[Image from American Music Channel]Charley Daniels is a country singer who blathers on about God, patriotism and fighting and stuff. I don't know, but I wonder if he's ever served in the military. There's another country, John Rich, a Jesus-lover, who's singing anti-Obama crap these days; God told him to. One of Toby's Keith's songs is downright racist, but I don't know if Keith loves Jesus or not.
These are jest a few of the goofy good old boys from Nashville, some of which love drinking, Jesus and c-a-p-i-t-a-l-i-s-m, and think this is a good old Christian country thet jest don't got no room for faggots and Democrats, and liberals, and atheists, and socialists and commies!
Enter Diamond Rio. They used to be "stars." Back in 2005, the group recorded a song called "In God We Still Trust." Sounds about right for a country group worried about liberals and godless commies and goddamn atheists.
Most people have probably never heard of it. I hadn't. Then I read a tidbit from The Boot.
And naturally, when weirdness rears its ugly head, it often derives from Florida. In St. Augustine, an elementary school evidently required its students to learn this Diamond Rio tune, "In God We Still Trust," "for an end-of-the-year-after-school assembly."
Two families have sued the St. John's County School Board, claiming that this "amounted to religious indoctrination and interfered with the parents' right to raise their children according to their own beliefs."
The pressure worked. Just before the lawsuit was filed, the song was dropped from the program. But it ain't over yet. A hearing is set for April 8 in Jacksonville.
This kind of thing goes on in our country every single day. For some reason, many personnel affiliated with our public schools, are so obtuse they don't seem to ever understand the fact that they cannot promote Christian or any other religious propaganda in their school settings, or they do understand and do it anyway.
It's not like this is a secret! It seems, rather, that if a school board is dominated by christianists and the school district is made up mostly of fundy christianists, the powers-that-be figure they can get by with their little "evangelistic" endeavors in spite of the fact they violate the Constitution!
So Diamond Rio is out. For now. But the game isn't over. In your city, today or tomorrow, there will be another school somewhere proselytizing your children in the name of Jesus; sometimes using the work of Nashville's finest country music stars; probably because they are such great theologians and such terrific role models.
What do you think would happen if a public school required its students to learn a song called "In Allah We Still Trust"?
