The recent allegations by India Tracy, a Pagan teen, are an alarming example of the inherent flaws in the new federal school-prayer guidelines issued early this month. According to the guidelines, students cannot be prohibited from religious expression so long as the student retains control over the content of his or her speech and that the students who speak have been selected in a neutral manner.

It’s bad enough that children of various religious beliefs or nonbelievers will feel excluded when the prayer of any faith is recited. But in addition to numerous other objections, the maliciousness that can result when vocal prayer and religious speech enter school-sponsored events, regardless of who initiates it, is the most compelling argument against it.

Fourteen-year-old India was allegedly subjected to ongoing abuse at her elementary school and, more recently, at Horace Maynard Middle School, in Union County, Tennessee. Her unwillingness to participate in Christian religious activities and the prejudicial views held by students and faculty, who could not accept her because of her beliefs, led to ridicule and worse.

In the Union County schools, overt religious activity that should never have entered or been endorsed by the public schools, was commonplace. In one instance, India was in the position of having to refuse to play the role of Mary in a Christmas play. She was also required by the school to attend Bible study classes during the day and could not even escape prayer, which she was urged to lead.

The school also participated in an annual Christian fundamentalist Area Wide Crusade, with India being the only child in the school that didn’t attend.

But this is only a glimpse at the frightening situation the young teen endured. According to the Tracy family, the girl was subjected to name-calling and rumors that she was a witch, a lesbian, a Satan worshipper, and that she ate babies. She had been physically and violently attacked a number of times. She also suffered having her head bashed nearly a dozen times.

Contrary to what would be expected, the maltreatment came, not only from misbehaving students, but also from teachers and even the principal. Despite being an “A” student and well-behaved, India, reportedly, was harassed by her bus driver who repeatedly questioned India’s church attendance in front of other students. The young girl, according to her parents, was even sent to the principal’s office a number of times when she didn’t participate in religious activities, where the principal questioned her about her religion.

One would hope this is a rare example of the bigotry that students of minority religions face. But such intolerance is all too often the case.

In February 2001, Tempest Smith of Lincoln Park, Michigan, hung herself after being endlessly tormented and taunted by her peers because of her Wiccan beliefs.

And three students in Santa Fe, New Mexico, were accused of threatening to hang a 13-year-old Jewish student, Phil Nevelow, in June 2000. His father said the boy was a victim of continual harassment that included being surrounded by students making the “Hail Hitler" sign, drawing swastikas on book covers, and provoking with anti-Semitic chants.

According to William Harrell, executive director of the ACLU of Texas, even some teachers had participated in harassing the only Jewish student in the school. Not surprisingly, prayer at graduation ceremonies and football games had been a problem in the district.

These situations are exactly what arise when a dominant religion is given a free-for-all in public places, especially public schools. It’s one thing to subject adults to the misdeeds that arise from other adults when boundaries between church and state are crossed. It’s quite another to put children in this position.

When religion is allowed to enter school-sponsored events, students who don’t practice become branded for their differences.

Life is often a turbulent emotional ride for youth, especially in their early teens. Socializing and fitting-in are of utmost importance both to their self-esteem and to discovering who they are. And how they come to perceive of themselves during these years will follow them all of their lives.

I find it a tragedy that some people are so consumed with uplifting their own religion that they feel it necessary to impose it on others, when they have all the freedom in the world to practice outside of public schools and even to practice and pray silently within.

 

Kimberly Blaker’s The Wall™ appears weekly. She is editor and coauthor of the The Fundamentals of Extremism: the Christian Right in America. Send your comments to Kimberly Blaker: TheWall@TheWall-OnChurchAndState.com   © 2002, Kimberly Blaker

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