Amerika

The “Evolution Academic Freedom Act” (HF 183; “A bill for an act relating to the teaching of chemical and biological evolution in school districts and public postsecondary institutions and providing an effective date”) has been sent to the House Education Committee and is startlingly familiar:

Students at all levels “shall be evaluated based upon their understanding of course materials through standard testing procedures. However, students shall not be penalized for subscribing to a particular position or view regarding biological or chemical evolution.”

In other words, if the student holds the scientifically incorrect view and uses it as an answer, you as a teacher cannot penalize them.

Science Blogs

Idiots are spinning this as a rightist platform, but this is really a response to the politically correct binges of the 1990s — when claiming the answer was related to “oppression” was more important than any kind of logic. The right’s just trying to keep up.

Eventually this means dogma will further replace reality, producing people who — like those in the Soviet Union or Revolutionary France — know the political answer but are incompetent at their jobs.

Tags: creationism, political correctness