The Worm In The Apple, or Seriously, I'm Not Crazy

I consider myself a reasonable man.

I am not given to conspiracy theories. Birfers, troofers, moon landing hoaxists and other nutbars receive their due laughter from me. As an atheist, I stay vigilant and mindful of my thoughts and actions to make sure I'm not assuming too much and running off on a false premise.

I really, really, REALLY wish this looked remotely close to a false premise.

This, coupled with the recent revelations from an ex-Liberty University-schooled pastor (hat tip to Hemant Mehta at The Friendly Atheist for that one) is painting a very, very nasty fucking picture of what's going on here.

From the first link, about how many schools are using state funds to buy textbooks from evangelical Christian-supremacist publishers, and how closely tied that insanity is with the right wing in America in general:

Unsurprisingly, the textbooks are fiercely anti-abortion and virulently anti-gay, similar to the ideology of Religious Right organizations (heavily funded by Betsy DeVos and family) that have been labeled hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center. A Bob Jones current events text argues against legal protection for gays, stating, “These people have no more claims to special rights than child molesters or rapists.” The text uses an often-repeated phrase that homosexuals and abortion-rights supporters are “simply calling evil good.”

Ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffuck. Seriously? That's what they're putting in schools with innocent people's tax money?

They also teach a radical laissez-faire capitalism. Government safety nets, regulation, minimum wage and progressive taxes are described as contrary to the Bible.

Oh because it wasn't insane ENOUGH. As if Conservapedia's attempt to rewrite the Bible to make it LESS FUCKING LIBERAL weren't sufficient proof that they're willingly going for an echo-chamber approach to drag America away from democracy and into the hands of priests.

The A Beka civics text states, “God’s original purpose for government was to punish the evil and reward the good.” The same text describes the ideal form of government. “All governments are ordained by God, but none compare to government by God, theocracy.”

Well APPARENTLY NOT, the sons of bitches that they are. Holy fucking shit, I'm less than a page into this post and I already feel like I need a shower. Might as well plough on. What else?

Predating today’s “tenther” movement, the texts consistently accuse the federal government of exceeding its constitutional authority as described in the 10th Amendment and taking powers that belong to the states. The 14th Amendment, passed during Reconstruction to give citizenship to African Americans, is criticized as taking away state’s rights.

Concerning slavery in America, a Bob Jones high school text states, “To help them endure the difficulties of slavery, God gave Christian slaves the ability to combine the African heritage of song with the dignity of Christian praise. Through the Negro spiritual, the slaves developed the patience to wait on the Lord and discovered that the truest freedom is from the bondage of sin.”

Really?! They REALLY fucking went there and outright stated that waiting for things to change and relying on Christianity is the way out of slavery?! With their little fucking Bronze Age book where every single bastard prophet, from Moses to Jesus, is FINE WITH SLAVERY...they think their faith is the key to ending it? Fuck, when the American Civil War started, the bastard secessionists were citing the Bible in favour of their perceived right to keep slaves. Fuck your scripture, you bastards.

There's also some boilerplate in this shit about evolution being destructive to American society, which could only really be accurate if they defined 'American society' as...well, exactly the kind of ignorant pigfucker theocracy they're trying to superimpose on the country, to be honest. There's even some really old-fashioned shit about Communism being the "spawn of Satan" (their fucking words)and more recently topical bull concerning global warming:

Global warming is presented as a theory that is “simply not supported by scientific evidence,” and is supposedly promoted by environmentalists for destructive reasons, according to the A Beka economics text. ““Global environmentalists have said and written enough to leave no doubt that their goal is to destroy the prosperous economies of the world’s richest nations.”

Gotta love how they read 'environmentalist' as 'someone who wants to take away my money'. Love it in a vomiting-until-your-ears-leak-bile sort of way.

There's even anti-fiminist hinting in there, with a story of a fictional corporation going under due to a lawsuit from a female junior exec who was passed over for promotion in favour of a man.

A quiz in the teacher’s guide for the A Beka eighth-grade text Matter and Motion asks, “Why did superstition take the place of science during the Middle Ages?” The answer key tells us, “People did not have the Bible to guide them in their beliefs. Many looked back to the false ideas of Aristotle.” The next question is, “Why did modern science begin so suddenly in the 1500s?” The answer given is, “As people returned to the authority of the Scriptures during the Protestant Reformation (1517), they started learning the truth about God and His creation.”

No, you FUCKING LYING SHITWEASELS, the reason superstition took the place of science during the Middle Ages was because if you weren't obediently superstitious about the correct things, CHRISTIANS WOULD BURN YOU ALIVE.

A three-page section in this A Beka text leads with a headline “Two Faiths: Creation and Evolution” and states, “Creation, not evolution, is based on a reasonable faith.”

Evolution isn't based on any kind of faith, the same way the nuclear fusion inside a star isn't based on faith. Let alone the reasonable kind. That's the whole problem with these fucktards, really: their faith is the strongest mental force they've ever encountered, so they think - and they think this because they cannot, literally cannot conceive of any other way to come up with a conclusion - that every other statement ever made has been a statement of faith, not of fact. I'd almost give them this paragraph, except that creationism, while based on faith, sure as fuck isn't based on the reasonable kind.

The teacher’s edition of a A Beka geography text describes “Modern Africa’s Needs” as follows. “Africa is a continent with many needs. It is still in need of the gospel. Many people have gone there as missionaries but the continent is so vast, and spirit worship and the Muslim religion so strong, that only a small percentage of Africans claim to be Christians..."

Still in need of the gospel?! Most of the population of the fucking continent is HIV-positive because a sinister old Christian virgin (we fucking hope he's a virgin, given the Vatican's semi-official sexual preferences) told them condoms MAKE AIDS WORSE. If there's one fucking thing that whole place needs less of, it's scripture. Get some fucking good teachers in there instead of some priests, and we might have something...oh no, wait, here's why they think it doesn't count.

An A Beka text reads, "The doctrines and practices of the Roman church had digressed so far from Scripture that the church was compelled to keep its members from reading the Bible and discovering the truth."

They're actually right on that one. It took me until I read the Bible to discover the truth. That's how I became an atheist, via a brief period of Buddhism that lasted until I heard about karma. The problem here is that little word 'truth'. It does not mean what they think it means.

They're even going after mathematics. One of their book synopses describes FUCKING SET THEORY as a burden on modern teaching. I can only conclude that they saw Venn diagrams, didn't like the way two separate (but equal) colours were mixed together, and concluded that it was miscegenationist propaganda.

My attitude concerning America is starting to lean toward the 'get out before the Christian Taliban complete their fucking takeover' side of the meter. It's not helping that according to the second link (yeah, remember that?):

I want you to know that the fundamentalist political movement is the beginning of a cultural revolution that will take our nation to a very dark place. You have to understand that this has been methodically planned and is being carried out with the utmost vigilance. In accordance with their worldview, my old friends do not in the least care about what you think. They are against democracy, and they are seeking to end the rule of the majority in our great country.

They truly believe that if you have not been “saved,” you are living under a curse and are incapable of knowing what is best and that because of this you should be ruled over. You should also know they do not believe that even centuries-old Christian communities (Catholics, Anglicans, Greek Orthodox, etc.) are “saved,” only those who think like they do.

Speaking as someone whose nation's history actually involves that shit having been enshrined in law at one point? THIS IS A VERY BAD THING TO HEAR. It's time to get the ratfucking hell out of America, or start pushing back. Hard. It was founded on sanity. Don't let it die screaming in a straitjacket with a cross round its neck.