From time to time, we're reminded of the right's general hostility towards science. The assault tends to be all-encompassing -- climate science, medical research, modern biology, sex ed -- and my friend Chris Mooney even wrote a brilliant book about it, documenting the extent to which conservatives have targeted the scientific process itself.
That said, Rep. Paul Broun (R-Ga.), one of Congress' most far-right members, is taking Republican opposition to science to a more startling level.
For those who can't watch clips online, here's what Broun said when he spoke two weeks ago at the 2012 Sportsman's Banquet at Liberty Baptist Church in Hartwell, Ga.
"God's word is true. I've come to understand that. All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the big bang theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell. And it's lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior. You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I've found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth. I don't believe that the earth's but about 9,000 years old. I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That's what the Bible says."
For the record, Broun's religious beliefs are obviously his businesses, and if he chooses to believe cosmology, biology, and geology are, quite literally, "lies straight from the pit of Hell," that's between the congressman and his conscience.
But the larger, national significance to this is that Broun isn't just some private citizen who rejects science; he's a member of Congress who sits on the House Science Committee.
I don't care that Broun prefers ignorance to knowledge, and chooses to reject evidence and reason, but it should matter that a man who thinks the planet is 9,000 years old is helping shape science policy in the U.S. House of Representatives in the 21st century.
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Getting all their ducks in a row? First Roberts as Chief Justice-go ahead IRS take away tax exemption from politicing preschers while he and the other activist republican justices are on the court, then putting this clown on the science committee -which of course will trickle down as a way to force creationism into the classroom.
There is a takeover in progress,well then again I guess using the term progress is on borrowed time.
How in the world could this MORON get a medical degree ?
How in hell does he get elected to anything ?
It is true, the further South you go, the dumber they get, amazing stupidity.
Aren't his voters embarrassed, I sure as hell am, but I don't live down South.
Easy, easy!! We aren't all mindless Bible-thumpers!
"It is true, the further South you go, the dumber they get, amazing stupidity."
Would you like someone from the south to explain to you all of the mistakes in this sentence? I live in Georgia. I did not vote for him. I am a secular humanist surrounded by religious people. Many of these religious people are using religion as a way to justify their wrong doings, but the vast majority of them were indoctrinated into the religion when they were children. I don't know if you know what that is like, but I do. It's a hard thing to trust the people who raised you, the community you live in, and then try to come to terms with scientific data in an area where you will be looked down on/yelled at/ridiculed because you had the gall to come to grips with the idea that what you've been told all of your life, the thing that has brought you comfort all of your life, and what has made you feel like you've had a purpose your entire life is all a story. Spare us your ignorance. It's not wanted.
no need to insult the entire south
Stupidity is independent of geography. Neither are the required proclamations and auto da fé.
Oh, we have our share of these nutters up north too. Bachman is from Minnesota, in case you forgot, and Wisconsin produced Paul Ryan and Reince Priebus.
We all have our work cut out for us if we're going to push back against this insanity.
I can go right up the street three miles to Porter Ranch here in the San Fernando Valley on any Sunday, walk in the "Shepherd of the Hills" megachurch, and hear the same ignorant crap. There are at least three other megachurches I can think of off the top of my head that are within 50 miles of my location here in Los Angeles, where one hears the same crap. When I go out to the airport in Chino, I see idiots who think airplanes fly because angels hold up the wings walking around with this sort of idiocy proudly proclaimed on their T-shirt.
My point is that "southernism," i.e., the public celebration of ignorance rooted in a fundamentalist "religion" is no longer confined to the South. Pretty much any of these "non-denominational" megachurches now found all over the country are Southern Baptist Churches in disguise.
I appreciate Paul Campbell's post, but I don't think it is anything quite that calculated... for one thing, I can't imagine how folks who believe the things this fool (Broun, I mean) says could be capable of calculation.
This is a dangerous position to take, Michael. NEVER underestimate your adversary. These theocrats are absolutely dangerous and a genuine threat to the republic. But they are not incapable. Quite the opposite; by sheer numbers alone, we who hold reason and accountability to be hallmarks of a civil, merciful and decent society are outnumbered nearly 10 to 1.
Strange Remain, we are not outnumbered we are outgunned. The forces of well-financed propaganda are arrayed against rationalism. It is to benefit the powerful that this country is kept divided. That strange small world which Mr. Broun inhabits is shared by merely a few, yet many more are cowed into acceptance of it through fear and ignorance.
Where is the line defining the separation between belief and faith . Having faith in ones beliefs without rigorous , i.e. , non faith based inquiry suggests an intolerable laziness , no ?
They would disagree and state that the whole concept of 'faith" relies on making sure there is no rigorous inquiry---over and above a document-able passage in the bible. Ancient crowd control. Worked well back then---not so well now.
By the way, Broun appears to be running unopposed.
Georgia's 10th Congressional district needs a write-in candidate, NOW!
(The district covers Athens and Augusta, among other parts of the state.)
Nice observation! How hard can it be to run against the party of willful ignorance? For a half-second there, you made me wish I lived in Athens so I can do it. But just a half-second.
To "write-in" a candidate assumes the ability to write! Let's search the area for a Democrat named X for whom they could vote.
It appears then that containment of this potentially contagious lunacy will come down to making sure his vote on that committee is an insignificant anomaly. We need to get out the vote in the Senate and Congressional elections not only this year, but in the 2014 mid-terms.
Broun's running in a district where it's all folks like him. That's why.
What's really mind-boggling is to talk to one of these people and point out things like the speed of light, which is the standard for discovering the age of the universe, or geology that demonstrates the age of the earth, and they will say that all of that was put in place by God because he let Satan create these "facts" to "test our faith" - what the hell kind of a God would do that????
Thirty years ago, that district gave rise to the B-52s and R.E.M. The latter's name comes from a scientific term.
Y'know, "Michael Stipe" is easy to spell. His bio has him born in the 2nd Cong. district, but maybe he's closer to Athens these days, or could be convinced to be?
They don't really give a @!$%# about reality, as you can tell listening to them. They just want a convenient framework for their bigotry and hatred.
They don't even believe the stupid @!$%# they "believe" half the time. Talk to a fundy long enough and everything they supposedly have faith in gets switched around.
They're just ignorant, mostly useless people. One day our society will have a use for them digging ditches or scraping fungus off the bottom of something or other, that is proportionate to their willingness to actually contribute.
It is scary, sad, and it makes the US a laughingstock around the world.
How can we be taken seriously as a country when our 'leaders' reject basic scientific concepts?
Do Republicans really think this thing doesn't matter in a world that is now interconnected?
Iran gets taken seriously and they do not have "The Bomb".
The world better be worried when zealots are trying to take over a Nation with the nuclear capability to destroy the world several times over!!
There are nuances to the concept of taking someone or something seriously. It is quite possible to realize both that a person or country is dangerous and that the person or country is despicable. It the Talibangelicals and their useful idiots take over the US, then there can be no legitimate doubt that more and more people in other countries will quickly conclude the the US is both dangerous and despicable. I'm sure there are already many people around the world who see the US that way. US nationalists will dismiss such considerations at their peril.
Thanks Steve,
I'm changing your name to Captain Buzzkill.. Another Religious Fruitloop in yet another position of absolute ineptitude! Gawd bless *Amercia! Yea!!
Remember the Spanish Inquisition? I think we're on our way to heresy trials.
sadly, i believe we are as well.
Looks like a witch-hunt for science teachers and "slutty" women who get pregnant from what is OBVIOUSLY not "legitimate" rape... as we all know that the female body has ways of "shutting that all down".
Science? PSSH. Lets go back to the days when the Earth was the center of the universe! We can cure cancer by using leaches, refute the existence of dinosaurs, and diagnose all our new Afghanistan vets plagued by PTSD with Possession by Terrorists!
"On our way"? They are already torturing prisoners. The inquisition has already begun.
I wouldn't have expected that!
(but then who would...)
Spanish Inquisition? Monty Python could use some bad tempered rodents (aka killer bunnies) right about now.
You know guys like Broun give religion a bad name. I have known Jesuits who were top tier scientists. Nobody doubted their devotion to their faith or to the scientific method.
I was educated by Jesuits. In science they taught us about the big bang, and evolution, and they reconciled it with their beliefs in theology class, by teaching us that billions of years ago, God created the big bang, and put all the building blocks in place, and let nature and evolution take it's course. They also taught us the bible is full of allegory, and parable, and lots of it is not meant to be taken literally.
Science and a belief in god aren't mutually exclusive for everyone.
A) For a God who always was and always will be, what is a day? I'm pretty certain it is NOT 24 hours because before the creation of the solar system, We didn't have a "clock" to determine what is OUR day, month or year.
B) It just makes good horse sense to me that when my God said "Let there be light" and all that vast beyond my comprehension nothingness obeyed His voice, it probably involved some type of an explosion, or "bang".
And while I believe my God could have created the world in 6 seconds if He wanted to, I find it an overwhelming expression of His love for us to take such a long careful process to give us this amazingly georgous planet to call home and we are absolutely responsible to cherish and protect this gift.
I don't remember exactly where it is stated in the Bible, but each of God's days was said to have been 1000 years.
That may be the case, but by playing nicey-nice with the nutters, the truly rational representatives of religion have willfully abandoned the field to the clowns and gadflies.
My science guys were Benedictines! No hanky panky regarding talking snakes vs. big bang vs. t rex vs. holy unicorns who missed the ark.
Guess who else is on the House Science Committee?
TODD AKIN - These guys are Captain and First Mate of the fail boat.
How do you right a ship of fools busily drilling holes in the bottom? This man has also been a physician since the 70's and since 2002 only makes "house"calls. ( Wikipedia Pun?) Maybe this is why he's been married 4 times!
It's like Limpdick and Newtie - eventually the women figure out they can't stand the insanity no matter how much money is involved (though Newtie appears to have met his match in mendacity - the "good Catholic woman" who had no problem having an affair with him).
Michelle Bachmann was right!
The Taliban has infiltrated the sacred halls of congress.
Simply beyond salvation. The dead head wrecks his own life and is compelled by his dereliction to bring his wreck to D.C. Not by the grace of god.
Yep. We better get used to this nonsense. I'm now coming around to the ideas that Obama's just not into this presidential thing anymore and our children, once Romney's elected, will soon be taught that enterprising young cavemen came up with the worlds first dinosaur rodeo on the night of the sixth day.
And Paul Ryan is on the Arithmetic Committee.
Rep. Paul Broun is a doctor who sits on the Science Committee with Todd Akin. Could Paul Broun be one of these mysterious doctors that Akin is citing?
He might be one of those who perform abortions on women who aren't pregnant.
@Dan_p When Akin said that in 2008, he also cited "doctors". Broun won his seat in a 2007 special election. I wonder what history these two might have together.
Does Paul Broun even know a lick about St. Thomas Aquinas?
If not, he is truly a very scary person, and if reelected into a Republican-majority House, Mr. Broun could become a leading figure in the retardation of our beloved nation! -Kevo
I do not know Dr. Broun personally, but I'd be willing to bet serious money that Broun has not read a word of Aquinas, and may not even know who he is. For one thing, Aquinas was a Catholic. Again, I cannot speak for Broun, but I can attest that anti-Catholic prejudice (while greatly diminished from what it was prior to about 1960) still lingers among Protestant fundamentalists. There are still Protestant fundamentalists who will tell you, in perfect seriousness, that they used to be Catholic but then later became Christian.
Moreover, I'd be willing to bet that Broun has a relatively limited education in arts and letters. Perhaps, like a lot of Americans, his exposure to the world of arts and ideas consists of sleepwalking through a course or two in World Civ as a freshman.
In the interests of full disclosure, I will note that what I myself know about Aquinas barely qualifies as a single "lick." As far as medieval Catholic thinkers go, I've been much more interested in Dante, Meister Eckhart, and St. Hildegard of Bingen. (Yes--Hildegard is a saint. She had been venerated unofficially as a saint for centuries in Germany, and Pope Benedict officially declared her to be a saint this last May.)
The unholy alliance between right-wing Catholics and Protestants has now become an Unholy Trinity with the addition of the Mormon church. It can't last, of course. One of them will inevitably attack another, two will gang up one one, and other scenarios. The more power the Christian (and quasi-Christian) right has in the US, the more certain is the eventuality of Christian religious wars in the US.
Just for the heck of it, I Googled up the phrase "age of the earth." Google replied: "4.54 billion years." Google is obviously a tool of Satan! (I'm being sarcastic, of course.)
I have lived my whole life in parts of the country that are dominated by Christian fundamentalists. Indeed, I was briefly one myself, from about age 17 through age 21. I can attest that fundamentalism actually thrives in the face of opposition (real or imagined). We could probably spend a long time speculating on why this is so. One factor is surely the difficulty fundamentalists have with the idea that spiritual truth can be expressed through myth and metaphor. Perhaps even more significant is the belief that Satan is ever-present and is always working to destroy believers; with that mindset, an argument over the age of the earth is transformed from a debate over paleontology to a cosmic battle of light and darkness.
The US is a free country. You can believe anything you want. But it is a shame that people like Broun have any say at all in shaping US policy toward scientific research and education.
All of the apocalyptic religions have a fondness for martydom . When Constantinople fell the Jews along with the Caliphate celebrated the destruction of the general "Evil" Roman Greek sublimation into Islamic culture . The Jews because they held that they were correct that their god had shown another god to be frail and gouty . The Muslim community for the obvious reason that they had conquered all the evil in the world , the world in front of them anyways .
No no no , these apocalyptic religions love to argue against facts , makes 'em saints y' see .
These Christian fundies so want to believe that the KJV/Bible is the Divine Word of God (which, by definition, must be literally correct) they are willing to accept all kinds of logical inconsistencies. It's sad, really.
Well there goes the Smithsonian's budget...
Perfect example of devolution - he is back to one cell and unfortunately even that is not between his ears.
It is this kind of "thinking" that drives me almost bonkers,with public servants like this we are the laughingstock of nations. If we keep electing such charlatans and fools we are not looking good for another hundred years,good thing I had the foresight to never having children.
I guess what I don't understand is why, if this is his belief, he wants to sit on the House Science Committee?!?! The ONLY conclusion I can come to is that he is hell bent on forcing his views down our throats... If there are other explanations I would be open to hearing them.
I'm sure that is exactly his intent!
Everyone should take a second and sign this:
http://www.change.org/petitions/house-science-committee-remove-rep-paul-broun#share
I sought out this petition because I believe science needs to play a leading role in healing our planet and someone who rejects hundreds of years of evidence and thinks it should be replaced by the tenets of 1 religion does not belong anywhere near the House Science Committee.
I was talking with a friend last night at my (Episcopal) church about people like Todd Akin and the question of abortion. One problem not already posted in this thread is that people like Akin and Broun have this almost "Platonic" concept of what they think is good, which does not actually exist in this world. Therefore, because they value what they understand of the Bible over the reality of their constituents' lives, they will shove their views of science education, abortion politics, or what have you down their constituents' throats. Unfortunately, we do not live in an age when legislators are willing to do anything other than represent their base--I long for the days when pro-choice Republicans were common in the federal legislature, because they would at least realize that people who disagree with them are still human beings. I think, with the trend to favor people like Michelle Bachmann, Sarah Palin, Tom Coburn, Sam Brownback, and Todd Akin, we easily get into the mindset that the other side, whichever the other side is, is literally demonic. I wish I could say that someone like Todd Akin wants to do the right thing for Missouri, but I disagree with his views so vehemently that it is not possible to see him as anything other than representing the home-school crowd, only.
When will we get to the stage when we will be able to say everyone is not entitled to their own beliefs. There are things that we know and things that we don't. If people believe things in opposition to what we know to be true they shouldn't be able to stand for public office. Our problems are bad and need serious people to fix them. Broun and Aiken not serious people.
YES! I believe that the one true god created the Earth in six days as we know them. That's what the Bible says! That's why they're called:
Day of the Sun, Day of the Moon, Day of Mars, Woden's Day, Thor's Day, Freya's Day, and Saturn's Day!
Clearly, we shouldn't leave the measurement of anything to science. That's why we have many gods. So it's easy to count!
I see what you just did there, Lilac. :-)
Nobel physicist Wolfgang Pauli once called a colleague's slipshod theory "not even wrong." Great put-down of fuzzy thinking. But for this kind of troglodyde drivel, you need a whole new dimension of "not even wrong" -- it's so wrong on so many levels that it's not even not even wrong.
Yes, it is, but it is Theologically Correct, so far too many people will uncritically accept it.
If this medical doctor believes the science of embyology to be nothing but diabolical lies (and one wonders how he managed to get his degree, given such on outlook), then it is perhaps understandable that he is currently employed as a legislator and not as a doctor. I'd be relieved on behalf of those who would have been his patients, except that in his current position there is a far broader reach to the harm he can do.