Wednesday, August 31, 2005

OPT OUT OF MILITARY MARKETING


Buried deep within the No Child Left Behind Act is a provision that requires public high schools to hand over students' private contact information to military recruiters. If a school does not comply, it risks losing vital federal education funds. As if that weren't bad enough, the Pentagon has now built an illegal database of 30 million 16 to 25-year-olds as another recruitment tool.

Am I the only one that sees this as somehow inappropriate? I definitely have a problem knowing that the youth I minister to and with are being targeted at SCHOOL by military recruiters and that these recruiters automatically get access to their PRIVATE contact information. Sounds pretty "sneaky sneaky" to me.

I found this "Action Plan" to help speak out against this.

Action 1: Protect our Children - "Opt Them Out!"

Action 2: Host a Back-To-School Event
Sept. 18 Blakemore and West Nashville Youth , my youth group, will be hosting a Back To School "Opting Out" Event.

Action 3: Tell Others about what's going on!!!

You don't have to be against the war, or be a pacifist to believe that some aspects of the way the government and our military conducts business is inappropriate- THIS IS ONE OF THOSE TIMES. PLEASE act on this and let our leaders, our boards of education, and local representatives know that the Christian community does not support this kind of military marketing to teenagers.

shalom,
jonathon

3 comments:

Chris said...

Glad you've got something to complain about regarding public schools. I know how you feel--abortion without parental notification, sex-ed classes that mock abstinence, and a culture that promotes moral relativism in all things have had me wanting to say, "Leave my child alone!" for some time now.

And I'm a strong supporter of public education. Go figure.

Jonathon said...

Is there just a breakdown of communication between govenment sponsored programs in our schools? What else do we not know about?

jn

John said...

This is a fairly easy thing to oppose, since the No Child Left Behind Act in and of itself violates the 10th Amendment.