Some of you are aware, I'm sure, of the controversy that has been raging throughout the right side of the blogosphere concerning Richard von Sternberg and the Smithsonian. Based solely on an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal, everyone from the Discovery Institute to the Worldnutdaily and a thousand blogs have picked up on the story to scream "PERSECUTION" at the top of their lungs in the fervant hope that their martyr complex had been proven true. Well, not so fast. I didn't bother to write about it a week ago because there was simply no information to go on other than the accusations made in Klinghoffer's article, and because we were attempting to verify whether some of those accusations were true or not. But now Sternberg's sponsor at the Smithsonian, Jonathan Coddington, has posted a response to the accusations and flat out denied them to be true. You can find the text of that response, and more information about this issue, in this post by Wes Elsberry at the Panda's Thumb.
Who is telling the truth? We have no way of knowing that yet. What we do know is that Sternberg is still a Research Associate at the Smithsonian with all of the same access that he always has had (an RA is not a paid staff position but merely access to the Smithsonian collections and a work space at the museum; he is not a Smithsonian employee and never has been). And that alone makes the claims of martyrdom a non-starter. I suspect this will go the way of more recent "scandals" that were dishonestly portrayed and briefly captured the imagination of the right wing media. It will likely take its place with the "Declaration of Independence Banned from Classrooms" story and the "ACLU Sues Department Stores to ban Merry Christmas" story in the religious right hall of fame for false claims that captivate the credulous. Claims of martyrdom and persecution are to the self-righteous what small shiny objects are to a kitten. They simply cannot help but be mesmerized by them and they rarely bother to ask whether they're actually true.
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I'm not sure if the proper title here is "Smithsonian Responds". Techincally, the Smithsonian, as an institution, has not released any public comment yet. And Coddington's response isn't exactly official, more like "quit making up crap about me!" Either way, it's his response and not the Smithsonian's.
Actually, I think kittens usually have fairly good reason to believe that shiny objects are true.
I'm not sure if the proper title here is "Smithsonian Responds". Techincally, the Smithsonian, as an institution, has not released any public comment yet. And Coddington's response isn't exactly official, more like "quit making up crap about me!" Either way, it's his response and not the Smithsonian's.
I agree with you here.
Also of note is that Coddington mentioned that since this issue is still outstanding, he could not comment as fully as he might wish to.
So this is probably better characterized as a preliminary response by Coddington, rather than a response by the Smithsonian.
The Smithsonian did respond in a letter to the Wall St. Journal:
To set the record straight:
It should be noted that Richard Sternberg is not a Smithsonian employee. He is a staff member of the National Center of Biotechnology Information at the National Institutes of Health. As a research associate he has permission to study collections at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History for a three-year term.
Dr. Sternberg's characterization of his work conditions and treatment at the Smithsonian is incorrect. He was never denied office space, keys or access to the collections. More importantly, the private religious beliefs of employees and research associates are respected by the museum, and have no bearing on their professional standing within the museum.
Randall Kremer
Director of Public Affairs
National Museum of Natural History
Smithsonian Institution
Washington