Yes, you descended from apes, live with it.

I'm going to say right of the top that this post can't possibly say everything...there will be holes, I apologize.

So Kansas, which is full of idiots (hey, you like Genesis, I like unfair generalizations), is having hearings about whether or not to teach alternatives to evolution in science class rooms. Of course, we should whole heartedly support such a move.

I say this for three reasons: 1) I like my crazies stupid, so go ahead an make sure that fundamentalists cannot become doctors or scientists; 2) this will open the door to alternatives to algebra in the math class and alternatives to punctuating sentences in language arts class--which of course are both also things that developed after the Bible was written and thus must not be true because otherwise the Bible would have included them and are you calling God a liar?; and 3) I'm kidding, of course we should teach evolution in science class room if only because we already do and it has the added benefit of actually being right.

Of course I am pretty well invested in the theory of evolution since I devoted a considerable amount of time in the past to obtaining a baccalaureate in Anthropology. If by "pretty well invested" you mean expertly educated and fully equiped to fend off any ignorant statement that "it's just a theory". In fact, I will not debate people who say that it's only a theory since that shows an extremely low threshhold of understanding of what science is and how it works. But I digress.

The thing is that religious values really have no place in the public classroom, except where they overlap with civic values, which is actually pretty often. But the whole point is to educate and indoctrinate into the civic religion of American-ness, and that involves science and math and social studies and language arts and a little bit of gym and art so they stay creative and not fatties because the world needs movie stars too. If you want to say, "I don't believe that evolution is true and I prefer the story in the first book of the Bible," well my friend, you go right on and hold your head high. But you got to teach your kids that on your own time. It is emphatically not the provence of the public schools to teach your kids anythig of the sort...that's what parenting is for.

And to the woman in the article who says that America was founded on Chrisitianity and not science: Look, Christianity was big, it's actually even bigger now, but the entire promise of the Enlightenment was to inject scientific rationality into every aspect of society. So really, America was founded on science as much as religion. This is, in fact the subject of innumerable books, read one. Many more of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and the Constituion were men of science than clergy.

So angry...