And nobody can argue that it doesn’t work. The crowds he gathers are as angry, rude and ill-behaved as any mob that ever vilified any prophet. And so later in his speech, when he talks about how today’s students are obnoxious and have no morals…well, you can’t really argue. (p. 142.)

A multiple of chapters is dedicated to family life, one entirely to Cindy, his wife, and how women should submit themselves to men. “I often say on campus that no matter how much she denies or fights it, every woman has a God-given desire to marry and bear children for a man who will lovingly rule over her.” (p. 167.) That chapter continues into narratives describing the conception and birth of two of his daughters and their place in his campus-to-campus ministry at early ages.

When he reaches childhood education, Jed would like everyone to know that the establishment of public schools by the state is taken directly from communism—“It is not the proper function of the state to provide education. ‘Free education for all children in public schools,’ is the tenth point of The Communist Manifesto. When the state controls education, it controls our children and our future.” (p. 178.) He then fails to source his claim or demonstrate evidence; the connection to The Communist Manifesto is not evidence because it’s a perfect invocation of a fallacy by appeal to spite. He appeals to the emotions of the audience via connecting public education to communism but fails to draw any actual connection with the manifesto to our incarnation of public education; and he even fails to source exactly why anyone should care other than because people of his era don’t like communism. Furthermore, Just because there are public schools does not prevent people from putting children in private schools; and it certainly does not prevent them from supplementing education at home.

Pastor Glen concludes, “The human eye is so complicated that it can function on as an integrated unit. Which means it’s scientifically impossible for the human eye to evolve piecemeal, as natural selection requires, because the eye is totally useless unless fully developed. (Remember, natural selection is supposed to cancel out useless organs and appendages!) Indeed, such sophisticated design is itself powerful evidence that there must be a designer. So the Bible looks better than evolution when It says man was made by God! (p. 266.)

Yes. He went there. I understand that this book was apparently written in 1995, but for someone with a college education, Jed certainly doesn’t do his research before parroting what other people say. Fortunately for us we do have a number of resources at our disposal to readily show us that most claims of irreducibly complex systems are simply thinly veiled arguments from ignorance.^[1] That, in fact, there are extremely plausible pathways that the eye could have evolved visible in extant versions of eyes in a multitude of differing animals.^[2] Brother Jed does like to toe the party line of “evolution is incorrect and a lie,” but when it comes down to actually presenting any case for it he doesn’t go the extra mile, let alone the first inch.

CONCLUSION

Overall, I’d say that most people won’t be interested in reading this book unless they’re looking for a biography of George Smock. It does that quite tidily, but skipping through the terribly formatted Bible quotes, and trying to navigate the irrelevant preachy segments is a little bit tedious. The table of contents certainly gives a reasonable road map for avoiding sections of the book that aren’t anything narrative and are only finger pointing.

The past narratives were probably the best part of the entire work; followed by the unintentional eye roll inducing humor of the parables like The Five Dormies. (p. 110-113.) Perhaps there’s some useful information about Brother Jed’s psychology in the other sections, but for anyone looking for substance will find themselves grasping at smoke.

Come to this book for the history, the narrative, and the pictures—and there’s many pictures. In the midst of the book, split between two sections, are select photographs from Jed’s preaching campaign trail. They create an interesting aperture into the past.

The life and times of Brother Jed.

Now close the book.

Part I | Part II | Part III

Many girls walk around campus braless and, on numerous occasions, to the delight of the boys, they have flashed their bare breasts toward me. No wonder there are so many rapes on college campuses. Those girls walking and jogging around campus with their shorts so short that their buttocks hang out are just asking for it. They might as well have a sign on their back saying, “Rape me, rape me, rape me.” (p. 114.)

Then, of course, there’s blatant showboating sexism. This, right after making craven veiled claims that his god “may be” condemning women to mastectomies and hysterectomies because of what he observes as today’s feminine immorality (p. 113).

Once again, Jed’s cherry picking reappears—this time in the reverse direction—he retells the story of Lot, instead of holding Lot on a pedestal, he’s attacking the people of Sodom. So now he brings up the rest of the story. “Lot had the same attitude, and he was vexed to the point of offering his own virgin daughters to a gang of sodomites.” (p. 118). This is part of the same story which Jed earlier used as an example of the Sodomites telling Lot not judge them; he portrayed the story as part of his illustration on using morals to judge behavior. This is Lot, after all, the only “good man” in all of Sodom and Gomorrah.

After further bad rhetoric and some poorly narrated stories about why he believes homosexuality is bad, Jed moves onto condoms. Here he has managed to cross the threshold from gibbering kook to outright jackass liar. “The AIDS virus is fifty times smaller than the tiniest pores of a latex condom. Using a condom to prevent AIDS is like using a tennis racquet to return B-B pellets.” (p. 122). This particular line of gibberish is brought to you not by a real misunderstanding of science done by the Center for Disease Control on the matter, but instead it’s a deliberately deceitful bit of propaganda forwarded by evangelists in 3^rd world countries like Africa to preach against condoms—worsening the already horrible HIV epidemic in such places. George Smock is a reprehensible asshole for reprinting this lie.

“Most students may not realize that, when they use drugs, they are practicing sorcery. Sorcery comes from the Greek word ‘pharmakeia,’ which in English would be ‘pharmacy’ or ‘drugs.’ Anyone using drugs illicitly is practicing sorcery. ” (p. 124.) Firstly, this is a fallacy by etymology—secondly, he’s wrong: E. Sorcery comes from L. sors/sortis: fate, oracle. Perhaps he was confused by the meaning of AG. pharmakis or witch. Maybe he should have claimed instead, following etymology, that drug users were practicing witchcraft.

Part I | Part II | Part III

If Jed’s theatrics on campus are any indication he certainly thinks romantically about his past experiences, so it is difficult to separate fact from silvery fiction in his book. Fun sections come out hither and yon when he snidely chuckles about how he can exorcize demons from people. One event happened on a college campus when he shouted in “Latin” at a man assaulting a woman—to which the man allegedly reacted by becoming docile, said “Okay,” and then left. (p. 70-71). Another account didn’t actually manage anything like expelling a demon. Instead he lay hands on a drunken man while in jail and shouted at him, startling the man awake. Jed calls the drunk man a “wino” in his prose. The assault, combined with him beginning to preach loudly at others in the jail cell with him, led the jailers to put him into his own cell (p. 87).

He has been the subject of multiple civil rights violations in regards to free speech on public property; however Jed doesn’t care about civil rights as much as he does spreading his own word. He capriciously condemns those who would defend his own right to speak freely and fails repeatedly to hold up his own civic responsibility when he feels like he’s “saved enough souls.” A great deal of his vituperative speech is directed against the culture that would stand with him in opposition to the sort of bad behavior of being arrested for speaking publicly. He will toe the line to get wrongfully arrested; but rarely follows through after the fact.

Like a lot of others like him, he also totally ignores or derides civil rights when they don’t agree with his agenda. He takes advantage of them when they’re in his favor, martyrs himself for them when it affects his freedom of speech; but when it comes to opening freedom of religion and speech to others he quickly shuts up or claims incredulity. In one example he is upset that chapel services and instruction had become optional—as if Christianity is the only proper and right religion to speak on campuses—and then decried this as a deathblow (p. 102). As if college students shouldn’t have a choice as to whether they’re going to listen to him or not; he espouses this while only a few chapters earlier he likes to laud himself for how many people “Didn’t have to stop and listen to him, but did anyway.”

“They disdain the one Book [sic] that unites races, ages, ethnic groups and economic classes into a common purpose.” (p. 106-107). We have to assume he means the Bible when he says “Book,” but really this book is also the origin of their god commanding the murder and genocide of multiple groups who were not the chosen people. So much for uniting ethnic groups; this book has been the basis of a multitude of atrocities based on these commands. The above quote is a common denominator of Jed’s style of cherry picking Christian mythology. In an earlier chapter he retells the story of Lot and the angels, only to leave out how Lot offered his daughters to the mob that came calling lustfully for the angels (presumably so that the mob would rape his daughters instead of the angels.)

Part I | Part II | Part III

Before watching “Expelled” I did encounter some hype for this movie, and due to my respect for Ben Stein I wanted to give it a fair review. I was keenly interested in the existence of intolerance and persecution from the know-it alls in charge – mainstream getting it wrong. This movie has been portrayed as being something to that effect, putting Stein et al. in the same vein as Alfred Wegener and his then-ridiculed hypothesis of continental drift, later to form the core of plate tectonics. Unfortunately, “Expelled” is nothing of the sort. It is a highly biased piece of propaganda that does nothing more than (try) to plant a seed of doubt with very little science to substantiate it. Apparently the seed is all that is needed and these ideas have taken root in the minds of many who are now thoroughly convinced that evil science has it all wrong.

In short, the movie “Expelled” fits the meaning of propaganda perfectly.

propaganda – [prop-uh-gan-duh]

• information, ideas, or rumors deliberately spread widely to help or harm a person, group, movement, institution, nation, etc.
• the deliberate spreading of such information, rumors, etc.
• the particular doctrines or principles propagated by an organization or movement.

Propaganda can either be true or false; the intent is to spread information. In this case, the documentary wants to tell you how true believers of intelligent design have been unfairly maligned and vilified for expressing alternative views within the hallows of schools and scientific institutions. It does this. It does not, however, tell you why intelligent design is a viable theory. It proposes 1) that people are being unfairly treated (with no evidence) and 2) not believing in god makes you just like Hitler (again with no evidence).

Right away we are exposed to Godwin’s law as secularist scientists are compared to Nazi Germany and concludes with “Darwinian atheism” being the inspiration for Hitler’s cruel acts. One minute in, and Stein loses.

The entire film plays out as a David and Goliath story. Science is the giant, arrogant and cruel, who tries to exterminate the Davids within. By their telling, Big Science suppresses ID in a ruthless, systematic way and advises everyone to keep quiet about their beliefs. Branded intellectual terrorists, these “free thinkers” can martyr themselves or stay silent. These revolutionists must throw out the tainted Darwinist tea in justified, righteous protest of scientific imperialism.

By this time, I understand their point: thinking people, scientists themselves, are being pushed around because they harbor an unpopular theory. I should point out, though, that this isn’t actually the case either – much of what they claim is blatantly false. Now as I watch more of the same, halfway into the documentary, I’m expecting them to blow me away with the enormous mountain of evidence back up the theory of intelligent design. Apparently, this would have to wait as we hear how evolutionary theory is simply “a mess” because nobody has pinpointed the moment nor mechanism of the creation of life, much less the universe. Oh, foolish science. You can do nothing that religion can’t best.

But this isn’t about religion, they are quick to point out. Intelligent Design is NOT about religion. It is about rational, evidence-based science and free thought. But first, more Nazi imagery, and the movie continues to degrade into a slurry of mixed ideologies and propaganda.

What we find, shockingly, is that science is covering up for a greater conspiracy: hippies. With their free love and protests!

Panspermia? Ridiculous. Big Bang? Preposterous. But now THIS theory of a Creator that preexisted and created life on earth is science. Of course, whether or not you want to call that Creator “God” is a religious debate that clearly has no place in science. But since we are on the subject of religion, let’s look what can happen if you don’t believe in god, demonstrated with a simple equation:

Evolution = no meaning in life + no hope + no ethics = Hitler

Evolution leads to atheism, and atheism leads to depression so in the words of Barney Fife, we gotta nip it in the bud. We’ll neglect to mention anything about how religion has inspired evil acts. And let’s throw in the evils of abortion because Ben Stein hates abortion even more than atheism.

Again and again they maintain that the theory of evolution is falling apart. At no time do they present any evidence to the failings of evolutionary theory, except to say that it seems unlikely. Their only concern is to tell the world how unfairly these people have been treated because of their deeply-held (religious) convictions. Much like the poor UFO believers who are scorned and ridiculed.

Most of the interviews were cherry picked for the best presentation for ID (that’s why nothing is really said about ID and concentrates on the politicking) and the worst from skeptics and atheists. The interview with Richard Dawkins was really bad. I don’t know if he just cracked under presssure, or if they used “tricksy editing” or both. Either way, Dawkins needs to up his game. He’s more of a presenter than a debater, while Stein’s been at the showbiz thing for a long time and is used to being in front of a camera. Stein comes off as “Why you gotta be such a downer and ruin it for the rest of us?” – as if this is the goal of Dawkin’s work.

“Expelled” doesn’t give you any real information and it unfairly presents these non-issues as if they were real threats to education. It attacks science for being science – the quest to find answers. It’s not a failure or a weakness in science to say that you don’t know all the answers. What is wrong is to start out with a premise and to seek to find “facts” that support this foregone conclusion. Scientists don’t start the day saying “How can I dispute a divine creator today? What evidence can I distort to prove my atheist agenda?” It’s fine if they see god or a supreme being in their work – they are entitled to their beliefs. But these beliefs shouldn’t guide their hands.

The facts are, “Expelled” doesn’t offer a shred of evidence to support ID. So why should it be treated as a plausible alternative to evolutionary theory? Because Ben Stein saw an area to exploit in a documentary that pushes his personal agenda. Maybe next time he’ll push for astrology, numerology and alchemy to get their fair share in the classroom.

“Praise the Lord!” they shout as the vile UN forces are ground under the treads of Jesus’ own tank brigade beneath a large ad for Dell computers plastered on an in-game billboard.

We’ve all been searching for a game where you can play as a group of militant Christian evangelists fighting the evil forces of Secularism, and we’ve finally found it. Left Behind: Eternal Forces is a game where the UN and its Antichrist leader Nicholae Carpathia (which must be pronounced Niiiiiic-ko-lie Kar-PAAAAAAA-thee-uh to obtain its full amusement factor) are vilified along with all non-Christians, education and rock music. If it weren’t a video game itself, Left Behind would almost certainly have included them in its list of the forces of evil as well.

Set in the early aftermath of “The Rapture”, an event in which some Christians believe that they will be instantly transported to Heaven before the world is thrown into chaos by the Antichrist, Left Behind starts with a premise that at least some segment of the gaming world could get behind.

The real world counterparts of the game villain “Secularists’” on the other hand, while they may think that the idea of a game world where all of the evangelical Christians suddenly disappear from the face of the planet sounds fun, will quickly be disappointed when they find out the evangelicals still manage to preach at you from The Great Beyond, and the goal of the game is actually turning into them!

Murdering unbelievers along with other atrocities such as seeing secularist propaganda and listening to rock music can lower your units’ “Spirit Levels” until they lose faith and switch sides. Fortunately, as in real life, there is a simple cure for all ills: prayer.

Whether you’ve heard a song that doesn’t glorify God, or you’ve merely shot a dozen people in their evil Secularist faces, prayer can bring your “Spirit Level” back up and keep you from losing faith.

It’s interesting that the performers of the game’s own Christian Rock music are not vilified along with other Rock Stars. Perhaps they managed to escape the malevolent clutches of the evil education system unscathed by college?

One of the most disturbing things about this game is that while it portrays the Christian Tribulation Forces as good in their ceaseless efforts to convert or kill the unbelievers, it shows musicians and unbelievers as forces of evil, even aligning them with cult leaders! Since when are “secularists” on the same side as cult leaders? Apparently since the poor martyr complex ridden evangelicals decided that life is just one big fight pitting Real Christians against Everyone Else.

Back in the game, God’s holy bullets rip through the bodies of the Global Community Peacekeepers (UN Peacekeeper stand-ins) as “Amazing Grace” plays in the background and the Tribulation Forces take down another group of unbelievers in the name of the Lord. This mind-bogglingly strange dichotomy is taken from the second official trailer for the game, so the sickness of this pairing is apparently lost on them.

In a vain attempt to make these battle scenes more palatable, the game’s designers chose to make it blood free. Sure, you can kill tons of people, but your poor little eyes are perfectly protected from the real problem with violence; the blood. Apparently it’s not that whole “killing” thing that’s a problem, just seeing the results.

At least the game won’t let you mow down groups of neutral people — until they decide to oppose you that is. Then they’re as bad as any lying Secularist pig and they deserve to be burned at the stake. If only the game’s designers had thought to include an Inquisition weapon set.

Unfortunately for Left Behind Games, they were unable to hide the blood pouring out of the gaping wounds in the game at launch. They have since released a patch that supposedly addresses at least the most egregious of the game’s bugs and faults, but one has to wonder, if God blesses endeavors He supports and curses those he dislikes, then perhaps this is a game that God doesn’t want us to play?

Despite Left Behind Games’ attempts at intimidating people through legal threats into not criticizing their prodigious flop of a game, major review sites kept their criticisms and low ratings up, which is probably a major reason for the multi-million dollar loss on this steaming pile of “How Not to Make a Game.”

Unless you’re in the mood for a buggy, preachy game of Christian Jihad, Left Behind: Eternal Forces is a good game to leave behind.