ACLU Defends Vanilla Crowd & Sore-thumbs

The ACLU has once more filed a lawsuit on the behalf of a faceless, nameless party. In Tennessee, a family has sued a school district because they felt that the district was promoting prayer at the expense of their son.

The lawsuit claims that a series of Christian meetings and prayer events at Lakeview Elementary School in Mt. Juliet violated the constitution al separation of church and state and illegally subjected young children to "religious proselytizing."

Named in the lawsuit is the Wilson County School System, the system's director, Jim Duncan; Lakeview Elementary School Principal Wendell Marlowe; Assistant Principal Yvonne Smith and school teacher Janet Adamson. The lawsuit goes on to give cause stating those offenses which included

a "Praying Parents" group that regularly met in the school cafeteria during school hours and dropped off fliers in classrooms to let children know they'd been prayed for

and also cited

the school observed "National Day of Prayer" by holding a competition for students to draw posters promoting the day, handing out stickers that said "I prayed" to students who'd participated and encouraging students to link up for the day with "prayer buddies."

Those students without a prayer buddy or a sticker stood out, "disfavored and isolated."

The unnamed litigants have since withdrawn their "then kindergartener" from the school in favor of homeschooling the child. The parents evidently would rather have the child isolated than faced with the possibility that he might be ostracized by his peers. Poor kid. Anyway you cut it, he has a lonely life to look forward to under the dictates of his well intentioned(?) parents. It appears since they have chosen to remain nameless and faceless in this lawsuit that they themselves have been subjected to schoolyard bullies and never have outgrown it. What a way to teach your child to stand up for himself in a world filled with people who do not think, believe, or feel the way you do. When in doubt retreat, hide, and then sic someone bigger than yourself on those you are scared to stand up to.

It says a lot about the "underdogs" here that the ACLU chooses to defend. They are clueless as to how to live in a world that differs from them. The vanilla crowd we should call them. "Accommodate me!", they cry because I am different. Rather than quietly going about their own business, the vanilla crowd would prefer that the freedoms the majority of people have enjoyed be washed out, homogenized beyond recognition in the communities they live in. They want their idiosyncrasies to take precedence over the idiosyncrasies of the majority. Yes, communities have idiosyncrasies, that are comprised of the will of the majority of the people living in them. You see it daily in their voting patterns, their choices of how their community properties are used, their support of issues on morality, etc.

Rivaling the vanilla crowd, but equally as clueless are those who cry "accommodate me" due to their distinct way of living that puts them in direct odds with the majority. Nothing vanilla about this crowd, they don't want everyone to be treated the same and have the personal issues they disagree with in their communities disappear - this group (let's call them the sore-thumb's) are hell-bent on making sure that the majority take notice of them and allow them their own idiosyncrasies even though it doesn't make a lot of sense. Take for instance the Virginia-based Muslim group who has launched a campaign to promote awareness of their individual religious needs in schools. In what they deem as a success story on accommodating their children

a high school in Burke, Virginia, agreed to compromise its policy on what students must wear during gym class. It says it will now allow a female Muslim student to wear Islamic attire in those classes instead of the required gym shorts.

According to the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the girl was threatened with failing the class if she did not wear shorts. CAIR's Maryland and Virginia chapter says it is making plans to conduct "diversity training" for newer staff members at the Burke school.

There is no word yet whether the ACLU will launch a lawsuit against the school accommodation of the Islamic student.

Like I said, the "sore-thumb" crowd is determined to make everyone else revolve around their specialized needs. Can you imagine the gymnasium during girls calisthenics? Burkas tangled up in legs while doing jumping jacks. Burkas caught in volleyball nets or tripped over while going in for a lay-up. For that matter, imagine the referee's dilemma trying to keep track of feet for a traveling call, while attempting to see past the folds of a burka. Yes, this group which is determined to set themselves apart in society has definitely earned the name the "sore-thumbs".

For all the differences there will be the ACLU. They are more than gladly willing to defend those that rock the boat. Even if in most cases the people they are defending are a couple oars short in the larger scheme of life of getting along peaceably with their majority numbers of fellow man.

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