Teacher Cannot Be Sued For Denying Creationism

gzipped_tar writes "A federal appeals court ruled on Friday that a public high school teacher in Mission Viejo, California may not be sued for making hostile remarks about religion in his classroom. The decision stems from a lawsuit filed by a student charging that the teacher's hostile remarks about creationism and religious faith violated a First Amendment mandate that the government remain neutral in matters of religion. A three-judge panel of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled unanimously that the lawsuit must be thrown out of court because the teacher was entitled to immunity."

Comments

Science or religion? It can't be both!

[Swoopy]

So is creationism science, or is it religion?
I thought that creationists argued that their ideas were "scientific" or was that the intelligent designers?
Anyway, either it's a religion, the basis for the creationists' case here, and would therefore have no place in a proper education system to begin with,
or creationism is a science, giving it a place in the education system but allowing teacher to have & express a negative opinion about it.
This seems the kind of circular reasoning we've come to expect from creationists and intteligent design proponents, in yet another interesting new form.

Re:Was he really criticizing religion per se?

[the_raptor]

Who cares if the teacher was criticising religion or not. Individual opinion of people who work for the government is not the same as government policy.

Here is the part of the first amendment of the US constitution that is pertinent to the case:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof

Nope, doesn't say "government workers have to have neutral attitudes towards religion". Members of government, let alone government workers, in the US can be as rapidly pro or anti religious as they like and they won't break the first amendment unless they start making policy that establishes religion or prevents the free exercise thereof.

If the nutjob who sued can't even understand what the first amendment protects, they sure as hell aren't going to distinguish between those who say creationism isn't a science (I say that and I am an evangelical Christian) and straight out attacks against religion.

P.S. I am an Australian and I find it sad that I know more about the US constitution than most Americans and the talking heads on TV.