Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
The Discovery Institute is passing the collection plate and needs your money. Apparently they base their plea for help on one of the most ridiculous exaggerations you are ever likely to see:
As a regular Evolution News & Views visitor, you have been continually informed of the ways in which leading Darwinists have unleashed an unprecedented wave of persecution, propaganda, and paranoia in an effort to strangle an idea that they insist is already dead.
Is Rob Crowther really stupid enough to complain about paranoia in the same sentence he alleges an "unprecedented wave of persecution"? Apparently so. Yes Rob, it's unprecedented how horribly you ID advocates have been persecuted...
Bill Dembski having to make his fart videos in an unmarked studio, leaving under cover of night to evade the ubiquitous cameras of the Darwinist police...
Michael Behe having to go underground and live surrounded by armed guards to escape the fatwah placed on his head for writing Darwin's Black Box...
Stephen Meyer being arrested and sent to Gitmo...
Do I even need to mention the waterboarding of John West?
It all reminds me of that famous Pat Robertson statement on the 700 Club years ago:
"Just like what Nazi Germany did to the Jews, so liberal America is now doing to the evangelical Christians. It's no different. It is the same thing. It is happening all over again. It is the Democratic Congress, the liberal-based media and the homosexuals who want to destroy the Christians. Wholesale abuse and discrimination and the worst bigotry directed toward any group in America today. More terrible than anything suffered by any minority in history."
It's so awful being you, Rob. You deserve a medal for withstanding the "unprecedented persecution" that you face every day. At the very least, there should be a Pulitzer Prize for the Diary of Casey Luskin, where he recounts how he and his family had to hide from the Darwinian SS in a secret room in Douglas Axe's lab in Seattle.
Comments
Please do.
Posted by: MartinM | December 20, 2007 9:27 AM
Wow did Pat Robertson really say that? Those guys better stop having their chauffeurs driving the fancy cars or the anti-chauffeur conspiracy might get them. Look out!! Thanks for the post Billy.
Posted by: reindeer386sx | December 20, 2007 9:50 AM
I like how at the end of his screed he writes "We'll be honest: It can be wearying standing for truth on this issue."
WTF??? So you weren't being honest before? Gee!
Evidently they are no better at writing and whining than they are at science.
Looking at the Big Picture, does this mean that Howard Ahronson, and the Moonies have had enough of the DI's Miami Dolphin-like performance over the last few years? Are the purse-strings now pulled tight? Will Rob and Casey be forced to get real jobs and try to make an honest living?
I guess we all need to stay tuned for the exciting conclusion! I hope it comes soon.
Posted by: J-Dog | December 20, 2007 9:54 AM
Here you are.
Among the many other things these guys are (drama queens, paranoiacs), they are such stuffed shirts! West mentions the "free beer" beforehand, trying to sound cool, and sounding uppity instead. Maybe we should have beer-boarded him. ;-)
Posted by: Kristine | December 20, 2007 10:02 AM
It's nice they appreciate the endorsement of Nature, especially considering that Nature is one of those journals that the Darwinists who are persecuting them publish.
Posted by: Dave S. | December 20, 2007 10:28 AM
A persecution complex is great glue for holding a cult together.
As for Rob, yes, the idea *is* already dead, but for some reason you guys keep peddling it as science. We're not fighting your idea; we're fighting your dishonest propaganda machine.
You know the one I mean -- the one that is now falling back on a dishonest pretense of persecution as a way of keeping the flock together, since you haven't been delivering them the long promised science.
Posted by: Bobby | December 20, 2007 10:32 AM
"Recognized by the science journal Nature as "the nation's leading intelligent design think tank,"
Do those guys really have the right to use words like "intelligent" and "think" when talking about themselves ? Shouldn't this be forbidden ?
Posted by: Christophe Thill | December 20, 2007 10:37 AM
Posted by: sparc | December 20, 2007 10:38 AM
Yes, dead like vampires. Science kills it but it keeps coming back, sucking the intellect out of well meaning citizens, rendering them unable to think. The unthinking then disperse to do the will of the dishonest propaganda machine. Need to break the unlife cycle. Must immunize the still living with knowledge and understaning. Thanks Ed for being on the front line. David
Posted by: David Grow | December 20, 2007 11:10 AM
Pat Robertson said that? What a shocker!!! Putting aside his brilliant and insightful remarks following 9/11, he does often make good sense. For instance, did you know that good Christians should not practice yoga? Its downright "spooky" according to Pat. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCZW0fOR8_8
I would sometime like to get an honest answer from the fundies about what their dream USA would be...I suspect none of the readers of Ed's blog would be allowed to participate in their dream USA...but of course they are being persecuted by people who think separation of church and state is a good idea, because criticism is persecution, but its just fine to criticize liberals, "secular progressives," and their ilk...uh huh, right.....
Posted by: lawdog | December 20, 2007 11:11 AM
Don't be confused about what these Dominionist-Christian Reconstructions want. They want an American Taliban where they can stone gays and kill virgins who get raped just like in Saudi Arabia. In short, they want a return to Levitical Old Testament law. They protest Gays but I've never seen a protest at Red Lobster. Why is that?
Enjoy.
Posted by: Tim Fuller | December 20, 2007 11:24 AM
See my Panda's Thumb comment 136217 at http://www.pandasthumb.org/archives/2007/11/unholy-row-over.html explaining how the Baptists are using Sunday School offerings to support intelligent design creationism.
The Dishonesty Institute already has massive financial support from the Christian Reconstructionists and Theocratic DOminionists and their fellow travelers. Their cry for help is bogus beyond belief.
Posted by: Paul Burnett | December 20, 2007 11:50 AM
Of course unlike real biologists, the DI and it's IDiots can't get NSF funding for their "research." That's as it should be, but it does allow them some ready spin, on the order of, "while the big bad ol' gub'mint funds these attacks on Jaysus using your tax dollars, we rely only on you, the true American patriot Christians."
If DI goes bankrupt, they'll have yet another claim to martyrdom, and will simply reappear elsewhere, under another name.
Posted by: James Hanley | December 20, 2007 11:52 AM
Well, they were running on Bill Gates' money for a while but he pulled they plug once he found out what they were really up to. I suspect it is running out just about now.
Posted by: Ferrous Patella | December 20, 2007 12:23 PM
Greed and paranoia are dangerous combinations. Of course, dishonesty ia bad too.
Posted by: Dale Husband | December 20, 2007 12:37 PM
oh my word. i criiiiinge when i read Robertson's quote. i think they are mistaking genuine, and well-founded, critique for persecution. yikes.
Posted by: paul | December 20, 2007 12:42 PM
"We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty."
Edward R. Murrow
Posted by: Bill Gascoyne | December 20, 2007 1:29 PM
Frankly, I think attributing a goal of theocracy to ID advocates is misplaced paranoia. Yes I know that Howard Ahmanson supports the DI and he used to be involved with Rushdoony's foundation, but that doesn't establish the motives of any of the actual ID advocates. I've been dealing with the major ID advocates for a long time. I've rightly blasted them for their lies and their distortions, but I've never seen anything that even hints that Dembski, Behe, Meyer or any of the other prominent ID crowd advocates theocracy or dominionism. The fact that they want society to be more god-centered is not evidence of any penchant for theocracy; any conservative Christian would make that statement, including those who are passionately opposed to theocracy. When we use these terms in such a broad manner we undermine our credibility and we leap from reasoned criticism into hyperbole and undue paranoia. There's plenty to criticize in ID without having to sell some dystopic future fascism as one of their goals.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | December 20, 2007 2:00 PM
In a democracy, I'm not sure there's a whole lot of difference between a "more god-centered society" and a theocracy. A popularly-elected leadership who fails to recognize the distinction between swearing to uphold the constitution with one's hand on the bible, and swearing to uphold the bible with one's hand on the constitution, would in my estimation constitute a theocracy. We already have leaders who draw a distinction between freedom of religion and freedom from religion. If these are the majority of the popularly-elected leaders, how is that not a theocracy? If such a leadership were to pass a constitutional amendment equating blasphemy with disloyalty, would that qualify? I'd say yes.
Posted by: Bill Gascoyne | December 20, 2007 2:35 PM
Posted by: Bobby | December 20, 2007 3:24 PM
"Persecution chic" or "persecution shtick"?
I guess it depends on how you look at it.
Posted by: Kevin Klein | December 20, 2007 3:25 PM
Well Bill,
Isn't it a sliding scale, with a whole range along the way? I think there's a big difference between people who explicitly want the government to recognize the US as an officially Christian nation founded by Christians, but otherwise would like to live their lives more or less as they do now, plus no abortions. And those who really do want to implement old testament law complete with execution for all sorts of offenses like talking back to your parents, simply because this would allow the rapture to happen.
I would hate to see either, but I don't think you can say whoever wants to former also wants the latter.
Posted by: MyPetSlug | December 20, 2007 3:36 PM
Further irony...
The DI recently took on radio talk show host Michael Medved as a Senior Fellow. That would be the same Michael Medved who returns from commercial breaks saying, "I am proud to say, 'I am not a victim!'" I can't wait for his review of Expelled, which has victimhood dripping all over it.
Posted by: Chris R | December 20, 2007 3:41 PM
That hurts. I've been a Dolphins fan for basically my whole life. I'll be the first to admit they're the worst team in the NFL this year, but comparing them to DI? That's just wrong.
Posted by: ShavenYak | December 20, 2007 3:44 PM
Persecuted? Better watch out the EEOC will be on anyone who persecutes them for their religious beliefs, though they vehemently deny any they, or ID, haa any connection to religion. They (religious folks) have insulated themselves and become a special protected class in this country. See what happened with Sternberg (Smithsonian), and currently Gonzalez (ISU) and also Nathaniel Abraham (Woods Hole).
The DI folks are pathological "misrepresentators of the truth," but that doesn't matter as the ends justify the means. After all, anything goes with religion.
Posted by: David K | December 20, 2007 4:00 PM
Bill Gascoyne wrote:
I would agree. I just don't see what that has to do with ID advocates.
Of course the religious right loves to make such a distinction, but in what context? Usually in the context of issues like religious symbols on public property like Nativity scenes. I'm opposed to those things as well, but their existence hardly turns America into a theocracy.
I would too. But again, where's the connection to ID? Has any IDer ever advocated such a law? None that I know of.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | December 20, 2007 4:25 PM
MyPetSlug wrote:
Precisely right. Genuine theocrats are actually a small percentage of the religious right and we do ourselves no favor by overusing that term and applying it to those who don't fit it.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | December 20, 2007 4:27 PM
Ah. So the term should be applied only to "genuine theocrats" (extremist, explicit, out-in-the-open theocrats) and not to partial, in-all-but-name, don't-you-dare-call-us-theocrats.
A matter of definition, I suppose. Perhaps only the ace is a genuine spade.
Posted by: Bill Gascoyne | December 20, 2007 4:52 PM
Bill Gascoyne wrote:
The term should only be applied to those it fits. Bear in mind the comment that provoked my statement about ID and theocracy:
That's certainly a real theocracy, but there isn't a shred of evidence that any ID advocate I am aware of actually supports it. You really think Michael Behe, a Catholic who would be right at the top of the list of enemies in any theocratic state (reconstructionists are almost always hardcore Calvinists who view the RCC was the whore of Babylon), supports making the Old Testament the law of the land? These are serious charges of someone taking a truly evil position; they should not be stated without compelling evidence.
And no, I do not believe for a moment that just because someone thinks that the government should support religion through declarations of thanksgiving or days of prayer, or by putting a Ten Commandments monument in a courthouse, they therefore want to rebuild Calvin's Geneva and start burning heretics at the stake. I am opposed to that sort of accommodationism, but it is folly to pretend that it is tantamount to theocracy; by that measure, George Washington and John Adams were theocrats. The overuse of this term is as silly as the overuse of "liberal" or "secular humanist" by the religious right. We do not enhance our credibility by using the term so loosely, we only risk becoming the boy who cried wolf.
The fact is, both sides have a disturbing tendency to engage in ridiculous hyperbole in many culture war battles. The simple truth is that we are not on cusp of a theocracy any more than we are, as some of the more strident religious right voices claim, on the verge of throwing Christians to the lions once again. There are real theocrats out there and I have devoted a great deal of time and energy to exposing them and ridiculing them, and I have no intention of ceasing my activities in that regard. But let's not pretend that everyone who thinks Christianity is true and ought to be a major cultural influence thinks we should be burning witches and stoning the hymenless on their wedding day.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | December 20, 2007 6:01 PM
Hold the presses! There is an honest statement in the DI's plea for money. Last paragraph, first sentence: "We'll be honest: It can be wearying standing for truth on this issue."
Unfortunately, there seems to be a problem with context and the implication that the truth can be what you want it to be. Sheesh. I wish.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | December 20, 2007 6:58 PM
Where is my persecution-o-matic when I need it? It's so hard to mount oneself on a cross they need to make a machine to make it easier for them.
Classic crank nonsense. A soon as someone says they're being persecuted and they're not being jailed/beaten/killed it's safe to say they're just being a crank.
Posted by: MarkH | December 20, 2007 7:25 PM
I find this sort of stupidity to be... ok, what's a stronger word than "offensive"? I guess I'll have to use more than one word.
It's an insult to persecuted peoples, especially Christians, everywhere.
It is true that Christianity is the most persecuted religion on the planet today. (That's only because it's the biggest, BTW.) But almost exactly none of it is happening in the Western world.
I would love to see Rob Crowther live in the Sudan, or North Korea. I'd like to see him hang out with Christian converts in rural Pakistan, or Serbian Orthodox Christians in Kosovo. Perhaps he could spend some time worshipping in churches that meet in secret in the Maldives, go to Vietnam, where unregistered churches are illegal, or perhaps to Morocco, where Christian marriages are not recognised by the state. Or he could spend some time in Myanmar/Burma, wondering when he's going to get thrown in Insein Prison and tortured.
Take your talk of "persecution" and shove it. You have no idea what persecution is, and you are a living insult to people who live in real fear every day of their lives.
Posted by: Pseudonym | December 20, 2007 8:00 PM
....Take your talk of "persecution" and shove it.
As I said to my (American resident) MIL tonight, when she asked if we got any of this "War On Christmas" idiocy in Canada: the American Christian Right is the biggest bunch of whining cry-babies on the planet.
Posted by: Eamon Knight | December 20, 2007 9:11 PM
I stand by my remarks that the Venn diagram of the ID crowd would nearly overlap the Donminionists. There may be exceptions,but the whole ID movement IS an offshoot of crazy creationism (Thanks Barb).
It's not like ID sprang out of some non-religious scientific circle as a rational alternative to anything. It's just a WEDGE to use to INDOCTRINATE people to the idea that religion has passed some type of scientific threshold and should now be taught as science.
If ID is science, where are the predictions, papers, research, etc? I was already leaning towards the ID crowd just being a special branch of dominionist lunatics when I saw the PBS show with the re-enacted Forrest testimony. After seeing same, there can be no rational argument other than the one I proffer regarding the true nature of ID.
Enjoy.
Posted by: Tim Fuller | December 20, 2007 9:49 PM
Tim Fuller wrote:
Standing by a claim should not be confused with supporting that claim.
Of course it is, but that has nothing whatsoever to do with your claim that the IDers want to stone gays and kill virgins who are raped and institute the Mosaic law in the US.
This is a non sequitur. It doesn't even attempt to address the issue. Of course ID is unscientific tripe. What in the world does that have to do with ID advocates wanting to stone gays and kill virgins who are raped?
Posted by: Ed Brayton | December 21, 2007 12:01 AM
Ed--"Precisely right. Genuine theocrats are actually a small percentage of the religious right and we do ourselves no favor by overusing that term and applying it to those who don't fit it."
If only the opposition had such admirable restraint.
Posted by: Paul Flocken | December 21, 2007 9:06 AM
Sure. But, as Dave Neiwart is endlessly pointing out, there's a conveyor belt that moves radical ideas gradually towards the mainstream. Organisations like the DI provide a mechanism for the mainstreaming of ever more radical notions. And never forget that their own stated goal is to use the evolution "debate" as a wedge to overthrow the very concept of science.
Posted by: Dunc | December 21, 2007 9:50 AM
Ed. Look at it this way. Howard Ahmonson, a know advocate of a US Theocracy funds the DI. Behe, Dembski et al are all "Senior Fellows" of the DI, and they all take money from the DI. Therefore, it follows that if they take money from the DI, they take it from a known theocrat, and they as Sr. Fellows have to be seen as supporting the DI.
So, although Behe is a Catholic, and Dembski an evangelical, they can and do support a known theocrat.
I think you are splitting hairs - and I think the "Duck Argument" applies. (Walk like a duck, hang out with ducks etc).
You may think that they are all nice, urbane, sophisticated, great guys to play cards with and hang out with, but at the end of the day, Dembski and Behe and all the DI fellows all go quack, quack, quack.
Posted by: J-Dog | December 21, 2007 10:26 AM
"That's [stoning gays, etc.] certainly a real theocracy, but there isn't a shred of evidence that any ID advocate I am aware of actually supports it."
No, they just support re-defining science so that faith-based foolishness can be written into law and the constitution, and extending the current administration's trends of "abstinence only" and using whatever belief floats your boat to justify themselves because "God told them" to. I'm sorry, but I feel justified in using the word "theocracy" to describe the slippery slope itself and not just the cesspool at the bottom.
Posted by: Bill Gascoyne | December 21, 2007 11:10 AM
Bill, et al. -
I don't think there is a slippery slope here. For instance, there have been plenty of officially Christian nations in the past that did not advocate to the Dominionist extremes. The England that America separated from for instance.
I think Dembski and cohorts are a bunch of deceitful ignorant twits who want to twist science back to the 16th century to satisfy their religious agenda. But I don't think their agenda is necessarily a Christatorship. More like official acknowledgement and respect for their faith. They go too far and run afoul of the Constitution when their faith meets a public school, but not that far.
Posted by: Dave S. | December 21, 2007 12:42 PM
An abhorrence of, and opposition to, science and education are clearly the intersection of Dominionists and ID proponents, there's no denying it.
http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/7135
Posted by: triviality | December 21, 2007 7:06 PM
Who would give these guys money? These are the guys that claimed that the Wedge document was just a "fund raising" document in order to deny the claims made in it. They claimed to be lying in the Wedge document in order to scam funding out of the creationist rubes, so that they could still claim that they were doing legitimate, science or whatever. Of course, they could have been lying about that, but would that make them an organization that you would support?
Posted by: Ron Okimoto | December 21, 2007 7:06 PM
Dave S.: I agree with you, but I will note for the record that the England that America separated from was very badly burned by theocracy a hundred years previously. The scars caused by Cromwell hadn't yet entirely healed.
Posted by: Pseudonym | December 21, 2007 11:55 PM
triviality -
That A imples B does not mean that B implies A.
Posted by: Dave S. | December 22, 2007 8:20 AM
Dave S stated:
It's been 14 generations now so the news is a bit stale, but my ancestor Edward Wightman was the last man known in England to have been burned alive as an official punishment for expressing his religious opinions (1612). That was only a decade or two before another ancestor, Roger Williams, found it necessary to relocate from Massachusetts because of his "diverse, new, and dangerous opinions" and to become co-founder of the colony of Rhode Island.
There are two classes of errors to be made in relation to purported "dominionist" threats: overstating and understating.
Posted by: Michael Rathbun | December 22, 2007 10:18 PM
I think the reasoning is clear that supporters of the Wedge Document want to take away our religious freedom, and every DI fellow is clearly forwarding the Wedge Stratagy. Ed B. cautions us not to be extreme in our slippery slope argument, so are we justified in being very fearful of Christian Theology being taught in public schools? I say YES!! This would represent a fundamental change in our Constitution and our society. Democracy and religious freedom are inseparable, and over time the other Western Democracies have been forced to practise greater religious freedom. (That is why Israel is in a constant state of war). To give up religious freedom is to give up democracy.
Posted by: Frank B | December 24, 2007 6:07 PM
Ed-- It's true the IDers aren't advocating killing virgins who are raped. They are, however, advocating forcing virgins who are raped to bear any consequent child-- even if the pregnancy endangers the mother's health. Others of their political persuasion have frequently stated that virgins who are raped were probably "asking for it," implying they should face, at the very least, social penalties for what was done to them. The religious right has also blocked virgins' access to the human papilloma virus vaccine-- an action which could potentially lead to a rape victim's death from cancer.
And, no, the fundies don't advocate stoning gays-- simply violating their rights to equal protection under the law, including equal employment oppotunities.
That's not what-if, slippery-slope stuff. That's what radical right is advocating now, today.
Do the folks at the Disco Institute really want all of that? I sincerely doubt it. I think their piety and patriotism is strictly limited to worshipping little pieces of paper printed with dead presidents and "in God we trust." But the IDers are definitely playing to the crowd who do want those things, and even to the flat-out Christian dominionists.
Frankly, I don't see any point in arguing about whether the religious right is trying to kill raped virgins today, or six months from now from an ectopic pregnancy, or twenty years down the road from cervical cancer. Their platform is all about placing arbitrary limits on the freedom of their fellow American citizens. And there's no way that we should accept that.
Posted by: hoary puccoon | December 26, 2007 9:03 PM
If these "Christian" types get control of your government for four years look forward to disaster. In those four years "abstinence only" idiotcy would kill c46,000 Americans from AIDS alone*. That's more that c15 times the number killed on September 11, 2001. Who needs the Taliban and Al-Queda? -DJ
*See "A Friend Leaves the AIDS Closet" [25 Apl] toward the bottom of the comments for my reasoning for this figure.
Posted by: DingoJack | April 29, 2008 3:32 AM