A Wrong That Needs Righting

I've been having a rather cultural week: 2 trips to see concerts from the Steve Reich "Phases" season at the Barbican and, last night, a trip to the Institute of Education in Bedford Way to see Richard Dawkins and Lalla Ward reading from Professor Dawkins's book "The God Delusion". Given that this blog has largely consisted of rants, you will be unsurprised to learn that while the Steve Reich concerts floated me off to a place of near-hypnotised wonder, the reading left me spitting blood.

I should say that I agree with much, though by no means all, the good Professor says. This is hardly surprising given that his books The Blind Watchmaker, The Selfish Gene and The Extended Phenotype did as much as many of my teachers to get me through my Oxford entrance exams. I also enjoy the relatively-high-pitched, clear, precise-voiced way in which he says it. The years that have passed since a bright, young biologist popped up on TV in the late seventies have left him with the agreeably Professor Yaffle-ish air of a senior Oxford don.

What disturbed me - just as it did when I first read it for myself last week - was the passage of his reading on the teaching of creationism to children at Emanuel College, Gateshead - one of a chain of schools set up under the Government's morally corrupt(1) City Academy scheme - and the Government's reaction to it. Mr Blair sees the teaching of creationism as part of obtaining "as diverse a school system as we properly can" - though I don't see him backing the teaching of the Satanist, Scientological or Spaghetti Monstrist theory of creation, all of which have as sound a base as the Creationist version. The school's former head teacher, Nigel McQuoid believes "to think that we just evolved from a bang, that we used to be monkeys, that seems unbelievable" ... showing the kind of sophisticated comprehension of science that we can expect from a nation whose flagship scientific television programme, Horizon, this week features a minor TV personality talking to chimps(2). His Head of Science meanwhile, I repeat, his Head of Science, believes in the absolute authority of Biblical scripture over all the findings of Newton, Einstein, Darwin, Crick & Watson (and Rosalind Franklin), Galileo and every other scientist ever to have existed :

"... we reject the notion popularised ... by Francis Bacon ... that there are 'Two Books' (ie the Book of nature and the Scriptures) which may be mined independently for truth. Rather we stand firm upon the bare proposition that God has spoken authoritatively and inerrantly in the pages of holy Scripture ... we can be sure that it is as robust a foundation as possible to lay down and build upon"

For the third time, this is the Head of Science. One can only hope that he is so distracted by the business of ensuring that none of his clothing contains both wool and linen mixed(3), killing and offering up his daily bullock(4) and selling any daughters he may have into slavery(5) to teach his distorted version of science.

What concerns me is that Sir Peter Vardy, and others like him, now have a chain of schools across the country where they can churn out child after child, trained to pass exams but also trained not to question authority save where the views of authority conflict with a 2,000-and-more-year-old document whose veracity is on a par with The Lord of the Rings or a government intelligence dossier. In essence we, the taxpayers, are being forced by our government to pay people money to tell lies to children. It is a wrong on an extraordinary scale, as egregious as anything this government has ever done. It renders Mr Blair's claim to believe in "education, education, education" utterly hollow. What he believes in is passing exams, by whatever means necessary, and hang the rest.

Should you happen to be one of the one or two people who ever stumble across this blog, I urge you to do something about this. Write to MPs, write to schools, write to newspapers, make anyone you can aware of what is a true national scandal. If the Creationists and Intelligent Designers are right about their wedge theory - and I fear they are - the time to act is most definitely now.

(1) Rich men (I don't think any women have been involved so far) put up a couple of million pounds of their own money to start up a school at which point the Government pours in far, far greater sums to get the school built and keep it running. In return for their cash these plutocrats are given the power to oversee the appointment of staff members, the implementation of the curriculum and to influence the school's whole ethos. In addition, the fact that these schools are given more funds than their Local Education Authority rivals helps them suck away bright pupils from other local schools, with the concomitant deleterious effects.
(2) I have nothing against Danny Wallace - he's written some very entertaining books and is a bright and genuinely nice person - I just don't think he should be hosting what used to be a hard science programme.
(3) Deuteronomy 22.11
(4) Exodus 29.36
(5) Exodus 21.7-8