Christian Evangelicals, Living in the Land of Ludicrous (Aka: Texas)

A high school in Austin, Texas has issued student ID cards with an embedded microchip that can be used to find the location of a student while on school property. The school sees this as a safety issue; in case of an emergency, they can know the location of any student. The microchips can be used to pay for school lunches and also enable the school to know how many students are in their home rooms at the beginning of the day which is a measure for how much tax money that school district receives.

Andrea Hernandez and her parents fussed about the microchip saying it would let administrators track when Andrea was in the bathroom. The school explained that they do not have someone assigned to sit in front of a computer monitor and track students all day long. “When I need to find (a student), I can enter his random number and I can find him somewhere as a red dot on that computer screen…it’s not about tracking them.” 

In an effort to accommodate the Hernandez family, the school agreed to remove the microchip from Ms. Hernandez’ ID card; but the family still refused to allow her to wear the ID and are suing the school on religious grounds, claiming that wearing the ID indicates “submission to a false god”.  Their lawsuit cites the book of Revelation, stating that “acceptance of a certain code…from a secular ruling authority” is a form of idolatry.  Their representative explained that Evangelicals view this as the “mark of the beast”.

Republican state Rep. Lois Kolkhorst has introduced several bills to outlaw the technology in Texas. She is hoping the publicity from the Hernandez case will help with her fight.

what eye thynk:    Once the school agreed to remove the computer chip from Ms. Hernandez’ ID this issue should have been moot. 
  
 You have to wonder if this child expects to live the rest of her life in a bubble.

• College will require a student ID, so I guess there will be no further education.
• Employees wear employee IDs, so forget about getting a job.
• Welfare recipients carry government IDs, so there will be no government assistance.
• Life will be hard, but she won’t be shopping at any of our wholesale clubs, because they issue membership IDs.
• If she continues to live in Texas, she won’t be able to vote because that state requires a voter ID.
• And, oh, forget about that drivers’ license when she turns 16.

I could go on, but sometimes the religious right makes it so easy to make fun of them that it takes all the joy out of it.　

This just proves that, if you look hard enough, you will be able to find a lawyer to take your case and, if it's far right enough, a Republican to champion it--no matter how ludicrous.