Context and “the Rest of the Story”

Recently I wrote a blog post titled “Skeptics Not Telling the Truth.” A few weeks ago, a small group of skeptics had contacted our publicist to obtain free passes to visit the Creation Museum. One of the jobs of our publicist is to vet requests from people who request complimentary passes as journalists and to determine if they are full-time professional journalists. These people who requested passes were not deemed to be legitimate journalists. Such skeptics usually come only to mock AiG and the Creation Museum and not write a balanced report. Now, there are professional journalists who will write articles that are not supportive of the Creation Museum and can be highly critical, but they possess legitimate credentials and usually act professionally when here. So they are entitled to receive free museum passes.

After this group was questioned about their intentions to conduct themselves as professional journalists, a writer for a skeptics magazine decided to write about their decision not to come to the Creation Museum. But this writer did not tell the truth about why the group didn’t come. See Skeptics Not Telling the Truth to read my blog post about this.

Now, the skeptic who told the writer the distorted view of what happened has responded with a blog post, where she claims the following:

Ham spends several paragraphs building an ironclad argument that I lied about that, which is very strange. He seems to think ‘we ended up skipping it’ is code for ‘the evil creationists barred the door and are hiding something.’ No, actually. Their PR person was very polite, and she was clearly concerned that we would make fun of their beliefs. At our other stops, the believers we talked with were by and large aware that their beliefs were weird and were fine with us having fun and making jokes. It didn’t seem to us that the creationists would like it if we made jokes about their weird beliefs, which is perfectly reasonable. Here is what their spokesperson said, in part:

While I know you may disagree with what the Creation Museum is all about, we wanted to make sure you weren’t approaching it with the attitude that people who hold those views are “weird” or to be made fun of.

Our publicist wrote the words above in the context of this group trying to get free museum tickets. She told them they would get the passes if they were professional media reps and would cover us as a professional journalist should: fairly and accurately. We are not in the habit of granting free tickets to bloggers who are not professional journalists and will only end up mocking us.

The blogger (writing under the banner “Skepchick”) conveniently left out that entire context. Our museum guests are not obligated to write about us fairly as a condition of their visit. Furthermore, how could we possibly bar skeptics—if we wanted to (but we don’t)—who intend to write poorly about us afterwards? Should we have all guests sign a statement to that effect? Of course not.

So, when this blogger claims that we attempt to bar mockers and she cites our publicist who said, “We wanted to make sure you [the skeptics] weren’t approaching it with the attitude that people who hold those views are ‘weird’ or to be made fun of," that is a misrepresentation. The group would not get free tickets if the members had the intent to mock the museum and weren’t professional journalists anyway. They certainly could pay like any other guest, tour the museum, and then comment later how they wished. And of course we couldn’t control what they write!

Now, our publicist did express to the skeptics that she had a concern that their group might be disruptive to the other guests during their visit. Our publicist told us that she “was concerned about their possible onsite behavior, but not their final posting. [She] didn’t want them making fun while at the museum, which would have disturbed other guests.” So, maybe this was another reason the skeptics decided not to tour (in addition to being denied free tickets). They might have had second thoughts about coming because they thought they could not get away with being disruptive if they openly mocked what they saw—and bothered our other guests (as we saw during a visit by a large atheist group previously).

You can read the Skepchick blog posting at this link.

Well, the Skepchick blog was taken up by atheist PZ Myers (associate professor of biology at the University of Minnesota Morris). As is usual for Prof. Myers, he lied to his followers. (Although for an atheist there is no such thing as ultimate truth, so lies are not really lies to them—ultimate truth, on the other hand, is presented in the Bible, which is the absolutely true Word of God.) The professor gave a highly inaccurate summary of his own visit to the Creation Museum when he and 285 other atheists (and some agnostics) came through four years ago.

Now, I want to warn you that the following quote from Dr. Myers is very explicit concerning some sexual matters. But I wanted you to know how far this atheist professor will go to lie to his followers—all a part of mocking God and shaking his fist at the God he claims does not exist.

In a recent blog post, Dr. Myers stated (among other remarkable comments), “When a group of us went to their ‘museum’, you could just see their paranoia twitch. They were very concerned that we amoral atheists might have gay sex on their exhibits, for instance, and told us not to … Not even if we brought condoms and promised it would be safe sex!”

Well, I’m sure nobody on our staff even thought of such garbage! Then the professor continued with his lies, stating, “We had to sign contracts promising good behavior.” The truth is that AiG did not get these atheists to sign such a statement—it was actually the leader in charge of bringing this group who insisted her people sign a statement that they would behave while here. That was because the organizer of the skeptics group had concerns that some of her people might get rowdy (and some of them did even after signing). Now, why did the atheist blogger leave out that key bit of information and instead make it appear as if the museum required the group to sign a statement of good behavior?

This Minnesota professor also claimed in his blog post that we threatened to “evict” one of the people in his atheist/agnostic group from the museum during their visit. What was omitted (conveniently) by this blogging professor was that the young man in question was previously involved in an incident downstairs (nothing major, but he was intending to be a distraction) that involved one of our public safety officers. In the museum bookstore episode that the blogger mentions, that same young man made some negative comments that were loud enough that other museum guests, and a staff member in the area (who was walking by and had also witnessed the incident downstairs), heard his loud mocking.

The young man was asked to keep it down—but there was no threat of eviction. Most of the atheists that day did follow the guidelines set by their group leader (however, the Minnesota professor did not, as shown at the link below). But sadly, some of our other guests did let us know that their visit was disrupted by the antics of some of the atheists. One family was given free tickets to come back another time after they shared with us that some of the atheists had disrupted their visit.

This Minnesota professor is not setting a good example for his students when he lies and misrepresents—including leaving out key information that would give his readers a completely different view of things. I hope this does not characterize the science research he is conducting at his university—much of which is probably at taxpayer expense.

You can read the original report on what happened the day when the 285 atheists and agnostics visited. You can also read more (and watch a YouTube video) about this group’s behavior when they went outside the front gates of the Creation Museum and conducted a mock communion service—to ridicule the death and Resurrection of Christ.

Actually, one of the main reasons I wanted to write this blog post today is once again to illustrate to what lows these skeptics will go to denigrate Christians. As Prof. Myers lies about what happened during his group’s visit to the Creation Museum, we need to understand that he also lies in what he teaches students about the creation-evolution issue. It’s sad that so many gullible students are being led astray by such an untrustworthy professor. The people who follow him as if he is some sort of guru or “god” want to be led astray because they are willing ignorant. 2 Peter 3 tells us about those who reject creation, the Flood of Noah, and the coming judgment by fire.

Of course, after reading this blog post, the professor won’t be able to help himself—he will come back with another blog and tell more untruths to defend himself (as he normally does when he is called out for his misleading blogs). Because the professor is so relentless in writing about AiG, he must see us a real threat. If not, why does he get so defensive of his anti-God stance?

Even though skeptics will continue to mock us, we do need to keep praying for these people (and they will mock us for even suggesting prayer)—that God will open their hearts to the truth of His Word and the gospel. This is what He did for Saul, who became the Apostle Paul—the greatest missionary of all time.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken