Oklahoma State Senator Josh Brecheen wants to cram his religion down the throats of all the little children in the OK state.

Posted by Greg Laden on December 26, 2010
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I hereby nominate Oklahoma as the Stupidest State in the Union.

According to KTEN, Brecheen is using the tired old argument that because creationism exists as a belief it must be taught in science classes. This is exactly like saying that because some crazy people think bigfoot is real, bigfoot must be included in science classes.

“If we really are going to use science in the classroom, let’s use the full science, let’s not just be selective in our science. That’s what my legislation is designed to do,” Brecheen said.

Idiot.

Creationism of any form, including “intelligent design,” simply is not science. Leave it out of the classroom. The guy thinks he’s a scientist.

“The main fallacy with Darwinian theory,” he argued, “is the sudden appearance at about 540 million years [ago] of fossil records. It’s like a guy standing at the chalkboard and saying okay here’s an atom [and then writing] question mark, question mark, human–here we are. But its fact, and there’s zero evidence to back it up.”

Face palm city. For one thing, no one thinks that life suddenly appeared 540 million years go. Second, he is incorrectly using the term “fossil record.” Third, he must have had a really sucky life science teacher if that is what he experienced in school.

But really, we all know that Brecheen does not really believe in biblical creation or that creationism should be in schools. But half of his constituents, and he’s pandering to him. Also, this is part of a broad strategy to muck up science teaching and science in general because that is what Republicans do. (You know, I ‘ve not looked up his political affiliation, but he probably is a Republican, don’t you think?)

According to the KTEN report,

“This is the future of our state, the future of our nation is dependant on what we teach our kidos in the classroom,” said Senator Brecheen.

Oklahoma’s major universities including OU and OSU all agree that evolution is the best science and that alternatives such as creationism should not be taught in public schools.

Did he really say “kidos”? Uffda.


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Comments

  1. #1 weez
    December 26, 2010

    “religion down thorats”? “things” instead of “thinks” in 2 plcs? The typo monster is stalking you- but otherwise, good bit, Greg.

  2. #2 Greg Laden
    December 26, 2010

    I’m writing under duress and in a hurry. Thanks for pointing them out.

  3. #3 Shawn Smith
    December 26, 2010

    Under duress? Oh, crap. I hope you didn’t trip on your knee again. That would really suck.

  4. #4 weez
    December 26, 2010

    No worries, Greg. Don’t mean to be a pedant, but a good bit hits harder without such.

  5. #5 Greg Laden
    December 26, 2010

    No, just ran out of cookies but now there are more.

  6. #6 tristero
    December 26, 2010

    Just back from Oklahoma, visiting in-laws. I would agree that it’s the stupidest state in the Union. But that’s not saying much.

    Education is not much better in the smarter states. They simply finesse evolution studies rather than risk upsetting the yokels. And the waste of precious natural resources, not to mention rampant xenophobia and racism, is a feature of the entire United States, not just OK or the rest of the midwest and South.

  7. #7 MadScientist
    December 27, 2010

    “kidos”? I always thought it was “kiddos”, or if you went to school with Dan Quayle it’s “kiddoes”. Now I’ll imagine Breechen in worn overalls, straw hat, and a length of straw hanging out the side of his mouth as he drawls on about gawd and how dem ee-leetes think dey know evurtin’ and how they’re on a croo-sade to prevent “gawd’s reel siuns” from being tawt in OK.

    I swear OK overtook KS as the laughingstock long ago; AK can’t compete, not even with Sarah Palin.

  8. #8 Drivebyposter
    December 27, 2010

    If someone is looking for a sentence by sentence in depth refutation of the idiocy that guy spouted, PZ did one.

    I’m not quite sure how the guy got a biology degree and says the stupid shit he said. (I mean the OK guy, not PZ)

  9. #9 ALWAYSBYTHEBOOK
    January 8, 2011

    OMG! He has picked up the”PALIN VIRUS”! This senator also wants to repeal Prop B! GET HIM OUTTA THERE!

  10. #10 SamWest
    January 25, 2012

    I grew up in Oklahoma and my teachers encouraged me to go into physics which I did. I also attended vacation bible school every summer with all of my baby sitters. I went to every church in Edmond, Oklahoma from Assembly of God to Baptist to Presbyterian.

    My science and math education was superior and the exposure to religion didn’t change my scientist mind or inhibit my Oklahoma teachers from teaching evolution.

    The two coexisted without problem.

    Back then no one was trying to stamp out the practice of Christianity like they (including Greg) are now so there was no reason to feel threatened. It was live and let live. Not so anymore because people like Greg think no one has the right to practice Christianity.

    Back off and Christians will back off too. You have no more right to shove your beliefs down their throats than they do theirs down your throat.

  11. #11 NJ
    January 25, 2012

    SamWest@10:

    Back off and Christians will back off too.

    Objection! Assuming facts not in evidence.

    …people like Greg think no one has the right to practice Christianity.

    ibid.

    The two coexisted without problem.

    No. They. Did. Not.

    People who did not follow Christianity had it force-fed to them almost without end. It coexisted without problem much like whites and blacks coexisted without problem in 1850′s Alabama. It just looked to those doing the forcing (like everyone around you) that there wasn’t a problem.

    Unfortunately, you baldly misinterpret people standing up for their rights as troublemakers, trying to force something down your throat, when all they are demanding is to be treated equally.

    It is not the atheists who are the problem. It’s people like you who refuse to accept that you are the problem.

  12. #12 NJ
    January 25, 2012

    Yvonne@12:

    darwin worshippers

    Can’t quite grasp the concept of respect w/o worship can you, sweetums? Since you worship something blindly, so must everyone else. Fortunately, the majority of us can separate the concepts.

    And the rest of your post let’s see…

    evolution = satan worship, check
    evolution (and climate change) = religion, check
    ‘were you there’-ism, check
    science = marxism, check
    evolution = abortion and homosexuality, check
    ‘ramming down throat’, check
    Earth must be young, check

    Hey, I almost have a full brain-dead fundagelical Bingo card!

    reading from the book of revelation

    I’ll see your ‘revelation’, and raise you a ‘Prisoner of Azkaban’! At least mine has plausible parts in it…

  13. #13 Rustic
    January 25, 2012

    OMG

  14. #14 Greg Laden
    January 25, 2012

    Yvonne, you will start treating the other commenters on this site respectfully or you’ll be asked to leave.

  15. #15 Drivebyposter
    January 26, 2012

    Oh my, god is an excuse for weakminded people to be assholes while refusing to take responsibility for their actions and speech.
    Is that a better use of “oh my god”?

    Proof that you are weakminded: You can’t comprehend people using common sayings that have deviated pretty far from their original and literal intent. Also you believe in magic.

    Proof that you’re an asshole:
    You worship the god of the bible and seem pretty enthusiastic about the suffering of people different from you.

    “Yours will burn in the end times. mine will be for eternity. Checkmate. calling me “sweetie” is a little creepie.Are your homersexual?”

    Are your literate?

  16. #16 NJ
    January 26, 2012

    Yvonne @ 14:

    Are your homersexual?

    Well, since Homer and Marge have three children (Bart, Lisa, Maggie), it’s clear that the answer has to be yes.

    In reading the ‘Yvonne’ comments with their free-form logic and writing style (to say nothing of the oddity that they seemed to forget that Yvonne is a female name), I will tentatively suggest that this was another Rob Hood sockpuppet. This would be consistent with the outbreak of similar sockpuppets on other posts.

    Can’t someone in his family stage an intervention and get him the mental health care he so desperately needs?

  17. #17 NJ
    January 26, 2012

    Ah, Rob Hood, if you only realized the (digital) paper trail of lunacy you have left here and how it will be used in your family’s behalf at your hearing…

  18. #18 Greg Laden
    January 26, 2012

    It is classic. If you don’t agree with me you are irrational. If you speak up, your words are hysterical. Your disagreement is a form of repression of me, so you clearly oppose the right to free speech even if you claim to support it.

  19. #19 NJ
    January 26, 2012

    “Leslie”@22:

    3251 pages of ranting

    Nope, no evidence of mental illness there, Rob Hood, no siree bob!

  20. #20 dean
    January 27, 2012

    Being that there are about a million abortions a year Pepsi should not run out of artificial sweetner for quite some time. In the meantime NJ, please direct your inquiries to my secretary. Take two fetus Mountain Dews and call me in the morning.

    Apparently this “fetus tissue in soda” idea has some loons’ blood boiling. Another senator from OK has stated

    As recently as May, Pepsi ignored concerns and criticism from dozens of pro-life groups and tens of thousands of pro-life people who voiced their opposition to PepsiCo contracting with biotech company Senomyx even after it was found to be testing their food additives using fetal cells from abortions.

    It’s easy to see how these morons believe human tissue is in food:

    Step 1: Note that Mountain Dew is green
    Step 2: Remember that in the classic 1973 preview of the coming “liberal utopia” Soylent Green, Soylent Green was also green, and made from people
    Step 3: Step 1 + Step 2 = OMG THERE ARE BABIES IN OUR SOFT DRINKS

    Science and investigative reporting are quite easy when you have no concern for facts.

  21. #21 abby
    oklahoma
    March 26, 2013

    and he just voted killing horses for food better watch the beef you feed your kids it just maybe not all beef but horse.