This post on Boing Boing seems a little weird to me. Its bloggers normally tend to come out in favor of science, rationalism, logic, etc. against beliefs and practices that they perceive as superstitious and irrational.And yet, we’re clearly meant to be outraged that threats of picketing forced a public library to cancel its summer program of teaching kids astrology, palmistry, numerology, and tarot card reading.
Maybe the library will have to go to Plan B, and expose the kids to science, art, and literature this summer.
(In the original piece there’s also an allusion to a bomb threat. But in context it’s not clear that this was one of the threats that was actually made, or if it’s meant to illustrate how seriously the library takes children’s safety. If there was a real bomb threat, no mention is made of the police being involved.)
Wade Rockett 
There is some difference. In most of the cases these days, the forces against rationalism are trying to bring their irrationalism into a state-mandated setting, i.e. public schools, which are compulsory*. In this case, however, the irrationalism is strictly voluntary — state-supported, but not state-mandated.
Although, really, of course it’s not about what, it’s about who. The tendency to just be anti-conservative Christian is just a dimension of the same tendency that makes it so easy for us to organize into political parties — the shortcut of choosing and being on a side.