Tennessee Senate passes bill to make the Bible the official state book

[All Along The Watchtower]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/tennessee-lawmakers-pass-bill-making-bible-official-book-article-1.2588624

FWIW: the Republican Governor, who has vetoed only 3 bills during his tenure so far, has 10 days to veto it before it becomes state law.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

I wouldn't expect anything less from a state that held the Scopes Trial.

[Mr. Reactionary]

As long as they aren't spending more than negligible funds on this, who cares? States have lots of weird State things. Virginia has a State fossil and a State dance and a State dog and a State drink. We have both a State flower and a State tree, even though both are the Dogwood.

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

As long as they aren't spending more than negligible funds on this, who cares? States have lots of weird State things. Virginia has a State fossil

it can't be as weird as illinois's though

[This account no longer in use.]

But there's still no problem with this. Us Bay Staters have far more state symbols than we actually need. Doesn't bother me.

[RightBehind]

Of course they did.

Gosh the South is messed up.

That whole Church and State thing? Please. This is a blatant, not-so-subtle endorsement of one religion over the other.

[Derpist]

I wouldn't expect anything less from a state that held the Scopes Trial.

Yeah, how dare a state try to combat eugenics. Those lesser humans need to get with the game and die off for our new utopia. So progressive!

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

I wouldn't expect anything less from a state that held the Scopes Trial.

Yeah, how dare a state try to combat eugenics. Those lesser humans need to get with the game and die off for our new utopia. So progressive!

What the hell are you babbling about?

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

I wouldn't expect anything less from a state that held the Scopes Trial.

Yeah, how dare a state try to combat eugenics. Those lesser humans need to get with the game and die off for our new utopia. So progressive!

What the hell are you babbling about?

gosh, kalwejt, clearly the scopes monkey trial was actually about ethics in eugenicism.
you third-wave evolutionists are so stupid jeez.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

1. Vetoes in Tennessee are meaningless as they can be overridden with a simple majority
2. Why does this really matter? - I don't even know most of MN's "slogans".

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Eugenics was actually a large part of what was perceived (especially among people who sided with the prosecution) at the time to be at issue in the Scopes trial. The textbook involved had whole sections on it. I'm skeptical of the historiographical veracity of implying that it was main reason why they cared, but it was very much part of it.

[Intell]

There is no real problem with this unless you believe in Laïcité ways of doing things.

+ Yes, there was a significant proportion of the scopes monkey trial, dedicated to eugenics.

[Cassius]

Eugenics was actually a large part of what was perceived (especially among people who sided with the prosecution) at the time to be at issue in the Scopes trial. The textbook involved had whole sections on it. I'm skeptical of the historiographical veracity of implying that it was main reason why they cared, but it was very much part of it.

In addition of course to a load of other dodgy theories that were fashionable at the time, including the idea of 'useless organs' and recapitulation theory, as well as citing 'Piltdown man' as evidence for evolution.

[Derpist]

Eugenics was actually a large part of what was perceived (especially among people who sided with the prosecution) at the time to be at issue in the Scopes trial. The textbook involved had whole sections on it. I'm skeptical of the historiographical veracity of implying that it was main reason why they cared, but it was very much part of it.

In addition of course to a load of other dodgy theories that were fashionable at the time, including the idea of 'useless organs' and recapitulation theory, as well as citing 'Piltdown man' as evidence for evolution.

Yeah, but those theories weren't used to justify dodgy political ideologies that did real harm (social darwinism and forced sterilizations).

I wouldn't expect anything less from a state that held the Scopes Trial.

Yeah, how dare a state try to combat eugenics. Those lesser humans need to get with the game and die off for our new utopia. So progressive!

What the hell are you babbling about?

I can say at the very least it's a bad idea to try to dismiss and circlejerk-mock people on the basis of a period in history you seem to know very very little about.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Eugenics was actually a large part of what was perceived (especially among people who sided with the prosecution) at the time to be at issue in the Scopes trial. The textbook involved had whole sections on it. I'm skeptical of the historiographical veracity of implying that it was main reason why they cared, but it was very much part of it.

In addition of course to a load of other dodgy theories that were fashionable at the time, including the idea of 'useless organs' and recapitulation theory, as well as citing 'Piltdown man' as evidence for evolution.

Yeah, but those theories weren't used to justify dodgy political ideologies that did real harm (social darwinism and forced sterilizations).

You can twist and butcher every scientific theory, still it doesn't render them invalid. Most reasonable or noble concepts were intentionally misinterpreted throughout history to justify awful things. Christianity is a good example. Should we then reject Christianity because of some abuses?

Also, the very name of "social Darwinism" is rather misguiding, since Darwin's own writings does not indicate his support for such "variation". Darwin did not even coin the term "survival of the fittest", which is commonly misattributed to him.

[/]

As long as they aren't spending more than negligible funds on this, who cares? States have lots of weird State things. Virginia has a State fossil and a State dance and a State dog and a State drink. We have both a State flower and a State tree, even though both are the Dogwood.

#makeislamtheofficialstatereligion #whocares

[afleitch]

Eugenics was actually a large part of what was perceived (especially among people who sided with the prosecution) at the time to be at issue in the Scopes trial. The textbook involved had whole sections on it. I'm skeptical of the historiographical veracity of implying that it was main reason why they cared, but it was very much part of it.

The textbook had little to do with it. It was written in 1914 and was still the required textbook in use in Tennessee despite falling foul of the law. Scopes wasn’t even aware if he had ever used that book in his discussions (as he only recently graduated from the University of Kentucky before taking up his post ) or even discussed evolution at all. The point being that in using the book, teachers were essentially bound by the state to fall foul of the law.

In prosecuting, it was an attempt to affirm the Butler Act which was legislative action to prohibit public schools (and that included universities) from denying the biblical account of man’s origin. Whether that included simply discussing evolution or using evolution as a vulgar political and social tool was of no consequence. The theory fell foul of pre-supposed Christian beliefs on human origin and the Christian obsession with trying to imply agency in everything. Natural selection being as it is the description of a biological phenomenon which is neither ‘good’ nor ‘bad’. It just simply is. That eugenics infected science and politics with political value judgements has nothing to do with the theory itself. Otherwise hanging is an abuse of the theory of gravity.

‘They were just trying to protect against eugenics’ is nonsense. They didn’t want the bible questioned, in whatever form the question took. Gordon McKenzie supported the bill on religious grounds. William Bell Riley supported the bill on religious grounds. Bryan supported the bill on religious grounds.

Arthur Hays was not a eugenicist. Ironically while he was defending ethnic Germans in World War 1 in the USA from mistreatment by the state, the chief prosecutor would later as Senator be proposing Japanese Americans stripped of their citizenship. (Hayes; fascinating fellow was also involved in the Sacco and Vanzetti case, the Scottsboro case and the Reichstag trial) Dudley Malone was not a eugenicist.

The law itself forbade the teaching that man evolved from a ‘lower order’ and the author of the law knew nothing about evolution other than recalling that he was concerned by people ‘coming home from school and telling their parents the Bible was all nonsense.’ As a result, there was very little consistency in how this law was defended and for what reasons. Evolution was lined up as the source of all ills, often by bombasts like William Jennings Bryan who blamed the effect of it for German aggression resulting in the Great War (a completely fraudulent diagnosis of the societal and political matters which led to the war) But ultimately talk of ‘social ills’ in America stemmed from the fear that American manhood was becoming ‘weak’. Weak from the Irish and the Slavs. Weak from urbanism and industry. Weak from ‘bad breeding’. Weak from ‘negroes.’ What’s interesting about this of course, is how readily Christians whitewash their role in the promotion of the ethics of eugenics. It was the handmaiden of ‘muscular Christianity’ after all.

[Mr. Reactionary]

As long as they aren't spending more than negligible funds on this, who cares? States have lots of weird State things. Virginia has a State fossil and a State dance and a State dog and a State drink. We have both a State flower and a State tree, even though both are the Dogwood.

#makeislamtheofficialstatereligion #whocares

Go for it.

[Bismarck]

In Indiana our state beverage is water. Like the law in TN, this is just a case of some legislator running out of ideas.

[Antonio the Sixth]

It's obviously unconstitutional and dumb, but there are more serious things to be offended at.

[dax00]

It's obviously unconstitutional and dumb, but there are more serious things to be offended at.

What more serious thing than a breach of the Constitution is there - besides an organized threat against national security - to be offended at?!

[Antonio the Sixth]

It's obviously unconstitutional and dumb, but there are more serious things to be offended at.

What more serious thing than a breach of the Constitution is there - besides an organized threat against national security - is there to be offended at?!

When the Constitution is regularly trampled upon in much more serious ways (Citizens United, voting rights, etc.) I just can't get myself worked up over some trivial and harmless forms of religious establishment.

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

In Indiana our state beverage is water. Like the law in TN, this is just a case of some legislator running out of ideas.

man, y'alls just love rubbing michigan's face in it, huh?

[This account no longer in use.]

I'm going to assume that dax is a regular contributor to r/atheism.