Economist and actor Ben Stein was scheduled to speak at the University of Vermont’s 2009 spring commencement. But in February he declined the invitation under pressure from university officials who took issue with his critiques of Darwinism. University president Dan Fogel explained that “Commencement obviously is an occasion where we celebrate the achievements of our graduates and it should bring people together, it shouldn’t present a speaker who divides the community amidst heated controversy.”1 In short, Stein was expelled.

That experience confirmed the claims in Stein’s 2008 documentary, Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, where he argued that scholars who acknowledge evidence for the intelligent design of life are persecuted by the academic establishment.

Guillermo Gonzalez, for instance, was denied tenure at Iowa State University despite publishing more than three times the number of articles his department regarded as the standard for demonstrating research excellence.2 He also authored a college-level astronomy textbook published by Cambridge University Press and organized research that led to the discovery of two new planets.3 Still, the university’s president contended that Gonzalez “simply did not show the trajectory of excellence that we expect in a candidate seeking tenure in physics and astronomy.”4 His crime: believing the theory of Intelligent Design.

Expelled similarly shows that George Mason University’s Caroline Crocker, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History’s Rick Sternberg, and Baylor University’s William Dembski faced persecution in the academy because they dared to criticize Darwinian theory.5 Gifted professors in fields as diverse as molecular biology and economics have had tenures denied, research funds cut, and jobs terminated for questioning Darwinism. The evolutionary zealots who censure them and who will brook no dissent are adamant that “the science is settled.”

Silencing critics of Darwinism is dangerous, Stein argues, because Darwinism devalues human life and provided the intellectual support for Nazi atrocities. By asserting that humans are neither unique nor special and have no immaterial soul, Darwinists lack secure grounding for human rights. Hitler embraced Darwinism to argue that “killing ‘inferior’ humans would bring about evolutionary progress.”6

Oxford’s Richard Dawkins displayed Darwinism’s anti-God prejudice in the final scene of Expelled, where he admitted that science cannot determine life’s origin and that Darwinism is antithetical to religion. He went on to say that if life was designed, the designing must have been done by intelligent beings elsewhere in the universe who themselves evolved by naturalistic means.7

With such candid exposure of Darwinism’s irrationality and immorality, it is no surprise that the secular media have called the film “truly offensive”8 and a “slickly produced piece of nonsense.”9 And then there are the websites dedicated to “exposing myths” in Expelled and Yoko Ono’s lawsuit against the filmmakers for using her late husband’s anti-religious anthem “Imagine.”10

Yet Stein’s supposed nonsense made perfect sense to millions of moviegoers who made it the number-one documentary of 2008. And though support for Intelligent Design has cost men like Stein and Gonzalez dearly, perhaps their efforts will help to expel Darwinian tyranny from the academy.
 
Footnotes:
 
1  “Ben Stein Drops Out of Graduation Ceremony,” United Press International Website, February 4, 2009, http://www.upi.com/Entertainment_News/2009/02/04/Ben-Stein-drops-out-of-graduation-ceremony/UPI-95361233777929/ (accessed August 13, 2009).
 
2  Erin Roach, “Culture Digest: Legislators Propose ‘a la Carte’ Cable Packages; …,” Baptist Press Website, June 20, 2007, http://www.bpnews.net/bpnews.asp?id=25939 (accessed August 13, 2009).
 
3  Erin Roach, “Culture Digest: Tenure Denied Iowa State Prof Because of Intelligent Design Beliefs; …,” Baptist Press Website, May 23, 2007, http://www.bpnews.net/bpnews.asp?id=25710 (accessed August 13, 2009).
 
4  Roach, “Culture Digest: Legislators Propose ‘a la Carte’ Cable Packages; …”
 
5  Tom Bethell, “No Intelligence Allowed!” American Spectator Website, February 19, 2008, http://spectator.org/archives/2008/02/19/no-intelligence-allowed/print (accessed August 13, 2009).
 
6  Richard Weikart, “Darwin and the Nazis,” American Spectator, April 16, 2008, http://spectator.org/archives/2008/04/16/darwin-and-the-nazis/print (accessed August 13, 2009).
 
7  Bethell, “No Intelligence Allowed!”
 
8  Frank Scheck, “Film Review: ‘Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed,’” Hollywood Reporter Website, April 21, 2008, http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/film/reviews/article_display.jsp?&rid=10989 (accessed August 13, 2009).
 
9  Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed: Review,” TV Guide Website, http://movies.tvguide.com/expelled-intelligence-allowed/review/293361 (accessed August 13, 2009).
 
10  “Yoko Ono Sues ‘Expelled’ Filmmakers over ‘Imagine,’” Reuters Website, April 23, 2008, http://www.reuters.com/article/musicNews/idUSN2320158220080423 (accessed August 13, 2009).
 
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