The Washington Flyer - 11/30/07
Washington, DC
November 30, 2007
Soldiering on in California: Californians are working to overturn a bill that was recently signed into law and that poses a great threat to traditional family values. SB 777, signed by Governor Schwarzenegger on Oct. 12, 2007, requires that education in public schools portray homosexuality in a positive manner.
Specifically, SB 777 states that “no teacher shall give instruction nor shall a school district sponsor any activity that promotes a discriminatory bias” towards homosexuality, transexuality, bisexuality, or transgender status. In addition, to avoid discrimination against these groups, allowances must be made within the schools to accommodate the preferences of homosexual and transgender persons (e.g., bathrooms and locker rooms must be available to a person’s preferred gender, regardless of his or her biological gender).
According to Capitol Resource Family Impact (CRFI), an organization formed to promote and protect family values in California, the “vague language of this bill could be interpreted to mean that instruction that only features a mom and dad or traditional family would be ‘promoting a discriminatory bias’ against homosexual couples.”
The bill, sponsored by the homosexual rights group California Equality, was introduced into the California state senate by state senator Sheila Kuehl. This bill passed the Senate and the Assembly in May and September, respectively, and was signed into law in October.
CRFI has received permission from the Attorney General to collect signatures on a petition to file a referendum that would prohibit the implementation of SB 777. The goal is to have the referendum on a ballot in the summer of 2008. To date, 125,000 petitions have been requested from CRFI.
ACTION: Those living in California can go to http://www.saveourkids.net/ for additional information on how to help collect signatures for the petition to fight this dangerous bill.
Advancing Life in Science: Last week, two scientists announced what some consider to be the most significant breakthrough in stem cell science. Shinya Yamanaka and James Thomson experimented with the manipulation of normal skin cells; they introduced four genes into skin cells and coaxed them to act like embryonic stem cells. After a few weeks of the process, they were able to take the modified skin cell and create a cell of a beating heart. These skin cells can be transformed into 220 cell types.
Although the technology is imperfect and too raw to repair the heart and spinal cord, scientists are buoyed by Yamanaka and Thomson’s work and believe such treatments are not far off for a number of reasons, such as this technique being relatively inexpensive compared to embryonic stem cell research. Also, since the skin cells would come from the recipient’s own body, the body’s rejection of these cells would not pose a problem.
According to one researcher, the best thing about this stem cell research is that it is “ethically uncomplicated.” Thomson, one of the primary researchers of this study and also the geneticist who isolated human embryonic stem cells in 1998, said recently, “Ten years of turmoil and now this nice ending.”
Former Bush speechwriter and advisor Michael Gerson stated in the Washington Post: “The human subject, in the case of embryonic research, is unrecognizable. But it is genetically distinct from other lives and undeniably human—a human at its earliest stage of development. It is not a superstition of the Dark Ages to believe that it should be valued, instead of discarded like cracked pottery.”
Gerson concluded, “Now science has demonstrated an even greater power—the power of morally responsible technology to serve the cause of human dignity instead of undermining it.”
Evaluating Values—A Look at American Teachers: In the Winter 2008 issue of Education Next, a journal of the Hoover Institution, Robert O. Slater examines the beliefs and values of American teachers. He points out in the introductory paragraphs of his article that since American schoolteachers annually spend an average of 1260 hours working with the country’s 54 million school children, it is important that Americans know what teachers believe.
Slater extrapolated data from the National Opinion Research Center’s (NORC) General Social Survey, which he considers to be “one of the largest, most reliable, and frequently used data sets in the social sciences.”
Slater concludes from his research study that America’s schoolteachers (both public and private) are generally more liberal than the rest of American society in a number of areas but are more conservative in these areas than people with higher levels of education. Investigating topics such as social issues, free speech, economic inequality, human nature, civic values, and church attendance, Slater found that in virtually every case, teachers were more liberal in their beliefs than the general public but more conservative than people who had received higher levels of educational training. Interestingly, more teaches stated that they attended church regularly than any other group of the American population.
Severing the Rod: Lawmakers in Massachusetts will soon be considering a proposed ban on spanking children in the state. According to The Boston Herald, State Rep. Jay Kaufman filed the spanking ban petition. Kaufman attributes the motivation behind his action to the urging of a Massachusetts nurse who desires her state to become the first U.S. state to prohibit spanking and corporal punishment in general.
According to the proposed initiative, parents who spank or physically discipline their children who are under the age of 18 could be charged with abuse of neglect. Debate over this measure is set to begin next Wednesday in the Massachusetts Statehouse.
-The Washington Flyer Staff Writer: Jennifer Groover
-The Washington Flyer Editor: Maureen Wiebe
November 30, 2007
946-0777