School reverses decision to censor references to God

FatBack, with regard to this thread you are thinking approximately the following.
I would love to get into a spirited discussion about this, but I can only do it if someone makes a radical statement about the First Amendment, Supreme Court or religious liberty. So far everyone here agrees with each other and the thread might soon hit a dead end.
Look, there's someone I can pick an unrelated fight with. Maybe that will liven up the discussion, but I have to publicly insult him so here goes.

 

I'm about as atheist as it gets and even I think a student should be able to say just about anything they want about their religion in their speech. I'm surprised the school even considered trying to censor the speech like that. Unless she was going to do a five minute sermon, go ahead and let her diminish her own accomplishments by attributing it to her imaginary friend.

 

So if she were Muslim and wanted to thank Allah, you'd be OK with that?

 

Jefferson's post was clear, it was not religion specific.

 

Looks like proselytizing to me.

 

she sure sounds like the type that would, but we have to wait and see

 

I have little doubt she will attribute her success to her faith in Jesus Christ. I ended up 22nd in a class of 270, top 10th. I didn't get to make a speech but if anyone had asked I would have attributed it to the late rally in grades 11 and 12, making the honor roll all but once after becoming a Christian. I did not study harder, but I did benefit by reading the King James version of the Bible. It helped a lot with English Literature class. Most of all God improved my average health, so I was rarely absent after my conversion. That made a lot of difference, probably rising past 30 sinners near the end.

 

Looks like she was pressured and bullied into changing her mind. Her original justification for the "censorship" was:

“You are representing the school in the speech, not using the podium as your public form,” Goldsmith wrote in a note to the student. “We need to be mindful about the inclusion of religious aspects. These are your strong beliefs, but they are not appropriate for a speech in a school public setting.”​

But then some jerk at Newsmax got involved, and the original publisher of this story, Life News, also added this to their article about the initial decision:

ACTION: Contact Principal Amy Goldsmith at 517-439-4320 x 1411 or email Amy.Goldsmith@hillsdaleschools.org​

https://www.lifenews.com/2021/05/27...an-to-remove-god-from-her-graduation-address/

She probably got death threats from lots of nice "Christians" before changing her mind. Oh, and the article about this reversal also has a call to action:

ACTION: Thank Principal Amy Goldsmith for backing down by calling 517-439-4320 x 1411 or email Amy.Goldsmith@hillsdaleschools.org​

https://www.lifenews.com/2021/05/27...torian-to-reference-god-in-graduation-speech/

 

In other words, you rose "past" 30 RANDOM People?

What is the big deal about that?

Since (according to Scripture):

EVERYONE is a "Sinner":

https://www.abiblicalview.com/is-everyone-a-sinner/

 

What if those 30 people I passed had been reading the King James Bible from the middle of grade 11. Half of them had the same English literature class and might have matched my performance, holding their lead over me. I assume some of the ones I overtook started doing things like drinking and taking drugs the last 2 years and that hindered their performance. I watched some kids really fizzle out during senior year and maybe some were ahead of me starting grade 11. By sinners in this case I mean sinners for whom committing certain types of sins is a daily regimen.

 

Yeah, I would definitely do Satan..

 

Mentioning religion in the context of a graduation speech should not have been censored. I am in favor of keeping religious material and proselyting out of schools(Outside of things like history and social studies, etc), but this wasn't part of the curriculum. This was the personal speech of a person. The school goofed in making an issue of this but I'm glad they reversed it.

 

I'm glad someone is looking out for your health. God gave me a faulty gall bladder. I've never been the same since...oops...I'll be back...hopefully within a half-hour...

 

As long as she is not quoting Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken which seems to somehow sneak its way into every high school graduation ever, it's all good.

 

You would think that would sound pretty reasonable.
Cue to "it's a waaaaaaaarrrrrr on christmassss" pearl clutching fox news hosts, politicians, and contributors at PF.

As to the issue at hand, it's really hard to tell because they just have an excerpt from her speech. If the speech is "class of 2021 go find your passion out there, I know I found mine in devotion" sounds fine to me. If it's "class of 2021 let me tell you about jesus". Then it is problematic, not realy from a 1st ammendment type of way, but from being a self centered tone deaf class speaker.
It really sounded like it was probably the former (as there were few extracts that the school was asking to be changed). So this really should not be a big deal. In a normal country, school would have objected to speech, parents would have met with school, normal discussion would have ensued. A solution found.
But in the US, it's law suit threats, hiring lawyers, going to the press, hiring a PR firm, and trying to monetize the situation for 15 minutes of fame.

 

You got me thinking about how I rose to the top tenth.
First languages: Near the end of French 3 Mr. Lanciaux gave us a sample of what we would be dealing with if we took French 4. It looked too hard, so I took Spanish 1 in grade 11 and Spanish 2 in grade 12. Spanish was easy after French so I probably passed some kids who took French 4 or Spanish 4 either year.
Mathematics: We had the option of levels 1, 2 or 3 for Algebra 2. When Mrs. Szcepaniak saw I had chosen level 2 she told me I was one of only about 5 kids in Algebra 1 who understood what they were doing. I told her it was hard work for me to get adequate marks and the extra study time was dragging down other marks. So I took Algebra 2 level 2. That changed everything, because it was there I met the girl who converted me. There was another girl who might have converted me if she had missed her chance, but she was less pretty and less bold. If she had I'd be a Baptist, not Pentecostal (cake without icing). I got good marks in Algebra 2 then struggled to adequate marks in Calculus in grade 12. (That teacher was tough. He once kept me from a 100 because I didn't reduce a fraction.) Some kids took Calculus and Algebra 2 at the same time and Trigonometry in grade 12. Those include some of the most successful but maybe a few fell behind me.
Science: I took Environmental Science in grade 12 and missed Physics. That might have put me past some people. Of course the smartest kids took Physics in grade 11 and Physiology in grade 12. Maybe I passed someone who tried that.
If I had been in a position to publicly comment on my level of success I would have apologized for overtaking some people because of an uneven system.

 

After deciding on that last post, but before posting it, I read the article.
Apparently the principal could have tolerated a proclamation of faith in Jesus but objected to the part about having misfortune in life and eventually dying. Maybe he thinks his students are immune to setbacks and will never face death.