Programmed ignorance?

And Brian Zick responds to my comments regarding fundamentalism's attacks on public schools:

"I don't know that I dispute your comment: 'It has to do with having the government help subsidize conservatives' campaign to create an undereducated working class that is captive to fundamentalist religions.' But I would like to examine it.

"Obviously, whatever the goal of the alleged 'pro-life' crowd may be, it is most definitely NOT a reduction in the number of abortions. The superficiality and irrationality of their arguments measured against real-world behavior makes that profoundly self-evident. Moreover, they don't really want to just 'win' the political argument either. In many respects, it's arguable they already have -- judging by the various cultural indicators to which I am exposed. My impression is that women are much more likely to carry pregnancies to term than they were, say, 20 years ago, mainly as the consequence of the whole guilt trip put upon them by the rabid coercive birth crowd.

"And frankly, given the First Amendment provides them a legit ability to try and guilt women into that decision, as long as women do retain their ability to choose, if they choose carrying to term, well, so be it.

"But what I see is that just ain't near good enough for the 'pro-lifers.' They don't simply want to change their opponents' minds, they want to crush them. It ain't about winning politically, it's about destroying a perceived enemy. Making political difference a criminal offense.

"I don't doubt they want the government to subsidize their agenda, but I wonder if any of them -- Pat Robertson, Gary Bauer, Jerry Falwell -- the usual gang of thugs -- have ever specifically thought in the terms you set forth, to 'create an undereducated working class that is captive to fundamentalist religions.' Have you come across any literature that actually supports that contention, or is your conclusion based more on extrapolating that goal from evaluating the tactics and strategies employed?

"Much as I believed nothing was beneath the conniving cynicism of tobacco companies, I used to argue vigorously that Joe Camel, simply by definition of being a cartoon character, did not ipso facto represent an 'appeal to children.' (I could go to great winded length describing the history of animation, and how Mickey Mouse was actually created for adult audiences, and that today there are
many feature animated films which are not at all for children. I paint pictures myself, of cartoon styled characters, and I don't even like children as a general rule.) It wasn't until specific documents surfaced, which detailed in plain text a corporate merchandising strategy, that the allegation was proved. I maintain, in the absence of those documents, that all the prior allegations were non sequitur leaps of attributing guilt by bogus association. The fact that the accusers were ultimately shown to be correct in the case did not justify the accusations, which had been devoid of intellectually credible foundation.

"It is clear -- they've made it so -- that the Faux Christians, like Robertson et al, are intent on creating a theocracy (actually a dictatorship based on genuine Christian beliefs no more so than the National Socialist German Workers' Party had anything to do with socialism - but that's for another correspondence). I think the effort is, such as can really be documented as far as I am aware, just a function of raw power lust. I don't think these people have the brains to conceive of a decades-long operation, consciously devoted to reducing the educational capacity of workers.

"I don't think they care if people really share their so-called religious beliefs, they just want to use the corrupted architecture of religion as a means to exercise control -- just like the Taliban. I am aware that Pol Pot made a point of slaughtering anyone with an education, so as to eliminate the potential for dissent, which could be described as working to 'create an undereducated working class that is captive to' the Khmer Rouge philosophy.

"Like I say, I don't necessarily disagree, I just wonder if they actually think in those terms. It wouldn't surprise me -- the tobacco company documents didn't surprise me -- but I would just prefer to have something with greater evidenciary substance upon which to make the claim than my ability to observe abstracted historical parallels."

Brian, that is my extrapolation, but it's not a difficult one to make. There is no shortage of material and rhetoric emanating from the fundamentalist right that attacks secular public education (see my earlier post about Laura Schlesinger), and particularly the sciences. Just their attacks in this field alone (let's not even get into the liberal arts) are enough to make quite clear that students would be undereducated on very basic matters if the thumpers were running the schools. In fact, hostility to secular education is endemic to fundamentalism -- it crops up with Islamists too.

There's an obvious reason for this. Fundamentalism is the antithesis of the scientific approach (and not merely because so much of it is imbued with superstition). Its opening proposition is a statement of belief, around which supporting evidence is then gathered. Science, of course, proceeds in the opposite direction, by gathering evidence, sorting it out, and then searching for a reasonable explanation.

Fundamentalists cannot hope to succeed in an environment in which people are fully educated in this fashion. They explicitly realize this, but usually couch it in their own unique perspectives, telling us the schools are "making war on Christian values" and that they are "instilling occult values" in our children. I think it's clear that they have (correctly) identified secular education, particularly in the sciences, as their enemy, and are working to destroy it.

I'm sure they haven't formalized the strategy in such stark terms as mine. But all I'm really doing is placing their well-established arguments in a real-world context. For the same reason I never refer to their position as 'pro-life' (they're demonstrably not pro-life when it comes to the death penalty), but rather as 'anti-abortion.' Truth in advertising, as it were.