To the editor:

Monday night dogma was presented. Straw men were built and the opposing side ridiculed. Making generalizations and ridiculing straw men and gods to get believing crowds frenzied is easy, but is much like a backwoods religious fundamentalist. As a staunch lover of God, I did not recognize the straw god ridiculed. Unproven dogma and ridicule pleased the crowd without any real reasoning. If any other group of people had been ridiculed like this, it would be called bigoted, intolerant and fundamentalistic. Ridicule of straw men and straw gods is the intellectual equivalent of putting fingers in the ears to keep from hearing others.

Richard Dawkins put on a show loved by believers, but there was no fairness or accuracy of the position ridiculed. The crowd laughed and applauded, but this was more like ignorant fundamentalism rather than a respectful pursuit of truth. Scientific fundamentalism has arrived and it stands on “thus says science,” which really means “as I interpret it.” Science should be practiced with true reason and testing rather than fundamentalistic practices and deductions. Intellectual honesty and reasoned approaches to serious issues (lack of an answer to morality and meaning) don’t please crowds in Lawrence. Rather than showing that God doesn’t exist, the hatred of God demonstrated God must exist. People don’t hate fairies. The hatred of God demonstrated the truth taught in the Bible when it teaches that man hates God. The speech and crowd demonstrated the truth of God on Monday night by their hatred of God.

Richard Smith,

Lawrence