Reason, faith, and tax-funding for education
February 23, 2006 by Paul McKeever · Leave a Comment
Reprint
The non-sectarian presumption
The London Fog
Thursday, February 23, 2006
Freedom Party of Ontario leader Paul McKeever sends along this letter in response to the Izvestia editorial on that mythical beast, “non-sectarian” education:
I agree that it is a mistake for the government to use taxes to subsidize “faith-based” schools. However, it is self-defeating to base that opposition on the idea that a society that funds multiculturalism should protect funding for a “melting pot role” of public education.
Intentionally or unintentionally, all schools – public and private – have a major influence on a child’s beliefs about the nature of reality, about how it can be understood, and about morality. When a government funds or subsidizes a school with taxes, it eliminates any pretence of a separation of church and state. The state becomes a god of sorts. The schools it funds become its temples. The taxpayer becomes the state’s followers, compelled to pay for the temples and to accept, on faith, that the state is the origin of moral truth. All schools a government funds are “faith-based” in that sense.
In a day when tax-cutters are blamed for murders, our politicians – to avoid offending any voter – fund public schools in which moral relativism wages war against objective codes of right and wrong. At a time when the criminalization of blasphemy is considered seriously in some quarters, Mr. Tory would have the state fund mysticism in a war against the idea that man can understand the universe and use reason alone to distinguish right from wrong. The religious and the moral relativists must be free to teach their children their beliefs and philosophies, but not at the expense of those whose philosophy they seek to destroy. Instead of funding public or private schools with taxes, we must let every parent pay tuition directly to the school that their child attends, and only to that school. A separation of education and taxation is reason’s only hope.
Paul McKeever
Leader, Freedom Party of Ontario
Courting the 'burbs
August 6, 2005 by Paul McKeever · Leave a Comment
National Post, Letters
Saturday, August 06, 2005
Re: A City Stunt that’ll Play Well in the ‘Burbs, Adam Radwanski, Aug. 5.Contrary to Mr. Radwanski’s speculation, Stephen Harper’s promise to make drivers, cyclists and pedestrians subsidize GO Transit and Toronto Transit Commission fares will not “endear” him to those living in the 905 belt. Mr. Harper does not propose that drivers receive a similar subsidy for their gasoline, licensing fees, artificially inflated auto insurance premiums or car maintenance costs. Nor can I imagine that drivers, cyclists and pedestrians will discontinue their current mode of transportation for a chance to give Mr. Harper a peck at the GO’s Kiss ‘n’ Ride.
To make residents of Oshawa, Ont., or Flin Flon, Manitoba subsidize GO and TTC riders is not merely something that will turn off Harper’s “conservative base” — it will rightly turn off anybody who believes that it is wrong to hitch your wagon to another person’s horse. Each individual should pay the full cost of his own freight, and should choose only the method of transportation that he or she can afford.
Mr. Harper would do well to advocate the tried-and-true policy of personal responsibility: “Pay only for what you get, and get only what you pay for.” The something-for-nothingers displeased with that message have already parked their votes and their Volvos elsewhere.
Paul McKeever, Uxbridge, Ont.
