Fellow blogger Mike Stuchbery is experiencing some flak from the fine Christians at Access Ministries at the moment, after he used some pictures from a new graphic novel that will be used as “teaching” material in SRI classes. Mike had this to say about it :
It’s a weird sort of publication, ostensibly mean to impart good, Christian values, but mostly comprising gunfights, bloodshed, messages of revenge, violence and clumsy renditions of the racism of the time. As a historical text, it’s shamefully bad stuff. It’s also ridiculously anti-science. Also, it seems to advocate killin’ cops. In all seriousness, I’d be very worried if I found primary school kids reading it.
I wholeheartedly agree, it’s a weird piece that sends equivocal, if any, messages, and it features way too much violence and fight scenes. Sure, that’s kind of biblical, but I would not want this shit anywhere near a primary school child.
Now, Access doesn’t usually deal well with criticism, so diverting from the usual script of crying persecution, this time they got their legal team to write a threatening letter, claiming copyright infringement.
Now, I’m not a legal expert, and there might be a point to their argument wrt the pdf file of the whole book, but I can tell you one thing.
There is a public interest in knowing which materials Access Ministries is using to brainwash our children, and maybe the lawyers at Access should google the term Streisand effect, and then think again whether they want to keep to send these letters to bloggers. because there’s more where Mike came from.
Just sayin’.
By the way, I note that a preview of 4 pages of this book is available for free online on the address linked above. One of the lines that the author makes some guy say :
“I hear Melbourne’s nothing but women now, doing what their husbands should be.”
And this is relevant for the religious education of an 8 year old in 2011 ? Access should be under no illusions here. We won’t stop exposing their bigotry and proselytising efforts. Welcome to the internet !
