Court Rules Teachers Still Allowed to Mention Creationism Is Ridiculous

In a stunning upset victory for common sense, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals threw out a lawsuit against a high school history teacher brought by one of his students who complained the teacher said in class that Creationism is "religious, superstitious nonsense." In the Olden Daze this would have been the sort of moment where the student raises his hand and says, "I disagree with you, shall we discuss this?" but eh, someone's homework assignment didn't exactly get done last night, how about he sues for an injunction instead? No more homework from that sharia atheist teacher again, ever!

From the Orange County Register:  

A federal appeals court on Friday tossed out a lower court’s ruling that Capistrano Valley High School teacher James Corbett violated a student’s constitutional rights by making comments disparaging to religion, saying Corbett could not have known he might be breaking the law.

The ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said laws regarding what a teacher can and cannot say about religion are insufficiently clear to indicate whether Corbett violated the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, which courts have interpreted as prohibiting government officials from displaying religious hostility.

“Nothing put Corbett on notice that his statements might violate the Establishment Clause. More to the point, we are aware of no prior case holding that a teacher violated the Establishment Clause by appearing critical of religion during class lectures, nor any case with sufficiently similar facts to give a teacher “fair warning” that such conduct was unlawful,” the ruling states.

The apes win again. [ Orange County Register ]