Godless: The Church of Liberalism

by Ann Coulter

  The judge who had spent his career handing out T-shirts to Little Leaguers with catchy antidrinking messages like “Stop underage drinking—Make the world a better place” concluded that alternative theories to evolution are unconstitutional. Jones wrote, “[T]he fact that a scientific theory cannot yet render an explanation on every point should not be used as a pretext to thrust an untestable alternative hypothesis grounded in religion into the science classroom.” Maybe some crazy scientific theory like quantum mechanics could be questioned, but not a rock-solid scientific theory that says a flying fish flew out of the ocean and became a bird. That’s hard science. At least according to No Zipper Shots Jones, who held, “[I]t is unconstitutional to teach I.D. [intelligent design] as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom.”

  The Times nearly ran out of fawning adjectives in its praise for Jones. Liberals hadn’t been this alarmed by the activities at a high school since hearing about a high school football coach in East Brunswick, New Jersey, who allegedly prayed with his players for a good, clean game. In a single article, Jones was called “a man of integrity and intellect,” “moderate, thoughtful and universally well regarded,” and a “renaissance man.” Needless to say, Jones was a “lifelong Republican appointed to the federal bench in 2002 by President Bush.” The Times still won’t mention that John Ashcroft went to Yale, but it managed to work in that Judge Jones’s father graduated from Yale. All you need to know about Jones’s breadth of intelligence is that he calls Tom Ridge the “singular inspiration of my life.”

  This is the scientific method when it comes to the state religion: Rolling Stone magazine and Jayson Blair’s employer browbeat a hack judge into declaring the mere mention of alternatives to evolution “unconstitutional.”

  The cult loves to boast that there are no “peer-reviewed” articles on intelligent design, but then treats the publication of such an article as a fireable offense. (Peer review is very important, because otherwise you might have South Korean scientists claiming they’ve used cloning techniques to create embryonic stem cells, as Hwang Woo-Suk did in a peer-reviewed paper published in the journal Science. Oops.)

  In 2004, Richard Sternberg (Ph.D.s in molecular biology and theoretical biology) published an article by Stephen Meyer (Ph.D. in the history and philosophy of science from Cambridge University) in what the Washington Post described as the “hitherto obscure” journal Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington.

  Meyer’s article was peer-reviewed by three renowned scientists and “complied with all editorial requirements of the proceedings,” according to a subsequent investigation by the U.S. Office of Special Counsel. Among Meyer’s points was the one about the Cambrian period having no Darwinian antecedents—something your children are not allowed to hear about in high school. Apparently, the six readers of Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington weren’t supposed to be told about the Cambrian period either.

  It wasn’t ever clear whether Sternberg actually believed in the heretical doctrine of ID, but for permitting the publication of a peer-reviewed article about it, he was adjudged a witch and banished from the Smithsonian. The obscure journal disavowed the article, and Sternberg was warned not to come to future meetings. As is always the case with the witch-burners, they went straight to Sternberg’s sources of employment, demanding that he be fired.

  The U.S. Office of Special Counsel, which investigates retaliation against federal employees, was soon looking into the Smithsonian’s treatment of Sternberg. The Smithsonian not only objected to any inquiry into intelligent design, it especially objected to any inquiry into its treatment of Sternberg.

  The independent counsel investigating the attacks on Sternberg issued a harsh report on the behavior of the alleged scientists at the Smithsonian and Eugenie Scott’s National Center for Science Education. In her usual role as Enforcer of the Faith, Scott had led a campaign of vilification against Sternberg. Leaping to action like angry gay David Brock when he’s cranky because he’s retaining a lot of water and has just seen a Bill O’Reilly broadcast, the NCSE immediately posted hysterical responses to the Meyer article on its website. Scott’s organization helped draft a repudiation of Meyer’s article for the journal to print, and then turned around and cited that very repudiation as proof that the article should not have been published.’

  The NCSE, the government report said, had worked closely with the Smithsonian “in outlining a strategy to have [Sternberg] investigated and discredited.” In the flurry of e-mails between the NCSE and the “scientists” at the Smithsonian Institution, Sternberg was accused of being a Young Earth Creationist. He was accused of taking money under the table to publish the article. His religion was investigated. He was accused of having no scientific training at all but only “training as an orthodox priest.” None of this was true. But according to the independent counsel, the claim that Sternberg was not a scientist became so persistent that a colleague had to circulate his resume to dispel the rumor. Remember, he has Ph.D.s in molecular biology and theoretical biology.

  The Smithsonian’s chief spider torturer, Jonathan Coddington, began making inquiries about Sternberg’s religious beliefs and politics—in particular, questioning if he was a fundamentalist or rightwinger. Another “scientist” at the Smithsonian wrote in an e-mail, “We are evolutionary biologists and I am sorry to see us made into the laughing stock of the world, even if this kind of rubbish sells well in backwoods USA.”

  Scott defended the inquiry into Sternberg’s religious beliefs, saying, “They don’t care if you are religious, but they do care a lot if you are a creationist. Sternberg denies it, but if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it argues for zealotry.” I’m no evolutionary biologist, but I think if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, that argues for it being a duck.

  The report concluded, “[R]etaliation came in many forms … misinformation was disseminated through the Smithsonian Institution and to outside sources. The allegations against [Sternberg] were later determined to be false.” The Smithsonian was unrepentant. Asked about the report by the Washington Post, Smithsonian spokesperson Linda St. Thomas said only, “We do stand by evolution—we are a scientific organization.”

  Whatever else can be said of academics in cushy, comfortable jobs, they tend not to be big risk takers. If this is what one Cambridge Ph.D. goes through for publishing a peer-reviewed article simply because he dared question evolution, you can be sure we’re not getting honest answers from the rest of the scientific community. One tends to hear about prominent academics who doubt evolution in the same hushed tones one hears about Hollywood actors who oppose abortion (Martin Sheen, Jack Nicholson, and Warren Beatty).

  You could have ten times the IQ of Eugenie Scott—and most do—but if you gingerly raise scientifically based questions about evolution, you will be denounced as a creationist nut, your life will be turned upside down, and your employers will be hounded. You will probably be fired and certainly have to hire a lawyer. Now let’s take a show of hands: Any Darwin skeptics? Good. Evolution has been proved again!

  * * *

  THE most fanatical defenders of evolution are not Harvard professors, curators at the American Museum of Natural History, or Times science reporters. They are cretinous high school biology teachers and liberal know-nothings trying to relive their fantasy of the Scopes trial. HBO Documentary and Family president Sheila Nevins says she doesn’t “shy away from such R-rated topics as `GString Divas’ and `Taxicab Confessions,’ ” but she complained of the imagined persecution she would face if she “made a movie about Darwin.” If HBO ran such a documentary, Nevins said, “I’d get a thousand hate e-mails.” (Maybe, but only from lonely guys upset about missing “GString Divas.”)

  Evidently, it isn’t that hard to make a fawning movie about Darwin in Hollywood. A partial list of movies and documentaries with Dar-win’s name in the title on the Internet Movie Database includes:

  Darwin’s Nightmare (2004
)

  Genius: Charles Darwin (2003)

  Freud and Darwin Sitting in a Tree (2000)

  Darwin’s Evolutionary Stakes (1999)

  A&E Biography: Charles Darwin—Evolution’s Voice (1998) (TV) Darwin (1997)

  Galapagos: Beyond Darwin (1996) (TV)

  Darwin (1993) (TV)

  Darwin on the Galapagos (1983)

  Terre des Betes: Darwin (1982) (TV)

  The Voyage of Charles Darwin (1978)

  The Darwin Adventure (1972)

  Darwin Was Right (1924)

  Felix Doubles for Darwin (1924) Darwin (1920)

  What Darwin Missed (1916)

  A Disciple of Darwin (1912)

  Cowardly people who run from the room crying at the idea that men and women could have different abilities in science like to play-act that they are John Scopes speaking truth to power against hate-filled fundamentalist Christians (“truth” being defined as “a discredited scientific theory from the Victorian age”). They are like geeks playing air guitar in front of the mirror pretending to be Keith Richards. Except there really is a Keith Richards. (In fact, some scientists argue that Keith Richards is actually the missing link.) The John Scopes of liberal imaginations never existed.

  In the great Hollywood tradition of All the President’s Men, Erin Brockovich, Silkwood, Good Night and Good Luck, and every single moviemade by Oliver Stone, there are two separate and distinct stories: the one that actually happened and the movie version. Despite the raw fear that grips the Hollywood community at the thought of making a movie that reflects favorably on Darwin, there have been four movie versions of Inherit the Wind, in 1960, 1965, 1988, and 1999.

  In the Book of Hollywood, it is taught that a brave high school biology teacher named John Scopes tried to educate his illiterate, tooth-less students in backwater Dayton, Tennessee, by teaching them “science.” For his trouble, he was nearly lynched by fundamentalist Christians, who stormed his classroom and arrested him on the spot for teaching Darwin’s theory of evolution. As told in Inherit the Wind, clergymen and businessmen immediately threw Scopes in prison, where he remained throughout the trial, with fundamentalist Christians screaming that they would lynch him and throwing things at his window. Scopes was crucified, died, rose again, and now sits—no, wait, that’s a different story.

  The real story of the Scopes trial is told in the book Summer for the Gods by Edward Larson. The Scopes trial was nothing but a publicity stunt. The idea for a trial on evolution was hatched by the ACLU in New York and seized upon by civic leaders in Dayton, Tennessee, as a way to drum up publicity for their town. Scopes was in on the prank, agreeing to be prosecuted even though he had never taught evolution and was not even a biology teacher. He did not spend one minute in jail, was never at risk of being sent to jail, was friends with the prosecutors, with whom he went swimming during the trial, and was even given a scholarship put together by the expert witnesses in gratitude for his star turn in the Monkey trial. When the trial was over, the school offered to renew his teacher’s contract.

  Darwin’s theory of evolution was a hot topic in the summer of 1925, with lots of public debates on the subject. The theory of natural selection was being used to justify racialist theories, eugenics, and German militarism—which I seem to recall took a turn for the worse shortly thereafter but I’d have to check my notes. The most important witnesses the defense considered calling as “expert witnesses” for the Scopes trial were all champions of forced eugenics.

  A few other state legislatures around the country had prohibited the teaching of evolution, but other state laws were merely proscriptive, with no punishment attached. Even in Tennessee, teaching evolution was only a misdemeanor offense, punishable by a nominal fine, much like drowning a girl in Massachusetts if your last name is “Kennedy.” The Scopes trial is, as Larson says, “the most widely publicized misdemeanor case in U.S. history.”

  The day the Tennessee governor signed the ban into law, he said it would never be enforced. And it never would have been—but for the bright idea of a native New Yorker who had recently moved to Dayton. Upon reading in a newspaper that the ACLU was offering to defend any Tennessee teacher who violated the law, George Rappleyea decided a trial on evolution would be a terrific way to get publicity for Dayton as a nice place to live and work (especially for busybody former New Yorkers with axes to grind).

  Rappleyea took his idea to the town elders assembled in the local drugstore, telling them that a trial on evolution would put Dayton on the map and boasting of his connections with the New York ACLU. Civic leaders warmed to the idea as a splendid way to promote the town—raising the possibility that they were serving more than milk-shakes at the drugstore. Even the school superintendent—who had supported the law—liked the idea of a cooked-up trial as a way to get Dayton national recognition. The ACLU signed on, agreeing to pay the costs of both the defense attorneys and the prosecutors.

  All they needed was a teacher to teach evolution—or at least to cop to teaching evolution—and a prosecutor to take the case. One of the town prosecutors was friends with John Scopes, a twenty-four year-old teacher who sometimes taught biology when the regular biology teacher was out.

  There was the small problem of Scopes not recalling whether he had ever taught evolution—and indeed, not even being the school’s biology teacher. The pharmacist pulled a popular biology book off his shelf, Hunter’s Civic Biology, and asked Scopes if he had ever used it to prepare for class when he substituted for the regular biology teacher.(Among the scientific facts taught in Hunter’s Civic Biology is that Caucasians, “represented by the civilized white inhabitants of Europe and America,” are “the highest type of all.”) Scopes said he had. The druggist excitedly proclaimed that the book mentioned evolution and everyone agreed that this was sufficient evidence for Scopes to be their defendant.

  So right there in the drugstore, Scopes cheerfully admitted to the misdemeanor offense of teaching evolution and a warrant was sworn out for his arrest. The school superintendent delightedly exclaimed, “Something has happened that’s going to put Dayton on the map!”

  Publicity flyers were immediately sent to New York announcing a trial on evolution. Both the prosecution and the defense were eager to rush the case to trial as quickly as possible—in order to prevent another town from beating Dayton to the punch and getting all the publicity. Each side retained prominent blowhards to assist: populist Democrat William Jennings Bryan for the prosecution and Clarence Darrow for the defense. From beginning to end, the Scopes trial was a scheme cooked up in New York and pawned off on the good citizens of Dayton, much like Cats.

  Civic leaders formed a Scopes Trial Entertainment Committee to plan activities around the trial. The town erected tents for the show and requested extra trains to accommodate the expected crowds. Pamphlets were prepared, touting the town’s virtues. A carnival atmosphere attended the trial, with street performers and bands. Stores in Dayton got into the spirit of things by displaying monkeys in shop windows and selling “simian sodas.” The sheriff decorated his motorcycle with a sign that said “Monkeyville Police.” The Progressive Club produced a souvenir coin for the trial showing a monkey wearing a straw hat. The drugstore where the plan was hatched displayed a huge banner proudly proclaiming, “Where It Started.”

  The rest of Tennessee was not so thrilled with Dayton’s public relations stunt. Chattanooga Congressman Foster V. Brown summarized the whole affair when he said the trial was “not a fight for evolution or against evolution, but a fight against obscurity.”

  Hardly a reviled figure by the townspeople, Scopes had to ask his students to testify against him, telling them they would be doing him a favor, and even coached the students on their answers. At least the students knew who Scopes was. When the famous defense attorneys arrived in Dayton for the first day of trial, they didn’t recognize their client and handed Scopes their bags. Worried he might be asked if he was a biology teacher at trial, Scopes never took the stand in his ow
n defense.”

  The defense sought to turn the case into a trial on God, rather than a trial on whether taxpayers could decide what would be taught in the public schools. Defense lawyers repeatedly moved to exclude the court’s opening prayer on the grounds that it would prejudice the jury. When those motions failed, the defense demanded opening prayers only from people who believed in a god of nature. The judge turned the matter over to the local pastors’ association. Being braying fundamentalist lunatics, the local pastors agreed to alternate prayers between pastors who prayed to God and pastors who prayed to Mother Earth.

  In his opening statement, Clarence Darrow compared fundamentalist Christians to dogs, suggesting that the best thing would be to strangle them: “To strangle puppies is good when they grow up into mad dogs.” Just a little more than a decade before the rise of monstrous atheistic war machines in Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, Darrow informed the court, “There is nothing else, Your Honor, that has caused the difference of opinion, of bitterness or hatred, of war, of cruelty that religion has caused.”

  Despite the defense’s religious hysterics, lead prosecutor Tom Stewart repeatedly returned to the dry technicalities of the law, saying the misdemeanor law was “an effort on the part of the legislature to control the expenditure of state funds, which it has the right to do.” He denied that anyone’s free speech rights were at issue. “Mr. Scopes might have taken his stand on the street corners and expounded until he became hoarse,” he said, “but he cannot go into the public schools” and teach evolution. Stewart opposed the defense’s request to bring in expert witnesses: “They will say [evolution] was simplythe method by which God created man. I don’t care. This act says you cannot [teach it] .”