I recently received an email forward with the subject, 'THIS SHOULD NOT BE TOLERATED!!---WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE!!!...' It was about Congressman supposedly refusing to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, with the writer outraged, and proposing that those Congress members weren't fit to serve.

I couldn't resist replying. So, here's the original email and my response. Note that I cleaned up the text formatting a bit (it was large, bold, and multi-colored), and reduced the image size (though you can click on it to get the full size version, if you're really that curious).

The Original Email

If they won't stand and recite the Pledge of Allegiance,

In my opinion...they have no place in our Congress!...

Any member of the house or senate that refuses to stand and recite the Pledge of Allegiance in the Chambers should be escorted out by the Sergeant of Arms until they comply If your allegiance is not with this country and our flag, just who is it with?

Why don't we ask someone like Minnesota's Muslim congressman Keith Ellison!

Let's cut off their pay -- and all benefits. Give the ingrates two days to decide to retire or be impeached!

The Facts:

• Snopes - Much Ado About Standing
• Syracuse.com - Syracuse-area lawmakers who are seeking re-election played key roles in 2009 Senate coup

• That's a photo from the New York State Senate, not the U.S. Senate or the House.
• The photo is from 2009, not recently
• The seated state senators were protesting the session itself, and the political wrangling that had led to it, not the Pledge
• The seated senators normally stand for the Pledge during normal, non-controversial sessions

My Commentary:

This photo doesn't have much to do with the commentary in the email, but I'll still add my two cents to that commentary.

I see this issue from multiple sides, and I'm kind of conflicted, myself. On the one hand, I'm note a huge fan of the Pledge to begin with. Forced loyalty oaths are for totalitarian governments, not the land of the free. Besides, Congressmen and Senators already take an oath when they first take office. If they're honest and will support the country, one oath should be enough. If they're not honest and patriotic, it doesn't matter how many times they repeat the Pledge - it's just empty words.

On the other hand, the Eagle Scout in me does get upset when people disrespect symbols of this nation. But then I go back to recognizing that everyone has their First Amendment rights to express themselves however they want. I mean, I just recently saw the clip of Donald Trump hugging an American flag at a rally (The Hill). And I'll be honest, it infuriated me. Talk about disrespect. He was treating the U.S. flag as a prop, not as a solemn symbol of our nation and all those who have fought and died to defend it. Has he ever even read the Flag Code? But, that's still his First Amendment right. I'm not calling for Trump to be impeached because of that sign of disrespect. So even if Congressmen and Senators (or Colin Kaepernick) decide to sit during the Pledge out of a principled protest, that's their First Amendment right, and I'll defend their right to do so.

And frankly, I have no idea why Keith Ellison was mentioned at all. He wasn't in the photo, and I've never heard of him refusing to stand for the Pledge. Was it merely because he's Muslim?

Short version: I'm not a huge fan of the Pledge, but as long as it's a custom, I would prefer that Congressmen and Senators stand and recite the Pledge appropriately. But if they decide to sit out of principled protest, that's their right to do so, just as it's Donald Trump's right to disrespect the flag by hugging it. And I'm not about to grant either party the right to start forcefully removing members of the other party because they deem them to be insufficiently patriotic.

Posted by Jeff on Tuesday, May 2 | Permalink | Comments (26) | TrackBacks (0)

I wanted to expand on something I wrote a few years ago in the entry, The Misleading Image of Bloggers. If you come and visit this blog and read my entries here, I think it would be very easy to get a misleading image of what I'm like in real life, and maybe even some misunderstanding over just how strongly I really feel about certain issues.

First of all are the topics I discuss here. I write an awful lot about religion and politics on this blog, as well as skepticism in general. Those are topics that interest me, but I know they're not topics that interest everybody, and even if they did, they're not necessarily polite topics for dinner conversation. Nobody wants to be that guy that's always starting a religious or political debate every time you hang out with them. Granted, I do like to discuss these things when they come up, but I usually wait for other people to bring them up. If you happened to meet up with me on a Friday night to go grab a beer, chances are that these topics wouldn't even come up. So, this blog gives me an opportunity to write about these issues without boring my friends.

Plus, it's not like I only think about religion and politics. Like I wrote in that older entry, "Nobody except my friends and family really cares what TV shows I've been watching, what I've been eating for supper every night, the chores I did around the house last weekend, the grades my daughter makes in school, how she did at her piano recital, or many of the other things I do or talk about on a daily basis." I write about certain topics because I do think there's an audience that will like reading about them. And even if it's not a huge audience, at least it's a bigger audience than just my wife and parents, who are just about the only people that would want to hear about all my mundane day to day experiences.

Second is how I feel about the 'opposition'. I criticize religion, creationism, conservative politics, climate change denialism, etc. And while I may at times call out certain individuals holding those positions, I don't mean to imply that all people holding those positions are bad people, nor necessarily even the specific individuals I'm calling out. All people have a multitude of views on a multitude of issues, and I seriously doubt that any one person is going to agree with me on everything. So, when I criticize creationism, for example, I'm specifically criticizing just that one belief. I don't think most creationists are bad people. I think they're just mistaken about that particular issue.*

Moreover, while I criticize religion a lot and think that on balance it does more harm than good (see the previous entry, Why Do I Spend So Much Time on Religion, for plenty of examples of the harm of religion, including fire bombings and persecuting children as witches, or a recent entry, Christian Privilege, showing the undue privilege religion receives in our culture), I don't think it's universally horrible in every aspect. Religiously motivated soup kitchens and homeless shelters do good in the world. Christmas bazaars and pot lucks can foster a sense of community. People who have had traumatic experiences can often find comfort in religious beliefs.

In addition, I hold people to different standards depending on the situation. I've already written about this in the entry, Run of the Mill vs. Big Name Creationists. Most people never had evolution presented to them well in high school biology, and don't have much reason to study it, now. As I wrote previously, "It's hard to get good and pissed off at someone who believes something and hasn't ever been shown a good reason not to believe it." But when someone like Ben Carson, a respected neurosurgeon, goes and gives a presentation to the public, or participates in public debates, then I do expect him to have done enough research to understand the issue and speak about it knowledgeably. And then there are the prominent creationists / creationist organizations like Answers in Genesis, or Kent Hovind, or Ray Comfort, who I know have been exposed to credible science, yet continue to spread their falsehoods. And even though I just used creationism for my example, that's not the only issue where I look at things this way. It applies to politics, science, and a whole bunch of other fields. I get much more upset with people who should know better but continue to spread misinformation.

In real life, I have friends of all types of religious and political persuasions. I have friends ranging from fundamentalist Christians to Muslims to agnostics and atheists, from young and old earth creationists to evolutionary biologists, from die hard Trump supporters to people who are far more liberal than me, from gun rights absolutists to people who would like to see more gun control (though no one I know of who would advocate outright bans). We get along because most of the things we do on a daily basis are talk about work, or vent about personal problems, or get together for a crawfish boil, or go out to happy hour, or help each other move, or, well, all the normal stuff everybody does.

So, if you're reading this blog, and you think I'm attacking you personally, please keep in mind that that's usually not my intent. I try for the most part to be civil and criticize ideas, positions, or policies. If I've crossed the line and written something offensive, then I apologize, and I would ask you to point it out to me so that I could address it in the future.

And keep in mind that this entire blog is only a small slice of my views - the ones I think people would be interested in reading. If you ever met me in real life, even if we disagree about these issues, there's still a very good chance we could get along just fine and find common ground in other areas.

*As a side note on that, though, I'm not so naive and idealistic as to think that everybody is always acting honorably. I've written quite a bit about Ray Comfort on this blog over the years. I know he's been exposed to the science regarding evolution, but he repeats the same falsehoods year after year. And he still uses dishonest tactics like quote mining and selective editing to make documentaries. It gets harder and harder to believe that he's not knowingly using dishonest tactics.

Image Source: Return of Kings

Posted by Jeff on Wednesday, Mar 8 | Permalink | Comments (27) | TrackBacks (0)

As described in the Austin American Statesman article, Texas education board approves curriculum that challenges evolution, the Texas State Board of Education has approved some troubling language for the state science standards.

If you want to see for yourself the full standards, you can find them here. Here are the four subject to the current controversy:

(3) Scientific processes. The student uses critical thinking, scientific reasoning, and problem solving to make informed decisions within and outside the classroom. The student is expected to:

(A) in all fields of science, analyze, evaluate, and critique scientific explanations by using empirical evidence, logical reasoning, and experimental and observational testing, including examining all sides of scientific evidence of those scientific explanations, so as to encourage critical thinking by the student;

(7) Science concepts. The student knows evolutionary theory is a scientific explanation for the unity and diversity of life. The student is expected to:

(B) analyze and evaluate scientific explanations concerning any data of sudden appearance, stasis, and sequential nature of groups in the fossil record;

(7) Science concepts. The student knows evolutionary theory is a scientific explanation for the unity and diversity of life. The student is expected to:

(G) analyze and evaluate scientific explanations concerning the complexity of the cell.

(9) Science concepts. The student knows the significance of various molecules involved in metabolic processes and energy conversions that occur in living organisms. The student is expected to:

(D) analyze and evaluate the evidence regarding formation of simple organic molecules and their organization into long complex molecules having information such as the DNA molecule for self-replicating life.

You can read a detailed discussion in a report put out by the Texas Freedom Network, Texas Science Curriculum Standards: Recommendations for Dealing with Pedagogical and Scientific Problems (pdf).

The Bad

Yes, the motivation behind these standards really is to promote creationism / cast doubt on evolution. Here are a few excerpts from that TFN report regarding the motivation behind three of these:

[Regarding 7 B] In a final appeal to preserve his proposal, McLeroy stated that the purpose of his standard was to argue against: "...the idea that all life is descended from a common ancestor by the unguided natural processes."

[Regarding 7 G] During the board debate, McLeroy explained that this standard: "...questions the two key parts of the great claim of evolution, which is [sic] common ancestry by unguided natural processes."

[Regarding 9 D] During board debate, Don McLeroy, R-Bryan, explained that the new standard was "basically an origin of life amendment," referencing public testimony provided previously by Ide Trotter, a well-known promoter of intelligent design."

And the history of the first one, 3A, makes it clear that this was compromise language regarding the strengths and weaknesses gambit so popular among creationists.

Moreover, the Board had actually formed an expert committee to review the standards and make recommendations on improving them, and the committee recommended removing these four particular items because "they were vague, redundant or would require too much time to teach" (quoting the Stateseman article). So, the Board is going against the advice of experts to push standards that were originally motivated by anti-science positions.

The Good

The standards aren't actually that bad. All of them could be handled by textbook publishers and teachers strictly keeping to real science, and not injecting any creationism or other pseudoscience. Let's look at them again on a case by case basis.

(3) Scientific processes. The student uses critical thinking, scientific reasoning, and problem solving to make informed decisions within and outside the classroom. The student is expected to:

(A) in all fields of science, analyze, evaluate, and critique scientific explanations by using empirical evidence, logical reasoning, and experimental and observational testing, including examining all sides of scientific evidence of those scientific explanations, so as to encourage critical thinking by the student;

Well, it says specifically 'all sides of scientific evidence'. Creationism is manifestly not science, so this shouldn't be a backdoor for creationism. As far as real science, this is a little overwhelming for a high school biology class. I mean, all sides of the scientific evidence supporting evolution in general could be an entire class unto itself. Even 150 years ago, in The Origin of Species, Darwin had an entire tome full of evidence for evolution, and the evidence has only grown stronger and more abundant since.

Granted, there are different 'sides' within current evolutionary biology - the relative influence of genetic drift vs. natural selection, how much of the genome is truly junk DNA vs. possible other functions, etc. So, teachers could delve into these current topics, but it seems a bit of a deep dive for high school biology.

(7) Science concepts. The student knows evolutionary theory is a scientific explanation for the unity and diversity of life. The student is expected to:

(B) analyze and evaluate scientific explanations concerning any data of sudden appearance, stasis, and sequential nature of groups in the fossil record;

Well, if you're sticking to real science, this is simply a discussion of gradualism vs. punctuated equilibrium, and perhaps some background on taphonomy and taphonomic biases in the fossil record. And that's all a decent discussion to have, showing students the evidence in support of both gradualism and punctuated equilibrium. In fact, there's evidence for both, so it's probably not an either/or discussion, but rather how they represent opposite extremes regarding the rates of speciation, and what might drive the different rates of change. Although like I said above, this is getting pretty in depth for a high school biology class.

(7) Science concepts. The student knows evolutionary theory is a scientific explanation for the unity and diversity of life. The student is expected to:

(G) analyze and evaluate scientific explanations concerning the complexity of the cell.

Well, yes, cells are complex. I remember learning about that back when I was in high school, and making a model stuffed full of organelles. And if you really want to get into the origins of the complexity, symbiogenesis is one of the topics to discuss in the origin of eukaryotes. And there's an entire field of study for abiogenesis, concerning how life first arose. But again, this might be more detailed than most people expect from high school biology.

(9) Science concepts. The student knows the significance of various molecules involved in metabolic processes and energy conversions that occur in living organisms. The student is expected to:

(D) analyze and evaluate the evidence regarding formation of simple organic molecules and their organization into long complex molecules having information such as the DNA molecule for self-replicating life.

Lots of good stuff to discuss here, as well. I'm sure that teachers would at a minimum bring up the Miller-Urey experiment, as well as other more recent experiments that used different conditions thought to be more representative of the early earth. Teachers could start discussions on the RNA World. And of course, there's that whole field of abiogenesis that I already linked to. But like I said for each of the other questionable standards, and like the expert committee said, this is getting awfully detailed for a high school biology class that has to cover all the other standards and curriculum.

So, it's troubling that these standards were motivated by creationist misunderstandings of science, and that the Board members went against the recommendations of experts regarding the standards. But at least the letter of the standards isn't horrible, and textbook publishers and teachers can stick to real science. I just hope teachers with creationist sympathies don't use these standards as an excuse to teach junk science.

Updated 2017-02-03: Made numerous small changes

Posted by Jeff on Thursday, Feb 2 | Permalink | Comments (27) | TrackBacks (0)

This is pulled out & slightly modified from a previous entry, 2016 Texas Republican Platform - Part 14, Foreign Policy, Xenophobia, & Isolationism, but in light of recent news regarding Trump's odious immigration ban, it deserves special emphasis.

There's a poem hanging inside a certain statue in New York City, the end of which reads:

Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

I like to think that statue and the words hung inside of it mean something. They're a symbol that America is welcoming, is the land of opportunity, and that we will take in victims of oppression and give them the chance for a new life here. They are not symbols of cowardice, of refusing to help the downtrodden and refugees because of some miniscule chance of danger.

To put this danger in perspective, chances of being killed by a terrorist in any given year are roughly 1:20,000,000 (source). That compares to the following risks (all taken from Mongabay.com - The most common causes of death due to injury in the United States):

Now, I certainly don't intend that to mean that we should ignore the risk of terrorism. But this definitely puts it in perspective. Terrorism is not the huge risk that fearmongers make it out to be. You're far more likely to drown in a swimming pool or suffocate in your own bed than you are to be killed in a terrorist attack.

And who are we turning away to protect ourselves from this tiny threat?

Image source: CBC News

Image Source: News Deeply

Image source: Raven Foundation

Image source: N.Y. TImes

If those pictures make you uncomfortable, they damn well should. That is the human cost of refusing to help these refugees. Hundreds of thousands of people have already been killed in Syria or trying to flee. And we have cowards like Trump refusing to help them because of a threat less dangerous than sleeping in your own bed at night.

Posted by Jeff on Monday, Jan 30 | Permalink | Comments (27) | TrackBacks (0)

I meant to write an entirely original entry on this, but came across an article on Scientific American that already says what I wanted to say, and says it much better than I could do. Here is the link to the article:

And here are a few excerpts.

Protesters who smashed windows and punched police on Inauguration Day are mirroring the violence they supposedly abhor

Part of me, I admit, admires the courage of these rebels, but the rational part of me loathes their violence. Like the Weatherman and other deadly activists of my generation, these young people have been seduced by the macho glamor of violence and by the rough justice of combating state oppression with brutality of their own.

The activists do their cause a disservice by mirroring the brutal values of the culture they oppose. History teaches that violent uprisings, if they succeed, often breed more violence. Think of the horrors that followed the French and Russian Revolutions. Political scientist Erica Chenoweth has shown that nonviolent resistance is far more effective than violence. I wish "disruptive" activists would take their lead from great nonviolent leaders like Gandhi, Martin Luther King and Gene Sharp.

I'll add an anecdote of my own. On Sunday, we had a few people over to watch the football game, and politics came up during conversation. And the main thing most of them talked about regarding the protests was the rioters, and how stupid it was to go around smashing up stores and attacking police. They didn't discuss the motivations, or the political goals, or any of the reasons why protestors might have been opposed to Trump. They didn't even talk much about the Women's March from the following day, because in their mind, all the weekend protests got lumped together. The message of the protests was entirely lost.

That article had a link to a related article:

Here's an excerpt from that article.

He advocates nonviolence for practical rather than spiritual reasons. He rejects religious exhortations that we should turn the other cheek and love our enemies. People in power often deserve to be despised and fought, he contends, but violence, even in the service of a just cause, often causes more problems than it solves, leading to greater injustice and suffering. Hence the best way to oppose an unjust regime is through nonviolent action. Nonviolent movements are also more likely than violent ones to garner internal and international support and to lead to democratic, non-militarized regimes. (Other scholars, notably Erica Chenoweth, have done empirical studies demonstrating the effectiveness of nonviolent social activism.)

So all you violent protestors and rioters, stop it. You're not advancing any progressive goals, and worse, you're actively harming fellow citizens.

Posted by Jeff on Tuesday, Jan 24 | Permalink | Comments (25) | TrackBacks (0)