The Golden Compass Controversy

So I went to Yahoo! and right on the home page, and all I see is, CONTROVERSY OVER GOLDEN COMPASS MOVIE!!!!!!! WATCH FIRST 5 MINUTES – SEE WHAT YOU THINK! plastered all over the front (not really, I’m exaggerating people).

So of course, I have to watch it. Movie Link. Right off the bat, not even a minute in – the narrator says, “There are many universes” WHAT!!! Did these people not take English class??? Anyway, the movie clip goes on. Then BAM! You can’t talk about dust! What!! A whole field of study, gone! All the history learned, all the other fields of study that rely on the study of rocks and such, all the economic opportunities created from geology, gone. Craziness… Plus, she, the main character, says something along the lines of “Stop! If you value your life you will not go any further“, yet she backs up, allowing the person she’s talking to move closer. Strange little movie, if you ask me.

Really though, the controversy is the Christians/Catholics are pissed (so what else is new?) because they’re being depicted as evil villians (again, I ask what else is new?). “Evil in Pullman’s books [The ones The Golden Compass is based on] is represented by the church, called the Magisterium, whose acolytes kidnap orphans across England to subject them to horrible experiments in the frozen northern wastelands.” (Yahoo.com) What do they want, an Index of Banned Media?? Eh, forget them, they didn’t like A Wrinkle in Time or Bridge to Terabithia either. Weirdos.

Bong Hits 4 Jesus!

Joseph Frederick was suspended in 2002 for displaying a sign saying “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” at a rally for the Olympic torch relay. The rally was an off-campus event not sponsored by Frederick’s school. A federal appeals court agreed with the ACLU that the school had violated Frederick’s right to free speech. The Supreme Court heard the case during the 2006 term and ruled that Alaska public school officials did not violate Joseph Frederick’s free speech rights by punishing him. In a criticism of the decision, Steven R. Shapiro said, “The Court’s ruling imposes new restrictions on student speech rights and creates a drug exception to the First Amendment.” [Emphasis added]

The Supreme Court’s ruling is also a judgment on whether Tinker v. Des Moines, the test for virtually all student speech cases since 1969, remains good law. In Tinker, the Supreme Court said that young people do not “shed their constitutional rights at the schoolhouse gate,” ruling that students have the right to free speech at school, as long as their speech does not disrupt the educational process.

Taken from aclu.org.
For more information about Morse v. Frederick check out the ACLU.

I currently hate our Supreme Court justices. At least about this decision. It makes me soo mad! The schools now legally, have power over their students ALL THE TIME?!

Rant 1-My school tried to foist a “code of conduct” contract on me, saying that my actions outside of school effected what I was able to do in school. It was something like, if you have a run-in with the law then you get kicked out of any extra-curricular activities. They were WAY over-extending their jurisdiction by creating those rules/that document. There were some other rules along with it, but the extra-curricular rule is the one that sticks out in my mind (Dazed and Confused anyone??). They hustled the WHOLE school into the auditorium, and stressed over and over how easy it was to sign this thing, and that we would only have to sign it once, and it would last all (+/-) 4 years of school. They kept harping on how this was so easy, since everyone already follows the rules anyway (riiiight). Sneaky little school officals. Signing away our few rights that were left was required, but since people were just passing it in and no one was checking it, I signed Seymour Butts, and went on with my day. I was never hauled in and never saw/heard of my, or anyone else’s “contracts” again.

Rant 2- My school also requires that each student purchases a student planner, because they had ordered “just enough” and need to “break even” (really, they wanted to make more profit). If you chose not to buy a planner (like me!), then you were sent to the office everyday (after the first week of school) to miss first period (just like being late +5 times total). This continues until you hand over the three dollars they demand. And it’s not that three dollars makes a huge dent in my wallet (well, actually it is..), but it’s the fact that they REQUIRE you to buy one, is utterly ridiculous. I think they do that for the money, and also they have this system of passes, you have to sign in and out every time you leave a classroom, and they have to sign your agenda. They can only sign these certain pages that come with the agenda you purchase. I told the office attendants repeatedly, that I was perfectly fine with not going to the bathroom/water/nurse/office during class time, but they said no, you have to buy one. Whatever. I bought one and promptly recycled it right in front of the secretary I bought it from.

Rant 3- My princepal. I can’t stand him. He discriminates. More on that later. I’m in too good a mood to go into detail about that… >:O