Evil Dr. P.

UPDATE: Evil Dr. P. has resigned. And, interestingly, it looks like the half-man, half-apes, just may be coming out of the woodworks after all:

On Monday, Mirecki was treated at a Lawrence hospital for head injuries after he said he was beaten by two men on a country road. He said the men referred to the creationism course.

Appears as if the Neanderthals are winning, huh? Sad.

Original Post:

Check out this excerpt from some e-mail goodness that University of Kansas religious studies professor Paul Mirecki sent to members of the Society of Open-Minded Atheists and Agnostics related to his plan to call his course on Intelligent Design, "Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationisms and other Religious Mythologies":

"The fundies want it all taught in a science class, but this will be a nice slap in their big fat face by teaching it as a religious studies class under the category mythology."

Mirecki addressed the message to "my fellow damned" and signed off with: "Doing my part to piss off the religious right, Evil Dr. P."

Very unfortunately, the powers that be have changed the course name to "Intelligent Design and Creationism" and Mirecki has since apologized. My sources tell me that the name change was mandated since the special folks behind the decision have yet to find a half-man, half-ape in their midst.

(Check out Mirecki's website here.)

Comments

[Coop]

The ape-men ARE out there. We just haven't found them yet. And I'll bet they're the ones hiding all the WMD's, those bastards.

[Cozmo]

And if you want to see why private universities will always be the gold standard of higher education in the US, look no further than the second to last paragraph where state and US legislators were threatening to withold funding to Kansas's best university if the course is taught at KU, even with the name changed.

Of course, there is no tie between the radical religious right and the Republican Party. Don't look behind the curtain either.

[Bluehorseshoe]

Jeez, I never thought I'd have this much respect for an Academic!

[daveNYC]

I'm starting to think that Bloomberg's second term should be spent preparing the city for succession from the union.

[BillCross]

Of course Coz, on the anti-private school wing you should check out Hilzoy at Obsidian Wings about Princeton and Alito and CAP.

http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2005/11/alito_and_cap.html#more

[Cozmo]

Interesting article, Bill, but please, Alito's just lucky they started letting papists into Princeton.

[Mark]

As someone who lives entirely too close to Kansas (on the Mo. side of Kansas City), let me tell you that this is a pretty hot topic out here.

I'm disapointed that Mirecki told the truth in his e-mail -- most everyone already knew it was an ideological wedgie given to the far right. Now, however, the class will come under intense scrutiny from the wingnuts.

One mistake and they'll cut it.