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Miracles Over Math

by Open-Publishing - Wednesday 8 December 2004
15 comments

Edito Governments USA Wayne Besen


by Wayne Besen

If America doesn’t wake up, it will soon become a big, dumb second-tier nation that values miracles over math and superstition over science. Thanks to the Republican’s embrace of anti-intellectualism and demagogic fundamentalism, we are already halfway there.

In the October 17 edition of the New York Times Magazine, Ron Suskind interviewed a key Bush aide that described the administration’s rejection of enlightenment principles. The aide chastised Suskind for living “in what we call the reality-based community.”

The aide said that people in this community “believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality...that’s not the way the world really works anymore.”

Indeed, it isn’t.

A recent poll by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland found that nearly 70 percent of President Bush’s supporters believe that America has produced “clear evidence” that Saddam Hussein was working with Al Qaeda. Amazingly, a third of the president’s fans believe weapons of mass destructions were found in Iraq.

Too many Americans are divorced from reality and live in a world where belief trumps brains. This threatens the very essence of democracy, which depends on an educated citizenry to make wise, informed choices.

“You want to get down to the nub of how this democracy is going to defend itself,” said former CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite. “We’ve got to have an intelligent electorate and we are not going to have it because our education system is in a shambles right now.”

A new study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development showed that the United States ranked 28th out of 40 nations in math and 18th in reading. But instead of recognizing that American innovation and prosperity is in danger of erosion, the Republican-led Congress just cut nearly $105 million from the National Science Foundation.

Of course, as Hong Kong, South Korea and Finland kick our ass in math and science, Americans have more pressing moral concerns. For example, Alabama State Representative Gerald Allen (R-Cottondale) wants to ban books that mention gay people from public libraries and schools. To rid Alabama of such books, Allen said that, “I guess we dig a big hole and dump them in and bury them.”

Finally, the educational reform conservatives have been promising.

The battle to substitute ignorance for education is evident in right wing efforts to teach creation “science” in public schools. School officials in Cobb County, Ga., were recently in court to defend a disclaimer on science books that reads evolution is, “a theory and not a fact.”

Sadly, much of America agrees and wants to undercut scientific progress. According to a Dec. 5 Newsweek poll, 43 percent of Americans favor teaching creation science instead of evolution in public schools. This shows that nearly half of Americans are not only hostile to science, but have little use for the separation of church and state.

Blissful ignorance dangerously extends to America’s sex education. This year, Congress will provide nearly $170 million for “abstinence only” programs. However, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 61 percent of graduating high school seniors have had sex. Wouldn’t it be healthier if they knew about condoms?

Columbia University researchers found that 88 percent of teens that take “virginity pledges” eventually have premarital sex. Sounds like “abstinence only” programs are working wonders.

It’s bad enough that these anti-sex programs deny reality, but a new congressional staff report by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) shows they also give out shockingly false information, including:

· Abortion can lead to sterility and suicide
· Half the gay male teenagers in the U.S. have tested positive for the AIDS virus (this statistic is not known)
· Condoms fail to prevent HIV transmission 31 percent of the time in heterosexual intercourse (the real number is less than 3 percent)
· HIV can be spread via sweat and tears
· Pregnancy can occur through mutual masturbation

Shamefully, on ABC’s This Week, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), who is a doctor, repeated some of the myths. On condoms he said, “We know there’s about a 15 percent failure rate.”

Host George Stephanopoulos asked him if HIV could be spread through sweat and tears and he refused to answer the question directly. He squirmed and tried to slither away. But after repeated prodding he finally said, “it would be very hard.” Either Frist is Dr. Dumb or he is guilty of pandering to America’s lowest common denominator.

America will fail if our leaders focus on magic and miracles over modernization and creating reality-based minds. The Neo-Puritan’s goal of replacing biology with theology is well underway. Sure, the facts don’t add up - but you have to be able to do math to figure this out.

http://www.outletradio.com/besen/archives/001355.php

Forum posts

  • America still thinks it the greatest. As it was in the past. Moreover it still snacks on the progress made
    in the 1960, when Nasa started it’s space program. But now they are falling back widely. The problem
    is the military/industrial complex and which sucks in all the resources and finances.
    The schoolsystem in America is wrecked and the only ambitious people there are immigrants.

    Bush and his gang are hating the American people. This old men see their end is coming soon and
    therefore the don’t care about the youth.
    I hear this also very often if I talk to older American native (or naive) citizens: for God sake our
    time has come soon, why should we deal with this problems... let the young work hard as we did ...
    etc..
    They just don’t get it: they are the reason why this once so promising land is going down...

  • As regards to the abstainence programs, the US has the highest teen out of wed lock preganancy, the most abortions, and the most uneducated teens in any "first" world country.

    I wonder when they teach creation science if they will call all other humanoids found to date that are not homosepians God’s mistakes or just other models?

    Meanwhile the churches (especially Catholic) have a huge pedophile homosexual community that is in the closet in denial just waiting to pounce on the children. Is this considered abstainence?

    Makes you wonder if this is just a hypocracy not a democracy after all.

  • To this:

    To rid Alabama of such books, Allen said that, “I guess we dig a big hole and dump them in and bury them.”

    I’m reminded of this:

    "Wherever they burn books, they will also, in the end, burn people."

    Heinrich Heine (1797-1856) German Jewish Author.

    Heinrich Heinie is one of my favorite poets. I discovered him by way of an antiquarian book. Recently, I saw the above quote on a button at BlueStockings Bookstore in NYC. I was thrilled that a long the way, other progressives have found him too.

    NJ Vince

    • Didn’t Hitler order history to be changed and books to be burned? The more things change the more they remain the same.

  • It’s so funny that you morons keep blaming the republicans when everyone knows it’s been the leftists and liberals who have hijacked education for the past forty years. The only people to blame for American students being ranked so low is because so many lefty teachers teach those stupid feel good classes and tests that aren’t so hard so that everybody doesn’t have low self-esteem. These morons don’t teach enough of the basic maths and sciences.

    • An education system that hardly touches on anything non-American for starters, a main course of CNN, FOX followed by dessert of American Gladiators, Monster Trucks, and Jerry Springer. Liberally sprinkle with creationism, guns, and twisted christianity.

      NOT a recipe for the development of human kind.

    • Well the Republican Bush is a typical example, he is a moron and even though his family was able to cover for him regularly, and get him into schools that would give him passing grades (social promotion) he came out uneducated and stupid...is that the left’s fault? Did our Republican president have to go begging to his Democrat teachers to please please not embarrass his family by flunking him along the way? I love how the Republicans are never to blame for anything on their watch or anything ever for that matter, they are still blaming Clinton for their present failures and Clinton has been out of office for more than 4 years, when is Bush going to be responsible for anything? Oh yeah that’s right NEVER.

  • Americans are among the hardest working people in the world. The average American works more hours than Europeans, gets less sleep, and takes less vacation. We continue to be innovaters in new technology. We originate while much of the world imitates.

    The only problem with our school system is lack of funding and the "new age" curriculum that has been forced on our schools by the left. Instead of math and science and history, liberals promote social "soft science" classes. They are also trying to sap our children of the will to succeed. You can’t separate students by skill and then teach to their level because it might hurt the feelings of a low skill child. You can’t Fail a student because it would be bad for their self esteem. In T-ball the children play till the score is tied so that no one loses. Liberals are also trying to promote a revisionist history on our students. In many text books America is always at fault and the founding fathers of this nation were not influenced by Christianity. In some schools our students can’t even be taught about the Declaration of Independance because it has the word God in it. This revisionism is as small minded as Nazi’s burning books with Jewish authors.

    • An oversimplification, for sure. Some Americans may be "among the hardest working people in the world" while other are among the laziest in the world. The average American may also spend more of those working hours doing something besides working (such as posting on various forums). Many innovate and originate with personal (or corporate) profit as the only goal and hoard those innovations unless someone pays for it.

      The problem with our school system is not as simple as a lack of funding and a liberal agenda. Comparisons of the average private schools tuitions with what the public spends per student often shows that the government is spending more (and getting less). Education was already broken when liberals started pushing their "new age" curriculum. Neither method works as well as we’d like. The entire educational system was never designed to foster innovation and critical thinking. Those who innovate and originate don’t do so because of what they were taught - they do so because they don’t accept the status quo (remember that conservatives want to maintain a status quo).

      Neither side has the right answers, but because all we hear are their two sides we fail to find the right path.

    • Have you watched t.v. lately? If you really blieve that the liberal left is what influences education in this country you should tune into t.v. The average US child watches 40 hours of t.v. per week which is much more influential than schools which are attended for about 30 hours per week. While the children watch t.v. which is a minefield of crap from violence (our citizens are the most violent in the world) to sex (our country has the highest teen pregenancy and abortion rates) to disfunctional families (our country has the most Columbine type teen school murders) and probably the most dysfunctional families (half all all marriages end in divorce) single working mothers are more common here than in any other 1st world country.

      Its easy to blame the schools and then to carry that further and blame the liberals, but over 1/2 of the country attends church and claims to be religious, yet look at the above and tell me how much the conservative right has helped to shape the youth of this country. Corporate interests dictate what is on t.v. not the liberals, the churches dictate the morals and are doing a very poor job (possibly because of the example they set themselves, pedophila, etc. approving whole heartedly of war). We have had 4 years of Bush at the helm what about his leadership on education? The testing shows instead of making progress we are falling further behind, is he ever going to be held responsible for anything? Or are we going to continue to point the finger at the "liberals" when everyone knows or should know that the liberals have been sidelined for a long long time now and the conservatives have been in the drivers seat of this mess certainly long enough that its unquestionably their baby and they should step up to the plate and accept some of the responsibility already.

    • You just said that children are influenced more by what happens outside of school (television, church, dysfunctional families) then what happens in school. Yet you still want to blame Bush for what is an obvious lack of responsiblity on the part of parents.

  • A lot has been said about the left and the right being morons. Well, I blame both sides. The right is not blameless because they are leading the charge to teach creationism and reinstate school-sanctioned prayer. The left, I have to admit, do love those social diversity classes. The original author of the post, Wayne Beson, is correct, America is going straight to hell in a handbasket, and instead of blaming the left or the right, let’s address the real problem...kids aren’t learning math and science and NOBODY in America cares. Someone posted that the US continues to be a leader in innnovation, however, I can tell you from experience a majority of these "American innovations" are coming from foreign engineers and scientists. The US produces less engineers than Japan, Russia and China and that’s why so many new innovations are coming from these places. If you don’t think so, check out all the gadgets coming from Asia.

    In essense, we’re all screwed. I’m moving to Canada...they’re closer to the American ideal than America is.

    • Their only national identity is vociferously claiming "We’re not Americans!" With all due respect to our northern neighbors with whom we share a very common background, Canada is not the utopia you may think it is. Excessive flannel use can be dangerous to national growth.

    • You know, countering my statement with a played-out stereotype does not strengthen your argument that Canada isn’t the utopia I think it is. Neither is your apparent nationality. Either way, let me ennumerate why Canada is better than the US (in SOME areas):
      1) free health care
      2) extending rights granted to tax-paying gay Canadians
      3) lower crime rates
      4) a respect for intelligence

      The last point ties into the point made by Besen in the first place. In America (I live in California, BTW), intelligence is portrayed by the media and society as some sort of stigma. Mad scientists, evil geniuses, Presidents Carter and Hoover, and nerds and geeks everywhere.

      The downsides of Canada? Lack of job opportunity (the US is the largest economy in the world), lousy weather, and no guns. Quite frankly, as much as I despise the direction the US is heading in, I’m thankful for the 2nd Amendment which allows me to buy as many guns as I damn well please so I can protect my beliefs when the fundies try to override them with theocracy.

    • I’m Canadian. I have two university degrees. I speak two languages (not French, unfortunately), and can read two others. Beyond the formal and specialized instruction, our education system has instilled in me a desire to continue learning, and I am self-taught in many fields. So, as a result of the formal and informal education I am very proficient in mathematics, physics, engineering, philosphy, sociology, critical thinking and analysis: essentially in both the sciences and the arts. I am in excellent health, thanks to our health care system, access to high quality foods, and an understanding of what it takes to lead a healthy lifestyle. I can’t complain, but I usually find I have more in common with the Europeans whom I’ve met, who are usually much more multi-lingual, and who have had access to very high quality education (at little or no cost). I can’t and I don’t complain.