Ben Stein And Intelligent Design: Truth Sings The Devolution Blues
1fastdog.
Posted to Media on Sat Apr 19, 2008 at 11:40:52 PM EST (promoted by port1080). RSS.
In his new movie, Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, Ben Stein decides to take a page from the Michael Moore school of film-making in his attempt to debunk evolution and the science community that teaches it. Moore has often been accused of not telling the whole story, and it seems as if Stein has fallen into an even more extreme version of disingenuous documentary film-making than Moore has yet taken.
Ben Stein travels the world on his quest and learns an awe-inspiring truth that bewilders him, then angers him, and then spurs him to action! His heroic and at times shocking journey confronting the world's top scientists, educators, and philosophers underscores the persecution of the many by an elite few regarding the rejection of Darwinism. Ben realizes that he has been "expelled," and that educators and scientists are being ridiculed, denied tenure, and even fired--for the "crime" of merely believing that there might be evidence of "design" in nature, and that perhaps life is not just the result of accidental, random chance. (Rocky Mountain Pictures)
Sounds like the subject's ripe for appraisal doesn't it, with all that firing, expelling, ridiculing, and denied tenuring going on? Problem is, Stein's tactics are disingenuous at best and outright untruthful at worst. Several scientists interviewed in the movie were under the impression they were filming something else:
"They played it up as a serious discussion with different points of view -- like a slightly boring documentary on 'Nova,' " he said. "Instead, we get a propaganda film portraying scientists as Nazis."P.Z. Myers, a biologist at the University of Minnesota, Morris, said the producers pulled a "Borat"-style switcheroo after arranging his participation in a project called "Crossroads: The Intersection of Science and Religion."
Among the other underhanded tactics now coming to the surface with the release of the film are:
Interviews with some folks were edited to make it look like Stein was conducting the interview - he wasn't.
The beginning and ending of the film features Stein supposedly lecturing to a full audience at a college hall concerning intellectual freedom, a topic that given the location should've inspired massive attendance. Instead, the producers had to resort to paying extras to fill the seats:
the college lecture hall scenes where Stein speaks to a rapt audience about dangers to intellectual freedom, which bookend the film, were staged. Mathis admitted the company paid extras to play audience members, but did not see how that ploy might damage the film's credibility.
Other problems include selective quoting of Darwin to advance those who support evolution as Nazis or Stalinists. And the claims of those whom were supposedly fired from the both Smithsonian Institute and from George Mason University for their religious/Intelligent Design beliefs are so shakey as to be apparently false.
"I just spoke to the band's manager, and adding to the confusion was the fact that they did authorize a project months ago with this request:
Quote:
What they authorized was a documentary about 'academic freedom in schools', not the film that the producers produced.
They contacted the producers of the film to ask that the song be removed but it is too late. Unfortunately it was misrepresented to them when the request came through to use it. Add this band to a long line of people who were misled by the producers of this film."
Scientific American has a list of problems entitled Six Things Ben Stein Doesn't Want You To Know, that underscores the falsities of Ben's venture into documentary film-making. Adding to the umbrella of bad actions were the implications that Stein and company didn't acquire proper rights to several of the songs used in the movie, including John Lennon's Imagine. And if they were acquired, they were done so by hoodwinking the artists involved. The Killers, whose song "All these Things That I Have Done," was acquired for the movie under the pretense that it was to be a movie about academic freedom:
Okay, new update. This is getting so strange... here is what the head administrator over at the official Killers forum just posted:
'The film is a satirical documentary with an estimated running time of 1 hour and 50 minutes, exploring academic freedom in public schools and government institutions with actor, comedian, economist, Ben Stein as the spokesperson.'
Not surprisingly, a website that shines a light on the underhanded shenanigans has popped up.
Lest you think that nobody appreciates Stein's movie, at least one reviewer thinks it's marvelous:
Ben Stein's extraordinary presentation documents how the worlds of science and academia not only crush debate on the origins of life, but also crush the careers of professors who dare to question the Darwinian hypothesis of evolution and natural selection....
....Everyone should take the opportunity to see "Expelled" -- if nothing else, as a bracing antidote to the atheism-friendly culture of PC liberalism. But it's far more than that. It's a spotlight on the arrogance of this movement and its leaders, a spotlight on the choking intolerance of academia, and a spotlight on the ignorance of so many who say so much, yet know so very little.
< Stop Your Seditious Teachings.
