At least, I hope so. The "conservapedia" is supposed to be an alternative to Wikipedia that removes the biases—although one would think the creators would be clever enough to realize that even the name announces that Conservapedia is planning to openly embrace a particular political bias. Unfortunately, that bias seems to be more towards stupidity than anything else.
In fact, reading through it leads me to wonder if it isn't actually a parody site. Some people are getting the same impression of Overwhelming Evidence, the Intelligent Design site that was set up to cater to the teen crowd, but is also looking like a magnet for parodists; the rebuttal to Ian Musgrave's summary of the evolution of the clotting pathway, for instance, is an amazingly subtle thing that basically puts the IDists on the side against any detailed discussion of molecular pathways. It's also obvious that the people behind OE are completely oblivious to the sneaky undermining that is going on, largely because it is so close to their actual positions.
I predict that Conservapedia is going to experience the same problem—I look forward to seeing devious examples of the conservative position being delicately exposed as inane. You can't find a better example than their tirade against the biases in Wikipedia, which I suspect was written by a sincere conservative, but reads like something out of The Onion. Among the things they find objectionable:
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The use of "BCE" and "CE" instead of BC and AD in dates.
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Wikipedia has lots of articles about trivia, like music and movies.
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Some articles use the British spellings for words.
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They just want more credit given to Jesus for everything.
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The whole worldwide community of English speakers edits Wikipedia; they're going to emphasize American (by which they mean not liberal) opinions.
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Too many Wikipedia entries are "gossipy" or sound like something from the National Enquirer.
You know, if someone wanted to just go with it and pretend to be the most obnoxious, sanctimonious, narrow-minded blue-nosed prig, you could probably have a ball writing all kinds of sneering articles for Conservapedia. I predict that the history pages are going to be great fun to read, as the editors egg each other on to be more and more outrageously reactionary.
But of course, the most amusing bits on that page are the anti-evolution tirades.
Edits to include facts against the theory of evolution are almost immediately censored.
This is a point in Wikipedia's favor: there is some quality control. Since these so-called "facts" creationists try to introduce are typically lies, distortions, and error, I think it's a good idea that Wikipedia has informed editors. Conservapedia, on the other hand, will encourage absolute idiots who know nothing about the subject to frolic. Here's their entry on evolution, complete with misspellings.
The Theory of Evolution, introduced by Charles Darwin in his book On The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life, published in 1859, is the scientific theory that explains the process of evolution. The basic principle behind evolution, called natural selection, states that in the struggle for life, fitter organisms will survive thus saving 'good mutations' and discarding 'bad mutations' enabling a species to become more specialized.
There are two parts of evolution: Microevolution and Macroevolution. Microevolution refers only to change within a speicies; e.g. a dog can be bred for certain traits but never can become a cat. Macroevolution is the theory that species can add information to their genetic makeup and therefore change into a different species; e.g. men and apes originating from a common ancestor.
Pathetic. The old "dog into cat" canard is such a silly idea, it really doesn't belong in any serious definition of evolution; no one promotes it other than creationists. And this is all they can say about evolution, that it's in two parts, macro and micro? Look at Wikipedia's definition, which goes on and on and talks about evidence and mechanisms and history.
Here's their justification for including tripe about science:
For example, even though most Americans (and probably most of the world) reject the theory of evolution, Wikipedia editors commenting on the topic are nearly 100% pro-evolution.
Well, it is true that if you poll ignorant people, you can get the most amazing ideas…but it doesn't imply that those opinions are valid. Again, it seems to be saying that while Wikipedia has benefited from knowledgeable people taking part, Conservapedia is going to go with the gut instincts of Joe Sixpack on science.
Then there is this kind of foolishness:
The Wikipedia entry for the Piltdown Man omits many key facts, such as how it was taught in schools for an entire generation and how the dating methodology used by evolutionists is fraudulent.
You really won't find that much about Piltdown in old textbooks. It's mentioned, but often with a quizzical air. I understand it was a bit more heavily promoted in old British textbooks, but in the American books I've looked at there's usually an expression of dubiety—it just didn't fit well with other known fossils. Complaining about the dating methods is weird: when the technologies that allowed dating were developed and applied to the fossils, they exposed the relative recency of the bones. All the Wikipedia entry says about the dating is that methods to accurately date the skull were not available when it was discovered.
Poor conservatives. I almost feel sorry for them for the way this kind of rank idiocy is getting tagged to their political position, but I am looking forward to many opportunities for satire.
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"I never meant to say that the Conservatives are generally stupid. I meant to say that stupid people are generally Conservative. I believe that is so obviously and universally admitted a principle that I hardly think any gentleman will deny it." -John Stuard Mill
That's "Stuart". Note to self- use preview!
And of course, they're completely full of fossilized trilobite poop when they claim most of "the rest of the world" rejects evolution. The US is highly unusual among developed nations for its rejection of what is known to be one of the most robust theories in all of science. The only country that falls below the US where acceptance of evolution is concerned in hyper-Islamic Turkey. Rejection of evolution is tied directly to the level of religious fanaticism, not education, in a culture.
I see they are off to a good start:
God
God is the all-loving creator of the universe, who created man in His image. His creation of man is described in the Book of Genesis.
Retrieved from "http://www.conservapedia.com/God"
The thing I just love about Conservapedia is the inconsistency and hypocrisy of it all. It's all their on their "bias in Wikipedia" page:
Mmm-kay. Doesn't sound like a bloke who believes in a free market of either goods or ideas. In fact, much of the "bias" complaint page is inconsistent or just downright incoherent. (The complaint about Wikipedia lacking "elementary proofs" in math articles is just goofy, and as I wrote over in Brayton's thread, the jibe about a thousand articles on "Moby songs" depends upon selective presentation of the evidence.) They say that Wikipedia focuses too much on celebrity gossip and other trivialities beneath the notice of a serious encyclopedia, but in their own Conservapedia Commandments, barely a breath after demanding that statements be "true and verifiable", they insist upon BC/AD dating and American spelling! They whine about Wikipedia giving too much space to Hollywood and pop music, and then with barely a pause they say that Wikipedia gives too short shrift to creationism — because most of the country believes in it!
This kind of illogic doesn't stem from a coherent philosophy. It comes from the gut. Here we see ideas being accepted based on their emotional appeal and ideological fitness, rather than their logical consistency.
When these folks say "conservative", the word you and I should hear is authoritarian.
Edit: replace first "their" with "there" — where's my caffeine, dammit?
Their examples of Wikipedian bias would better serve as textbook cases of poor thinking, selection bias and obfuscation. To pick just one:
First, saying that topics are "beneath a regular encyclopedia" rather begs the question, doesn't it? And then, a quick site-specific Google search reveals 697 pages containing the words Moby and song, some of which are organizational in nature ("Category: Moby songs"). Other mentions are incidental, such as a list of all songs named "Beautiful". Giving the impression that all of the 600-odd hits are full-fledged encyclopedia articles is disingenuous at best. Since any further refinements to the search would reduce the amount of material returned, I wonder how they got their figure of 1,075.
Let's try a control experiment. Performing the same search on the words Beethoven and symphony returns 1,340 results! There are more hits for Mozart concerto than for Moby song, and hundreds for Bach fugue. Plainly, the good stuff is there, if you look for it.
Bah. I've wasted enough ATP on this.
What a fitting time to use this word:
Nincompoops.
Noun 1.nincompoop - a stupid foolish person
ninny, poop, simpleton, simple - a person lacking intelligence or common sense.
I reject empirical reality and substitute my own. Yay!
Aha - no bias here!
Abortion
The word abortion, in connection with pregnancy, can be defined as "Termination of pregnancy and expulsion of an embryo or of a fetus that is incapable of survival."[1] Thus, the word includes miscarriage, but commonly refers to induced abortion; that is, the intentional performance of a procedure which causes the death of a living organism. Most Christian conservatives regard human life as beginning at conception and consider abortion to be the murder of innocent babies while in the womb of their mother.
Abortion is a controversial topic in the United States. Prior to 1973 it was illegal, usually criminal, and considered to be serious medical misconduct. The U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade[2] decision ruled that abortions are permissible, as a woman's choice, up to the point at which the fetus becomes able to survive outside the womb.
[edit]Abortion and Breast Cancer
The majority of scientific studies have shown that abortion causes an increase in breast cancer, including 16 out of 17 statistically significant studies.[3] However, like the tobacco industry in the 1950s, the abortion industry has so far kept this important information away from much of the public. This may be due to the controversy around this finding, which suggests that data linking abortion to increased breast cancer risk is not yet conclusive.[4] Some of the reasons for the difficulty in verifying these studies include:
The number of cases observed; a very small number may not be reflective of the general population)
The type of abortion: induced versus spontaneous (also called miscarriages)
Accounting for other lifestyle or genetic factors that may influence breast cancer risk
The amount of time between abortion and breast cancer occurrence
Data limitations due to the changing legal status of abortion (for example, an American woman's abortion history may not have been reported before 1973, when the Supreme Court legalized abortion).
Recall bias (women may not accurately report their reproductive history)
Emotional and/or socio-political factors
[edit]Political Action Committees
The most powerful political action committee (PAC) is EMILY's List.[5]. EMILY's List contributes money to Democratic candidates who support abortion-on-demand, including forced taxpayer funding of abortion. EMILY's List candidates also oppose regulations such as:
providing health information to abortion patients;
requiring that the abortionist have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital in case there is a complication; and
providing parental notification if the patient is a teenager.
Due to the influence of the abortion industry and EMILY's List, nearly every Democratic presidential candidate and senatorial candidate supports abortion-on-demand. "EMILY's List, the nation's largest political action committee, continues to be the dominant financial resource for Democratic candidates," its above-referenced website declares.
http://www.conservapedia.com/Abortion
"Cerebral hygiene" is alive and well.
Apparently reality has a strong liberal bias.
Looks like the site is already down. I'm getting a bunch of "connection refuseds."
Checking the registration records for the domain, I see it registered to a "Andrew Schlafly" of New York, NY.
A quick google search for that name says that the guy was an attorney in the Terri Shiavo case, as well as writing articles saying that there's a link between abortion and breast cancer.
Classy!
A finer example of Newspeak I've never seen. Orwell would be proud.
I am not sure if they know, but the British spelling for words, is actually the spelling they began with, the Americans took words like
colour and turned it into color, probably due to laziness, not being bothered to write in the u. I can't believe they would put that as a reason to not use wikipedia, maybe they just couldn't think of enough good reasons. Idiots
What is the purpose of a site like this anyway? It's not like you're going to win any left-right arguments by referring to the Conservapedia definition of "abortion," e.g. Is the idea just to form a completely self-contained world, utterly divorced from reality, in which to formulate disastrous policies to be forced upon an unsuspecting populace?
And wasn't there a Spiderman comic about that?
"When these folks say "conservative", the word you and I should hear is authoritarian."
Bumper sticker!
I just tried searching their site for "global warming", and it immediately came back with "connection refused".
Coincidence? I think not. :)
I wonder if their server can't handle being ScienceBlogged. ;-)
I'm not sure how many of the conservatives I know would be embarrassed by conservapedia. Unfortunately, most of them would love it.
I wish I could go there and have some fun checking it out, but the page won't display for me either. :( I wanted to look up all sorts of fun things.
Well, I for one am extremely embarrassed at the whole thing. Every entry I have read has poor writing, poor content and even poorer creationist teaching. Most of it isn't even logical and wouldn't be usable in any situation, let alone as a alternative to Wikipedia.
I suppose there is something to be said for wanting to build a site that refutes some of the evolution claims elsewhere, but at least try to get it to sound good. Put a little effort into it or something.
z.
Actually, as far as I know the choice of the American alternate spelling for many English words was often intentional, part of a conscious effort to distance the new country from the old, through the (manufactured) need for locally-written textbooks for use in schools. The American textbooks would of course reflect the values of the Revolution, shaping young American minds to embrace those values.
Mr. Noah Webster is to be blamed (or cheered, according to taste) for playing a very large role in this process, and incidentally pissing off many millions of future non-native English readers...
When I could get thru, I compared the George W. Bush entry (two sentences, three facts given, one of them wrong) to the Bill Clinton entry (must be read to be appreciated). Good stuff, I can always use a laugh.
I suppose there is something to be said for wanting to build a site that refutes some of the evolution claims elsewhere, but at least try to get it to sound good.
--s. zeilenga
Not possible.
If you are able, I suggest checking their entries on biological structures and phenomena. The source must be seen to be believed.
Please Z.
Enlighten us.
What are some of the claims of evolution that have been refuted and what is the evidence for those refutations.
I finally got a connection. Looked up "vaccine". Got back (this is the whole article)
Very deep. So, conservapedia is the encyclopedia for people who can't be bothered to read more than one sentence.
But wait, there's one more thing. Here's the reference cited for the article.
That's a fundie homeschool textbook. The book cited, by the way, has such wonderful parts as:
"Inconclusive evidence: The geological column"
"The details of the fossil record: evidence against macroevolution"
"Molecular biology: The nail in macroevolution's coffin"
In the "Conservapedia Commandments" the first commandment is : 1.Everything you post must be true and verifiable.
Too late. I am a craetionist and I can't even believe this statement. :) heh.
z.
Checking the registration records for the domain, I see it registered to a "Andrew Schlafly" of New York, NY.
As in son of the famous Phyllis "Judge Jones should know which side his bread is buttered on" Schlafly? Andy, who with brother Roger, were for a time the Creationist Dumb & Dumber act of talk.origins? That explains everything.
As for the amount of "fluff" on Wikipedia, so what? It's free, and contains whatever people contribute. If it were a dead-tree encyclopedia being flogged door-to-door for kilobucks by high-pressure conmen, then it might be relevant that it had a high fluff content -- the editors have cheated the buyers who thought they were getting an educational resource. But as it stands, if I want some quick background on a bit of science or history or philosophy, I go to Wiki and look it up. The fact that there may be (say) 100 articles on Britney Spears and only one on Aristarchus needn't bother me, as I never even see the former. As long as Aristarchus is there, and reasonably accurate, that's all that matters.
(I bet Andy would approve of the political articles in my 1965 World Book Encyclopedia ;-).
The book cited, by the way
Whoops ... my bad. Those sections are in their biology textbook, and Conservapedia's actually referenced a lower-level "general science" textbook. Here are some samples from the fundie homeschool textbook that Conservapedia actually cited:
"Failures of the Scientific Method"
"Evolution: Another Weakness of Uniformitarianism"
It's not really an improvement. :)
Once you've clicked on a few random pages, you soon begin to realize that most of it was written by grade schoolers. It really is that embarrassingly amateurish in style and content.
Once you've clicked on a few random pages, you soon begin to realize that most of it was written by grade schoolers.
Rather, that most of it was cribbed from fundie homeschool textbooks for 7th-10th graders. If Conservapedia stays up long enough to allows you, search for "Wile" (the author I mentioned above).
473 entries, all from that "Exploring Creation" series of books.
This is my new hobby! I'm actually making existing articles readable--adding grammar, structure, coherency, and so on. It's fun.
If you really want to spoof Conservapedia, here's a standard to shoot for: http://jonswift.blogspot.com/ Like conservative political thought, this stuff is tough to parody...
Steve C - The comments section of PZ's blog is no place to have any kind of debate, especially one that will range from cosmology to biology to zoology to history. We couldn't have a good discussion even if we did want one here.
We can talk later sometime.
z.
From "Overwhelming Evidence":
So does a lobotomy.
Did y'all see this example of bias from their site?
"Wikipedia's entry omits references to leading pro-parent websites concerning vaccination, and instead Wikipedia's entry lists pro-government and pro-vaccine-manufacturer websites."
(By the way, how do you do that cool blockquote thing in the comments here?)
That's not a typically politically conservative position. In the case of vaccines, it's usually the screwball fringe of the political left who are against good science, and the pro-corporate conservatives who take the correct side.
So it seems Conservapedia takes the stupid side of each issue.
That changed a bit with the advent of the HPV vaccine, since the screwball fringe of the political right thinks it's a license for premarital and/or teen sex.
As a conservative, I can say 'conservapedia' is a poorly designed site (-- Try navigating within it, but try not getting angry with all the error messages -- it's good practice) and the little I can see of their content offends me.
These people are cristo-fascists masquerading -- badly -- as conservatives.
Conservatives are for -- altogether now -- fiscal discipline, small government, limited intrusion into people's affairs, respect for the law and the Constitution, and tempered changes.
These wackos are radical zealots who want to change everything everywhere, they are ruining our past, present, and future, and they truly seem intent on seeing the world come undone in their own lifetimes, as if apocalypse would be the only thing that would give their lives meaning. Otherwise they'd be lost in the shuffle and forgotten in the sands of time.
I wish we could rationalize our political vocabulary and call things by their historically correct names- it would save an awful lot of confusion. You, sir or madam, are a liberal. PZ is a social democrat, as am I. (Or possibly PZ is a bit to my left and would be more correctly described as a democratic socialist- I'm not sure.) And the authoritarians are indeed conservatives in the proper meaning of that word. See how that clarifies things, rather than lumping all sorts of mutually incompatible positions into the catchall "liberal" and "conservative" labels as they've come to be bizarrely misused in this country?
I'm so glad to find a resource that is not biased at all. It gives us such gems as this (from the Today in History for Feb. 2nd):
Perhaps someone had better let all the other religions of the world know that they have no faith.
I guess social conservatives and traditional conservatives have a problem with each other.
The traditional conservatives let the socials take over in order to gain power.
Except that didn't really happen the way they wanted it.
I would prefer traditional conservatives would stand up and knock down the social conservatives down 3 pegs. At least then we could get on with the debate of how the country should be managed reasonably between progressives and conservatives.
ColorMeSad said:
"Conservatives are for -- altogether now -- fiscal discipline, small government, limited intrusion into people's affairs...."
When the conservatives tell me they have a right to, for example, legislate my behavior in the bedroom (between, or among, consenting adults), or make child-bearing choices for me, I don't consider that a "limited intrusion".
you copy-n-paste the bit you want to quote, then surround it with
tags.
I'm guessing they'll also be telling us that the SI metric system is a tool of subliminal mind-control designed, in concert with fluoridation, to pave the way for godless communism and rampant gay sex.
Fun's over.
"I am not sure if they know, but the British spelling for words, is actually the spelling they began with, the Americans took words like colour and turned it into color, probably due to laziness, not being bothered to write in the u."
An anti-American bias doesn't make you look smarter or liberal. The reason that we have different spellings is because in the early 1800's American English was a mess for spelling and slang. Noah Webster created an American dictionary to standardize spelling. The "u" in words such as favor and color he deemed extraneous. He made other changes, such as "s" in defense, "theater" as opposed to "theatre."
Our language made much more sense after that, and reduced the number of "outlaw" words that kids had to learn as they were learning to write.
This doesn't excuse Schlafly, though, as he fails to understand that Wikipedia is open to the entire web and not just to the United States.
okay, those tags got mangled somewhere in between previewing and posting; scienceblogs webmasters take note of that!
the tag name is "blockquote", and like all HTML tags it needs to get wrapped in less-than and greater-than signs; the closing tag, furthermore, needs a forward-slash ("/") sign in between its less-than character and the tag name.
let's see if this works:
<blockquote> ... </blockquote>
ah, i see what went wrong now; i hit "post" at the preview page when the preview looked good. i should have checked that the text entry box was also copacetic, and it wasn't. partly my fault, then.
Anything involving the Schlaflys has got to be a farce. For those of you born since the 1950's, Phyllis Schlafly, the mother of Andrew and Roger, has been a self-appointed voice of American arch-conservatism since Eisenhower's presidency (whom she incidentally viewed as a Communist dupe). She's now so ossified in hair spray, face-lifts, and ancient ideas that it's amazing she's still alive. I think she takes a general botox treatment for any public appearance, otherwise she'd resemble a prune, both physically and mentally, too closely to be believed. The Conservapedia is typical of the nonsense she and her clan have peddled for decades.
When words become poisoned so badly that they need to be abandoned...
Back when I lived in the UK, I was a paid up member of, and activist for, the Conservative party. Of course, that was when being "conservative" meant things like commitment to balanced budgets, minimising state interference in peoples everyday lives and such stuff. Where did that go? I always think it's odd that people now call me a "liberal" notwithstanding the fact that my views on the role and limitations of government haven't actually changed substantially. When anybody tells me they're a conservative these days, I tend to start wondering (possibly incorrectly) whether they're some kind of wacko.
It's probably also worth pointing out that when Benito Mussolini coined the term "fascism", he never intended it to be a pejorative either.
this is, of course, their answer to the dkosopedia, the liberal encyclopedia, on dKos.
"Facts have a well known liberal bias"
Stephan Colbert 2006.
You do the blockquote thing with the
tags.
Dammit, the preview didn't preserve the escapes. (Bug report!) You do blockquotes with the
tags.
Some people are getting the same impression of Overwhelming Evidence, the Intelligent Design site that was set up to cater to the teen crowd, but is also looking like a magnet for parodists
Parodists? *she said innocently* Sock puppets? Subtle undermining? At the expense of clueless moderators?
Mais non! Surely you jest. ;-)
Snort.. They had something on the Discovery channel the other day that I found real funny. It was talking about Nixon. If you overlooked his blatent lying about and hiding of shit that Bush is trying to do as well, with less success and more openness (i.e. illegal wire taping, unlawful searches, etc.), he did a lot of good things, which also contrasted to Bush, is a major difference... Not to meantion the comment, "Nixon liked to know *exactly* what caused things, drilling down farther and farther, until he found the true cause of a problem, then addressing it." Just wish the guy hadn't been such a fracking idiot when it came to hiding how agressively stupid various agencies came in their zeal to support him. He might have ended up being the best we ever had, instead of the worst.
But anyway, I found it damn funny how people *in* the Republican party that worked near and around him lamented in 1-2 cases about how, "Back when Nixon was in office you didn't have as many of these 'conservatives' in the Republican party, whose ideals have nothing to do with Republican values." In other words, even they know that at one time the Christo-fascists where not running things and that the situation, and the political climate in the party, has changed drastically since.
Its like a lot of people have said, the problem isn't that the country has gotten more liberal and lost its way, it is that the right has stampeded so much farther right that you can't go much farther without looking like a fascist dictatorship, and sadly, the main party for the left has stumbled farther right to try to preserve some sort of narrower gap, which they can claim is the middle ground. The public meanwhile has mostly gone along for the ride, blisfully unaware of the massive techtonic shift that just happened. Then again, a lot of the left is in places like California, so they are used to earthquakes. A lot of whom probably did the same thing during the political earthquakes as they do with real ones, and just waited until the shaking stopped, before going back to their business, blythely ignoring the new cracks in the walls.
Speaking as an administrator on the English Wikipedia, a lot of us are really trying our damnedest to keep pseudoscientific and nonscientific crap out - and by and large, we do a good job. Our article on Evolution is really well done and doesn't give undue weight to the "creationist viewpoint".
Hey, some Schlafly's are cool! There are Schlaflys in St. Louis who run a lovely microbrewery. They are cousins of some sort to Phyllis Schlafly's husband, but not to blame for her nonsense.
Conservatives are for -- altogether now -- fiscal discipline, small government, limited intrusion into people's affairs, respect for the law and the Constitution, and tempered changes.
Interesting... where can I find one of these strange creatures?
They certainly don't exist in government.
Whether this thing is real or not, the self-righteous act on the part of conservatives is beyond old. It really needs to be asked: "What ARE conservatives conserving?"
I just can't get over the mental image of peoples' brains shrinking under the load of a cancer of lies, when these people open their mouth about pretty much anything. It's like watching acid eat through metal.
Let them make their "conservopedia". It'll be wrong back to front on everything but most of the spelling. If reality-minded people stay active and true to history, we'll outshine them.
Abortion is a controversial topic in the United States. Prior to 1973 it was illegal, usually criminal, and considered to be serious medical misconduct.
Illegal where? Abortion wasn't illegal in all 50 states until 1967, and by 1969 Ohio, North Carolina, New York, and California changed their laws. So it was illegal for what, two years?
Conservapedia: conserving ignorance, one hick at a time.
.
This doesn't excuse Schlafly, though, as he fails to understand that Wikipedia is open to the entire web and not just to the United States.
Indeed. A medievalist colleague of mine once spent an entire evening arguing on Wikipedia with a bunch of nationalist Québécois who thought that Clovis was the first king of "France" and kept vandalizing the entry.
.
Conservatives are for -- altogether now -- fiscal discipline, small government, limited intrusion into people's affairs, respect for the law and the Constitution, and tempered changes.
This is the central issue that pisses me off when crap like "conservapedia" gets put up. The name is a lie.
Conservatives of the type described by ColorMeSad are great people to have around. I can have a reasonable, stimulating discussion about a wide range of topics with such a person. I like reading articles and blogs written by such people. I'd vote for someone like that with no qualms in an election should I find the competition lacking in someone more closely aligned with my own views - which often happens (the lacking, not the appearance of proper conservatives).
But the word "conservative" got hi-jacked by a bunch of ignorant anti-elitist rabid religious wackos, and now triggers a quite different definition in my mind: a raving lunatic who is incapable of recieving further knowledge input on any issue. It's both sad and frustrating.
ColorMeSad, please continue to visit here, along with the rest of us. I assure you that any future disparaging remarks I may aim at "conservatives" are NOT aimed in your direction.
*****
Steve C - The comments section of PZ's blog is no place to have any kind of debate, especially one that will range from cosmology to biology to zoology to history. We couldn't have a good discussion even if we did want one here.
We can talk later sometime.
z.
Very politely put, but total bullshit. When has Pharyngula not been a site for good discussion? Ranging across cosmology to biology to history (hint: zoology is a sub-discipline within biology) sounds great! Doesn't that happen here pretty much every day?
Z, your comment looks distinctly like "I don't want to play with you anymore! I'm going home!". You were challenged to provide ONE piece of evidence that, even in some small way, refutes the Theory of Evolutionary Biology. You can't, we all know you can't, so you whine about appropriate context and leave.
I'm just agog at that abortion entry. Nothing like absolutely frakking up BOTH law and science in one handy article!
The more time you spend pregnant and/or breastfeeding, the lower your breast cancer risk - ergo, abortion causes breast cancer, right.
I've noticed that many of zeilenga's comments seem to consist of little more than excuses for not addressing a point.
By that definition, the most successful recent American conservative politician would be ... Barry Goldwater, I guess. Ron Paul is probably the only such character presently in Washington.
(Aside: When I worked in Lindon UT, I had a co-worker, who never voted, but donated to Ron Paul's campagin, despite not having lived in Texas for many years.)
This seems like a good thread to bring this up... the corrupting of the term "conservative" to mean "religious yahoo".
By any measure of the term that does not involve yahooery, I am conservative. I resist wanton change, preferring instead that change occur when necessary and after due thought and consideration. I resist change for change's sake because I don't think it is in the best interest of anyone.
And yet, I'm an atheist.
These so-called "conservatives" who would have us regress to the dark ages are not conservative as I understand the term. They resist change for the sake of RESISTANCE, not because the changes are bad. They would turn the clock back on centuries of progress to further their own perverse ends, and they do so in the name of their favourite invisible sky god. That's not conservatism, it's regressive, and it's lunacy.
And to be fair, there's a good many religious people who have their invisible sky god and still want progress at a pace that makes sense when such changes can be shown to be in the best interest of society at large. They can be conservative, as I understand the term, without being regressive.
He does the same thing on his myspace site. He's a YEC, claims to have about a "thousand" reasons for being a creationist, but can't be bothered to tell us what those reasons are.
I wonder when they'll be putting in the climate change contrarians, like Soon, Baliunas, Pat Michaels and Roger Pielke Jr.?
It seems that the internet itself has been embarrassed by the existence of Conservapedia, as the site is down.
*Chuckle!*
Wikipedia claims about 1.5 million articles, but what it does not say is that a large number of those articles have zero educational value. For example... yadda... This reflects a bias towards popular gossip rather than helpful or enlightening information.
Yeah. Wikipedia is really going to advertise, "But our product has zero educational value!" Actually, this nation being as enthusiastic about intellectual endeavors as it is about the Brussels Sprouts Crash Diet, that probably would be a good PR move. But if these fist-shaking neo-Commies (oops, neo-Cons, well, it is hard to tell the big diff anymore) were to set foot anywhere near academica (just look me up, I'll hold your hand), they would discover that Wikipedia is not considered a scholarly resource, and is not to be cited in undergrad or grad papers, etc. Of course it's not to be trusted, although I have been pleasantly surprised at the amount of good information that can be found there.
But can they make macrobrews? Hunh? Hunh?
Hey, can anyone here explain what this means?
* Did you know that faith is a uniquely Christian concept? Add to the explanation of what it means, and how it does not exist on other religions.
Of course not. We can enjoy microbrews all the time. But every beer lover knows that macrobrews (especially the American ones) are a Satanic counterfeit.
The comments on this thread, maybe so--since the discussion's a little off-topic. But PZ's blog is a great place to have a debate about lots of things, including the topics you mention. There are lots of knowledgeable people who post here and enjoy going back and forth on different topics, and you have to really work at it to get banned (i.e., repeatedly and deliberately troll the site, etc.)
Ya know, they use German spellings for some of their beer names, instead of American. I realize now that they are fifth columnists and Hate America. I'm sure glad I found out in time.
You think that is weird?
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/news_press_release,62484.shtml
I know it's just a Press Release from Disco, but COME ON!
Kristine:
Pretty much anything on WP that isn't particularly controversial is going to be reliable, if not always entirely comprehensive. The problem that I found, however, isn't so much one of reliability, but rather one of clashing egos. Some editors who were deeply invested in their completely, objectively wrong piece of information drove me away almost a year ago (my last edit was on 10 May, 2006).
Heh, I realize it sounds like that. I knew someone would say that the moment I commented. I think I remember Steve C accusing me of the same thing in another post. But really, I don't want to drag a whole debate out in some random comments section. So, if it seems like I am running it isn't the case. Besides, I am not going anywhere.
Really? Oh, um. Ok, well I will work on that. I try to be concise. But really, I am playing against bigger brains than myself with all of you folks.
ha ha... well, that is specifically me trying to be funny. I suppose I should post a follow up to that post with a few more reasons though.
z.
Roger and Andy Schlafly (who both I watched with jaw-dropping fascination for some time on talk.origins) have a gay right-wing brother in San Francisco. In a gift that had to be divine, it was discovered all three were engaged in an ongoing public chat for months on Roger's website.
Reading it was an out of body experience. It remains today the single greatest BizarroWorld I've seen.
Z is just avoiding the inevitable smack down.
He believes in creationism and states it every time he posts. And this is a place where that's like screaming..."I'm a fuckwit!"
What do you think we talk about here day in and day out? The weather? Anime?
Creationism vs. Evolution... it's the number one topic after cephalopods. ;)
But yeah, this is the last place we should want to talk about your reasons for doubting evolution. You might just learn something.
I suggested that you really study the topic before you opened yourself to the barrage...
Your just not willing to defend your beliefs, or be confronted by them.
Maybe you don't actually believe in creationsim but just want the attention.
z,
wasn't that just another response without actually answering the underlying question? You said you had many examples which refute evolution. So.... ?
That is indeed a horribly biased wiki. For another example of a horribly biased wiki, be sure to check out our atheist counter-apologetics wiki at http://www.ironchariots.org .
Heh. Technically Steve C nailed it on the head. I do like the attention. I mean, have you clicked on linked name lately? Yeah, see I like the attention. Where else can I go where I am in the 2 percent minority?
But also, why is it a bad thing that I just come here to read PZs posts? Do I have to debate you all? Cant I just read and hang out and post occasionally?
z.
I think I just discovered a quantitative measure of authoritarian, creationist stupidity. Andrew Schafly complains that the GNU Free Documentation Licence (GFDL) is "another complex and arbitrary set of rules to be enforced at whim". At 1600 words, it's too long and complicated for him to figure out!
But also, why is it a bad thing that I just come here to read PZs posts? Do I have to debate you all? Cant I just read and hang out and post occasionally?
that entirely depends on whether you are wearing your "kick me" sign or not.
obviously, you yourself determine what you want the response to your posts to be based on the content of them.
paint yourself as a creationist, and *shocker*, people here will throw eggs at you until you choose to defend yourself.
you could go with the "don't ask don't tell" thing, if you really are interested in general discussion.
something tells me you're simply not though, and Steve is indeed correct.
you're naught but a lonely little troll.
the best solution for you isn't to engage on an internet blog, but rather to go outside once in a while and actually talk to people.
Yes. Lurk away. But your posts never seem to contribute much more than "creationist" i.d. dropping. Not sure what the point of that is.
It's like saying you're a geocentrist on an Astronomer's blog.
I listened to some of your tracks. They're ok. Kinda boring. I like Brian McBride and other electro minimalist artists. So it's not the genre that I'm dissing.
This is indeed unfortunate, because in the first page I looked at (macroevolution), I immediately noticed that nearly everything user "Aschlafly" posted was provably false, indicating either abysmal ignorance or thorough dishonesty, or possibly both at once.
If that's who's running their circus, I bet even the clowns won't be funny.
Conservapedia's entry on the Theory of Relativity is so jaw-droppingly crackpot that it's worth quoting in entirety:
I'd try to count the flaws, but this is the crackpot physics equivalent of a Gish gallop. For starters, it misrepresents where special relativity came from, confuses special relativity with general, GPS wouldn't work without general relativity, GR has been tested in other and more reliable ways than the 1919 eclipse measurement, etc., etc. It's worth noting that everything except the last paragraph was written by Andrew Schafly, the project founder (and rather fractured ceramic vessel) himself.
Same old discredited arguments, same old hay-leaking strawmen, same old yawn-inducing shrillness.
The misbegotten mishmash of words which went into Conservapedia's name should've gone one letter further: "Conservatedia."
"Sir Isaac Newton was one of the inventors of calculus and the propsed the theory of gravity (It should be noted that gravity, like evolution, is just a theory and has never been proven to be true). He was a Devout Christian who said his discoveries were inspired by God."
Wow...
Wow. Just hit the "random page" button over and over. Its a symphony of hilarity.
For instance:
It reads like a 3rd grade research report, and a 3rd rate one at that.
this is not serious, is it?
hehe. It sounds like something Bush would write.
Rename it Bushpedia!
"And there is distrust in Washington. I am surprised, frankly, at the amount of distrust that exists in this town. And I'm sorry it's the case, and I'll work hard to try to elevate it." --George W. Bush, interview on National Public Radio, Jan. 29, 2007
"I think that the vice president is a person reflecting a half-glass-full mentality." --George W. Bush, interview on National Public Radio, Jan. 29, 2007
"And one thing we want during this war on terror is for people to feel like their life's moving on, that they're able to make a living and send their kids to college and put more money on the table." --George W. Bush, interview on the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Jan. 16, 2007
"The best way to defeat the totalitarian of hate is with an ideology of hope -- an ideology of hate -- excuse me --with an ideology of hope." --George W. Bush, Fort Benning, Ga., Jan. 11, 2007
"Make no mistake about it, I understand how tough it is, sir. I talk to families who die." --George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Dec. 7, 2006 (Watch video clip)
"It's bad in Iraq. Does that help?" --George W. Bush, after being asked by a reporter whether he's in denial about Iraq, Washington, D.C., Dec. 7, 2006
hmmm, I don't see a "Conservapedia" article on WP yet. Strange. Someone needs to remedy that!
...although one would think the creators (apparently the nuevo-type conservative) would be clever enough to...
Stop it! No really, stop it - I can't breath for the laughter.
Don't worry, they'll get George Will to punch up the copy soon.
Once again, I would like to point out that 'conservative' as it is commonly used in the US has little to nothing to do with traditional political conservatism, just as 'liberalism' has little or nothing to do with its original concept.
This links to a page describing how faith is also emphasized in Islam.
Also: "on" other religions? Who is writing this drivel?
Once again, thank you, Caledonian. Where would we be without you?
Treading water in a sea of nonsense - just like you are now.
I've been a Wikipedia contributor for many years, and sometimes I stray into discussion pages and community pages, where I find heated debates and criticisms of Wikipedia. Interestingly, in addition to some people criticizing it for being liberal, I also see people criticizing Wikipedia for having a conservative slant. It seems that if you fall on either side of an issue, and you're active in articles about controversial topics, and you're passionate about the subject, then you're going to be upset at people from the "other side" who appear to be compromising the articles. Many liberal editors put controversial articles on their Watch list, and are very upset with what they see as conservative bias constantly being inserted into them. It's like the opposite of the "grass is always greener on the other side" maxim.
Of course, nobody is proposing a "Liberalpedia" to combat this perceived bias, because the whole idea of making a competing wiki with "conservative" or "liberal" in its name in order to be unbiased is beyond ridiculous...
But maybe that's what we need: Maybe a "Liberalpedia" would be a good parody of "Conservapedia", just like the Flying Spaghetti Monster is a great parody of Intelligent Design Creationism, and Stephen Colbert is a great parody of conservative pundits (who also claim to be fair and unbiased).
Mommy, what's judicial activism? Well, Johnny, let's look it up in Conservapedia...
Judicial Activism
There are two major types of judicial activism practiced in the United States' court system:
1. Liberal judges striking down laws that uphold core conservative American values
2. Liberal judges refusing to strike down laws that subvert core conservative American values
The most famous example of this is Roe v. Wade
Retrieved from "http://www.conservapedia.com/Judicial_Activism"
Nope, no bias there!
Will I go to hell if I eneter?:
Stratigraphic succession: What some evolutionary geologists call the steady accumulation of dirt and other earth particles in an upward direction that eventually becomes rock layers. These geologists often clame that old bones, often referred to as fossils, found within this "stratigraphic succession" make up a "fossil" succession that can be used to support Darwinism (often referred to as evolution; changes in a person's fitness in two parts).
However, these "stratigraphic/fossil successions" have often been reported in peer-reviewed journals to be sideways and even upside down. This completely turns Darwinistic evolution on its head - according to evolutionist dogma, these upside down fossils would indicate that man was evolving into monkeys! It is clear that a growing number of concerned top notch geologists, engineers and MDs are convinced that something is clearly wrong with these "stratigraphic/fossil successions" and often cannot explain what has happened. That is why they discovered the theory Intelligent Design.
The concerned public and all aspiring young earth scientists are warned to keep an open mind during this controversy.
http://www.first-draft.com/2007/02/your_president__15.html
Uhg. How does anyone find him believable? He's a puppet going through the motions of giving a shit.
So logically,
A grievous omission: there is no entry on "cats." Not even on the order of "to which animal has a dog never been observed giving birth?"
Talk about your unsupportable biases. I'm going to stomp off in a huff and start my own collection of semiliterate nonsense, and I will call it "Ailuropedia."
There are Schlaflys in St. Louis who run a lovely microbrewery.
But can they make macrobrews? Hunh? Hunh?
I'll be at their bottleworks brewery in about 15 minutes enjoying some stout. I'll ask.
Check out the "World History" section of conservopedia's index. Yes, indeed, it starts with the period "Creation - 50AD", and all the material therin are strictly YEC. "Lecture One" under "Lectures" has a long rant about YEC.
And plenty of woo about how the pyramids are so perfect in all ways and that we could never produce an engineering feat as impressive today.
eewolf,
I'm ROFLing to the right, ROFLing to the left, uncontrollably cackling maniacally and gasping for air, even as the little men in the white lab coats with the big butterfly nets are knocking on my door...
SHIT! sudden realization, these conservatives are in charge of US foreign policy, *THIS IS SERIOUS*, back to ROFLing to the right, ROFLing to the left, help me stop, please, it just hurts too much!
It is disturbing/hilarious that I can't tell if the Conservapedia was meant as a joke or not.
Well, unless you're British. Or your university is one of those without a president (like CalTech used to be). Or...well, you get the idea.
From the "angle" entry: "An angle is a bend formed by two intersecting lines or Line Segments."
That "random page" link is fucking gold. I simply can't recommend it enough.
About American spelling - speaking as a British person, I think that American English spellings are usually an improvement. They make more sense and are easier to remember and teach to children or people studying English. On the other hand, I think it's pretty strange that this Conservapedia think non-Americans should use American English. That one example - changing the name of the American royal family from "Hapsburg" to "Habsburg". Oh, wait a minute...
my addition to arguments against evolution:
http://www.conservapedia.com/Is_the_theory_of_macroevolution_true%3F#No
9. The "Anthro-Simianic Paradox" -- If great apes evolved into humans, why are there still great apes? The inherent inconsistency in the pro-Darwinistical position can be verified scientifically, using the foam dinosaurs that grow larger in water. Place a package of tiny foam dinosaurs (representing apes) into a sink (representing evolution). All the dinosaurs will grow to giant proportions (representing humans) and no tiny foam dinosaurs will be left. Clearly, scientists must examine alternate hypotheses for the evolution of giant foam dinosaurs (human beings).
OK, one more. This is absolutely the funniest thing on that site. Check out the title of the entry.
You won't be sorry. My whole office laughed for three solid minutes over that one.
"Lenin was one of the most influential persons in all of history. He was both a thinker and a revolutionary, which is a rare combination."
Huh. Two Nobel Peace Prizes in different fields?
Emphasis mine.
Latin America is Spanish America and Brazil, where Portuguese is spoken.
At least they got something right.
TR - Your wish has been granted. Wikipedia now has a link to Conservapedia.
Evan, thanks for the quote.
I thought it was important to educate my fellow conservatives on HIV risk factors:
http://www.conservapedia.com/HIV
Recent clinical trials have uncovered common risk factors associated with elevated HIV transmission rates: immunodepression, shared needles among drug abusers, double-penetrative (vaginal-anal) intercourse, ingestion of mass quantities of arugala, homosexual acts in fast-food restrooms, and frequent unprotected intercourse.[1]
References
McDavid, et al. "HIV/AIDS risk factor ascertainment: A critical challenge." AIDS Patient Care STDS. 2006; 20:285-92.)
Sure, if you want. Except you didn't; you posted that you had lots of evidence supporting your position that you could show us all if you really wanted to. You can't expect not to be called on it...
to the list of george w. bush accomplishments:
http://www.conservapedia.com/George_W._Bush
Expanded the Regean doctrine of economic health through defecit-based policy. Introduced the idea of global peace through pre-emptive warfare.
Someone please nominate the creators of Conservapedia for at least a half dozen Nobel Peace Prizes in Medicine.
I can't stop the tears streaming down my face and I'm sure I may have at least a few cracked ribs, but laughter is indeed the best medicine and I haven't had such a good laugh in a very long time. Thank you!
Dale, I don't see it! Does it take a while to be posted?
Here is the entry for "United States Constitution":
The rest of the article is just the text of the U.S. Constitution. By contrast, Wikipedia has a huge article on constitutions, including analyses and history, as well as links to the constitutions of various countries.I have found the articles in Conservapedia to be childish and poorly written for the most part, and in no way comparable to the high-quality posts I see in Wikipedia.
Hmmm... not sure this was necessary.
Not here I didn't. Jen quoted a joke post from my blog at myspace.
z.
This is so much fun!! They just expanded the evolution entry. It looks a lot like Wiki's...
Just for kicks - look up entropy:
Entropy is a measure of disorder in a system.
The discovery of entropy is remarkably recent. By comparison, it is more recent than Darwin's proposal of a theory of evolution. Because theories of entropy contradict theories of evolution, it is likely that full development of theories of entropy have been restrained by evolutionists.
Hi TR,
Not sure what happened to the initial submission I made. I've retyped it and submitted it again (and checked that it works from another browser).
That's pretty much the funniest thing I've read in ages. And that random link feature makes for a fun joyride straight into Silly Town.
I made corrections to their entries on evolution and natural selection and genes and I forget what else, managing to get myself banned from the site in about 15 minutes.
And of course all my changes were quickly reverted.
But it's a lovely target for malicious mischief.....
Regarding "Z.", may I remind those "feeding the troll" that the GreaseMonkey killfile is still available? Search for it from the sidebar. I kinda wish it would work on the other ScienceBlogs, as some of those also have unfortunate infestations, but hey, it's something.
Also, the crazies currently running the country are "neocons". If you remember to use that word (AFAIK, their own term), then you needn't worry about incidentally insulting "original style" conservatives, who hardly deserve it.
Regarding the stumbles trying to demo <blockquote>, there's a long-standing bug in the SciBlogs "preview", where "ampersand escapes" get translated not only in the preview display, but also in the redisplayed edit box. This is particularly unfortunate when the escape in question is "<", which represents the less-than symbol. (Note that the ampersand itself is produced by "&".) The workaround is to re-escape the offending (offended?) characters in the preview's edit box before actually posting. Of course, this means you don't actually get correct previews for any comment with amp escapes....
Now let's see if I can get the above to post correctly....
OK, it posted as written, but *I* muffed a statement. The preview display is correct, but you can't just hit "post" for it, because you'll be submitting de-escaped text. I suspect the SEED Web programmers were trying to be excessively helpful, but got too "smart" for anybody's good.
You gotta be joking. How am I trolling?
z.
I just recieved this message: "Bob, you made an supported claim in your change to someone else's entry. This is a warning. A second time will result in blocking."
I strongly suspect I'm banned by now, as I added a list of Bush's successes.
But really, I'm banned for "making a SUPPORTED claim"!?
I love my username...Asschafly
Inappropriate, Beavis and Buttheadish, childish, but in a Cartman voice "Sweet"
Anyone want to give me a quick, good, satire-ish contribution to put up?
oh no... I'm going to be up all night here wading through the stupidity. It's like slowing down to look at a car wreck...
Latest I've found is the page on the Munich Conference of 1938, in which the authors seem to be slyly tring to connect the United Nations (founded in 1945) with Chamberlain's policy of appeasement:
Re: wiki entry on Consevapedia...
The article I put up has been deleted. There was one initially created in Dec 2006, the details of its deletion can be found here. Apparently it's against policy to simply link to other web pages.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Conservape…
That's one of the things there isn't much of a sense of humor about. I got into a fairly heated debate a few months back with some other wiki contributors regarding articles about "online phenomena." Very few of them truly conform to Wikipedia standards, but some are left and others are not, sort of a "If I havent heard of it, it's not important enough" phenomenon.
It is sort of a problem inherent to the class, but It shouldn't necessarily make many of the articles candidates for deletion.
On another note, one of the things I find amusing is that I can pick out a lot of the articles written by Andrew Schlafly on sight. He's a lawyer, and for example the article on the American Association of Physicians and Surgeons article He uses textbook blue book format (legal citation format) and cites largely unknown appellate court cases.
Uses CE rather than AD? To be fair, I don't like CE or BCE at all, I think you're just changing the name without fixing the problem. I honestly think we should switch over to AY. For example this is 2007AY, Julius Caesar died in -43AY, the AD calendar starts in the year 1AY, the AY calendar starts in the year 0 AY. Herod the Great died in -3AY.
Any BC/E date you subtract 1 and make it negative. So the calendar starts in the year 0, otherwise known as 1BC.
I don't want to change systems without fixing some of the problem involved.
Other than laughs, I guess this is the only possible use for the site...
From wikipedia:
"The Eagle Forum is a conservative organization founded in 1972 and led by Phyllis Schlafly."
"Eagle Forum is connected with Eagle Forum University, which offers conservative-oriented online courses on topics such as American History 101. Eagle Forum University courses make use of Conservapedia, a nascent wiki-based online encyclopedia with a conservative point of view."
Atheism
Atheism is the disbelief in the existence of any God. This disbelief can take a number of forms, such as the assertion that deities do not exist or the absence of any belief in any God.
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins (March 26, 1941-) is considered to be a great evolutionary biologist.
Just click random article. I love uncyclopedia (wikipedia of joke articles) but honestly this is better. Much higher laugh per line ratio.
As did my husband and I, O Disgruntled One. Thanks for enlivening our Wednesday date night.
I suspect that it's legit. This would explain a lot of the stupid typos and the third grade style:
"Conservapedia began in November 2006, as the class project for a World History class of 58 advanced homeschooled and college-bound students meeting in New Jersey."
"Eagle Forum is connected with Eagle Mountain Garbage Dump, which offers brain-dead online courses on topics such as Revisionist History 101"
I've met people that think Rush Limbaugh is god and Phyllis Schlafly is his bitch (I live in Southern California).
they make me physically ill.
if you ever caught the movie "Idiocracy", this is kinda where I would have expected wiki to end up in that future.
Another hilarious entry:
Cytolysis:
The rapturing of a cell due to excess internal pressure.
Man. Every time i think it can't get better:
I wonder if there was a Nobel Peace Prize in Chemistry for inventing subscripts.
Judicial Activism
There are two major types of judicial activism practiced in the United States' court system:
1. Liberal judges striking down laws that uphold core conservative American values
2. Liberal judges refusing to strike down laws that subvert core conservative American values
The most famous example of this is Roe v. Wade
Actually, to be fair, I'm about as liberal as they come. I made an account on Conservapedia and posted that (and others) just to make fun of them.
The really funny part is that no one has edited it yet.
I actually felt a little bad for a fraction of a second when I saw it being quoted seriously on a blog... but then went back to laughing.
Anyone want to give me a quick, good, satire-ish contribution to put up?
They don't have one for home schooling yet...
Home Schooling
Indoctrination into the ways of faith, generally Christian, by mostly semi-literate parents who truly understand that "ignorance IS bliss" and know, better than any fag liberal teacher, that it is a far, far better thing to circumscribe a child's education and teach only the facts presented in the "Good Book," thereby avoiding like the plague the godless teachings (like evolution, civil rights, and equality) that infect public school systems like a plague. Plus you can beat your child all you want at home. That's every conservative's dream.
I also found it hilarious that my parody of them resulted in this:
Hello and welcome to Conservapedia! I have removed the last sentence from the Spartan Soldiers page, because I feel it is irrelevant to the article which is about soldiers rather than the Spartan society. Thank you for your excellent contributions! ~ SharonS 17:46, 21 February 2007 (EST)
http://www.conservapedia.com/User_talk:DrShaffopolis
What we need is to hire some good Post Modernists to post things that **sound** like they refute science and evolution, while actually just reposting the principles in a way thats sufficiently confusing as to prevent immediate removing on the grounds that its actually supported by facts. lol Something along the lines of the one article some guy published that spent 3-4 pages to say what basically translated as, "Our modern view of the world is now informed by the location and position of objects, not mere geometry."
That said, one suspects that the response which implied removing of pages that *are* supportable makes this in point of fact an amazing joke, which is going to at some point in the future be dragged out into the public by some kid with the "same name" as the famous nut we are attributing it to, at which point everyone except the conservatives that flocked their for their cool aid will have a hernia from the laughter that revelation causes.
Rather than call them "neo-cons", I prefer the term "post-conservative", since they clearly have wandered off to some place far removed from anything resembling any nation's idea of conservatism.
In all probability this site will serve three useful purposes
1) It will cause a lot of neocons to waste a lot of time adding articles to it when they could be doing more destructive things.
2) It will dumb down future young neocons, putting them even more inside the bubble and unable to function in the real world
3) It will provide endless humor for everyone else.
However, I am a little worried that they will be able to get their Google ranking up somehow and innocent young school kids will end up checking the site and thinking it is reliable.
So, if it seems like I am running it isn't the case. Besides, I am not going anywhere.
Shouldn't you be reading the talkorigins archive?
Surely it is important for us to help these people improve the quality of their wiki. I myself have popped over to brush up the articles on "gene", "microevolution" and the Disgruntled Chemist's favourite. Amusingly, some helpful soul has already edited my edit of "microevolution", apparently taking it seriously.
haha.. it must be satire, that's the only explanation..
This "elementary proof" thing is really ridiculous, also their entry on "elementary proof". I have read it and am still giggling.
Re: Dumbing-down. C. M. Kornbluth is spinning in his grave. Or laughing his ass off in Hell. Or something.
It's really getting hard to distinguish between parody and... Well, for example:
This page has been updated in an interesting way. Contrast to the original.
Kseniya @ #156,
that update was mine, I'm afraid (or that of my Conservapedia userid, Hiram Whickermeister III). The original was all too sciency, so I had to make sure the poor wee conservatives' minds, such as they are, were drawn back to what really matters.
If you liked that, check out my entry for patriotism.
Good golly, I've just realised that some (apparently genuine) C-pedia editor has deleted part of my "patriotism" entry (regarding that part as an attempted joke), while leaving the real joke (and insult) unchanged. These people would be funny, they really would, if only they could be isolated in an ant farm.
Z.
I wasn't particularly cruel in my critique of your tracks. You seem adverse to opinions.
Odd for someone who craves attention so obviously.
Maybe it's a marketing ploy. Creationist Electro Artist.
Do you smoke copious amounts of weed?
It occurs to me that one could port Jesus's General's archives to Conservapedia, and they would probably not notice that anything was amiss.
Oh... This is just the best entry I've seen so far.
Mrs. T.: Thanks for the clarification. I suspected tampering (probably by someone here) but it's so hard to tell!
Ok, I just read the Patriotism entry and... OMG! That's what they KEPT? I wish I could laugh, but I can't. Teddy Roosevelt is spinning madly in his grave, now:
"To announce there must be no criticism of the president or to stand by the president right or wrong is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonous to the American public."
Ms. T, your edits are wonderful. I'm assuming the "sweet and decorative" part in the patriotism entry was you? And I'm sure I know what your contribution to the "Law of Mass Conversation" page was - well played, ma'am.
You've got to be careful with those confessions, though -- at least one of the Schlaflys has commented on Pharyngula in the past. They aren't regular readers, I don't think, but they could catch on.
Good point PZ, but I think I might have to edit their entry on the Nazi party, specifically the last sentence:
"All Nazis are atheists."
Unless you count Hitler, when he said in Mein Kampf:
"I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord.."
Jesus, these people suck.
TDC,
aw, I'm all bashful now. Yeah, that was me. The guy who edited me only deleted stuff (such as it not being treason to oppose a Democrat president -- he apparently thought that I was a good conservative getting in a bit of Fox Network comedy).
PZ is right, though; we should tread softly. I suggest we each make one strictly anonymous change to a random page each day though, as Kseniya notes, it might be hard to tell the deliberate insanity from the genuine conservatism.
Carsten,
yes, there's something extremely strange about that whole "elementary proof" thing. If you follow all of the links (and look at the older versions before they got cleaned up a bit), it seems there's some deep suspicion of complex numbers... owwww.
Hey Disgruntled Chemist,
I've taken care of that Nazi article for you. No, no, don't thank me...
BTW, while on the C-pedia site I had a message from one Aschlafly, who thanked me for my "interesting entries". Clearly he hasn't seen all of them yet...
Kseniya:
I can laugh; does this speak to some strain of morbidity within me?
Back last summer, I remember seeing someone (not me!) edit the Wikipedia page "The Moon in astrology" to change every descriptive word to its opposite. Individual to group, inner child to inner adult, feminine to masculine and so forth. Since the page didn't cite any sources (and still doesn't today) there was after all no way to tell that the changes were "wrong", even to the extent that they disagreed with any particular astrologer's claptrap. Conservapedia's standards for verifiable citations seem to be on a par with Wikipedian astrologers, their First Commandment notwithstanding.
Not that I would ever believe that an upstanding Pharyngula commenter would go and do such a thing to a site which is, of course, run for the benefit of wee lil' homeschooled kids. No, never would I ever. . . . Ahem.
Funny how this didn't occur to me until this morning, but their whole "fluff" complaint is really just another liberal whine. Look who they chose as an example: Moby, the vocal vegan anti-Bush, anti-hate speech recording artist. The fact that he's also Christian must really rankle them.
Rey Fox:
As I mentioned up in comment #6, their "Moby" example also depends upon biased reporting of statistics. Thanks for illuminating why they might've picked that particular artist to make their deceptive claim!
Nicely done, Mrs. T. That is subtle, for sure - I bet it stays.
I'm sorry to say, Mrs Tilton, that they've caught up to your addition to the Darwin entry and fixed it.
They added a paragraph break.
I honestly don't know if I should be outraged or embarrassed when I read some of the articles on there. I mean, I share a country with these people?
B-b-b-but... I didn't do Darwin!
(The ones I've done are here, if you care to check them out before Los Bros Schlafly catch on.)
Their entry on atheism is fantastic!
"Atheism is the disbelief in the existence of any supernatural deity. This disbelief can take a number of forms, such as the assertion that deities do not exist, or the absence of any belief in any deity.
Stalin and Richard Dawkins are prominent atheists. Dawkins wrote a book, called "The God Delusion". Stalin is now dead, having killed millions of people in the name of Marxis-Leninism."
http://www.conservapedia.com/Atheism
hehe... I think I spotted your edits in the MIcroevolution post.
Micro because they are microscopic and macro because they are large... like elephants.
Giggle worthy.
Mrs Tilton,
On the gene entry did you also add:
"Genes do, however, explain the differences in intelligence and academic performance between different races"
SteveF,
yeah, though I have second thoughts about that one, as many conservatives would see a reference to the Bell Curve as dead serious. I should probably take it out. Indeed, I just did. I'll be curious to see whether anybody puts it back.
Mrs. T., you are evil.
I mean, in a good way. :-p
See if you can spot the spelling mistake on http://www.conservapedia.com/index.php?title=The_Law_of_Mass_Conversati…
That would explain why so many of the entries were taken from fundie homeschooling textbooks, but I thought that one of the few things that these people did manage to get their kids to do is to spell words correctly.
Guess I was wrong on that one, too.
"I'm assuming many conservatives are embarrassed by Conservapedia"
We bow down to our overlords in Embarrassoconservapedia, for the middle-Right niche.
But we must pause in our blogging to take up arms with the army of the Lord to stop Hilary and Obama, the two top blog-aggregators of Leftopedia.
Or something like that...
There's been quite the edit war over their atheism page, actually; look into the history and start laughing. Can't tell the parodists from the genuine conservatives without a program.
It has apparently not dawned on Conservapedia that WP's verifiability and weasel words policies (among others) exist for a reason. Why am I not surprised?
Actually, Chris, the first two Conservapedia Commandments are the following:
That's the problem with commandments, I guess: it's so darn easy not to live up to them!
Some statistics:
I find the "most viewed pages" list rather illuminating.
Chris said:"There's been quite the edit war over their atheism page, actually; look into the history and start laughing. Can't tell the parodists from the genuine conservatives without a program."
Haha, that might be my fault. I just checked back, expecting my claim that atheism leads to pedophilia and bestiality to have been removed. Not only is it still there, but someone added references. I love this place.
Well, (alleged) bias in wikipedia is the site's raison d'etre, so I'm not that surprised by its prominence. Among the first questions that must occur to any visitor is "why did they bother to do this at all?"
Evolution is probably linked from the bias page, and is a well known bone of contention between conservatives and the reality-based community.
The fact that user pages show up in the 10 most viewed pages is a bit bizarre, though. It seems to indicate a lot of meta and relatively little interest in actual content. With such small hit counts it would be really easy to manipulate, though.
One more amusing statistic: the front page now claims over 89,000 page hits on Wednesday. If this is included in the 166,000 it means that over half the site's lifetime hits came yesterday, after they started being discussed in the blogosphere.
BTW - Andrew is probably more reasonable than some of the Schlafly boys - check out Roger's blog. http://www.mindspring.com/~schlafly/blog/
You know, if someone wanted to just go with it and pretend to be the most obnoxious, sanctimonious, narrow-minded blue-nosed prig, you could probably have a ball writing all kinds of sneering articles for Conservapedia.
From the "Jesus" page:
"Historical context indicates that as a 'rabbi' in judea, Jesus would have been married. An explaination for his lack of a wife may be that he was a confirmed bachelor, and had twelve men to fufill his needs."
Oh, someone is taking serious advantage of the Conservative inability to grasp naunce.
Drat! I was just going to point out the 89,000 hits they claim for Wednesday, but Chris beat me to it. Good job, Chris.
Now I'm off to point Phil Plait toward Conservapedia's take on the Moon.
You might want to take another look at that faith definition...
Weee, I wonder how much traffic I can scrape up for my Blog of the Gods by building links into the main entries.
I made this nice little edit to the "abortion" entry: Most Christian conservatives regard human life as beginning at conception and consider abortion to be the murder of innocent babies while in the womb of their mother. They believe babies should be murdered within the first few years after they're born, especially if God orders the hit.
I love the entry on homeschooling, and the fact that they put Jesus Christ on the list of famous homeschooled Christians. That's just killing me it's so funny.
All these parodists are making it harder to mine the site for examples of authoritarian, creationist stupidity. Now I have to check the Page History tab and verify that the stuff I'm quoting comes from the genuine folks and not their imitators.
Check out Socrates, Brazil and Is the theory of macroevolution true? Quick, before someone reverts them.
Wow. Roger is a nutbag. Look at his photo. He's a unabomber waiting to happen.
Do they propose "intelligent falling" in place of gravity? Guess it means that the writers of this joke might be closet Pastafarians.
Slav, that's clearly the work of one of the satirical infiltrators. Really, you guys should be a little more mature about vandalizing someone's wiki.
*quickly hides can of spray paint*
I certainly had nothing whatsoever to do with the writing of www.conservapedia.com/Cactus
Nope. Nothing at all.
What Conservapedia has to say about Cacti:
Mmmmmm. Sacrilicious.
Why is there a wiki entry on this guy with all the Snoopy references? Anyone want to fess up?
http://www.conservapedia.com/Manfred_von_Richthofen
I've not tinkered with anything on that Wiki. I've just been having too much fun hitting random links and laughing wildly.
"Oh give me a button of wild peyote to munch in my den at night, so that I might set my Id afloat in the country of queer delight"
This recipe poached and adapted from http://www.deliaonline.com/cookery-school/how-to/how-to-poach-an-egg,12…
In case you come upon a group of little orange invasive species, sitting around their campfire in the desert poaching high alkaloid content cactus hearts. This might be how they are doing it...
I swear all I did was substitute the words "cactus hearts" for eggs in the original recipe.
1. This method is not at all frightening or hazardous, but bear in mind that for successful poaching the cacti have to be really fresh - less than four days old. The key to a well-poached cactus heart is to keep the water at a bare simmer throughout the cooking. Place a suitably sized frying pan over a gentle heat and add enough boiling water from the kettle to fill it to 1 inch (2.5 cm). Keep the heat gentle, and very quickly you will see the merest trace of tiny bubbles beginning to form over the base of the pan.
2. Now carefully squeeze the cactus hearts, one at a time, into the water and let them barely simmer, without covering, for just 1 minute. A timer is essential here because you cannot guess how long 1 minute is.
3. After that, remove the pan from the heat and let the cactus hearts sit calmly and happily in the hot water, this time setting the timer for 10 minutes. This timing will give perfect results for a beautifully translucent, perfectly set pale green and a soft, creamy heart of cactus.
4. Now remove each cactus heart by lifting it out of the water with a draining spoon and then letting the spoon rest for a few seconds on a wodge of kitchen paper, which will absorb the excess water. As you remove the cactus hearts, serve them straight away.
*snicker*
http://www.conservapedia.com/Plesiosaur
*tee-hee*
All together now: Fiscal discipline and tempered changes are conservative values. Limited intrusion into people's affairs and small government are liberal values -- remember that "liberal" and "left" are not the same. I can't see how respect for the law and the big-C Constitution are limited to any ideology; what ideologies differ about is whether the laws should be changed, and if so, in which directions.
If you're liberal about social issues, just say it.
I got curious and tried to go to the plesiosaur article... it opens too slowly...
Z, it may surprise you, but as a scientist you do not have the right to hold a testable opinion and anxiously shelter it from all possible tests. Put up or shut up -- publish or perish.
Do you want my e-mail address? I'll gladly discuss with you, after you've read the talk.origins FAQ.
I'm a conservative so I'll answer PZ's question. There exists no word in the English language that describes the degree of embarassment this site provokes. It's SO insane that the editors of the Onion would kill it becuase it is too over-the-top. Unlike other conservatives I won't even try to defend my brand of conservativism other than to say my brand is different than conservapedia because it uses at least one neuron. Now where's that rock I can hide under? Please pass the ear plugs because the laughing is WAY too loud.
"Pilgrims were people (mostly puritans) in the 1600's that traveled to the American Colonies because of persecution in England. These settlers started the very first settlement in the American colonies, Jamestown. "
Retrieved from http://www.conservapedia.com/Pilgrims
So many errors in one small space... so little time.
Dustin's right! If you have to wait all night, go to the Plesiosaur article!
http://www.conservapedia.com/Plesiosaur
Then it really starts to get funny!
Dustin, did you notice that someone has removed the "stupid alien references" from the Plesiosaur article, with an admonition to ""?
Dustin, did you notice that someone has removed the "stupid alien references" from the Plesiosaur article, with an admonition to ""stick to the known facts"?
Evan, when I read that I immediately thought of Team America: World Police:
"The Equator. 1,800 miles south of America."
There's a great comment in the Talk on the plesiosaur page:
Note the commenter's name carefully.
Re: The cactus and plesiosaur entries: I am in awe.
Apologies if this has already been mentioned (this is a long thread!): The Global Warming article is most amusing. An excerpt:
Giggles...
This is so sad; who told them that Medina was a
http://www.conservapedia.com/Medina
I don't even dare to look for the Arabic city of Medici...
As others have mentioned, the Random page link provides hours of fun. The Ninteenth Amendment one "discusses" said amendment to the USAian constitution (that's the one ensuring the other half of the adult population can vote), and concludes with:
As I recall, "state's rights" was also an argument for slavery, or at least for the "recovery" of escaped "property".
Isn't Medina supposed to be funky and cold? That's what Tone Loc said.
Any relation to naturalist and watch aficionado William Paley?
RBH,
do you think anybody will notice?
More to the point, do you think they'd be able to tell without Googling the name beforehand? (Come to think of it, how many people can tell afterwards...?)
btw, I can't actually get to it now, but for me the best part on the page is (was? don't know if it's been edited yet) the caption for the photograph (showing a rotted basking shark carcass) reading "This is Totally Not a Shark"... ;-)
Wkpd s bng cntrlld by vl znsts!
http://rbrtlndsy.blgspt.cm/2006/04/wkpd-zpd-r-jdpd.html
Others have said it already, but this is pure gold. I haven't laughed this much in weeks. I'm sore, really.
The final straw was the caption under the photo of the "Plesiosaur" carcass; "This is totally not a shark".It took me a few minutes to settle down after that.
Is there an entry for scrotum?
http://bookshelvesofdoom.blogs.com/bookshelves_of_doom/2007/02/tshirt_o…
Martin Wagner,
There's nothing "hyper-islamic" about turkey. If anything, it is the most liberal and secular of all muslim countries. Even this, of course, does not mean that most people who live there aren't a little... thick ;)
How stupid can they be? Medina is NOT a powerful Italian family from the 13th to the 17th century.
Everyone in Minnesota knows all about the Medina. And it's colder than it is funky.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, to all the bloggers and posters who discovered this wealth of comedy material. However, I must stop for a few days to rest and recover before I can read any more. For my sides ache, I think I may even have cracked a few ribs, my jaw aches, my eyes are sore from crying, my throat is hoarse from laughing and giggling and even my mind is boggled :)
There's some quality bowling in Medina.
I have a very sore stomach and a very wet hankie. I haven't even had to leave this comment thread. But now if I visit this 'pedia, how will I know what is added parody and what is ignorance? OH well. The 'equator' really got me.
Someone needs to write a Time Cube article for this thing.
You know how painful it is, to watch movies where the protagonists are too stupid for the real world? Well, I'm almost to that point with Conservapedia, but it's too damn funny.
What? WHAT!! This isn't even a real sentence! A 'bend' can't occur by lines intersecting (is that 'a corner'?); it's when SOMETHING BENDS or IS BENT. That's like saying a cup is when a bowl is small: No, its a cup OR a bowl. Isn't and angle a section of a circle? They should've just left it at the Euclid quote.
Why does the 'George W. Bush' page have a paragraph on the 2004 election? Shouldn't this be somewhere else?
I love that their abortion entry has three headings: Abortion, Abortion and Breast Cancer, and Political Action Committees. WP has 8 content section, 9 subsections and 6 subsubsections. Clearly WP just fluffs up the topic.
Evan, you were warned for making 'an supported claim'. You have to make them in plurals to be safe.
It is a line of latitude. The other kind of line on a map is longitude.
I understand that CP has recently been 'contaminated' by posters who don't necessarily have the site's good standing at heart... could it be that they've been there all along? MWAH HA HA HA, MWAH HA HA, MWAH Ha Ha HAAAA
The Feminism page simply states: Feminism is the philosophy that the sexes deserve to have equal rights.
Spose you can't get in trouble for sayin nothin. :\
Scrotum has no page.
For Australia it says:
*cringe* *cringe cringe cringe* *puke*
And New Zealand?
ugh. The pain. ('and also'?) Must be a joke post.
I know it was only started 4 months ago, but COME ON. I so want to get in there and edit this stuff, but I couldn't bare to be a contributor to the site (read 'validate the site). Any dickhead that considers it an authority of some kind doesn't deserve broadband.
OK, I think I've calmed down now. Time to write it off as a wanky pipedream that'll die in the arse.
Sonja said "Everyone in Minnesota knows all about the Medina. And it's colder than it is funky."
And everyone who lives in Microsoft country knows that Medina is a ritzy lake front suburb of Seattle where Bill Gates built a huge house:
http://www.zpub.com/un/bill/ecology.html
hey,
Does anyone have the numbers on the "billions" of grant dollars going to global warming advocates? That phrase is spreading like lice across the internet and is being repeated verbatim by my wingnut friends, including the "hubris" lunacy, and needs a response.
the pale scott
OK, the jig's up, people. Fess up. Or alternately, start a pool on how long the article will stay up.
The citations aren't on the page
footnotes 1, 2, 3 get you here:
http://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/
Some kids built a sandcastle and said it would be a cathedral soon, and you are all coming in and peeing on it and laughing at how ridiculous it looks with pee on it.
Not that Conservapedia didn't sort of bring it on themselves by posing as if it already _was_ an encyclopedia, but... Many of the things you are laughing at in Conservapedia are vandalism.
And there are reasons why it has been slow to be reverted besides Conservapedians "not getting it." One is that despite having the expected bees in his bonnet, Andrew Schlafly has been welcoming and civil to outside editors and has tended to give them the benefit of the doubt. Another is that when the liberal blogs discovered Conservapedia, circa Thursday, there was, well, really quite a lot of vandalism to deal with.
Many of the other things you are laughing at are the result of its status as a teaching tool for high-school students, and its status as an undeveloped Wiki. I take it most of you were not looking very closely at Wikipedia in, say, late 2002. I was, and it was the most absurd pastiche of substubs you can imagine.
So, what's going on here? Are liberals having a good-faith dialog with conservatives? No, they are not. Are they proving conservatives wrong? No, they are not. This is behavior that I can only call bullying, based on the principle that "There are a lot of us and not so many of them and we think they're nutty, so let's make fun of them."
Not very pretty.
OK, I did it myself, if you must know. One of my first edits to Conservapedia was the creation an article on Onan, and it was exactly what you'd expect, citing Mark Twain's speech to the Stomach Club and all. But after I thought about it I felt ashamed and stuck around and tried to give them a hand in those areas where my opinions are not too diametrically opposed to theirs.
It would be nice if some of you did the same.
Conservapedia's concern troll.
Hi, how ya doin'.
I believe the Pacific_Northwest_Arboreal_Octopus from one of the fine commenters at Making Light http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/
Hi, if I'm the Making Light commenter JamesK is referring to, I was merely commenting on the source of the Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus article, which I immediately recognized as coming from zapatopi.net, a.k.a Zapato Productions Intradimensional. It's a memorable tale and a memorable site.
I've certainly been a bit tempted to create an account and go commenting on Conservapedia, but good lord! I couldn't bring myself to. It would be like shooting fish in a barrel.
In any case, it's just not necessary. One of the Making Light commenters discovered the fine fine article on the Moon, written mostly by ASchlafly with help from Dpbsmith. It's locked down to prevent vandalism, so clearly Mr. Schlafly is quite proud of it. Go read it.
I hope this clarifies that we're not making fun of 5th graders, we are making fun of purported adults who have the reasoning ability of 5th graders. (If that - I think my daughter had better critical thinking abilities by the time she was in 5th grade.)
dpbsmith wrote "... Many of the things you are laughing at in Conservapedia are vandalism. "
Not me. What I am laughing is one particular entry added to by Mr. Andy himself where they identify the Stealth Bomber as an F-117A, and wonder why a bomber is designated with an "F"... EXCEPT the actual stealth bomber is the B-2 Spirit that was designed in the 1980s and built by Northrop.... and since only about 20 were ever built it is also the most expensive airplane in the American military arsenal:
http://www.conservapedia.com/Stealth_bomber
All the verbage is about the Stealth FIGHTER... a completely different aircraft that looks different, and is different (in size, shape, stealth technology, manufacturer and mission).
That is so completely stupid, and very laugh worthy.
Now, the other entries that bring amusement were written by children and just deserve a few giggles. Those include putting Japan on the WEST coast of Asia and claiming "pilgrims" founded Jamestown, VA (which was also not the first English settlement in the Americas).
Well, the writing is bad. There are a few spelling mistakes. The examples are, well, I'll let you all judge.
http://www.conservapedia.com/American_History_Lecture_Two
Also, if you read the "update" to the Pacific tree octopus page, authored by Andrew Shafly, it's painfully clear that he still doesn't get it. The kids don't have anything to do with the stupid statements he makes.
I picked up on this:
Random Quote
I have examined all the known superstitions of the world, and I do not find in our particular superstition of Christianity one ... Thomas Jefferson.
As if Science hasn't got its fair share of being beastly to others, arrogance, and dogmatic beliefs. The 'you-know-who' are doing an excellent job of destroying civilization as we know it, but not without the complicity of scientists. Destroying civilization to save the world...?
Its all a game, and none of us are around for the end.
Hey, look! Jin Wicked's Crap I Drew On My Lunch Break has picked up on this!
Have seen comments that many with more education and knowledge are making contributions to Conservopedia, but are really taking the mickey out of the conservative fools.
It could be true, but on the other hand the conservatives, especially of the evangelical variety, appear to be so dim that the articles could well have been written by them.
Any idea anyone?
Because both Wikipedia and Conservapedia are clearly biased against the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, we have now started Pastapedia as an FSM-friendly, objective, reliable alternative. It's still in its infancy but we welcome contributions and hope to make Pastapedia the most reliable encyclopedia for all current and future Pastafarians!
Dear PZ Myers,
You title your article, "I'm assuming many conservatives are embarrassed by Conservapedia".
Rather than put together an article which is informative and actually enlightens people what conservatives think about Conservapedia you start of with the lame title you chose. Please don't think that many people notice that your choice of title conveniently freed you from actually having to support anything. I think it would have been far more noble to do a little investigation on your part.
I will also point out to you that recently conservative websites linked to Conservapedia homosexuality articles and Conservapedia received about 60,000 plus hits as a result. If you doubt this please write to http://www.americansfortruth.com I also know that 3 other conservative organizations plan on also linking to Conservapedia's homosexuality article.
However, I wouldn't be surprised if you were a liberal who disproved of Conservapedia's article on homosexuality which is located here: http://www.conservapedia.com/Homosexuality
At the same time, I don't think you will be able to effectively dispute the medical journals, eminent pathologists, and other authorities that Conservapedia cites. I also do not believe you will be able to effectively refute the connections to pediphilia that the homosexuality community has exhibited that Conservapedia mentions.
Dear PZ Myers,
A small revision to the above post and it should have read:
However, I wouldn't be surprised if you were a liberal who disaproved of Conservapedia's article on homosexuality which is located here: http://www.conservapedia.com/Homosexuality
Dear PZ Myers,
I think I will be using the preview button more often at your blog. :)
My first post should have read:
Your choice of title for your article conveniently freed you from actually having to support anything.
Hmmm... obviously Ken Demyer (aka Peter Moore) thinks that because he criticises the article of a blog entry from nearly 10 months ago he can escape the glaringly obvious issues raised in the entry.
I will also like to point out that ONE conservative website linked to the article in the end (at one point Ken was saying two major news organisations, a dedicated news journalist and many conservative websites). The website in question receives less internet traffic than Rationalwiki and firmly believes that there is a plot by homosexuals to take over America, and these are the same loonies who keep coming up every now and then to express their belief that women, Africans, Communists, Italians, Asians and then Muslims (in that order) have tried to oppress the white, God fearing males and indoctrinate their children in a bid to control America for their own desires. I think you just need to go to their site to see that hatred they happily promote, all in the name of their American values.
At this time I would also like to consider the homosexuality article, most of the medical journals and eminent pathologists that Ken cites are actually password protected pages (ie you need a paid account to access the information) that he has just copied and pasted from google after viewing the edit summaries, given that many of the links actually contradict his message it is obvious he hasn't read them and has chosen to resort to quote mining instead.
At the same time he fails to notice his ridiculous manner of approaching the material, focussing on comparisons that overly affect homosexuals for one reason or another (the fact that homosexual males cannot have vaginal sex and hence have to have anal sex, and that this reason is why there are disproportionate amounts of parasite infections is conveniently overlooked, as are all the diseases that mainly affect heterosexual couples). The mentions of pediphilia are further blatant displays of homophobia, he seems to act under the assumption that no paedophile is straight and that all homosexuals are paedophiles (sort of like saying all Muslims are terrorists and all terrorists are Muslims, another ideology promoted on the site).
I would also encourage you to notice that within the article Ken expresses his belief that property damage and derogatory speech directed at homosexuals because they are homosexuals are not examples of hate crimes, but the vandalism of a Church sign that contained a provocative message against homosexuals is (note that a hate crime in this instance would be because the sign was made by Christians which obviously wasn't the intent, and that there is no evidence the perpetrator was homosexual).
The blatant discrimination at CP is not restricted to homosexuals, just today a user was blocked because she was an atheist with the message "atheists are not welcome here", it was only after outrage expressed on another site that the admin reversed his decision. The site also supports the extreme views of Ann Coulter in believing all Muslims should be bombed and converted to Christianity, labelling criticism of this attack as "hate speech against women" but then supports the beliefs that women should be submissive to their husbands and are less able in areas of science and mathematics, ironic isn't it?
Sadly there are still ultra conservative, racist, sexist and homophobic people like Ken in the world, and it's just hilarious watching them trying to justify their actions by quote mining eminent scientists or appealing to other equally discriminatory websites. Still, I guess we have to let them have their stage to express their opinion less we be dragged down to the level they occupy.
Dear Bob,
Given your comments regarding RationalWiki I cannot help but believe you are from RationalWiki. Well in this thread a fellow RationalWikian with the same name of a RationalWiki Adminstrator stated that user conservative at Conservapedia tells lies about homosexuality: http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/06/andy_schlaflys_success_story… When asked to support his allegation he slinked off the scene. Bob, I am afraid that RationalWiki has lost all credibility here so you your multiple unsupported allegations will be ignored by astute readers.
I would also state that when you write that "he seems to act under the assumption....." you are engaging in internet "mind reading" and it would certainly behoove you to act in a more scholarly manner which of course necessitates scholarly caution.
Next, you wrote:
"I would also encourage you to notice that within the article Ken expresses his belief that property damage and derogatory speech directed at homosexuals because they are homosexuals are not examples of hate crimes..."
Well first of all Andy Schafly wrote quite a bit of the hate crime material and second of all you certainly do not provide a quote to buttress your assertion and I believe it is because you cannot.
Next, given that user conservative has never discussed race at Conservapedia (if he has please point it out) I find your comment about user conservative being racist very pathetic to say the least. I would also point out that your allegation of homophobia was certainly not demonstrated and so your attempts to encrouch in the social science of psychology without showing the requisite data to support your diagnosis is certainly an indication that perhaps the reason why RationalWiki has such low internet traffic is due to lack of quality and relevant material which is something the search engines often although not always reward.
Dear Ken, you do know that pretending your name is "Peter Moore" is an example of deceit and breaks the 10 commandments, so perhaps you better stop before Andy adds you to his little list of "examples of liberal deceit", because we all know conservatives never practice deceit, right?
On that other thread people are ignoring you not because you are winning but because you are just repeating the same invalid information over and over again, and given that you are insisting on dragging arguments along on 10 month old threads I hardly feel that any person wants to read your arguments.
If Andy wrote some of the hate crime stuff that's brilliant, but you wrote the rest, you expanded it into other articles. I don't think I need to go to the trouble of providing an exact quote since this debate is clearly between me and you and you know what you've done.
And I believe it is quite clear you are homophobic. You have written and contributed large amounts to 15 lengthy articles on why homosexuality is bad in the face of other editors complaining to Andy that wikipedia is wrong for having multiple articles on the subject. You actively subscribe to the homosexual agenda myth (having written most of the article) and parrot your beliefs that homosexuality is taking over the media, over schools, over society. This clearly indicates a fear of homosexuality, and by definition you are homophobic.
As for racist, I am willing to let that pass (I guess that jab at the entire Islamic religion that was on your user page for over a month was only a passing phase) provided you answer three questions:
1) Is Christianity superior to other religions, and if so should it have an elevated position in American society (ie treated more favorably than others)?
2) Are women equal to men? Should they receive the same rights such as the right to vote? Should they be allowed to work the same jobs as men do and receive equal pay? And should they be free from the assumptions of child rearing (ie could men stay home to look after children instead of women)?
3) Should homosexuals receive equal rights? If not why not and what should we do with them (should we make them wear a special mark to know they're homosexuals, should we try to breed them out, should we actively suppress any mention of homosexuality in society)?
For all his talk about others avoiding the truth it seems Peter Moore aka Ken Demyer aka User:Conservative on conservapedia cannot answer three simple questions. Perhaps it is because he is afraid of the truth and what others will think of him when they realise that he is a deluded racist, sexist and homophobe.
All together now: Fiscal discipline and tempered changes are conservative values. Limited intrusion into people's affairs and small government are liberal values -- remember that "liberal" and "left" are not the same. I can't see how respect for the law and the big-C Constitution are limited to any ideology; what ideologies differ about is whether the laws should be changed, and if so, in which directions.
If you're liberal about social issues, just say it.
I got curious and tried to go to the plesiosaur article... it opens too slowly...
Z, it may surprise you, but as a scientist you do not have the right to hold a testable opinion and anxiously shelter it from all possible tests. Put up or shut up -- publish or perish.
Do you want my e-mail address? I'll gladly discuss with you, after you've read the talk.origins FAQ.
This, from Conservapedia, the so-called “Trustworthy Encyclopedia" (I checked it out yesterday - I kid you not).
“Conversions to Christianity (from any faith or lack thereof) outnumber those to Islam, but cannot keep up with the birthrate discrepancy. Only a small extremist sect of Muslims participate in this activity, using the concept of "Jihad" (Holy War), to justify their actions”.
Wow. What ARE they referring to? I didn’t know that conversions to Christianity were being undertaken by a small extremist sect of Muslims. Or is this the secret agenda of Schlafly et al.? COULD CONSERVAPEDIA BE ALL CLOSET MUSLIMS? SHOCK HORROR!
Come to that, I didn’t realise that the high birthrate among Muslims was justified by the concept of Jihad. If you read George Orwell’s novel “Nineteen-Eighty-four”, you will find that sex is a subversive activity. That’s why the powers that be set up the Junior Anti-Sex League. But then, if you try to find what Conservapedia says about sex, you get a blank page.