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AZ Lawmaker proposes bill to make Pledge of Allegiance mandatory in schools

Stevicus

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
Arizona bill would require students say Pledge of Allegiance

PHOENIX — An Arizona lawmaker wants to make it harder for schoolchildren to avoid saying the Pledge of Allegiance in the morning.

Republican Rep. John Fillmore of Apache Junction introduced legislation that would require students to recite the pledge each morning unless a parent excuses them. Along with this, schools would also be required to set aside at least a minute each day for "quiet reflection and moral reasoning."

So, if you bring a note from your parents, you'll be excused from having to recite the Pledge.

When I was in school, we were required to stand, but we didn't have to put our hands over our hearts or recite the Pledge.

I'd like to know what the penalty is for breaking this law. If a kid refuses to recite the pledge, will he/she go to jail?
 

joe1776

Well-Known Member
I wish they'd had that law when I went to school. I'd have been suspended and not forced to spend my days in boring classrooms.

I could have gone to the library. I really wanted an education but I was kept too busy going to school to get one.:D
 

shmogie

Well-Known Member
Arizona bill would require students say Pledge of Allegiance



So, if you bring a note from your parents, you'll be excused from having to recite the Pledge.

When I was in school, we were required to stand, but we didn't have to put our hands over our hearts or recite the Pledge.

I'd like to know what the penalty is for breaking this law. If a kid refuses to recite the pledge, will he/she go to jail?
Nah, just reform school.
 

Good-Ole-Rebel

Well-Known Member
If they make the pledge compulsory, they'll have to remove the reference to liberty from it.

I agree. Plus they will have to allow Southernors to say a pledge of allegiance to our flag if they want to and if the local school district so determines.

I mean, after all, it is our flag.

Good-Ole-Rebel
 

Ponder This

Well-Known Member
Arizona bill would require students say Pledge of Allegiance



So, if you bring a note from your parents, you'll be excused from having to recite the Pledge.

When I was in school, we were required to stand, but we didn't have to put our hands over our hearts or recite the Pledge.

I'd like to know what the penalty is for breaking this law. If a kid refuses to recite the pledge, will he/she go to jail?

I suspect that detentions, in-school suspensions, and talks with parents are more likely punishments for a kid's refusal...
 

SigurdReginson

Grēne Mann
Premium Member
Enforcing mandatory pledges of allegiance while simultaniously degrading the quality of education that children recieve. Seems like a recipe for making future generations more easily manipulated.
 

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
Enforcing mandatory pledges of allegiance while simultaniously degrading the quality of education that children recieve. Seems like a recipe for making future generations more easily manipulated.
I'm not entirely sure. Even those of us old enough to be raised when nationalism was viewed as a great thing (assuming they don't anymore given the number of those younger than me who seem terrified of nationalism), many of us weren't trapped in that mode of thinking forever, and many just never adopted even though it was very taboo to not recite the pledge.
 

SigurdReginson

Grēne Mann
Premium Member
I'm not entirely sure. Even those of us old enough to be raised when nationalism was viewed as a great thing (assuming they don't anymore given the number of those younger than me who seem terrified of nationalism), many of us weren't trapped in that mode of thinking forever, and many just never adopted even though it was very taboo to not recite the pledge.

It's always nice when people strive to be as objective and free thinking as possible, but people who gravitate towards that goal are the exception it seems. I hate referring to people as sheeple or anything, since we all have our biases which make true objectivity problematic, but it's uncommon for someone to not be part of and influenced by a group of people in some way.

Keeping people dumber as a whole with programs like no child left behind, and making nationalistic propaganda mandatory under the law seems like it would make it easier to influence Americans into complying with our government more. It won't effect everyone, but it would make it a little more difficult to resist - and everyone has a limit to how much they are willing to resist. North Korea would be an extreme example, China would be a less extreme example (see how many folks from China are willing to talk about Tiananmen square).

That's how it seems to me, at least.
 

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
It's always nice when people strive to be as objective and free thinking as possible, but people who gravitate towards that goal are the exception it seems. I hate referring to people as sheeple or anything, since we all have our biases which make true objectivity problematic, but it's uncommon for someone to not be part of and influenced by a group of people in some way.

Keeping people dumber as a whole with programs like no child left behind, and making nationalistic propaganda mandatory under the law seems like it would make it easier to influence Americans into complying with our government more. It won't effect everyone, but it would make it a little more difficult to resist - and everyone has a limit to how much they are willing to resist. North Korea would be an extreme example, China would be a less extreme example (see how many folks from China are willing to talk about Tiananmen square).

That's how it seems to me, at least.
Enforcing it through law is definitely more extreme. I never faced any formal sanctions for not doing it, but social chastisement. And, even then, legal or taboo, it won't stop everyone.
There is the question of guiding people, and indeed we even find individual capitalist and communist economies that are driven along different paths (such as capitalism with pro-oligarch legislation in America compared to capitalism with legislation that doesn't favor the elite that is found in many countries; Stalinist and Maoist; even economies with features that are fundamentally both capitalist and socialist). The question becomes a question of driving them for the benefit of many, rather than just the few. Kennedy was probably one of the better presidents at channeling a national spirit to work towards improving things and reaching new heights as a nation, including initiatives such as the "war on poverty." And even in him, the national discourse that drove science and technology did forever change the world and shape into the world we know today. Not that it's always good, and indeed Nazi Germany is an easy example of the bad, but here it got us national parks, anti-trust laws, and some other needed things when we've put country first. It may just be that we aren't yet to a point as a species for think beyond our own group, and have to grow beyond the nation-state.
 

Good-Ole-Rebel

Well-Known Member
Sure, and why not the Jolly Roger while we're at it?

Well, if that is your people's flag, knock yourself out.

I agreed with you, remember. Perhaps for a different reason. Why should we have to pledge allegiance to the U.S. flag when all they do to the Southernors flag is tear it down along with any monuments we have.

Good-Ole-Rebel
 

Good-Ole-Rebel

Well-Known Member
The fact that, for the most part, often, frequently, rarely do I see otherwise, they are referring to a latte comer battle flag as the stars and bars.

Well, the original stars and bars had been replaced also as the Confederacy's flag. This battle flag, as I use in my avatar, had become the most popular. Thus it was incorporated into the next official flag of the Confederacy situated in the top left corner on a field of white, and even later with a red bar run down the right side edge.

Most people believe this battle flag to be the stars and bars, and though it is not the original, it certainly has stars and bars. So I make no big issue about it. The point is they recognize it. And so does everyone else.

Good-Ole-Rebel
 
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