Drew Brees and baby Baylen

GEAUX  SAINTS!!

THANKS, BOYS!

WHO DAT NATION

FEBRUARY 7, 2010

January 2010 Featured

By Sandhya Bathija

For Barbara Forrest, fighting for church-state separation and quality science education in Louisiana – and the rest of the nation – has become her civic duty.

“Someone once said, ‘knowledge brings responsibility.’ I had the skills to do it, I knew what was going on, I understood it,” Forrest said, describing why she wrote her first book with co-author Paul R. Gross, Creationism’s Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design, a 2004 work (updated in paperback in 2007) that exposed the theocratic agenda of the Discovery Institute and other creationist organizations. “I don’t want these people running my country and running my kids’ schools.”

Read the rest of this article on AU’s website.

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. / Is there anything of which one can say, ‘Look: This is something new’? / It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time.”  — Ecclesiastes 1:9-10, New International Version

Resistance to the teaching of evolution is an integral part of the history of American anti-intellectualism, which stems in great part from religious fundamentalism. Hence, framing this discussion of creationism within a biblical context is fitting given the singular importance of biblical interpretation in creating the problem. At the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth, these verses from Ecclesiastes perfectly capture the perennial American problem of creationism, which began in the early twentieth century and continues into the twenty-first. In 2009, evolution remains the most contentious issue in public-school science education, as Louisiana has — once again — shown the world.

This is the opening of my article with the above title in the February-March 2009 issue of Free Inquiry magazine. Click over to this web page to read about how creationists at the Discovery Institute [pdf], working with the Louisiana Family Forum, used rehashed creationist tactics to pass the stealth creationist Louisiana Science Education Act of 2008: “From a strategic standpoint, ID creationists’ current tactics are merely the retooled creationist strategies that were used decades ago.”

Actually, we’re not having that much fun down here at the moment. Gov. Jindal wants to cut $219 million from higher education, dealing a devastating blow to the state’s public universities just when they have been recovering in recent years from similar cuts made in the 1980s. Four of the state’s former governors actually met with Jindal in person to urge him to reconsider (such a meeting is highly unusual). The fact that Jindal is even contemplating such drastic cuts to higher education is indicative of the misplaced priorities in the Pelican State. His appointees enjoy very high salaries (which he made sure to give them last year), and legislators continue the time-honored Louisiana tradition of maintaining a slush fund, despite the fact that higher education and health care for the poor must go begging. But back to the matter at hand . . .

Concerning the six “academic freedom” bills introduced in 2009, the creationists at the Discovery Institute are batting zero. Without the kind assistance of the Louisiana legislature and Bobby Jindal, they would have earned the same score in 2008. Here’s the scorecard for “academic freedom” bills introduced in 2009:

(1) Oklahoma SB 320: Died in committee

(2) Iowa House File 183: Died in committee

(3) Alabama HB 300: Died in committee

(4) New Mexico SB 433: Died in committee

(5) Missouri HB 656: Died without even being assigned to a committee

(6) Texas HB 4224: Died upon adjournment of the legislature on June 1. Texas (yes, Texas!) had the good sense to let both this bill and another one, HB 2800, die. HB 2800 would have allowed the Institute for Creation Research to offer a master’s degree in science education.

So there we have it. Louisiana is still number one in promoting the use of bogus teaching materials in our children’s science classes. We at the Louisiana Coalition for Science love our state, and we can take some comfort in knowing that our science teachers have better sense than our government. As for school boards and the very few teachers who may be inclined to make use of the new law, we’re watching.