The Reactionary Utopian
                    November 13, 2006


SCIENCE, RELIGION, AND HATE
by Joe Sobran

     Though I try to keep abreast of new ideas, the 
conclusions of modern science are often, as they say, 
"counterintuitive" -- that is, contrary to what common 
sense might lead you to expect. In the realm of physics, 
this is true of the theory of relativity, quantum 
mechanics, Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, and the 
currently fashionable string theory, which it would take 
me a separate column to explain. 

     Let's take an example closer to home. Paul Harvey 
reports that scientists have found that, other things 
being equal, there are more germs on a steering wheel 
than on a toilet seat. Talk about counterintuitive! But 
if you live in the realm of ideas, you must be prepared 
to have your mind dizzied now and then. 

     Which brings me to the theory of evolution. When 
Darwin proposed it in 1859, it struck most people as 
counterintuitive. But after being pushed by the drive-by 
media for a century and a half, it has come to seem like 
common sense itself. 

     I often ask liberals to explain what they mean by 
"right-wing," a term they apply to everything they 
dislike, even principles that have nothing in common, 
such as anarchism (opposition to all government) and 
fascism (government without limits), as well as 
conservatism (government within carefully defined 
limits), not to mention monarchism, oligarchy, 
plutocracy, nativism, militarism, laissez-faire 
capitalism, theocracy, libertarianism, feudalism, 
neoconservatism, and a hundred mutually incompatible 
other things. What common denominator can they possibly 
share? How can they all be "right-wing"? No liberal has 
ever been able to tell me. 

     To add to the confusion, no matter how bitterly all 
these right-wing people disagree amongst themselves, they 
are always a single thing: "the" right wing. And no 
matter how much President Bush increases the size of 
government, no matter how far to the left he moves the 
Republican Party, all liberals agree that he is 
"right-wing." 

     I finally began to get my answer when I watched, yet 
again, the classic liberal movie INHERIT THE WIND, a 
fictionalized version of the 1925 Scopes "monkey trial." 
If you want to understand how liberals see the world, 
this is the place to start. 

     The real Scopes was prosecuted for teaching Darwin's 
theory in a public school. Today, when government has 
switched dogmas, he would be prosecuted if he tried to 
teach that God created man. 

     The movie never actually uses the term "right-wing," 
but the basic idea is there. On one side are the 
reasonable, benevolent, open-minded liberals, typified by 
the Clarence Darrow character (played by Spencer Tracy); 
on the other are the religious bigots, buffoons, and 
blowhards who hate science and are typified by the 
William Jennings Bryan character (Fredric March) and form 
lynch mobs. 

     Liberals may not believe in God, but they make it 
clear that if they did, he would be a much nicer sort of 
Deity than the one the believers believe in. In fact, he 
would be more comfortable with the people who don't 
believe in him than with the ones who worship him. It's 
the atheists who are made in his image, so to speak. And 
needless to say, he would probably reject the ontological 
argument for his own existence. 

     In the spirit of the movie, Richard Dawkins, a 
Darwinian biologist and militant atheist, says atheists 
are smarter than believers and the world would be better 
off without religion, just as, I suppose, Russia was 
better off under Stalin than under the superstitious 
tsars. Elton John, the rock star who has tied the knot 
with his gay lover, seems to agree. He says religion 
breeds nothing but hate, especially hatred of gay people. 

     According to liberals, if you think marriage makes 
sense only as an objective relation between people of 
opposite sexes -- for the practical purpose of 
establishing and regulating paternity -- you must hate 
gay people. And hate, after all, is the essence, if 
anything is, of what it means to be right-wing. It goes 
hand in hand with logic and defining things, and is but a 
short step from outright popery. (Let us not forget that 
the Catholic Church has always persecuted science.) A 
liberal God, if such existed, would want everyone to have 
the right to marry, even -- or especially -- gay people. 
He would also accept gay and lesbian bishops. 

     Hate is so intrinsic to all that is "right-wing" 
that liberals have to keep coining new words, such as 
"homophobia," to identify right-wing hatreds. Other 
right-wing traits include greed, fear, insensitivity, and 
bellicosity. Do I overgeneralize? Well, what would you 
expect? I'm right-wing! 

     Excuse me; I have to run. My lynch mob is waiting 
for me. 

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