Wayne Besen - Author, Activist, Columnist, Public Speaker

Thursday, December 16, 2004

by Wayne Besen

If America doesn't wake up, it will soon become a big, dumb second-tier nation that values miracles over math and superstition over science. Thanks to the Republican's embrace of anti-intellectualism and demagogic fundamentalism, we are already halfway there.

In the October 17 edition of the New York Times Magazine, Ron Suskind interviewed a key Bush aide that described the administration's rejection of enlightenment principles. The aide chastised Suskind for living "in what we call the reality-based community."

The aide said that people in this community "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality…that's not the way the world really works anymore."

Indeed, it isn't.

A recent poll by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland found that nearly 70 percent of President Bush's supporters believe that America has produced "clear evidence" that Saddam Hussein was working with Al Qaeda. Amazingly, a third of the president's fans believe weapons of mass destructions were found in Iraq.

Too many Americans are divorced from reality and live in a world where belief trumps brains. This threatens the very essence of democracy, which depends on an educated citizenry to make wise, informed choices.

"You want to get down to the nub of how this democracy is going to defend itself," said former CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite. "We've got to have an intelligent electorate and we are not going to have it because our education system is in a shambles right now."

A new study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development showed that the United States ranked 28th out of 40 nations in math and 18th in reading. But instead of recognizing that American innovation and prosperity is in danger of erosion, the Republican-led Congress just cut nearly $105 million from the National Science Foundation.

Of course, as Hong Kong, South Korea and Finland kick our ass in math and science, Americans have more pressing moral concerns. For example, Alabama State Representative Gerald Allen (R-Cottondale) wants to ban books that mention gay people from public libraries and schools. To rid Alabama of such books, Allen said that, "I guess we dig a big hole and dump them in and bury them."

Finally, the educational reform conservatives have been promising.

The battle to substitute ignorance for education is evident in right wing efforts to teach creation "science" in public schools. School officials in Cobb County, Ga., were recently in court to defend a disclaimer on science books that reads evolution is, "a theory and not a fact."

Sadly, much of America agrees and wants to undercut scientific progress. According to a Dec. 5 Newsweek poll, 43 percent of Americans favor teaching creation science instead of evolution in public schools. This shows that nearly half of Americans are not only hostile to science, but have little use for the separation of church and state.

Blissful ignorance dangerously extends to America's sex education. This year, Congress will provide nearly $170 million for "abstinence only" programs. However, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 61 percent of graduating high school seniors have had sex. Wouldn't it be healthier if they knew about condoms?

Columbia University researchers found that 88 percent of teens that take "virginity pledges" eventually have premarital sex. Sounds like "abstinence only" programs are working wonders.

It's bad enough that these anti-sex programs deny reality, but a new congressional staff report by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) shows they also give out false or misleading information, including:

- Abortion can lead to sterility and suicide
- Half the gay male teenagers in the U.S. have tested positive for the AIDS virus (this statistic is not known)
- Condoms fail to prevent HIV transmission 31 percent of the time in heterosexual intercourse (the real number is less than 3 percent)
- HIV can be spread via sweat and tears
- Pregnancy can occur through mutual masturbation

Shamefully, on ABC's This Week, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), who is a doctor, repeated some of the myths. On condoms he said, "We know there's about a 15 percent failure rate."

Host George Stephanopoulos asked him if HIV could be spread through sweat and tears and he refused to answer the question directly. He squirmed and tried to slither away. But after repeated prodding he finally said, "it would be very hard." Either Frist is Dr. Dumb or he is guilty of pandering to America's lowest common denominator.

America will fail if our leaders focus on magic and miracles over modernization and creating reality-based minds. The Neo-Puritan's goal of replacing biology with theology is well underway. Sure, the facts don't add up - but you have to be able to do math to figure this out.

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