If there's anything more frightening someone can say than "Burn the books," I'm not sure what it is.
Well, maybe "Ready, aim, fire," but aside from real violence, the thought of suppressing ideas by burning the paper on which they're printed is about as anti-democratic as it comes.
That's what you'll hear if you listen to this video from one of Glenn Beck's "Tea Party" meetings recently.
On the surface, what Beck is doing in trying to return America to the feeling people shared on Sept. 12, 2001 -- the day after the attacks -- seems relatively innocuous. But what is actually going on here is an anti-tax, anti-government, anti-Obama movement that's starting to sound really nasty.
I know there's an element of "whose ox is gored" in all of this. When George W. Bush was in office, those of us out of power said a lot of vicious things about him, just as the Republicans did when Bill Clinton was president.
But it seems like every time it happens again, it's another rip in our national fabric, and it seems to me this time there's a disturbing undercurrent of anti-intellectualism in it. When someone asks the woman who wanted to burn books in the video what she means, she talks about the "evolution crap."
I have otherwise intelligent friends who reject the idea of evolution, but they know they're doing it in spite of scientific evidence. I myself am a practicing Catholic who has read and accepts Genesis, seeing no contradiction at all between an obviously allegorical Creation story and Charles Darwin's theories.
What bothers me the most about this is that both sides seem so angry in support of their point of view. Liberals see conservatives wanting to "dumb down" America in a world where we need to be smarter, and conservatives see liberals as wanting to eliminate God from our lives.
I'm afraid this won't end well.
An update -- and an apology -- on delays
12 years ago
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3 comments:
Sorry, but sometimes you come across as an arrogant bastard.
I have TWO doctorates in natural science, and after years of opposing "creationalists", I finally got around to studying -- and I mean studying -- the evidence.
Two years -- one being my sabbatical year -- I invested in reading all sides and examining all of the evidence.
Many of the idiots in this video tape maybe can't rub their brains together to start a fire, but you -- a man I believe to be intelligent -- are so arrogant as to amaze me.
Not only did I change my complete position on evolution -- I now reject it as flawed -- I even returned to the religion of my youth that I rejected -- Roman Catholicism -- and discovered more real evidence for believing in the God of the Bible than in so much of the nonsense that passes for knowledge in our society, our institutions of higher learning, and our governmental.
I'm still a registered Democrat and I will remain one. I believe I can do more good staying in the party I believe cares about the "little" guy (at least in principle, certainly neither party helps the individual in practice).
What this video shows is a group of very frustrated people using what information and knowledge they have to respond to forces they believe do not listen to them or care about them.
I also chafed at the "burn the books" comment, as most reasonable people would, but I don't take it at face value.
You certainly are entitled to your opinion, but you're as biased and judgmental as the very people you criticize.
As a scientist, I can hold a theorem in mind while exploring the evidence that supposedly disproves it.
That's called being objective, and being fair.
Mike, I challenge you: you are NOT fair.
Sure, it's your website, but ever since my daughter started reading it as a college assignment, I find myself drifting to it when I check my mail or do online research. Consequently, I consider it in part "mine" as well -- because I take my time to read you and read your readers' comments.
My challenge to you is this: start examining your own biases and prejudices.
One line you wrote in this blog would've angered a lot of people in my small church. You wrote about the book of Genesis and called the creation account "allegorical."
Do you actually know what allegorical means?
Six days may indeed be a literal six days as we know it, but it also could be six years or six centuries of six millennial periods. "Time" as we know it had not yet been invented, according to the biblical account.
Why do you and other so-called intellectuals feel the need to have to "understand" everything?
I've been a member of Mensa and years ago I stopped attending all functions because the people I met there insisted on controlling any debate much the same way the folks in the video do. Yes, one group would be elitists and the other would revel in their "common sense." Both err.
Your recent blog and document for a Third Party in politics was compelling, but then you fall back on pridefully dismissing anyone who doesn't agree with you.
If you want to know what's wrong with America, take a long, hard look in the mirror.
You have met the enemy and guess what, you are one.
What we need are for scientists to be scientists and for schools to revert back to teaching with bias.
And for writers -- particularly the bright and talented ones -- to work their craft with care.
Help illuminate and call subjective opinions and practices into question WITHOUT condemning the practitioners.
If we need something right now, it's to be "bigger" in forbearance and mercy. We ought to persuade with facts rather than mere rhetoric.
I blame the mass media in general because it doesn't really focus on the message, only on procuring the largest audience to exact the greatest profit. All this while under federal and state regulations.
Alright, I'll step back from the soap box, but you since you routinely use inflammatory language, I would urge you to filter it out -- as much as you can.
That comment you made: "I have otherwise intelligent friends who reject the idea of evolution, but they know they're doing it in spite of scientific evidence" is born of pure arrogance.
Maybe, just maybe, they know more than you do.
I certainly believe I do.
I'm almost sixty-nine years old, and I am on my second family. I remarried years after my first wife died -- and now I have three children in college. I hope they don't get brainwashed into believing something simply because one view is the only view represented. Their older siblings have children of their own -- and they admit that schools and society are far worse today than when they were growing up in the sixties.
I have had my own problems at my university and so I will not not sign my real name. Frankly, I'll retire when I wish and not before -- and simply disagreeing with the lock-step (and locked mind) endorsement of evolution -- which, my younger friend, existed LONG BEFORE Darwin's "On the Origin of Species". He merely popularized the theory of evolution with his own particular views on natural selection.
It's very late, and I have to return to grading graduate papers.
This whole rebuttal grew out of a break I took from my work to read your blogs -- and the annoyance I felt at seeing you replicate what you accuse others of -- intolerance and bias.
Please, rise to the occasion. Don't slip into partisan rhetoric.
A.B. in the O.C.
Wow.
What a LONG rebuttal.
Okay, doc. But you have to admit there's room for disagreement. Just because you're an "expert" in your area, it doesn't mean I have to agree with you -- even IF I'm not an expert.
Meanwhile, interesting bit with the video, Mike.
Maybe the doc has something -- maybe we can't take at face value remars like "burn the books" from people who are losing their jobs, their homes, and to some degree, their minds.
If it seems that everyone is pissed, then maybe we should look at who profits most when people are clawing up one another.
The banks and soon the insurance companies are going to rape the national purse -- and everyday people know who's getting it in the end.
I'm a reasonable person, but even I get upset more easily nowadays.
Maybe we should take a collective big breath -- and try to figure out what's going on.
PAM IN POMONA
I've already revealed that my "time" was decades ago and with that, I can see things in a different perspective than most people.
Yes, there's always been varying degrees of opposition -- and as I mentioned that Joe McCarthy managed (along with communism) to divide the country much the way it's divided today.
Yet, in all of my life, I've never seen such acrimony and bitterness.
maybe PAM IN POMONA has something.
maybe there are people using the economy and other issues to divert us.
I wonder how we ever got to this place, but I'm more concerned for my grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
They are the ones who will have to live in the world we're leaving.
Herb
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