as being “very similar to the Jewish Pharisees whom Jesus condemned for putting outward cleanliness above inward purity.”

Although the texts repeatedly use the term “Judeo-Christian,” Jews are also considered to be in need of conversion. An ACE text states, “Not realizing that he is already come, Orthodox Jews continue to look for their Messiah. As the end time prophesied in the Bible draws near, many Jews are now turning to Jesus Christ and accepting him as Messiah.”

Non-evangelical and non-fundamentalist Protestant denominations are described as liberal, a dirty word in these texts. Paterson dedicates an entire chapter of her book to examples of anti-Roman Catholic bias, which is taught to students beginning around the fifth grade. Catholicism is described with terms such as "distorted," "false," and "error." A Bob Jones high school text states, “The seed of error that took root during the fourth and fifth centuries blossomed into the Roman Catholic Church -- a perversion of biblical Christianity.”

An A Beka text reads, "The doctrines and practices of the Roman church had digressed so far from Scripture that the church was compelled to keep its members from reading the Bible and discovering the truth." The A Beka text also repeatedly uses the term Romanism, which has pejorative connotations and has been used as a slur against Catholics for generations. It is still used by apocalyptic televangelists, like John Hagee, claiming that “Romanism” is the biblical “Whore of Babylon” in his descriptions of the destruction of Rome and the Catholic Church in the end times.

In a perverse irony, the pro-voucher proponents working to remove the clauses in state constitutions that prevent public funding of religious schools, claim that this must be done because these “no aid” clauses, also known as Blaine Amendments, are a vestige of historic anti-Catholicism.

Math!

The worldview of these textbook publishers impact areas you might not suspect, including choosing phonics over whole language reading instruction and rejecting the teaching of set theory in mathematics, both on religious grounds. The A Beka publishers advertise the math curriculum as, “A Beka Book provides attractive, legible, workable traditional mathematics texts that are not burdened with modern theories such as set theory.”

Florida’s Corporate Tax Credit Program: Do They Know What They're Funding?

Florida has the largest “school choice” program in the country, followed by Pennsylvania, Arizona, Wisconsin, and Ohio. Over 54,000 tuition recipients are enrolled in private schools in Florida, with the majority of these students in a corporate tax credit program that allows businesses to divert their taxes, dollar for dollar, up to 75 percent of taxes owed to the state.

Florida currently has a voucher program limited to special-needs students, since the state’s Supreme Court struck down a more expansive program in 2006. The Florida House and Senate have approved a ballot initiative for the 2012 election to try to remove the “no aid” clause in the state’s constitution that would open the door to Gov. Rick Scott’s vouchers-for-all scheme.

Florida’s corporate tax credit program disbursed the full amount allowed last year -- $140 million dollars for tuition to students in 1,092 schools and has a cap of $175 million for 2011. These funds are handed over to private non-profits for distribution, with the vast majority since 2002 disbursed through Step Up for Students, also a recipient of funding from the DeVos family foundations.

This is one of several names used by the Florida School Choice Fund, Inc. a 501(c)(3) headed by John Kirtley, a venture capitalist who is also vice chairman of the Betsy DeVos-led American Federation for Children and a director of the James Madison Institute, one of many right-wing think tanks that promote privatization of public education. (The institute’s founding vice chairman, J. Stanley Marshall, has signed a proclamation calling for the end of public education.)

As of February 2011, 83.8 percent of the students in the Florida tax credit program were attending religious schools, approximately the same rate as Milwaukee’s voucher program. However, unlike Milwaukee, hundreds of the Florida schools fall into the category of right-wing evangelical or fundamentalist, with many using A Beka, Bob Jones, or ACE curriculum.

The Step Up For Students reports describe the typical student in the tax credit program as a minority from a one-parent home. Currently 35.6 percent are African American and 27.5 percent are Hispanic. The organization's glossy reports tout the improved opportunities of the students provided with tuition grants to private schools.

The Florida tax credit program is voluntarily supported by corporations including AT &T, Burger King, CVS, Lowe’s, Marriott, Sysco Food Services, and others, described in the Step Up For Students annual reports as “receiving a high rate of return on their investments.” Do these corporation know what they are supporting? The Step Up For Students reports and other pro-privatization propaganda openly report the participating private school’s use of the curricula series quoted in this article, without revealing what that means.

The Step Up For Students reports also fail to include the fact that some American universities refuse to accept high school credit for courses taught from several textbooks quoted in this article. University of California specifically cited several A Beka and Bob Jones textbooks and, although challenged in court, won the case.

Some of the glowing testimonies in the Step Up for Students annual report include this 2008 description of Bible Truth Ministries Academy. “Students are divided into multi-grade learning groups and taught with the Accelerated Christian Education curriculum, which is self-paced and has allowed some of the students to advance well beyond their grade level.”

The 2007 annual report features Esprit De Corps Center for Learning in Jacksonville. Next to a photo of smiling African American children, smartly attired in uniforms and berets, the curriculum is touted. “Using an A Beka curriculum designed to challenge students to reach their full potential, the school offers outstanding academic programs that provide its students with the skills and knowledge to become active, productive members of society. [...] EDC has partnered with Step Up For Students since its inception.”

When the Palm Beach Post conducted its survey in 2003, the Potter’s House Christian Academy was one of the major recipients of voucher funding and reported using both the A Beka and Bob Jones curriculum series. The school is affiliated with the politically influential Jacksonville mega-church, the Potter’s House Christian Fellowship, led by Bishop Vaughan McLaughlin.

In February 2005, an estimated 2200 people attended a rally at the church in support of Step Up For Students, led by Governor Jeb Bush and the state’s attorney general at that time, Charlie Crist. This June, the Potter’s House will be a host of the Global Day of Prayer, led by an international Charismatic network, which includes Apostle Ed Silvoso, Bishop McLaughin’s spiritual mentor. This network teaches that Christians must take control or “dominion” over government and society. (Silvoso is the brother-in-law of evangelist Luis Palau, whose ministry has received at least $3.5 million from the Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation.)

This tax credit program money could have been used to improve Florida’s urban public schools, but that would not serve the purpose of indoctrinating the largely minority recipients of the tuition grants with the right-wing religious worldview found in these textbooks. As Frances Paterson states in her research, Americans absolutely have the right to send their children to schools that use these fundamentalist curricula. But she adds, “The public policy makers can and should ask whether the alternative system of Christian education for which they seek public approval and support is ideologically driven in ways that run contrary to the best interests of a diverse, democratic society.”

This article was found at:

http://www.alternet.org/story/151046/the_%27christian%27_dogma_pushed_by_religious_schools_that_are_supported_by_your_tax_dollars

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