I thought perhaps the effect of Ben Stein’s movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed would be to preach to the choir about Intelligent Design, and that every other rational thinking creature would go on about their lives once the media frenzy died down. This film isn’t going to persuade anyone who doesn’t already believe in bunk, I thought.

Someone did believe a message of the film - that Darwinism equates to anti-Semitism - and wrote an abusive letter to Michael Shermer in response.

Now I truly understand who you atheists and darwinists really are! You people believe that it was okay for my great-grandparents to die in the Holocaust! How disgusting. Your past article about the Holocaust was just window dressing. We Jews will fight to keep people like you out of the United States!

Richard Dawkins wrote an Open Letter to the person, to set the record straight and attempt to straighten the mess that Ben Stein and Company have created. An excerpt:

There is no mention of Darwin in Mein Kampf. Not one single, solitary mention, not one mention in any of the 27 chapters of this long and tedious book. Don’t you think that, if Hitler was truly influenced by Darwin, he would have given him at least one teeny weeny mention in his book? Was he, perhaps, INDIRECTLY influenced by some of Darwin’s ideas, without knowing it? Only if you completely misunderstand Darwin’s ideas, as some have definitely done: the so-called Social Darwinists such as Herbert Spencer and John D Rockefeller. Hitler could fairly be described as a Social Darwinist, but all modern evolutionists, almost literally without exception, have been vocal in their condemnation of Social Darwinism. This of course includes Michael Shermer and me and PZ Myers and all the other evolutionary scientists whom Ben Stein and his team tricked into taking part in his film by lying to us about their true intentions. read more »

…….

My open letter would go something like this:

Dear David J,

When I think about the Holocaust, a dark feeling of grief wells up inside me. It is something I will carry forever, and I imagine this is felt by many other people, simply because we are all people - we all share the experience of this world, and our experience is threaded with sorrow.

I just turned thirty. Apart from not being alive during World War II, I also wasn’t alive to witness a virulently anti-Semitic world, though I know that’s how the world was before my birth. By the time I came along, many old prejudices had been set aside. I wasn’t brought up to hate Jews, and I don’t know anyone who was. Only after learning about the Holocaust as a child did I begin to understand what hatred meant. Further delving in history, I began to learn that the Jews had been persecuted long before Hitler and the Reich. I am sorry this has happened to your people.

I read the stories of non-Jews who helped Jews escape the Nazi regime. It is hard to know what I would have done if I were there, in that situation. My heart tells me I would have helped. Even though I am not a Jew. Even though I am not a Christian, or a Hindu, or anything. I am an atheist.

I am an atheist, and I believe in the theory of evolution. I have read Darwin’s On The Origin of Species and have learned about natural selection. It is true that Darwin’s theories were misapplied in ‘Social Darwinism’, around the turn of the century. I am equally anguished to see this kind of veiled hatred. But I also understand that Hitler was not a Darwinist. He was not influenced by the writing of Charles Darwin, who would have been appalled to see the misuse of his ideas. Hitler was actually influenced by the long-standing anti-Semitism of the Catholic church, of which he was a member.

I just wanted you to know, David J, that choosing to hate me - as an atheist and a believer in Darwinism - does not work to cease the cycle of violence and distrust that killed your family members in the Holocaust. It perpetuates it. I want you to understand, too, that reviling a people, in this case, atheists, is exactly what your people have suffered under. If this is what Ben Stein’s movie has done, then he ought to be doubly ashamed - first for perpetuating lies that promote scientific ignorance, and second, for breeding hate. I advise you to learn about the theory of evolution from reputable textbooks; not from a shoddy propagandist film made in stunning ignorance.

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BBC News: An Italian woman artist who was hitch-hiking to the Middle East dressed as a bride to promote world peace has been found murdered in Turkey.

Requiem for an Honest Liberal, Scragged, honors Giuseppina Pasqualino di Marineo, known as Pippa Bacca, for “for doing what the overwhelming majority of liberals entirely refuse to do: to live in full, logical consistency with their professed beliefs.”

Pippa Bacca had said she wanted to show that she could put her trust in the kindness of local people. As reported by the BBC, the artist’s sister Maria told the Italian news agency, Ansa, “Her travels were for an artistic performance and to give a message of peace and of trust, but not everyone deserves trust.”

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An 8-year old girl was forced to marry a 30-year old man by her father. Her ‘husband,’ Faez Ali Thamer, regularly beat the girl and forced her into sexual acts.

Yemen Times, vol.18.

When her family refused to help, the girl appeared in court by herself to ask for a divorce.

“My father beat me and told me that I must marry this man, and if I did not, I would be raped and no law and no sheikh in this country would help me. I refused but I couldn’t stop the marriage,” Nojoud Nasser told the Yemen Times.

The law has done little to prosecute, and this is not the first case of this kind in Yemen. What makes it different from the other instances of child rape in a Muslim country is that the girl had the courage to appear in court by herself. According to the article, Nojoud Muhammed Nasser will attend a state-run school and will not be returned to the custody of her family.

So she’s safe - for now. But, she lives in the world of Islam, where women are subjected to gang rape as a lawful punishment. It is a world where men get away with abusing their women, because the Koran says it’s absolutely fantastic to do.

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Of all the podcast options available these days, in all the myriad subjects, Point of Inquiry is not only the most insightful when it comes to examining secular issues and claims of the paranormal, but is regularly the most stimulating and thought-provoking hour I spend in a week.

I can’t recommend it enough. Over this last year, I’ve listened and become acquainted with the interviewing style of host DJ Grothe. While the show is produced by and contributed to by many people, I’m not sure it would be what it is without DJ’s ability to play devil’s advocate for his guests. For example, having a guest like Dr. Eugenie Scott, Executive Director of the National Center For Science Education on to talk about why evolution matters on a show that focuses on science education may seem like an opportunity for Dr. Scott, as a defender of evolution, to state her case without opposition, but as in all the interviews I’ve listened to, DJ digs a little deeper, asking questions that take the discussion to the points that really matter. Why not allow the teaching of intelligent design? Eugenie Scott’s answer can be heard in the January 20, 2006 podcast, The Dover Trial: Evolution vs. Intelligent Design.

I recommend Point of Inquiry because it has helped to shape my worldview. Interviews with Edward Tabash, Jennifer Michael Hecht, and Center For Inquiry founder, Paul Kurtz, have had a particular impact on me. If you’re looking for something interesting to fill your mind with, Point of Inquiry is a smörgåsbord for thinkers.

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A very small, very fast, very furry little creature shot out of my bedroom closet last week and had there been a chair nearby, I’d probably have jumped up on it in the manner of sitcom housewives.

I don’t know what business Mr. Mouse had been attending to in there, but I had obviously given him a great a scare. And likewise, he scared the bejeesus out of me. Pete happened to be in the room to witness my girly squeal, jumping sidestep, and look of stunned horror, though I still turned to him and shrieked obviously, “There’s a mouse! There’s a mouse in the house!” He advised me to calm down, at which point I realized I’d really lost my head over the matter.

Talk began almost immediately about what we planned to do about the mouse. We debated using mousetraps versus D-Con, and weighed the pros and cons. But imagining that speedy, furry, small thing suddenly coming to a halt; squished in a mousetrap, its tail hanging limply on the ground, its marvelous feet no longer scurrying so quickly across my floor, I didn’t feel a rush of relief or a desire to see these things come to fruition. It seemed like such a waste of something so incredible to take away those tiny feet that, were we on a similar size scale, would out-run mine. I began to feel pity for the mouse. And then, indignation. Why shouldn’t he be allowed to live? A mouse has to have a warm place to sleep, just like any mammal, so why not amongst the long-forgotten storage items in my closet?

Apart from being unsanitary. And, there’s the matter of not knowing how many mice we’re talking about here, or how many there will be. If allowed to live and proliferate, will we soon have an epidemic? And does it carry disease, ie: Hantavirus? Will it chew holes in our belongings, nibble into our food, climb on us while we sleep?

I saw little mouse, again. I surprised him late at night, nibbling on some of the seeds my birds had flung from their cage. A mouse has to eat, right? Poor thing. He scurried away again when he saw me, but in the most remarkable way: he ran at breakneck speed along the baseboards of the house, turning with precision around every corner and never putting even a tiny toe off his half-inch wide path. So curious. I just don’t have the heart to kill this amazing creature.

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