More monkey trials
With creationism and “intelligent design” in the offensive across America, the Kitzmiller v. Dover trial has the potential of becoming another Scopes Monkey Trial – the famous 1925 trial that allowed the state of Tennessee to keep anti-Darwinism statutes on the books. Only this time the roles are reversed. In Kitzmiller v. Dover parents and students, with the help of the ACLU, are fighting to keep creationism out of the science curriculum in Dover, PA.
Aided by the American Civil Liberties Union, 11 parents of Dover, Pa., schoolchildren have filed a federal lawsuit against that town’s school board, accusing it of violating the principle of separation of church and state. The school board requires that at the beginning of the 9th grade unit on evolution, teachers are supposed to read a statement to a biology class: “Because Darwin’s theory is a theory, it continues to be tested as new evidence is discovered. The theory is not a fact…Intelligent Design is an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin’s view.”
Science teachers balked and many Dover parents were angered as well. The plaintiffs are asking the court to void the intelligent-design policy in the class.
WSJ.com – Scopes, 2005: ‘Design’ Theory Faces Legal Test
Why not mention ID in biology? Because if creationism gets a foothold in the public schools, the religious right is going to demand that the astronomy teacher has to talk about how Galileo might be wrong and the pope might be right, after all, that the earth is the center of the universe. Then they are going to require that geography teachers teach the “scientific theory” that the earth is flat.
The middle ages never happened in America. The religious right is determined to change that.