Dispatches from the Creation Wars

Remember the story last week about how Bill Maher supposedly fooled Ken Ham and the folks at the new creation museum and got in for an interview? Agape Press, now known as One News Now, has a poll up at their website asking their breathtakingly stupid readers whether Maher should be prosecuted for – get this – burglary:

POLL: Should comedian be prosecuted for alleged burglary

He didn’t burgle anyone, nor did he commit breaking and entering. The museum had an arrangement with a production company for a tour and an interview. Maher did not go along with the film crew during the tour, but he came in and did the interview – and the museum went through with the whole interview and only later realized who did it. There’s nothing illegal there. But I really do think they should call the police and report it; cops need to laugh too. The punchline to this joke? 96% of their readers urged prosecution.

Comments

#1 Royale
April 25, 2007

It’s been changed to “allegedly breaking into”.

Not that it matters though, there’s still no crime.
#2 John Pieret
April 25, 2007

One News Now’s rational readers …

[stop laughing!]

are apparently rushing to Maher’s defense. At last check the percentage of people wanting prosecution is down to 83.6%.
#3 llDayo
April 25, 2007

I’d almost consider this a libelous (sp?) action on ONN’s part. Maybe that’s why they changed it to “allegedly breaking into” instead of “burglary”?
#4 paulh
April 25, 2007

Let AiG make a formal complaint – then they can be prosecuted for “wasting police time” (or whatever the right terminology is in that jurisdiction).
#5 jpf
April 25, 2007

There was a situation a few years ago where some creationist documentarians making a film called “From A Frog To A Prince” managed to trick Richard Dawkins into an interview by misleadingly presenting their intent. When Dawkins realized what was going on — mid-interview after a loaded question that obviously was coming from a creationist perspective — he paused for supposedly 11 seconds before answering. The documentarians later made that pause the selling point of their documentary, promoting it as Dawkins’, and hence Evilutiondarwinatheism’s, downfall (and are still promoting it as such).

Interestingly, those documentarians were working with, and that video is being distributed by…Answers in Genesis. You know, the same people that Bill Maher supposedly burgled in a remarkable similar manner.

(Wikipedia reference to event. AiG claims that Dawkins knew who he was dealing with before the interview. Dawkins apparently disagrees. I’m sure the Maher/AiG situation won’t degrade into a similar he said/she said.)
#6 doctorgoo
April 25, 2007

jpf… Ed played a large part in exposing this incident:
http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2004/02/the_richard_dawkins_incident.php

So Ed, I’m curious… what’s your take on this situation 3 years later? Did you ever find the original tapes to verify your memory (as Nick Matze suggested in the comments)?
#7 Ed Brayton
April 25, 2007

My take on it is the same as it was when it all happened; I’ve seen no reason to change it. But no, I have not tried to dig the tape out. It’s in any one of a couple dozen boxes in storage.
#8 maurile
April 25, 2007

Speaking of calling the cops for silly reasons, check out this 911 call over Burger King’s inability to get an order right.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EykZnm_VgU
#9 Crudely Wrott
April 25, 2007

Ed, I went to the poll site and clicked on Comment / News Tips. In order to be posted I must surrender possession of my first and last name and my web address to them!

Boy! Someone’s ox is being deeply gored here . . . the butt of the joke I surmise.
#10 valhar2000
April 26, 2007

This reminds of that time a scientist gave a talk worrying about the possibility of a worldwide cholera pandemic, and one of the kooks at the DI thought he was ADVOCATING such a thing, and reported the guy to Homeland Security.

I was just dying to have that taken to trial, and to progressively higher courts on appeal, and then finally to the Supreme Court, under scrutiny from national television, only to watch the DI folks mumbling “Well… a friend of ours told us he said that…”.

I guess the Homeland Security people were not quite as dumb as the DI kooks.