America and Creationism

to quote bill hicks: explain dinosaurs.

What's genuinely scary is that these buggers are over here!

http://www.creation.ie/Library/

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGF2AxlQsYE

It's very sad to see how grown men and women can just abandon reason, logic
and critical thinking so easily.

I think the problem is that unfortunately in America creationism has become so entangled with politics, nationalism and religious fundamentalism in general. It is constantly insinuated that evolution is to cause of all the world ills. So to a creationist this isn't about two competing theories about the origin of man, this is about two completely different world views. One good and one evil.

Also they fill the children's heads with this crap when their young and it is constantly reinforced by their parents, religious leaders, politicians etc. So it has become completely self-perpetuating. They are never exposed to any other viewpoint.

do you Really want to get me started on this, or what?

I'd begin telling you it all started after WWII and the Cold War. It all went downhill from there. You start giving up freedoms, doing some morally questionable things like incarcerating everyone japanese or descent in the country, etc etc.

Then the Nuke happens, then the Cold War happens.

As a result: gross levels of media blackout, propoganda, and general fear - at the time even the government was as scared as anyone else if not more so. How rare these days.

One of the first things to happen? Well its simple really: you teach your kids to hate communism, and as that spreads you begin to have to avoid so many aspects of sociology, history and geography in order to maintain the desired level of Patriotism that eventually the only thing you focus on is the U.S. of A. Eventually world maps get grossly outnumbered by US maps and then after about 20 years who the hell really knows how to point to our good war buddies England and France anymore?

Then before my time during a phase I have still learned little about the attention shifted dramatically to the middle east and Jihad this and Isreal that. Religion comes to the fray again and again after so long in ignorance and fear things like Creationism and (Help Us) Scientology began to gain traction. And this is why most Americans (not me!) are stupid and uneducated. I have to admit moving away at 13 did a world of good.

as well as that though I'll add the reason the government over there is so feared now is because of the Cold War - they were so terrified themselves they got dirty: if you disagreed with their policies to spy on you, you were a Communist sympathizer and a traitor to your country! They got really good at this after a while and now it amounts to many, many layers of government influence, media backhands and lobbyists. The laws are now so contorted that it would take an army of scholars just to comprehend it all - to the point where the Country is just dying in on itself for a Revolution that will never come.

****

As for the Creationism taking hold again? Its this War on Terror; and all that crap. Then you have this building tension with Russia with Putin taking the reigns there...

Over the summer there was a big expose' on a Summer Camp program that good ol' Vladimir was running near Moscow that the press went crazy over; comparing it to Hitler's Youth. I could have agreed I suppose but then I found a contrary couple clips on the Tube of You, that show how the same thing has been happening in the States! Good little boys and girls being taught I paraphrase in lack of a direct recollection of the quote: 'To be God's soldiers (Christianity, here) and that anyone who isn't a Christian is The Enemy.'

Those kids looked in the age range of around 5-10 years old. What the fcuk.

anyway I cant find the videos at the min - its late; im tired and i have a test in the afternoon if I can find them again though they'll go up straight away.

womoma wrote: »

Any Christian here who thinks creationists are crazy or naive- I suggest you spend some time questioning and chellenging your own beliefs, you may come to a very liberating conclusion.

now, ive had my fill of religious debates over the years, and so i generally stay away.

but..

what i really hate are people who think that all you need to do is 'spend some time questioning and challenging your own beliefs'. cos im not too bright see, and i never thought of that before.

oh, and we must be doing it wrong if we dont 'get it' right?

you are correct in respect to the liberating conclusion however. my conclusion is that anyone who thinks that creationism is a functioning theory is a few sambos short of a pic-a-nic.

each to their own. im with the dinosuars. especially as they just found a big one recently in Australia i think. possilby the largest and most well preserved one ever found. i guess god buried that one more recently. i wonder where he gets them made?
probably china.

starn wrote: »

But why the US in paticular. They dont teach creationism in Ireland, or France or Belgian, Germany etc, etc. But yet in the US the majority of people seem to have rejected evelution. WHY ?

People tend to forget that there were three Christian sects in England in the 17th Century - Catholic, Protestant and Puritan.

The majority of England's Puritans left to colonise North America between 1620 and 1640 partly due to persecution

These were the first settlers of what is now the USA.

The puritans were uber-religious and adhered strictly to the letter of the Bible.

There's one particular funny episode in Black Adder II where Edmund's puritan relations come to visit - you'll remember his aunt wore a skull cap with a model of Mount Calvery on it and insisted on only eating a single raw potato.

In the late 17th Century, the Puritan movement slowly transformed into the Baptist religion, now the most dominant Christian religion in the southern states.

In the 18th and 19th Centuries the Baptists began to colonise southwards as more and more emigrants from Europe landed in New England.

So basically, there you have it.

The thing that baffles me a bit is the fact that they cling so strongly to it even though they know that the scientific proof against creationism is overwhelming and they also know (I hope) that the old testament is more about meaning than actual fact (the catholic church itself has even said that you're not supposed to take the old testament literally).
Otherwise they'd have to allow inbreeding since we all come from Adam and Eve, and then Eve and her sons. I also can't recall any mention of Adam and Eve actually getting married so they'd have to allow unmarried couples the same rights as married.