Tonight my wife and I enjoyed another (prerecorded) episode of the Discovery Chanel’s Life TV series. The series is filled with beautiful, painstaking photography and fascinating facts about our natural world.
However in order for people to benefit from this, they must constantly be subjected to Darwinian correctness. I say “correctness,” because it’s not just the facts that are presented, it’s that they are said a certain way.
For example, every time narrator Whoopee Goldberg made reference to a creature that has a unique ability, she would say it “has evolved” the amazing characteristic, regardless of whether there is any fossil record of the development of the feature. But when it was noted that any of today’s creatures was identical to its entire fossil record, Ms Goldberg was obliged to say that it “has remained unchanged over millions of years.”
So, what’s wrong with this? Two things: First, the carefully selected words would never be interchanged. Never could Ms Goldberg say that an animal “changed” into its present form, nor would she ever have liberty to say that over millions of years an organism “had not evolved.” To say that something had not evolved, even if it had not changed, would be anathema!
Second, evolution must be continually reinforced in the minds of the audience, even though it has nothing to do with the facts being presented. For example, any time a feature was mentioned as having evolved, no reference was made to what it had evolved from. There was no evidence, just the presumption of evolution. It sounds so intelligent to say “evolved,” in a nature show, even though it has nothing to do with the facts being presented. Likewise, on the flip side, when reference is made to no change, there must be insertion of the phrase “millions of years,” even though the show is only about life today.
This is why most people who believe in evolution believe in evolution. They aren’t dumb. They have just never been exposed to the evidence and allowed to make up their own minds. Maybe they never will. They just constantly hear the presumption of evolution, and assume it’s a slam dunk. Maybe it isn’t. If they ever find out, it’s going to be because they take the initiative to find out for themselves. The Discovery Channel certainly isn’t going to help them.