Atheist student threatened & disowned for protesting prayer

[iGod]

May 25th, 2011 - Bastrop High School, Louisiana

When a high school atheist tried to stop prayer at his graduation, he was harassed and kicked out of his house. But the atheist community stepped in.

[...]

Fowler's name, and his role in this incident, was leaked. As a direct result:

1) Fowler has been hounded, pilloried, and ostracized by his community.

2) One of Fowler's teachers has publicly demeaned him.

3) Fowler has been physically threatened. Students have threatened to "jump him" at graduation practice, and he has received multiple threats of bodily harm, and even death threats.

4) Fowler's parents have cut off his financial support, kicked him out of the house, and thrown his belongings onto the front porch.

[...]

The whole thing here.
Also here.

[inky]

Disgusting but given the setting, it's really no surprise. The town is overrun by crazy in-bred Jesus people who are impervious to reason and foreign to the word "tolerance".

[heroo]

what a moron. not because he is an atheist, but because he makes a problem out of nothing. so what if his school is having a prayer? isn't he happy that he graduated? he even threatened the school to call ACLU if they had the prayer, lol. serves him right the crybaby.

[Miguez]

All the parties involved have overreacted.

[Apollion]

Im atheist, dont think ive ever stopped or gotten offended by prayer. I do my own thing, they do theirs

[McLovin1t]

Whoa what a crybaby trying to uphold the law in his home town. I thought these bible nuts were fans of the Constitution? Establishment Clause anyone?
Lee v. Weisman anyone?
Inbred tards.

[heroo]

lol trying to uphold the law. now you makin' this crybaby a hero too?

[Tasdik]

This amused me.

[.AWAKE.]

Attention whores

[Pinoy_Archer]

The 2 links details have different info and does not stay relevant, but rather based upon the opinion on the article writer. Now I'm confused.

The 2nd link had a video attached, I went to its source and want to find out its video description. It has something to do with American constitutions and also the separation of church and state, ACLU, and etc which i'm not familiar of, soo i have to stay out of that.

Also in the related videos there happens to be another graduation vid that happens to be related to Mr. Fowler...

If i'm right the sequence would go like this:

1. Night before the graduation this happend:
Code: Select all
2. then this:


Fowler's name, and his role in this incident, was leaked. As a direct result:

1) Fowler has been hounded, pilloried, and ostracized by his community.

2) One of Fowler's teachers has publicly demeaned him.

3) Fowler has been physically threatened. Students have threatened to "jump him" at graduation practice, and he has received multiple threats of bodily harm, and even death threats.

4) Fowler's parents have cut off his financial support, kicked him out of the house, and thrown his belongings onto the front porch.

[...]



3. The day after or few days after, this happened:
Code: Select all
4. Then


NEWS ON THIS CASE: Currently Damon Fowler is residing in Dallas... A nice drive away from this shit hole Louisiana and all the small minded rednecks. Damon Fowler is pursuing his case through the FFRF and ACLU concerning his rights. Lets keep this video popular and spread it as much as you can in support of Damon! People need to know that it is wrong!!! I have disabled the rating because everyone was giving it a thumbs down which i understand ...............

If you find something wrong in my findings. Don't be flaming, this is just my assumption, also i'm open for correction.

[XemnasXD]

All the parties involved have overreacted.

[TheDrop]

what a moron. not because he is an atheist, but because he makes a problem out of nothing. so what if his school is having a prayer? isn't he happy that he graduated? he even threatened the school to call ACLU if they had the prayer, lol. serves him right the crybaby.

This

All the parties involved have overreacted.

and this

Disgusting but given the setting, it's really no surprise. The town is overrun by crazy in-bred Jesus people who are impervious to reason and foreign to the word "tolerance".

the irony here..

Its like a kid crying about the pledge of allegiance because of that one line "under God" ~,~

[inky]

When a high school atheist tried to stop prayer at his graduation, he was harassed and kicked out of his house. But the atheist community stepped in.

Okay, this part I didn't read earlier...just kinda went through the list and skimmed the article quickly... lol I don't really see the big deal but the rest of them went overboard with the threats.

[NuclearSilo]

Everyone should be like NuclearSilo, who loves to live in peace and always respect other's lifestyle

[inky]

Everyone should be like NuclearSilo, who loves to live in peace and always respect other's lifestyle

Hmmmm....... I'll give you that.

[*BlackFox]

All the parties involved have overreacted.

QFT

respect other's lifestyle

Well, as long as it doesn't violate, mess up other ppls lives.. Or someone being forced into it.

[woutR]

If you're making a problem out of other people saying a small prayer you fail at atheism.

[Azilius]

So wait if we dumb this down..

1. Someone warns a school that they're going to do something illegal and tries to have it stopped

2. People find out and ostracize him

3. Now he has no home, financial support and is being constantly threatened?


Ya he's the one overreacting for sure. God forbid people try to follow the law.


EDIT:
From the article:

Spoiler!

And perhaps most dramatically, Friendly Atheist blogger Hemant Mehta has established a scholarship fund for Fowler, so he can attend college despite being cut off financially by his parents -- and the response has been overwhelming. As of this writing, the atheist community has donated over $15,000. Essentially filling the role that his parents have abandoned.

Thank God there are still decent people in this world..

[.curve]

EDIT:
From the article:

Spoiler!

And perhaps most dramatically, Friendly Atheist blogger Hemant Mehta has established a scholarship fund for Fowler, so he can attend college despite being cut off financially by his parents -- and the response has been overwhelming. As of this writing, the atheist community has donated over $15,000. Essentially filling the role that his parents have abandoned.

Thank God there are still decent people in this world..

That's actually pretty cool that this whole community has stuck up and supported him. I'm interested in how the rest of the story will play out.

[TheDrop]

So wait if we dumb this down..

1. Someone warns a school that they're going to do something illegal and tries to have it stopped

2. People find out and ostracize him

3. Now he has no home, financial support and is being constantly threatened?


Ya he's the one overreacting for sure. God forbid people try to follow the law.


EDIT:
From the article:

Spoiler!

And perhaps most dramatically, Friendly Atheist blogger Hemant Mehta has established a scholarship fund for Fowler, so he can attend college despite being cut off financially by his parents -- and the response has been overwhelming. As of this writing, the atheist community has donated over $15,000. Essentially filling the role that his parents have abandoned.

Thank God there are still decent people in this world..

1. Some nut demands school system to not do prayer during graduation
2. school says ok, people get pissed
3. Guy finds out everyone hates him, and atheist nuts from the internet gave him 15,00$

It would be interesting to find out if the prayer at graduation was a annual thing or not, cause in that case it would be obvious the guys a dumbass.

[the.unseen.]

This shit happens all the time just read Atheist section in reddit, those guys seem to go crazy over such little thing. xD

[Azilius]

Thank God there are still decent people in this world..

1. Some nut demands school system to not do prayer during graduation
2. school says ok, people get pissed
3. Guy finds out everyone hates him, and atheist nuts from the internet gave him 15,00$

It would be interesting to find out if the prayer at graduation was a annual thing or not, cause in that case it would be obvious the guys a dumbass.

Implying the internet communities that donated all that money are nuts.

Therefore..implying what I said earlier.

[TheDrop]

I didnt call all the atheists on teh internetz nuts, which is what i guess you are trying to say i did.

[Azilius]

Edited old post by accident..read that.

[BuDo]

As an atheist he's no different than some religious nuts who feel they have go overboard to impose their beliefs on others.....He failed....All he had to do was chill and not make a big deal.

[TheDrop]

They are nuts cause they are giving free money to a nut to try to support their nutty cause

As an atheist he's no different than some religious nuts who feel they have go overboard to impose their beliefs on others.....He failed....All he had to do was chill and not make a big deal.

Exactly.
If he didnt want to part take in the prayer, he could easily well, not taken part in it instead of being a whiny bish and complaining to the school board.

[Azilius]

They are nuts cause they are giving free money to a nut to try to support their nutty cause

As an atheist he's no different than some religious nuts who feel they have go overboard to impose their beliefs on others.....He failed....All he had to do was chill and not make a big deal.

Exactly.
If he didnt want to part take in the prayer, he could easily well, not taken part in it instead of being a whiny bish and complaining to the school board.

And the school could have, you know, followed the law. But that's too tough for religions isn't it. Seeing as how many religious people are exempt from certain laws due to religion itself. If you are unaware of what I'm talking about you can google around. This is just another case of state and religion not being separated, hence why it SHOULD be blown out of proportion. The little things add up..

[MrTwilliger]

They are nuts cause they are giving free money to a nut to try to support their nutty cause

As an atheist he's no different than some religious nuts who feel they have go overboard to impose their beliefs on others.....He failed....All he had to do was chill and not make a big deal.

Exactly.
If he didnt want to part take in the prayer, he could easily well, not taken part in it instead of being a whiny bish and complaining to the school board.

The issue isn't about whether or not he should be taking part in the prayer, rather the actual prayer itself is an illegal act to commit inside of a public school. He made his stand because the school, despite the student making a formal complaint about the unlawful nature of this prayer, still decided to disrespect his concerns and commit the unlawful act anyway. It's not an argument of whether or not one side is more important than the other, of whether one side is more dramatic than the other, rather it's an argument about the schools violating the laws that forbid that kind of act occurring in a public schooling environment.

The U.S. Supreme Court has been vigilant in forbidding public schools and other agencies of the government to interfere with Americans' constitutional right to follow their own consciences when it comes to religion. In 1962, the justices ruled that official prayer had no place in public education.

This decision is widely misunderstood today. The court did not rule that students are forbidden to pray on their own; the justices merely said that government officials had no business composing a prayer for students to recite. The Engel v. Vitale case came about because parents in New York challenged a prayer written by a New York education board. These Christian, Jewish and Unitarian parents did not want their children subjected to state-sponsored devotions. The high court agreed that the scheme amounted to government promotion of religion.

In the following year, 1963, the Supreme Court handed down another important ruling dealing with prayer in public schools. In Abington Township School District v. Schempp, the court declared school-sponsored Bible reading and recitation of the Lord's Prayer unconstitutional.

Source: http://www.au.org/resources/brochures/p ... c-schools/
That article was linked in the original article and since I'm not American, I read over it for a bit of basic understanding as to the laws that govern 'praying' in a public school environment.

[strangelove]

You're either not from the US or very naive if you believe this is about defenseless Christians being persecuted by the godless atheist for a harmless school prayer. This is about holding individuals accountable for laws broken and civil rights being trampled on. Any public space or facility that is government-funded is not allowed to promote or sponsor any one religion or faith and is to prevent such violations from occurring. If this were a private school, then I would agree that this was a pointless fight to pursue because such actions would be allowed. Furthermore, these are the type of people that wouldn't flinch for one second to stop any other non-Christian prayer from being uttered at graduation.

As an atheist he's no different than some religious nuts who feel they have go overboard to impose their beliefs on others.....He failed....All he had to do was chill and not make a big deal.

In general, atheists have no issues about anyone praying to whatever god or deity they want. You can pray till you're blue in the face and collapse from hypoxia for all we care, as long as it isn't violating anyone else's rights. Was the student robbing people of their faith? No. What beliefs did he impose on others? The belief that public schools and facilities shouldn't promote any one religion? That's not a belief, that's law which applies to everyone. Take your false equivalence argument elsewhere.

Civil rights exist specifically because minority groups 'make a big deal' when treated like second-class citizens.

[NuclearSilo]

I'm not from the US, but.. what's the impact with having a prayer in school? Like it will change anything with/without?