Atheists are banned from an intelligent design movie
Sound Off: What is being said about this story from around the blogging and opinion world.
Transcript of today's show:
The banning of atheists from a prescreening of Ben Stein’s film, Expelled No Intelligence Allowed, drew hundreds of postings in the blogosphere this week according to Technorati, a leading blogpost barometer. Producers of the film about intelligent design claim the furor is around the value of their message. Atheists question a film that associates Darwin with the Nazi Holocaust.
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from a blog post by PZ Myers, who was banned from the film screening:
I went to attend a screening of the creationist propaganda movie, Expelled, a few minutes ago. Well, I tried … but I was Expelled! It was kind of weird — I was standing in line, hadn't even gotten to the point where I had to sign in and show ID, and a policeman pulled me out of line and told me I could not go in. I asked why, of course, and he said that a producer of the film had specifically instructed him that I was not to be allowed to attend. The officer also told me that if I tried to go in, I would be arrested. I assured him that I wasn't going to cause any trouble.
I went back to my family and talked with them for a while, and then the officer came back with a theater manager, and I was told that not only wasn't I allowed in, but I had to leave the premises immediately. Like right that instant.
I complied.
I'm still laughing though. You don't know how hilarious this is. Not only is it the extreme hypocrisy of being expelled from their Expelled movie, but there's another layer of amusement. Deep, belly laugh funny. Yeah, I'd be rolling around on the floor right now, if I weren't so dang dignified.
You see … well, have you ever heard of a sabot? It's a kind of sleeve or lightweight carrier used to surround a piece of munition fired from a gun. It isn't the actually load intended to strike the target, but may even be discarded as it leaves the barrel.
I'm a kind of sabot right now.
They singled me out and evicted me, but they didn't notice my guest. They let him go in escorted by my wife and daughter. I guess they didn't recognize him. My guest was …
Richard Dawkins.
[read full blog post]
a comment posted on PZ Myer's blog Pharyngula:
The strategy of keeping the skeptical and rational sectors of society out of preview screenings of this movie makes a lot of sense. If we can't see it we can't destroy it's credibility before it is widely released, and it follows that they will be able to blindside uninformed people much more easily.
excerpt from a press release issued by the makers of the film Expelled:
Executive Producer Logan Craft noted: “EXPELLED makes it clear that academic freedom is at stake. Yet Dawkins and his friends continue to misrepresent the film and slander the producers. It is obvious that they do not want to debate the real issues raised in the movie. Their only interest is to control the damage their interviews have done to their cause. We are happy to let the public decide where the truth rests on this controversial issue when the movie opens nationwide on April 18th.”
Myers has apparently been asking supporters to sneak into the different private screenings for many weeks. After being denied his chance to see the movie, Myers blogged about his experience and expressed his outrage.
Executive Producer Walt Ruloff responded, “This is the typical reaction of Darwinists and atheists who are so blinded by their own self importance that they fail to understand what is really going on. They yell and scream when one of their friends isn’t allowed to see a movie weeks before it goes public. All this outrage while these same people organize witch hunts to expel those who disagree with them.”
[read complete press release]
The Voice of Science: Shelley Greene, Ph.D., comments:
It is the duty of education and educators to present students with a wide variety of viewpoints, especially those students with young and developing minds. This would include introducing students to alternatives to evolution theory. Yes, let them learn about and discuss creation theory and intelligent design. However, such discussions belong in a philosophy or religion class, NOT science. Unless a theory is empirically accepted by the scientific community as science, it does not belong in a science class. It especially should not be offered in a science class as a scientific theory, different from but equal to actual scientific theory.
The Brits have given this very issue some careful thought, and have chosen a wise solution. They allow open debate of creation theory, atheism, intelligent design, and Darwin. These debates are held in high school religion classes – banned altogether from science courses. Here, in American, this debate is stirring, like it or not. It will rage in our schools, in our churches, at home, in shopping mall parking lots, whether 'supervised' or not. In the schools, administrators and teachers can provide healthy containers for this debate, in any number of contexts: debate class, religion class, government, philosophy, sociology, ….. But please, keep this debate out of the science class. It will confuse the developing minds of our children.