Reposted from "Think Atheist:"
"Bill Nye, the harmless children's edu-tainer known as "The Science Guy," managed to offend a select group of adults in Waco, Texas at a presentation, when he suggested that the moon does not emit light, but instead reflects the light of the sun.
As even most elementary-school graduates know, the moon reflects the light of the sun but produces no light of its own.
But don't tell that to the good people of Waco, who were 'visibly angered by what some perceived as irreverence,' according to the Waco Tribune.
Nye was in town to participate in McLennan Community College's Distinguished Lecture Series. He gave two lectures on such unfunny and adult topics as global warming, Mars exploration, and energy consumption.
But nothing got people as riled as when he brought up Genesis 1:16, which reads: "God made two great lights -- the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars."
The lesser light, he pointed out, is not a light at all, but only a reflector.
At this point, several people in the audience stormed out in fury. One woman yelled 'We believe in God!' and left with three children, thus ensuring that people across America would read about the incident and conclude that Waco is as nutty as they'd always suspected.
This story originally appeared in the Waco Tribune, but the newspaper has mysteriously pulled its story from the online version, presumably to avoid further embarrassment."
Texas isn't the only state where wackadoodles exist in blissful ignorance. Tennessee has its share of them as well, and the state legislators are doing all they can to guarantee that their state can out-stupid states like Texas:
Tennessee Senate Approves Bill To Warn Students That Hand-Holding Is A ‘Gateway Sexual Activity’
"Like any state legislature dealing with 8 percent unemployment and thousands of its residents facing disenfranchisement, the Tennessee Senate is targeting the menace of underage hand-holding.
Last week, the Senate passed SB 3310, a bill to update the state’s abstinence-based sex education curriculum to define holding hands and kissing as 'gateway sexual activities.' Just one senator voted against the legislation; 28 voted in favor."
And this jaw-dropping anti-science imbecility, again from the great state of Tennessee:
Tennessee Passes ‘Monkey Bill’ To Teach The ‘Controversy’ On Evolution And Climate Science
On Monday, the Tennessee state legislature passed legislation that requires public schools to teach the “controversy” over evolution, global warming, and human cloning:
"The Senate voted 24-8 for HB368, which sponsor Sen. Bo Watson, R-Hixson, says will provide guidelines for teachers answering students’ questions about evolution, global warming and other scientific subjects. Critics call it a 'monkey bill' that promotes creationism in classrooms."Anyone with a functioning intellect knows that Evolution is a fact. To deny this and to encourage legislation that puts factless, faith-based Creationism on the same level as scientific fact is folly and will continue to add to America's shameful decline in science and math, ignorantly brought to us by the extremists in the GOP while the sensible members of that party remain silent, allowing the Know-Nothings to drag it back to the 19th century.
Texas and Virginia state legislators have passed into law a requirement that forces girls and women to have an ultra-sound probe inserted into their vaginas, without their consent, before any abortion, no matter what the circumstances are for the procedure.
With all the problems these states face in unemployment and budgetary short-falls, one can only marvel at the willingness to make scientific fools of themselves as well as forcibly insert the power of the state into the most private lives of citizens.
This is just a small sampling of what the extremists in the GOP do in states where they have control of the governorships and legislatures.
Just imagine what a GOP president will do on a nationwide level.
42 comments:
well since Obama has the Occutards on his side I will join in the May Day festivities by:
I will print every email that I get and throw it away. The emails with the obnoxious “consider the environment before printing this email”signature line I will print twice, make 10 copies, and throw them all in the trash can. Again, with a recycling bin in reach.
I will visit my bank. Just to say “Hello, thanks for being capitalists!”
I will leave my car running all day, even when I’m at my desk.
I will buy 100 watt incandescent light bulbs, and while I’m in that aisle I will berate anyone who even looks at a mercury filled “hazmat in waiting” bulb.
If I should happen across any Occutards, I will give them a “brief” lesson on what an oppressor really is.
“Excessive force” will be an objective minimum standard.
I will replace our toilet paper with copies of “Das Kapital” and “Dreams of My Father”. I will then by my entire department lunch from that roadside taco stand with the questionable Health Department certificate.
For the feminazi’s I will eat a delicious meal prepared by my wife, who I will insist cook it while barefoot. I will then enjoy a beer and ceegar while she does the dishes and cleans the kitchen.
Dear Anonymous,
What a great and hilarious parody of a wingnut!
Do you write for The Daily Show? The Colbert Report?
I especially like the part about "the little woman" cooking while barefoot (note: you forgot the part about her being pregnant to make the image even more GOP "Leave It To Beavery." LOL!
"Occutard." Perfect take-down of the TeaParty's overuse of the "'tard" suffix: i.e., "libtard" [dmarks does NOT think that's appropriate].
As for that "questionable" taco stand lunch?
I commend you and your willingness to invite explosive diarrhea to prove a meaningless point! Another great parody of how a wingnut is ever so willing to degrade him/herself just to prove his/her wingnut bonafides. Good one!
And so very apt.
People who vote and act against their best interests always end up with a shitty deal.
Given the phases of the moon and the obvious observations that the sun and lunar eclipses are not simultaneous, Anaxagoras noted
that the moon reflected sunlight
back in 450 BC. Newt's projected
lunar colony might have shed 'light' on the topic (and provided a home
for the Waco whackos).
shaw, you missed giving praise to anonymous for this particular piece of wingnut idiocy, "I will leave my car running all day, even when I’m at my desk."
but waht is so funny about the parody is that a lot of extrme wingers actually do support anti-envoronment policies so that our environment will degrade to the point where they're actually cheering on the early death of their own children.
Truth, with a smattering of hyperbole. All in all, a solid B.
Just so you publish a little bit of truth.
"forces girls and women to have an ultra-sound probe inserted into their vaginas"
I know his statement sounds better for your purposes but ultrasound probes are not inserted.
"forces girls and women to have an ultra-sound probe inserted into their vaginas"
Before inserting cutting and suction tools.
See "Choice"
skudrunner, FYI (from PolitiFact):
The mentioned "probe" has a formal name, we noted in a March 2011 fact check, which is "transvaginal sonogram." At the time, we were reviewing state Rep. Carol Alvarado's claim, made during House debate of the Texas proposal, that a woman who is eight to 10 weeks pregnant would have to get a transvaginal sonogram.
Alvarado told us that she meant to say that women who are up to eight to 12 weeks pregnant need a transvaginal sonogram because the better-known abdominal ultrasound doesn’t always produce a clear enough image.
According to a medical encyclopedia on the University of Maryland Medical Center website, the transvaginal ultrasound looks at a woman's reproductive organs by placing a probe into the vagina. The internal probe "sends out sound waves, which reflect off body structures," the site says. "A computer receives these waves and uses them to create a picture."
An abdominal ultrasound is performed externally, the site says. A water-based gel is spread over the woman’s pelvic area, which helps the probe transmit sound waves, generating an image.
Most of the experts we reached agreed that to produce a clear image, a transvaginal sonogram is best, if not the only choice, up to about the seventh week of pregnancy.
It is indeed "inserted" against a girl's or woman's consent--a vaginal probe is state mandated.
This was passed and is the law in Texas where the Tea Baggers and conservatives howl the loudest about government instrusiveness.
When will women wake up and see that THE MOST INTRUSIVE laws come from the conservatives?
What, may I ask, is more intrusive than a state forced rape? And that is exactly what is going on when a girl or a woman has NO say in what the state inserts into her vagina at one of the most vulnerable times in her life.
This is the current GOP and what it is most interested in.
Anonymous, it is not your business to decide what reasons or when a girl or woman chooses an abortion.
You and the GOP and their invasive state governments need to keep your and their noses out of girls' and women's reproductive organs.
Find something else to do to put America back to work.
Inteferring in girls' and women's personal lives won't do it.
and here I thought it was your priority you know free birth control and all
Nicholas Kristoff writing in the NYTimes, March 2012:
“It’s state-sanctioned abuse,” said Dr. Curtis Boyd, a Texas physician who provides abortions. “It borders on a definition of rape. Many states describe rape as putting any object into an orifice against a person’s will. Well, that’s what this is. A woman is coerced to do this, just as I’m coerced.”
“The state of Texas is waging war on women and their families,” Dr. Boyd added. “The new law is demeaning and disrespectful to the women of Texas, and insulting to the doctors and nurses who care for them.”
That law is part of a war over women’s health being fought around the country — and in much of the country, women are losing. State by state, legislatures are creating new obstacles to abortions and are treating women in ways that are patronizing and humiliating.
Twenty states now require abortion providers to conduct ultrasounds first in some situations, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization. The new Texas law is the most extreme to take effect so far, but similar laws have been passed in North Carolina and Oklahoma and are on hold pending legal battles.
Alabama, Kentucky, Rhode Island and Mississippi are also considering Texas-style legislation bordering on state-sanctioned rape. And what else do you call it when states mandate invasive probes in women’s bodies?"
Anonymous @ 1:24 [First off, are you so devoid of any creativity that you can't come up with a name. How can I know if you're the same Anonymous. I have 3 Anons on this thread. Are you all the same or 3 different Anons?]
Insurance-covered birth control, or better, free birth control, is an important part of women's health.
Your snarky comment reveals your distaste for girls and women who wish to control their bodies and health.
A perfect adherent of today's anti-women GOP.
Huh? These ding-dongs want to argue about the Moon not being self-luminous? And they get mad when people compare them to flat-Earthers?
The hand-holding thing is the exact same kind of mentality that leads to burqas. The extreme Islamist wingnuts think that if women walk around with their bare foreheads or ears or whatever exposed, men will be so overcome with lust and temptation that society will break down, or something equally ridiculous. Treating hand-holding as similarly dangerous isn't as far out as that, but it's getting there.
Finally, yes, teach the controversy -- except when there isn't one. Reality is not determined by opinion. If some chunk of the public believes that Joan of Arc was Noah's wife (I've seen claims that something like 10% do), we don't declare a "controversy" and require history classes to teach "both sides".
Infidel: "Huh? These ding-dongs want to argue about the Moon not being self-luminous?"
Yes, Infidel, I'm afraid this is what happens when the sensible members of the GOP allow the anti-science and extreme religionist yahoos in their party to have "equal time" to promote their stupidity.
Reminds me of an Isaac Asimov quote:
“Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'”
I'm afraid this is what happens when the sensible members of the GOP allow...
A couple of problems here. First, the GOP does not "allow" people to do anything. We're free people over here. If you progressives want to ingest the propaganda and march in lockstep, great, but things don't work that way on the right.
Secondly, where in the story does it say that the people who stormed out were republicans?
And all sides have their kooks. Even more dangerous are your kooks, who think more government is the answer.
"First, the GOP does not "allow" people to do anything."
Well that's disputable, since we've seen with our own eyes how the House Republicans march lock-step with the leadership. And I've never heard a GOP pol, well maybe Huntsman, say that global warming is not a hoax but real. The GOP always are on the same talking points, via Frank Luntz.
Look what happened to the GOP moderates in the Senate and House.
Where in the story does it say the people who stormed out were Republicans?
It doesn't, but it also doesn't take a rocket scientist to deduce that the overwhelming majority of Christian fundamentalists belong to and vote for the GOP. I'm guessing the people who stormed out of the meeting weren't Episcopalians or Uni-Unis.
I guess I've done what a lot of conservatives do when they assign all the OWS protesters to the Democratice Party.
Wow. So Christians can't be democrats? Glad that came from you, and not my side...
And Obama and the Pelosicrats embrace the OWS movement, so what are we to believe? Their own leftist agenda clearly marks them as not republican, the the Ron Pauloids among them notwithstanding.
An overwhelming majority of demonstrators supported Barack Obama in 2008. Now 51% disapprove of the president while 44% approve, and only 48% say they will vote to re-elect him in 2012, while at least a quarter won't vote.
From the WSJ:
Fewer than one in three (32%) call themselves Democrats, while roughly the same proportion (33%) say they aren't represented by any political party.
Christians for the most part are fairly evenly distributed along the political spectrum.
"Wow. So Christians can't be democrats? Glad that came from you, and not my side..."
Excuse me? Where do I say that?
SF: "An overwhelming majority of demonstrators supported Barack Obama in 2008. Now 51% disapprove of the president while 44% approve, and only 48% say they will vote to re-elect him in 2012, while at least a quarter won't vote."
Maybe. But when they actually have to vote and look at what conservatives have done in the states where they are the majority in the legislature and the governorship, they'll pull the lever for Obama.
Meanwhile, today the DOW has closed at its highest level in 4 years today.
And Obama is president? What a Socialist!
No, many, maybe millions will pause, think, and vote for change. Gary Johnson.
Hi RN? You don't have to use "Anonymous." You're welcome to contribute to the discussion.
SKU,
My Dallas wife just had a baby. I am very familiar with this probe. It is inserted deeply into the vagina, and it was painful for her, an adult.
Shaw,
"Anyone with a functioning intellect knows that Evolution is a fact."
just a little scientific correction for you.
Anyone with some functioning knowledge of science knows that Evolution is a theory not a "fact".
"Meanwhile, today the DOW has closed at its highest level in 4 years today."
Obama's Wall Street fat cat cronies are doing great, what about main street?
Griper: Excellent point!
That's the problem with non-scientific people talking about science...
It's theory, not dogma.
JM, there is no way the conservatives can defend this stupid anti-woman law.
It has been enacted in GOP-run states for the sole purpose of humiliating and punishing women for seeking a legal medical procedure.
To my knowledge, there is no other medical procedure that is specifically forced on girls and women {and the doctors who are forced to perform it} and that is totally medically unnecessary.
This is something the Soviets would have or North Koreans would be proud to support and enforce.
Griper: "Anyone with some functioning knowledge of science knows that Evolution is a theory not a "fact"."
Griper, you apparentaly don't understand the meaning of "theory" when it applies to science.
In everyday usage, "theory" often refers to a hunch or a speculation. When people say, "I have a theory about why that happened," they are often drawing a conclusion based on fragmentary or inconclusive evidence.
.
"The formal scientific definition of theory is quite different from the everyday meaning of the word. It refers to a comprehensive explanation of some aspect of nature that is supported by a vast body of evidence.
In science, a "fact" typically refers to an observation, measurement, or other form of evidence that can be expected to occur the same way under similar circumstances. However, scientists also use the term "fact" to refer to a scientific explanation that has been tested and confirmed so many times that there is no longer a compelling reason to keep testing it or looking for additional examples. In that respect, the past and continuing occurrence of evolution is a scientific fact. Because the evidence supporting it is so strong, scientists no longer question whether biological evolution has occurred and is continuing to occur. Instead, they investigate the mechanisms of evolution, how rapidly evolution can take place, and related questions." SOURCE
Evolution is a fact and is supported by mountains of evidence. There is no argument on this fact except from religious factions who, for their own reasons, feel threatened by science.
I'm not going to invite arguments on this subject, and that is not being close minded, as some would claim. I don't argue with people who willfully ignore accepted scientific evidence, as I wouldn't argue with people who claim gravity is only a "theory," or Einstein's "Theory of Relativity" is "just a theory."
I really don't need any "scientific correction" on this matter, since I do have a very good understanding of it.
I'm afraid it is you who don't.
SF,
See the above comment.
Fat cats? You mean like the ones who support Romney and his several overseas bank accounts? What a patriotic American he is! Stuffing his billions overseas to avoid supporting his country.
"Fat cats? You mean like the ones who support Romney and his several overseas bank accounts"
Let's not forget this guy
Evolution is a theory in the standard scientific use of the word. It is a good theory, and I'm not arguing against it, but merely pointing out that there are many gaps.
His overseas accounts are on the record and legal, so I don't understand your point.
But back to the fatcat wall street types, they give more to Obama and the dems than they do Romney.
And I'll ask you again, why is Obama taking care of his Wall Street cronies while main street (including main street banks) suffer?
Shaw,
"Griper, you apparentaly don't understand the meaning of "theory" when it applies to science."
i fully understand the meaning of theory and i know the difference between specuation and theory. i also know the difference between their scientific usage and everyday usage.
i understand them well enough to acknowledge the possibility that you may be right and i may be incorrect and that be based on the possibility that all that i was taught in the many classes of science over the years was for naught.
are you willing to say the same?
Griper: "i understand them well enough to acknowledge the possibility that you may be right and i may be incorrect and that be based on the possibility that all that i was taught in the many classes of science over the years was for naught.
are you willing to say the same?"
I don't know what you mean by am I "willing to say the same."
I learned, through my studies, that Evolution is a fact. There are theories on the different mechanisms that bring it about, but there's no evidence to dispute that Evolution is a fact.
Of course there are "gaps," in the theory, because it's been only a little over 150 years since Darwin published his book. As more and more evidence emerges to add to the evidence we already have, those gaps will close. It's only been since the last half of the last century that the double helix was discovered and DNA was added to the evidence.
There is such outrage from the leftists over Romneys wealth. I don't remember this being a big issue with Kerry, Kennedy or even madam Polosi. Is it because Romney earned his and the others did not?
The Obamites will do anything to divert attention away from his total failure as a president.
relativity is a theory.
Newt Gingrich's intelligence is a myth.
skudrunner: "There is such outrage from the leftists over Romneys wealth.I don't remember this being a big issue with Kerry..."
You have a short memory, because there was. The opposition made fun of the kinds of "upper class" sports he participated in, and they said Kerry was "very French."
(Mitt actually lived in France and is fluent in French. I guess it's okay to be Frenchified if you're a Republican.)
No one is "outraged" over Romney's wealth. The controversy is his inability to understand middle and lower income families' problems in this economy. His remarks about his wife owning two Cadillacs and his purchase of a lavish 3rd or 4th home in La Jolla, Calif. and putting in a garage elevator shows that he has no connection or understanding with average Americans and their struggles.
"Is it because Romney earned his and the others did not?"
Excuse me? Romney was the scion of a very wealthy man, George Romney, CEO of American Motors.
It is hard to believe any politician can relate to the average citizen, except maybe Biden, Coburn and Paul. Romney's father was well off but not near what Mitt is currently and Mitt earned that wealth. No one comes close to Kerry who did it the Democrat way, he got it from someone else.
Kerry came from a wealthy family as did Romney. Kerry was a Forbes.
He did well just as Romney did.
Nice try though.
"The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics. It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition. When one party moves this far from the mainstream, it makes it nearly impossible for the political system to deal constructively with the country’s challenges."
Actually his father was in the Army Air Corps (that is really pronounced core not corps).
He married well and didn't have to work for his wealth. Unlike Obama, Kerry did hold a private sector job at one point if only for a short time. Obama has always been supported by the public's money so it is understandable that he dislikes people who earned it themselves.
"Hype & Blame 2012" Love the Obama campaign slogan.
Nice try
Obama has always been supported by the public's money so it is understandable that he dislikes people who earned it themselves.
That is a non-sequiter, sir. (not to mention wrong). Most of Obama's money did not come from the public coffers, but even if they had, it would not cause him to resent those who work in the private sector. Somehow you managed to get two errors in a single thought.
Actually JM if you read my post I said his support not his money. He went to school on grants (public funds), to Harvard on a scholarship (at least that is reported but he has never said), "taught law" at a university (public funds, organized a community, (public funds), state and federal senator nor president (all public funds).
He has no accomplishments as president so he has to blame someone or something and the "rich" are an easy target because no one can accuse him of being a leader.
"He has no accomplishments as president so he has to blame..."
Biggest fekken lie the miserably unhappy liars in the GOP keep repeating.
Every time a liar repeats that we send money to the Obama campaign.
Thanks, shaw!
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