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Today I stumbled upon a Conservative American version of Wikipedia. At first I thought it was just right wingers, but it was also a very strong sense, of Christian Fundamentalist input. The most popular post that Conservatives like to read up on was no doubt about the current President of the USA, Barack Obama. Here is what the first paragraph stated:

“Barack Hussein Obama II aka Barry Soetoro (allegedly born in Honolulu Aug. 4, 1961) is the 44th President of the United States, and previously served as a first-term Democratic Senator from Illinois (2005-2008). Obama and his running mate Senator Joseph Biden won the presidential election after 23 months of campaigning that spent over $700 million, much of it raised from undisclosed or fraudulent donors. Obama spent far more per vote than McCain did: Obama spent $7.39 per vote, while McCain spent only $5.78 per vote.”
Within the first paragraph, they question his name, then they question his place of birth. These are what are known as Ad Hominem, which is an attack on the individual at hand rather than their opinions or policies. They question his place of birth because they simply do not want him to be President of the United States, because you have to be a born citizen of the nation to lead it. By questioning his place of birth, they question his legitimacy as President.

Furthermore, they add the issue of campaign spending to try to make it look like The Obama campaign purchased votes, and that because Senator McCain spent less, he is the more “virtuous” of the two candidates. They even add an allegation of financial fraud into the argument.

I figured that this ignorance would be limited just to political figures until I realized that many of the radical right are pro-Christianity in a fanatical manner. One of the more popular individuals for the fundamentalist Christians to ridicule is of course the famed British Naturalist, Charles Darwin.

Of course Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection was one of the main reasons why these Conservatives started their own wiki, stating that it was the “Trustworthy Encyclopedia”. When someone claims that, you know that they are clearly against that motive. Of course much like Obama’s Wiki page, Darwin’s is filled with criticisms, and downright insulting remarks towards his personality. In his article there are in fact references to supposed racism, sexism, and downright hate. There are criticisms of his religious points of view where Darwin confirmed that he himself was an agnostic. It is recorded by friends and families that Darwin abandoned his belief in Christianity after the death of his daughter, that he could not understand why a merciful loving God would take the life of such an innocent and young child.

As for his supposed racism and sexism, comes from simple quote mining and misquoting of his own works. In his own time, the term “race” was akin to the term “species”. Simple changes in vocabulary in the day to the context of the age is easily used to explain the differences in the terms. Of course when you have a predetermined judgment you want to reach you do whatever you can to only present your point of view which is what these Young Earth Creationist Right Wingers like to do. They attempt any trick to try to eliminate any credibility to Charles Darwin himself, hoping that it will “rub off” on his scientific findings.

Of course with the Charles Darwin page there is every form of criticism presented. However it seems that this criticism is not always the case depending on who they want to support and who they want to defame.

Adolf Hitler’s page on the Wiki is a prime example where information is deliberately hidden, mainly Adolf Hitler’s religious points of view. Adolf Hitler’s reputation has lead to the creation of Godwin’s Law which is a side point to the issue. Hitler’s page is surprisingly lacking of any points towards Hitler’s religious views, that lead to his actions. It is no more just to the anti-semite than to be pro-Christian, because to eliminate the Jewish Race, the Race that executed Jesus is seen as a very distorted view of justice.

Hitler’s own words, in the Nuremberg rallies, in Mein Kampf all indicate that his views were clearly Christian, if not directly Roman Catholic. Hitler viewed his actions as inspired by the words of the bible and the traditional anti-simetic views of the Christian Churches, that Jews are the ones who killed Jesus Christ and that revenge was righteous. The Church officially preached anti-Semitic teachings until 1964.

Of course all this is kept conveniently out of the Conservative Wiki.

Why? Because it may make Christianity look slightly bad. And anything that makes Christianity look bad is wrong, and should never be included in the “Truth” of their encyclopedia.

Now onto today.

Today we had a lovely discussion regarding morality. A girl stated, in using the example of a green card marriage, that a marriage in itself really depends on who and what is involved and that the context of the situation, is what decides the morality of the situation. Basically context determines the moral outcome and moral standing. However a Christian fundamentalist in the room attempted to argue the otherwise side that there is only only one right or wrong, and that context doesn’t matter. A crime is a crime, and a sin is a sin.

However I indicated that even in the bible, in accordance to the 10 commandments of Exodus, specifically “Thou Shall Not Kill” even then is only applied when the context is appropriate. In the book of Numbers, Chapter 31, the very man who brought down the 10 Commandments, Moses, orders the Israelites to war against the people of Midian, the Midianites for occupying the Holy Land. Therefore this “Thou Shall Not Kill” is simply  only applied in context of Israelite vs Israelite, and not Israelite vs Midianite.

Interesting, that this “not kill” clause seems to be very easily discarded when dealing with people of another tribe or cultural group? So context, even in the case of the bible, matters, but interestingly enough it was ignored in the debate between these two people.

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