I am on Rev. Donald Wildmon’s email list. Trust me, this can be an enlightening email list to be on at times. It’s always good to keep an eye on those with whom you disagree.

Dear Friend of the Family,

or at least, Perceived Friend of the Family

American Family Association/American Family Radio is partnering with Tim Todd Ministries this week (August 29 – September 2) to place the TRUTH FOR YOUTH BIBLE into the hands of our teenagers who will distribute them to lost students in our public schools.

I am going to assume they don’t mean by ‘Lost’ that the students are vampires. Or maybe they do.

Parents and grandparents are urged to participate in this vital campaign by calling the toll free number below and ordering a free Bible for a teenager to distribute at school. Tim Todd Ministries has underwritten the costs of making this Bible available free of charge.

[…]

“The Truth For Youth” consists of the entire New Testament in the God’s Word version, along with powerful full color comics that are packed with “absolute truths” regarding issues young people are faced with, such as: Evolution, Sexual Purity, Homosexuality, Abortion, Pornography, Drugs, Drunkenness, Peer Pressure, School Violence and Secular Rock Music. God’s wonderful plan of salvation is incorporated into each of the stories. (You may view the comics at www.truthforyouth.com.)

I advise against it, unless you feel you must.

The Student’s Legal Rights on Public School Campuses are displayed on the back cover of “The Truth For Youth” to inform school administrator’s and young people that they have the right to give Bibles away on campus during non-instructional time.

This is what truly spurred this post, as throughout reading this email I was thinking “is distributing religious literature allowed in public high schools?”

So I found the Student’s Legal Rights on Public School Campuses:

I. THE RIGHT to meet with other religious students.
II. THE RIGHT to identify your religious beliefs through signs and symbols.
III. THE RIGHT to talk about your religious beliefs on campus.
IV. THE RIGHT to distribute religious literature on campus.
V. THE RIGHT to pray on campus.
VI. THE RIGHT to carry or study your Bible on campus.
VII. THE RIGHT to do research papers, speeches, and creative projects with religious themes.
VIII. THE RIGHT to be exempt. Student may be exempt from activities and class content that contradict their religious beliefs.
IX. THE RIGHT to celebrate or study religious holidays on campus.
X. THE RIGHT to meet with school officials.

I agree with all 10, except for number 4. The reason they cite is the Equal Access Act which gives students the right to meet. But that was Right number I. Distributing literature goes beyond meeting.

To quote from the Act itself, here are a few restrictions:

The group is student-initiated.

This email says nothing about groups, but assuming that a bible group is already on campus, this group activitiy is being initiated by the AFA. See following.

Persons from the community may not “direct, conduct, control, or regularly attend activities of student groups.”

This activity is being directed, conducted, and controled by the AFA. Parents and grandparents (members of the community) are being encouraged to buy bibles for their kids and grandkids to distribute.

IANAL (nor do I play one on TV) But to me, this looks like a violation.

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

Dwight D. Eisenhower, U.S. general and 34th president (1890-1969)

Every year, Beloit College releases their “Mindset List” for the incoming college class.
Here are 14 items from this year’s list.

BELOIT COLLEGE MINDSET LIST FOR THE CLASS OF 2009

Most students entering college this fall were born in 1987.

2. They don’t remember when ‘cut and paste’ involved scissors.
4. Wayne Gretzky never played for Edmonton.
8. They never had the fun of being thrown into the back of a station wagon with six others.
9. Iran and Iraq have never been at war with each other.
10. They are more familiar with Greg Gumbel than with Bryant Gumbel.
15. Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker have never preached on television.
19. Condoms have always been advertised on television.
29. The Starship Enterprise has always looked dated.
37. They have grown up in a single superpower world.
41. Les Miserables has always been on stage.
53. They do not remember “a kinder and gentler nation.”
54. They never saw the shuttle Challenger fly.
58. They never saw Pat Sajak or Arsenio Hall host a late night television show.
75. They have always been challenged to distinguish between news and entertainment on cable TV.

The rest are listed here

A few months ago a community social group chose me to be their leader. (insert maniacal laughter)

So when the aliens arrive, and ask one of them to take them to their leader, the odds are they’ll lead them to me. Which I’m not sure I’m ready for.

I’m not sure I was ready for any of this.

But I’ve begun to develop a list of rules that other leaders might find full of wisdom

Heading the list:
1) When you are leading a group meeting, it is best not to be drinking alcohol.
2) Someone should be recording the minutes.

I’ll share a few other items on the list later.

I receive a poem in my email every day. Today’s was written by George Gordon Byron, aka Lord Byron.

It’s title: So We’ll Go No More a-Roving

There’s no sense in me reprinting the words here. I just like the title. That’s the entire purpose of this post.

Amazon has something new called Amazon Shorts

Short fiction and essays for fifty cents. (It doesn’t say specifically on the site, but I’ve read that the author gets 20 cents, and Amazon gets 30 cents. This may or may not be true.) Author John Scalzi has written a good review of the concept.

I downloaded an essay by Terry Brooks entitled, “Why I Write About Elves.” I also downloaded an essay by Robert Silverberg entitled, “Building Alternative Realities.” I really had no idea both articles would be approaching the same idea from different directions. Silverberg focused on creating Alternative History. Changing some event in history and extrapolating the results.

I’ll excerpt one paragraph from this long essay.

One of the earliest such tales of alternative reality that I know of is Edward Everett Hale’s “Hands Off,” published in Harper’s Magazine in 1898. The one little twist here is the assumption that Joseph, the son of Jacob, was never sold into slavery in Egypt, but, instead, had escaped the slave traders and returned to his father’s camp in the desert. Whereupon — without the shrewd mind of Joseph to guide its government — Egypt was conquered by Canaanite barbarians, who went on to engulf the rest of the ancient world. Judaism died out, the great culture of Greece never had a chance to emerge, Rome was crushed, and a reign of “lust, brutality, terror, cruelty, carnage, famine, agony, horror” descended on humanity, until…

Silverberg finishes that last sentence, but I won’t. And I’m going to go in search of that book, even though I already know everything that’s going to happen. He goes on to explain how he went about creating one of his own alternative realities.

Terry Brooks discusses the exact same thing…though he discusses alternate realities that are formed on the foundation of magic…

More often than not, fantasy takes place in an imaginary world. It relies on imaginary creatures and that all-important element of magic. In order for this to be possible and for the book to succeed, there must be an acceptance of both characters and story that, however odd or foreign to a reader’s real life experience, allows for a willing suspension of disbelief. Within the parameters of the world the writer creates, everything must hang together in a reasonable, cohesive way.

Many people think writing fantasy is easy, because you get to make your world up and aren’t bound to the facts. But you have to create your own facts, and stick to them, because if you’re inconsistent your reader will catch you.

The same is true with science fiction. You may have a little flexibility in what will be possible 200 years from now, or what the world might be like if Lincoln hadn’t been shot. But if you have no idea the progression of events that leads to your reality, your reader is likely to notice, and not believe it.

Most upsetting about the two essays is that Robert Silverberg in his describes a book that sounds a little bit like one I have been working on for a few years. I’m sure the concept is treated differently, but now I’m going to have to read that book and make sure.