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Subject: PLANS' lost case
[someone] wrote: Whew, Sune, yesterday PLANS had lost all credibility, the litigation was doomed, and the discussion on this list was "dying."PLANS has lost its credibility in terms of demonstrating since long that it contributes very little to the discussion of what probably engages most waldorf parents, but is caught up in focusing on fringe problems with very little bearing on WE or WS in general as part of Dan's fundamentalist ideological warfare, not primarily on the major part of WE as such, which is quite OK to him when done by other than Waldorf trained people. That that is all there is left to PLANS, was shown by Dan in his letting this ideological warfare show its real face through Michael Kopp, for whom the Debra - as President of PLANS seemingly since its start - has expressed her love for in his, in her eyes, 'keeping the discussion on track'. What Dan did the last weeks, was letting this combined personal-ideological war by PLANS, particularly the personal part nurtured by Debra as the long term President of PLANS, come to full bloom and show its real face for a time. In letting this happen, it demonstrated that the essence of PLANS as represented by its President, has very little credibility on a large scale. The litigation by PLANS is doomed. See below. As for the discussion, even if there is some lingering impetus, it's a dead end, basically decaying discussion, dying to the extent that Dan lets it develop as the purely personal-ideological war it is in essence from the side of PLANS. Most participants actually interested in WE and having come here to see if they can learn something interesting about WE, realizing that is what PLANS, its site and this list is about, and it - being a dead end discussion - sooner or later leave it for this reason, if not trapped into or returning to eternal unfruitful quarrels and arguing by PLANS' supporters. You, Dan, Debra and some other PLANS supporters don't want this to happen and people to leave, and try to keep the ideological warfare on anthroposophy going. To the extent newcomers realize the nature of this 'personal-ideological warfare' and not are fundamentalists in the same vein, which most - even the Vice-president of PLANS - did when Dan gave Debra's beloved brute free hands to start slaughter those he considered to be on the 'wrong side', they withdraw. To the extent that this discussion is developed according to the drive of Dan and Debra, more as a personal war from Debra and more as ideological war from Dan on anthroposophy, it is a basically unfruitful, dead end, receding discussion. As an actual, developing and fruitful discussion, years of discussion on this list has made it clear that it only can develop outside this of this forum for personal, ideological war by Dan and Debra. That also is where the greater part of discussion on WE
is taking place, by people of whom many have looked into the activities
of PLANS and realized the unfruitfulness of the discussions on this list.
Wendy's list, that I mentioned, is just one example of many of people creating
fora for fruitful discussion from all sorts of angles, not stuck in the
personal-ideological warfare of primarily Debra and Dan on this list, joined
and supported by Sharon and some others of different backgrounds with the
same war or
[someone] ... Maybe you've missed the major arguments here, Sune? Dan has not suggested anthroposophists be thrown in jail and tortured.That he personally aims at is not torture. As for jail, one part of his arguing on anthroposophical physicians implicitly goes in that direction, also indicated by his tacitly supporting way of bringing the developing inquisition spirit in France into this discussion. As is shown in his comment to Kerr, that I read in passing and commented on, I think it reveals the implicit argument in much of what he writes on this list; what people do inspired by anthroposophy is OK, when not done for specifically that reason, that they have been inspired by 'anthroposophy. IF they do it on the basis of some thinking in anthroposophical terms, however, that should be prohibited, not because what is being done as such is bad or wrong, but purely because those who have thought about it in one or other anthroposophical or related way, have been developed an incorrect thinking about it. This war on what he considers to be incorrect thinking is identical to the argument by the Medieval Inquisition in its war on anyone who did not think correctly about the spiritual world. Dan's war is just one variant of it, developed in many forms in history and in periods in different parts of the world, also today, especially during the last decades. Dan does not want to torture people and he does not primarily want to put in some way spiritually oriented people in prison. What he does argue, however, is that if and when people act on the basis of some spiritually oriented thinking as something that actually could have a bearing on the material external world (thinking monistically), that is, as something more than as a personal faith about a world beyond, he opposes it with all his soul. One of the most developed expressions of such a monistic philosophy and thinking, not only discussing beyond worldly issues, but also this-worldly issues, is anthroposophy. There are philosophies and spiritual traditions, that do not let people relate to the spiritual world in a free way out of their own experiences and thinking. I know of no other spiritual philosophy that, even if having developed possible understanding and hints for understanding about the man and the universe more broad and extensive than any other that I have seen, lets people do it in such a free way as anthroposophy. That comes to expression in that the single precondition for membership in the Anthroposophical Society is that one sees the existence of spiritual research as an effort developed at Goetheanum as a School for Spiritual Science to be justified. Nothing else in terms of believing or adhering to any thought except: There is a spiritual world and it is possible for everyone to develop an ever more conscious awareness of this spiritual side of reality in the sense of individual spiritual research. That is all. If you don't think that is possible, nothing forces you to become a member of the Anthroposophical Society. That is a challenge to both its supporters, constantly being faced with the danger of developing anthroposophy in a fundamentalist and inhuman direction as a danger facing any view of the world. It is also a challenge to fundamentalists on both the 'spiritual' side and on the 'materialist' side. You yourself once demanded that all Waldorf teachers should be prepared to demonstrate that they know about everything Steiner ever has expressed as his understanding of 'anthroposophy' as documented by some 350 lecture series and defend it to the last comma, seemingly not understanding that anthroposophy could be anyhing else than this projected fundamentalism. This projected fundamentalism is what Dan argues and opposes against, thinking and arguing - based on a somewhat fundamentalist dualist view that the external world in itself has nothing whatsoever to do with anything spiritual - that if anyone not only disagrees with that, but also in any way works professionally on that basis, they should be deprived of their possibilities to do that, based on their thinking about it. That is working for thought cencureship in the tradition of Fahrenheit 451, the litigation by PLANS and Dan's argumentation on this list only being more civil forms of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages. He has suggested their schools are not eligible for US tax dollars. He, and others, have certainly pointed out many problems with anthroposophy and the running of said schools. I think with today's outburst you kinda blew your own credibility with the "PLANS is dying" angle.Maybe you have missed out on the outcome of the litigation by PLANS, financed by right wing fundamentalist money, expressing the essence of the argumentation by PLANS, on the two school districts in CA. PLANS case is lost, dying and only keep alive artificially by PLANS. Judge Damrell in September 1999 ruled that public school programs using Waldorf methods have a secular non-religious purpose, meaning that they in that sense do not violate the US constitution. In May this year, he also in addition found that PLANS had not shown, neither that, were it not for the Waldorf method, the new Yuba River Charter School would not have opened, nor that 'substantial money' was spent on 'religious education' at the public Waldorf charter schools in question as was the implied demand for a ruling in favour of PLANS, based on the ruling in the case of Altman vs. Bedford Central School District (http://hem.passagen.se/thebee/comments/...Court_Decision.htm). This accords with the declaration by the two school districts
of Twin Ridges and Sacramento city, that the schools do not teach religion,
anthroposophy, or any of the personal philosophical beliefs of Rudolf Steiner
The only remaining straw that the appeal clings to is if it could be shown that public school programs using Waldorf methods would make the pupils more 'anthroposophically inclined' any more than the body of parents, for example in demonstrating that they after school would tend to choose to study for one or other anthroposophically inspiried profession, like Waldorf teacher, biodynamic farmer, some profession at an anthroposophically oriented therapeutic home or some other way. Experiences from a number of Waldorf schools does not support such an hypothesis. As for the constitution not allowing the use of tax-payer money to support schools that are based on some spiritual view or basis, as I think PLANS argued in a Press Release after having lost the case, that is not the interpretation by those School authorities in Arizona who supported the starting of a Catholic charter school a number of years ago (http://www.tucsonweekly.com/tw/1999-10-14/danehy.html) It is also not what is being practices within the frames of the school voucher system, that is an ever more wide spread system of financing a free, not state directed school system based on the right of every child to get an education based on the choice of their parents, within some general frames. (http://www.jsonline.com/news/metro/may00...22052100a.asp) 28 June last year; 2000, the Supreme Court ruled that taxpayer money can be used to buy computers and other instructional materials for religious schools; (http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/...textbooksruling_000628.html) As to the views of Teachers Unions, in- and outside US on the vouchers system, they generally support it. http://www.adti.net/teacherchoice/choice.html : 'A survey of members of the Association of American Educators, an independent teachers association, found that 14 percent agree with the NEA's position on school choice, while 76 percent disagree. Teacher union officials from Sweden, Belgium, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Australia, and Denmark say choice including, in most cases, government support for private schools works.' The separation between the Church and the State is followed by the natural separation also between the School system and the State, only keeping some general legal frames for the work of the schools as criterion for financing them as something everybody, independently of parental economical status, have the right to. Everything points to development leaving PLANS behind as a marginal phenomenon, for a time trying to make the 'correct thinking' of rationalist, sceptic secular humanists the rule of a developing school system, in the spirit of the Medieval Inquisition, only with some more civil means. In general, that shows that PLANS' interpretation of the US Constitution is an expression of an ever greater misunderstanding. Regards, Sune Nordwall
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