Holy f*ck, California bans the dictionary....

[Cail]

[url=reason.com/blog/2010/01/25/southern-california-school-dis]Southern California School District May Ban the Dictionary[/url]

[rdhopeca]

Next, they'll be banning all conversation on the playground because someone might slip and say "crap".

Ludicrous and irresponsible.
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Rob

"Progress is made. Be warned."

[dlbpharmd]

Ridiculous.
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[Orlion]

Sheds some light on the insane decisions California voters seem to make in mass...
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'Tis dream to think that Reason can
Govern the reasoning creature, man.
- Herman Melville

I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all!

"All creation is a huge, ornate, imaginary, and unintended fiction; if it could be deciphered it would yield a single shocking word."
-John Crowley

[Avatar]

*shakes head* Gods forbid people should be able to find out the actual meaning of words...

--A
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It's easy to judge. It's more difficult to understand.

[lucimay]

[Avatar]

--A
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It's easy to judge. It's more difficult to understand.

[danlo]

Kind of goes along with the Govenator's idea to send all the superfluous prisoners in California to Mexico...

[Vader]

Maybe they should ban my trusty old Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary as well.



honi soit qui mal y pense ...

Next up it's banning the Bible for all that graphic sexual and violent content.
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Functionless art is vandalism. I am the vandal.

[Cameraman Jenn]

I resent that too!

I voted for "buffing the dolphin" and "munching on a vertical seafood taco" myself.
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Now if I could just find a way to wear live bees as jewelry all the time.....

www.fantasybedtimehour.com

[Kalkin]

Next thing you know, Big Government will be trying to tell people what they can do in the bedroom. Oh, wait...
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"How do you say 'we're screwed' in your native tongue?" ~ John Crichton

And on the Eighth Day God created Whiskey so that the Irish would not rule the Earth

[Avatar]

Welcome to the 'Tank Kalkin. Always good to have another contributer.

--A
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It's easy to judge. It's more difficult to understand.

[Seven Words]

*headshake*

I knew the basics of oral sex (meaning, nothing in a dictionary entry would increase my knowledge any) by 4th grade...Hell, I learned about it from kids at school in 3rd.

[sindatur]

RIDIKULUS (Surely it must be a Boggart)

Who in their right mind would try to ban a dictionary from a school, generally the school is encouraging you to go to the dictionary for spellings and definitions.

[Vraith]

It is moronic: but it ties to things in several other threads.
Why was it banned? Because nowadays all school systems must be terrified by the oppostion of a single dork parent. Both left and right dorks rule, depending on the district and whatever weird law of nature governs media attention.
Why aren't more people disgusted by the contradictory screaming in:
"Teachers suck! My children aren't LEARNING anything!"
and
"You CAN'T [or MUST] teach them "X." [X being a variable that can stand for 'oral sex', 'creationism' and a whole host of other things]
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Spoiler:

Sig-man, Libtard, Stupid piece of shit. change your text color to brown. Mr. Reliable, bullshit-slinging liarFucker-user.

the difference between evidence and sources: whether they come from the horse's mouth or a horse's ass.
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
the hyperbole is a beauty...for we are then allowed to say a little more than the truth...and language is more efficient when it goes beyond reality than when it stops short of it.

[sindatur]

I'm pretty sure all schools frown on teachers teaching their students oral sex
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Remember, everytime you drag someone through the mud, you're down in the mud with them

Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass...
It's about learning to dance in the rain

Where are we going...and... WHY are we in a handbasket?

[Cail]

I'm willing to bet the students feel differently....
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"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." - PJ O'Rourke
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"Men and women range themselves into three classes or orders of intelligence; you can tell the lowest class by their habit of always talking about persons; the next by the fact that their habit is always to converse about things; the highest by their preference for the discussion of ideas." - Charles Stewart
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"I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - James Madison
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[rusmeister]

I don't have time to respond to this at length, but while everybody is congratulating each other on agreeing, no one is attempting to ask if there is anything rational in an attempt to guard children from examination of sexual activity in a public setting. It's not impressive when the answers are always assumed - that the people who disagree with us are simply crazy. It's the way people are manipulated to react without thinking. I would bet a million dollars, and win, that nearly all of your great-great grandparents would agree that such dictionaries ought not be accessible to children and should be replaced with dictionaries that omit those things. And I happen to think that your great-great grandparents were not crazy.
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"Eh? Two views? There are a dozen views about everything until you know the answer. Then there's never more than one." Bill Hingest ("That Hideous Strength" by C.S. Lewis)

"These are the days when the Christian is expected to praise every creed except his own." G.K. Chesterton

[Orlion]

[Cameraman Jenn]

I think banning the dictionary is ridiculous as well. How much do we need to shelter our kids because one day they are going to go out into the real world and shouldn't they be prepared for that? A dictionary is not just a learning tool but a reference to help educate on spelling, definition, pronunciation and nuances of meaning to improve the vocabulary and comprehension of anyone who uses it. Was the dictionary in question highlighted on the term oral sex? Was the page bookmarked? Was it dog eared or made to stand out in any way? Did the teacher point out the entry to the student? Probably not which means the student most likely heard the term from a peer or in the media and looked it up themselves. Should we ban the dictionary for defining such words such as copulation, fertilization, homosexuality, erotica, pornography, breast, penis, labia, racism, sexism, lust, genocide, fratricide, child abuse, bestiality, sadism, defecation, knickerbockers... and the list goes on? So what is next? We ban online access to the myriad of online dictionaries and thesauruses that are out there and free to anyone? We must then also make sure the kid can't look up both words separately and make the connection on their own. All of my sample words can be found in Webster's Unabridged Dictionary and actually I am thrilled to hear a kid was actually USING a dictionary given our current state of education in the US.
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Now if I could just find a way to wear live bees as jewelry all the time.....

www.fantasybedtimehour.com