1960s: Holy Shit; Man Walks On Fucking Moon

I was born in 1968, so while it’s true that men first landed on the moon during my lifetime, there is not a time which I can remember when men walked on the moon. (I’m reminded of a cartoon showing a Saturn V rocket lying on its side at JSC in Houston, with a caption, “I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up!” (the cartoon quoted an old tv commercial for a medic alert braclet, targeted at old people, iirc.))

Getting around to my point (if I have one). About the only time I can remember in my life being as proud — if that’s the right word, and I’m not quite sure that it is a big enough word — as those watching the TV coverage of the first moon landing must have been, is when I was watching the election returns in 2008, when Obama won. We landed a man on the moon in 1969, but didn’t have a black person as president for 39 more years, and still have not had a woman president (though at least, on the democratic ticket, it was either going to be a black man or a woman, historic either way.)

Ok, so that has not a lot to do with the speech, and how funny it was… should I delete all this stuff I typed? Nah, I’ll post it.

But calling people uneducated clowns just doesn’t seem to work in getting them interested in becoming educated, or in supporting education for others. It just reinforces their negative stereotypes against educated people. They won’t encourage their kids to become literate in science if their impression of scientists is that they are a bunch of hostile snotheads. Humiliating them only makes them more defensive, not more open to new ideas.

We have to reach out to the reachable ones, and respectfully show them how they already are benefiting from science, and how the gifts of science that they enjoy come with a responsibility to support science even if some of it may not flatter their vanity or soothe their child-like fears. Encouraging maturity from people works better than ridiculing their immaturity.

I do this for a living; popularizing science, getting people, especially the young excited about it. I think I’m making a difference, but this is a generations-long process. I will not see the fruits of my efforts in my lifetime and I accept that. I do my small part to light candles in the dark, as Carl Sagan would put it, and hope that people coming after me find their way.

Atheists
Muslims
Homosexuals
Conservative Christians
Recent Immigrants
Hispanics
Jews
Asian Americans
African Americans
White Americans

Among this list, Atheists were at the bottom.

Since atheists and agnostics account for 93 percent of the academy of science (and 60 percent of all American scientists), these clowns actually DO trust atheists; they just don’t know that they do.

Excellent point! That definitely needs to be a part of the freethought community’s public relations strategy — let people know the critical role that freethinkers already play in making our world go ’round.