Both atheists and theists attempt to push their beliefs on others at times. You can see how religion in schools in America is often not allowed a voice. Much of the time the religion of government is to let people - children in school - make up their own minds. This isn't what school is for. School is for training children rather than letting them make up their own mind.
Then it isn't a place of learning, it is a place of indoctrination.
A school is to educate children so they may be better able to make sense of the world around them, not to make-shit-up(tm) and tell them they must believe it.
So, on the basis you believe that children should be 'trained' rather than educated, does that also follow as them being raised?
It truly does take religion to make good people do bad things, but it also provides as a nice camouflage for nasty bastards to abuse their children, the vulnerable human beings whom they are entrusted to care for and nurture, but who choose, instead, to beat into submission, in the name of their gawd!
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-25268343A child-raising book that advocates whipping with branches and belts has sold hundreds of thousands of copies to evangelical Christians. But the deaths of three children whose parents appear to have been influenced by the authors' teachings have provoked a growing backlash.
The implements can vary. For a child under one year old, a willowy branch or a 1ft (30cm) ruler is recommended. For older children, a larger branch or a belt.
But the objective of the "spanking" described in Michael and Debi Pearl's To Train Up a Child is the same - making children surrender completely to their parents' will.
"Training is the conditioning of the child's mind before the crisis arises; it is preparation for future, instant, unquestioning obedience," reads a passage from the book's first chapter.
The "training" is meant to start early and pre-empt the need for punishment. But if the child is already rebellious, parents are told to "use whatever force is necessary to bring him to bay".
"If you have to sit on him to spank him then do not hesitate. And hold him there until he is surrendered... Defeat him totally."
Hannah (not her real name) grew up in a community of Independent Fundamental Baptists in north-western Florida. Her parents obtained copies of books by the Pearls when she was about nine and her sister seven.
The spanking began shortly afterwards and continued for at least eight years. In the first five years, it usually happened several times daily.
One day, when she was 14 or 15, her father heard a story about Hannah getting into a fight with a boy at church.
"I'm still not sure honestly what I was being accused of, but my dad just completely flipped out because whatever he heard was just atrocious," she says.
He used wooden rulers, or yardsticks, to spank her, snapping about five in the course of the beating - her mother kept a dozen in the house because they broke so often.
"When I couldn't sit down a couple of days later he was like: 'Stop being so melodramatic, what's wrong with you?' Then he had mother look and [my coccyx] was incredibly bruised and swollen."
Hannah, now in her mid-20s, says her father was "horrified" and never spanked her again. But her mother continued, using a plastic blind handle that she thought was less likely to leave marks on her children's skin.
Like other people who have witnessed Michael Pearl's advice being put into practice, Hannah says her parents were seduced by the idea of a simple formula that would make their children compliant.
"The problem is that [Pearl] tells you you have to break your children," she says. "And to get there you have to be completely ruthless."
To Train Up a Child is widely seen as the most extreme of the publications produced by conservative Christians in the US who advocate corporal punishment.
It is produced by the Pearls' organisation, No Greater Joy Ministries, which is attached to the church where Michael Pearl is a pastor in Pleasantville, Tennessee. First published in 1994, the book soon became popular among fundamentalist, non-denominational groups outside mainstream Christian culture.
Within these tight-knit communities, many families educate their children at home, viewing schools as having a harmful social environment and being insufficiently religious. The Pearls started homeschooling their children in the 1970s, when the practice was still novel.
Homeschooling in the US
Elizabeth Esther, a blogger who grew up in a conservative Christian community in California and describes herself as a "recovering fundamentalist", says that in her church the Pearls were "basically held up as the sterling example of how to raise your children before God".
The group said its revenue for the 2012-2013 tax year was $1.5m, 60% of which came from sales. Some products are donated to prisoners and military families, and boxes of books have been sent to US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
To Train Up a Child has sold more than 800,000 copies, according to Michael Pearl. Sales have remained steady in recent years and are only boosted by attacks, he says. "We have several million very happy and cheerful parents and kids who've seen great, wonderful fruit from that book and other things we've written."
Extracts
For the under one year old, a little, ten- to twelve-inch long, willowy branch (striped of any knots that might break the skin) about one-eighth inch diameter is sufficient. Sometimes alternatives have to be sought. A one-foot ruler, or its equivalent in a paddle, is a sufficient alternative. For the larger child, a belt or larger tree branch is effective.
The parents who put off training until the child is old enough to discuss issues or receive explanations find their child a terror long before he understands the meaning of the word. A newborn soon needs training
PARENTS MUST ASSUME THAT PART OF THE CHILD'S MORAL DUTY WHICH IS NOT YET FULLY DEVELOPED. The parents' role is not that of a policeman, but more like that of the Holy Spirit
When the time comes to apply the rod, take a deep breath, relax, and pray, "Lord, make this a valuable learning session. Cleanse my child of ill-temper and rebellion. May I properly represent your cause in this matter."
Make it a point never to use your hand for spanking. The hand swatting is a release of the parent's own frustration. Furthermore, where the child is concerned, the hand is for loving, not martial arts.
Matthew (whose name has also been changed) grew up in a homeschooling family in the mid-West that expected just such positive outcomes from To Train Up a Child.
Spanking with wooden rods and branches started at a very early age for Matthew and his two younger siblings. In the first 10-12 years it happened daily to weekly, he says, before becoming less frequent but more severe.
He says there were no serious injuries. But there have been cases ending in tragedy.
Three child deaths
Hana Williams, 13, hypothermia, malnutrition (2011)
Lydia Schatz, 7, massive tissue damage (2010)
Sean Paddock, 4, suffocated in blankets (2006)
In 2010, Lydia Schatz died after being beaten, three years after arriving in California from Liberia. The following year, another adoptee, 13-year-old Hana Williams, died from hypothermia and malnutrition after being left in the back yard in a small town in Washington state.
The Schatz parents are serving long prison sentences after pleading guilty to charges including second-degree murder, torture, voluntary manslaughter and unlawful corporal punishment.
The Williams parents were sentenced in October to decades in prison for manslaughter.
Investigators said both sets of parents had followed advice from To Train Up a Child, a copy of which was reportedly found in both homes.
Michael Ramsey, a district attorney who prosecuted the Schatzes, said he was planning to mention the book as a contributing factor if the case had come to trial.
Though he did not want to detract from the parents' responsibility in causing Lydia's death, he said the book's ideas were "wholeheartedly embraced by the Schatzes", and "the entire philosophy of the book is intended to lead someone down that slope".
